Tai Chi

For the last week, every morning when I leave for the hospital, there's an Asian man standing in the grass by the shelter doing tai chi. His clothing is simple: a rumpled khaki button down shirt and shorts. Most mornings there's a little mist coming off of the pond and the silence, combined with the mist and the green surroundings, is almost too real to be in front of me and not on the pages of a book or the big screen. For a few moments I'm not in Columbia, Missouri. He moves, slowly and confidently, his arms making shapes that flow from one form to the next with liquid precision. I'm transfixed, amazed, transported. And it's not that he seems so out of place that freezes me in my tracks. It's his focus.

I'd give anything to have focus like that. In the midst of a living, breathing city where thousands are waking, fixing their breakfast, brushing their teeth, this man seems so calm, so quiet. Imagine if we could all adopt that kind of focus in the midst of a million things to do by five o'clock. The only place I can think of where I've felt anything close to what I see in this man is in my prayer time. When I'm listening to God, the world could fall apart and I'm pretty confident I wouldn't notice until I said got up off my knees. Does that mean that those times when I feel so unfocused, so strewn about in my day to day activities, I'm actually stepping away from the throne? Is it possible that our focus shifts from the King of Kings to our surroundings and that's why we all feel so stressed?

I don't know if this man is a Christian. I don't know what he hears during this time each day. Does he hear God? Does he hear nature? Does he focus on his own heartbeat or the movement of his chest in and out as he breaths? Who knows. I should probably ask. I know that the Lord would have me ask myself why it is that there are times when I allow my own heartbeat to drown out His voice as He beckons me to His feet. The real question is, with this awareness, do I focus on Jesus as He says "Come" or the distracting lub-dub, lub-dub, lub-dub of my life?