The 5 People You Meet in Heaven
Recently, I completed a book called “The 5 People You Meet in Heaven.” The main idea of the book is that, heaven, more than anything, is understanding the course of your life, and as a function of that, being able to make peace with it. As the story goes, upon your “arrival” you are greeted by 5 people. These five people are different for everyone, because they are simply people who passed away before you. The common thread between them however, is that they are all people who’s life had intertwined with yours in a major way-sometimes without you even knowing it- and they were simply waiting there to tell you about it.
Oddly enough, if it wasn’t for the fact that both of us are still very much alive (at least unless God is playing some kind of a joke on me right now) I would say that I met one of my 5 this past week.
Not too long ago, I was contacted by a former student of mine from my Peaceboat days (i.e. when I was sailing around the world as an English teacher with a Japanese NGO) who has recently become seriously ill. As the email came from more or less out of the blue, I was really caught off-guard by it, but naturally when she said she wanted to meet, I certainly wasn’t going to say no.
We met for dinner at an Okinawan restaurant not too far from where she lived, and caught up over the past few years. We talked about the people we both knew, who we kept up with, and who we didn’t, and life in general since we had both returned to dry land. She also told me of her personal history, (which I new nothing of), the loss of her loved ones, and how it was that she came to be facing her condition alone.
Despite how much of a downer all this seemed to be however, I was surprised at how relatively light our conversation remained, and when I commented on it, she told me it was because she knew what happiness really was, and that ultimately, it was thanks to me.
Reminiscing on the first time I had met her (which until she reminded me, I couldn’t even recall), she said that before she decided to go on the 3-month cruise, she was scared that she wouldn’t be able to learn English or handle the cruise itself because she was deaf.
At the time that I met her, she had come in to try an English class at that NGO’s Tokyo Office, and I was the one who was teaching. I gave her the lesson with a group of other students, and in the exact same way that I gave it to everyone else. I had noticed that her speech was a little bit unusual, and she asked me to repeat myself a lot- but this was an English class afterall, so I didn’t particularly think anything of it. She seemed to do just fine.
After the class, she told me that she was actually deaf and hearing through aids, and she asked if I thought she could handle the 3 month intensive program that we offered on the ship. With that, I told her that I hadn’t even noticed that she was disabled, and I thought she be just fine. At the time, I wasn’t trying to encourage or flatter her- I was just speaking honestly. She was obviously a smart woman, she asked questions when she had them, and now that I knew was her issue was, I could help her to work around it. Even if it was more challenging for her, objectively, there was no reason why she couldn’t do it, and as far as I was concerned, it was as simple as that: If she wanted to, she could.
Anyway, to make a long story short, as she told me, it was then that she decided that she could really do it, signed up, and went on to have the best three months of her life. She had said that that that three months had not only empowered her and opened her eyes to the outside world, but gave her a sense of peace that she brought back with her. She said that it gave her the ability to always look back on that time, smile, and remember what it means to be happy. She told me that this-more than anything- is where she is drawing her strength from now, and that she wanted to meet with me simply to say thank you. I was completely blown away.
After listening to her, although the parallels with the book’s main concept didn’t click immediately, one analogy that I had read in it did…. The author had said that people, (especially children) are like fine glassware: they absorb the prints of all who handle them. And I guess the funny thing about life is that we never really know just how big of a print we can leave.
Oddly enough, if it wasn’t for the fact that both of us are still very much alive (at least unless God is playing some kind of a joke on me right now) I would say that I met one of my 5 this past week.
Not too long ago, I was contacted by a former student of mine from my Peaceboat days (i.e. when I was sailing around the world as an English teacher with a Japanese NGO) who has recently become seriously ill. As the email came from more or less out of the blue, I was really caught off-guard by it, but naturally when she said she wanted to meet, I certainly wasn’t going to say no.
We met for dinner at an Okinawan restaurant not too far from where she lived, and caught up over the past few years. We talked about the people we both knew, who we kept up with, and who we didn’t, and life in general since we had both returned to dry land. She also told me of her personal history, (which I new nothing of), the loss of her loved ones, and how it was that she came to be facing her condition alone.
Despite how much of a downer all this seemed to be however, I was surprised at how relatively light our conversation remained, and when I commented on it, she told me it was because she knew what happiness really was, and that ultimately, it was thanks to me.
Reminiscing on the first time I had met her (which until she reminded me, I couldn’t even recall), she said that before she decided to go on the 3-month cruise, she was scared that she wouldn’t be able to learn English or handle the cruise itself because she was deaf.
At the time that I met her, she had come in to try an English class at that NGO’s Tokyo Office, and I was the one who was teaching. I gave her the lesson with a group of other students, and in the exact same way that I gave it to everyone else. I had noticed that her speech was a little bit unusual, and she asked me to repeat myself a lot- but this was an English class afterall, so I didn’t particularly think anything of it. She seemed to do just fine.
After the class, she told me that she was actually deaf and hearing through aids, and she asked if I thought she could handle the 3 month intensive program that we offered on the ship. With that, I told her that I hadn’t even noticed that she was disabled, and I thought she be just fine. At the time, I wasn’t trying to encourage or flatter her- I was just speaking honestly. She was obviously a smart woman, she asked questions when she had them, and now that I knew was her issue was, I could help her to work around it. Even if it was more challenging for her, objectively, there was no reason why she couldn’t do it, and as far as I was concerned, it was as simple as that: If she wanted to, she could.
Anyway, to make a long story short, as she told me, it was then that she decided that she could really do it, signed up, and went on to have the best three months of her life. She had said that that that three months had not only empowered her and opened her eyes to the outside world, but gave her a sense of peace that she brought back with her. She said that it gave her the ability to always look back on that time, smile, and remember what it means to be happy. She told me that this-more than anything- is where she is drawing her strength from now, and that she wanted to meet with me simply to say thank you. I was completely blown away.
After listening to her, although the parallels with the book’s main concept didn’t click immediately, one analogy that I had read in it did…. The author had said that people, (especially children) are like fine glassware: they absorb the prints of all who handle them. And I guess the funny thing about life is that we never really know just how big of a print we can leave.
posted by Chuck at 3:49 AM
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