Vibes

Here's a true confession: for years I thought the town I live in was amazingly unfriendly.  Too many times, I'd smile at someone whose child was on one of my kid's teams, or even had been in their class and I'd get a stony look back.  "Hello"'s in similar situations were greeted with looks of disdain.  It used to make me want to scream.  My husband thought we hadn't lived here long enough to be accepted.  I could never quite figure out if it was the culture of the town or something about me.

I've dealt with the frustration I felt from this in many different ways over the years.  For a long time, I conformed: no smiles or hellos from me unless I got one first.  Then I tried being super-friendly: I even tried starting conversations with some of the people who had pointedly ignored me.

 

Here's another true confession: none of this was easy for me.  I've been shy for most of my life. As a child, it was hard for me to talk to my mother, let alone strangers.  Most of my teachers in elementary school couldn't tell my parents anything about me except my grades because I did everything I could to avoid being noticed.  In high school, my parents wanted to send me to a small private school, with classes of only five students.  I thought this was the worst idea I'd ever heard: how would I hide in such a small group? Which is a long way of saying that all this town-rejection was tough on me.  I finally accepted that this seemed to be the predominant culture here. I decided that I could say hello and smile when I wished.  I stopped caring when I got no response.

Then, last year, a funny thing happened.  People started smiling at me.  They'd even say, "Hello."  Last week, the woman parked next to me at the supermarket, started telling me about a dog in the car parked next to her (he looked ridiculous with a leaf stuck to his face). It took me a minute to realize there was no one standing behind me and she was indeed speaking to me. Fairly often now, someone here who I don't actually know, finds a story to tell me.  A couple of days ago, our mail carrier, who hadn't driven down our drive since our old wonderful, but somewhat crazed, former dog barked his darn fool head off at him, came down the drive to bring me the mail and chatted with me about his new exercise routine and dogs.

  

I'd like to say that my rising above my shyness and being friendly initiated the change in my neighbors but while that may be part of what's happening, it isn't the whole story. True, once I acted consistently more friendly, more people were friendly back to me.  But now, other people are approaching me first.  People I've never seen before.  This began after I started meditating. I believe I'm radiating a more peaceful, open vibe, and people are responding to it.