The Wisdom of the Little Prince by Rev. Eva S. Hochgraf This Sunday I bring to you some of wisdom of The Little Prince. A book written some 53 years ago by Antoine de Saint Exupery, but which continues to be a story which captures our hearts. Perhaps what makes this book so compelling is that it somehow captures the incredible divide between the world of the child and the world of the grown-up, and that speaks deeply to our hearts. Perhaps now as adults we don’t feel, or think that we are so far from childhood that we can’t comprehend it. But somewhere deep in the recesses of our being we remember what it was to be a child--and how totally alien and foreign the world of the adult was to us. The adult world could be divided into categories to help us, as children, conceive of it, as people the Little Prince visited on his journey--kings, conceited men, tipplers, businessmen, street lamp lighters, geographers--but to name them meant little, because their lives were just as incomprehensible and puzzling to us as children. They seemed trapped, beyond reach only to be observed as beings who can’t even comprehend what is of essence. It is this divide which is pointed out repeatedly, which subtly captures our hearts--as child readers or as adult readers. How can the writer know our childhood secret puzzlement? It is this shared secret that makes us feel so close to story. We see the same alien world, our grown-up world, from many different angles and perspectives. Each perhaps strikes a cord with some element of our lives, some time, place, or experience we’ve had. As we see the world through the Little Prince’s eyes, we realize we can regain wisdom we have lost in growing up, and joining the grown-ups in their world. I try to remember this feeling of difference, of alien incomprehensibly when I am around children--particularly my own. For me, it is easy to forget how much I am a part of this grown-up world, use to its demanding rhythms and patterns, accustomed to its unrelenting demands of of culture’s path for sustaining life--”work” in all its complexity. Because I learned it all slowly and gradually, I have forgotten what an alien place in all was to me at one time. So, I try to remember that when I’m around my kids--or any kids. There are many times when we who are parents must seem so odd to our children. My daughter Irene, who has an amazing ability to speak of complex issues in her simple three year-old vocabulary, has said to me in these times, “Mom, you are just so ‘Mommy-ish.’ I wish you could be more ‘kid-ish’ sometimes!” So now, I try to be more kid-ish when I can. Having become accustomed to the customs, the ways, the workings of this grown-ups world, I am now easily enmeshed and susceptible to becoming totally engrossed, or perhaps the better word is entrapped, by the machinations which are so much larger and more complex than I. I think Irene would simply say I was being too “Mommy-ish.” I think that this is another one of the truly compelling points of the book. I believe most all of us feel or have felt that sense of being trapped in this very complex world, and not quite sure how we got here. The lines are very fuzzy and not many people talk about it, so to see it so clearly pointed out--a bit indignantly in fact, is so refreshing. We read, and we say, “Yes! Yes I have had this vague feeling about this, and here it is, as plain as day. Sometimes the whole thing just creeps up on you, like it did just the other day on me, when our family decided to go for a late afternoon canoeing trip on the river. We were having a fun time with the kids and the dogs. One of our dogs--they are both Springer Spaniels, so they love water--but one of our dogs, the young one--just loves to swim. Usually when we go out paddling, she just swims along. So we were all out on the river, the dog was swimming and the kids starting saying, “We want to go in too!” Well, we hadn’t planned for swimming--just a quick paddle. So they were in their clothes--but Gary and I shrugged our shoulders at each other and said “Hop in.” The kids thought it was great fun. Gary who was in the back of the boat, said to me, “Don’t you want to go in too?” Its funny, because I love swimming, but until he said that, it hadn’t occurred to me to go swimming. We were there to go canoeing. We had clothes on, not swimming suits. And we were indulging our kids, because they were kids after all, and deserve to have a lot of fun. My mind had somehow gotten trapped in that mind set. How strange it felt, to have Gary ask me if I wasn’t going to go swimming and realize that it had never even occurred to me. How trapped I really am sometimes, in my grown-up world--a street lamp lighter, following along with the set plan, no matter what the actual circumstances--that wonderful weather, wonderful water, happy splashing, and my being there didn’t automatically mean to me a great swimming experience. So, of course, I jumped in--and had a great time splashing and swimming with the kids! But how did I get in this grow-up world? I’m not entirely convinced I want to be here! I found, that it is this capacity of our grown-up world to trap us, our thoughts and our vision, that the story of the Little Prince, makes so clear. In its many ways of showing the world to us in a different way, a different angle than we usually see it, The Little Prince, helps us to be aware of some of the qualities of our existence, which enables us to strive for a balance in our living. Now I want to tell you a story, it just so happens that I recently bought a bicycle computer. A great little device. It tells you your speed and distance traveled, as well as things like your maximum speed for the trip, your average speed for the trip, the time which has elapsed while you’ve been on the particular trip, and other such niceties. So I got this bicycle computer right around the same time I started thinking about this sermon on the Little Prince. It made me think about what I think of as the “figures man.” Do you remember him? He was the businessman the Little Prince visited on one of the asteroids. He was so busy calculating things he didn’t even greet the Little Prince. It turns out he had decided that he would own the stars by counting them and writing them all down in his book. He said he concerned himself only with matters of consequence, so he didn’t have time to speak to the Little Prince. But he didn’t even know of the name “star”, calling them only “those little objects one sometimes sees in the sky.” All the while writing the numbers of stars down on little pieces of paper and putting them “in the bank.” And as I rode my bike back and forth to the church I wondered whether knowing my speed at any given moment, or how fast I had gone so far that trip, really made the trip better in any way? And I wondered why I wanted to know these things--why just experiencing the wind blowing past me, the sight of the city, the challenge of traffic, the variety of up hills and down hills wasn’t in all its stimulation--enough? And as I spent more time, riding my bike back and forth, I thought more and more about this bicycle computer and the Little Prince’s judgment against the “figures man.” Was I like that? Where what truly mattered to me was the numbers in life, instead of life itself? It seemed a very dreary existence--and yet I found myself thinking--why can’t I have it all, have the moments of living life, wind blowing past my body--exhilarating ride downhill, and analyzing, categorizing moments as well--”Hey, I just went down that hill at 20 mph! That’s faster then I’ve ever done it before!” And in my riding back and forth some more, I started thinking about how we as humans have been so successful, in living on this planet in so many circumstances, and certainly that must be in part because we do crave so much stimulation, from so many sources. And new ways of exploring things are generally considered great to us. Our analytical and our experiential sides have had to work side by side, trying to balance each other to win our survival. It is in-bred in us--this incredible thirst for taking in information. So what I decided, as I rode my bike back and forth some more--sometimes looking at the computer and sometimes decidedly not looking at it, was that we cannot see that everything analytical, or this looking at the world in terms of figures, as wrong or bad. But we must always be aware of this knife-edge ridge we are hiking along. If we walk over too much to one side, say the side of the figures man--then we no longer can see the other side at all. It is out of our view as long as we remain down there. And we are missing a lot of the world view that way. Our view, our comprehension, our ability to make wise choices based on what is before us--has been cut in half. But the same is true for the walk a few steps in the other direction, off the knife-edge down into the valley of purely experiencing the world. We have lost just as much. For me, I think, and for most all of us perhaps, we are aware of both of these realms, the valleys” of experience and analyzing life. The thing to keep in our mind’s eye is that life really is a knife-edge. It is very easy to take a few steps in one direction or the other and totally lose track of the other side. It is very easy to think that you are seeing the whole picture, when in fact you are not. And once we’re down in the valley--its very seductive. Like I said, its hard to even imagine that there is another valley. The world view becomes fixed very quickly. And then suddenly you find you’ve become the “figures man.” The “figures man” reminds me to always look for the edges of the ridge--and to keep moving along my trail, following the top of the ridge, keeping my eyes open to both valleys. So that I may clearly see the essence of what is there. Perhaps it was this, this vision of what is essential, that the fox taught the Little Prince more than anything else. For when the Little Prince first met the fox, he did not understand the essence, the inherent value in his own relationship with his single rose from home. And in fact was rather disheartened to learn that she was not the unique flower he had supposed her to be--but only one of thousands and thousands. But after taking the time to slow down, and follow the fox’s advice on how to tame someone--he learned that indeed his own rose was very special because he had taken the time to get to know her, to build a relationship with her. He could see the situation in a whole new perspective. The Little Prince says, “The men where you live, raise 5 thousand roses in the same garden and they do not find in it what they are looking for. . . .And yet what they are looking for could be found in one single rose . . . .” What are you looking for? So many people I meet these days are looking for “uh, maybe, something spiritual.” This is true even of many people I meet who never go to any church. They don’t quite know what it is they long for--they know its something to do with spirituality, or a sense of purpose to life. A sense that what we do is not just in vain. A sense that we are not just running around on tread mills, or worse yet, right off the edge of a cliff! Do you remember all those people traveling this way and that, the busy commuters the Little Prince saw when he visited the railway switchman? I think many people feel a bit like those people looked to the Little Prince. Again we feel compelled to this book because it captures many sides and views of this incredible longing, deep hunger, and sometimes complete mind-numbing activity that speaks volumes about who we, humankind, really are. What are you looking for? The Little Prince’s friend the fox says that what we need is to take the time to tame each other. “It is an act too often neglected,” he says. “Tame someone” means, in the mind of the fox, “to establish ties.” He says,”if you tame me, we’ll need each other. To me you will be unique in all the world. To you, I shall be unique in all the world.” But the Little Prince is eager to rush off and discover new friends and says there is a great many things to understand. To which the fox replies, “One only understands the things that one tames. Men have no more time to understand anything. They buy things all ready made at the shops. But there is no shop anywhere where one can buy friendship, and so men have no friends anymore.” People often say that spirituality means doing things which help bring a sense of connectedness to their lives. When was the last time you took the time to make a close friend. It is a spiritual practice, which will bring you a sense of connectedness, understanding, and the gift of knowing someone as unique in all the world. I want to remind you of the fox’s tips for how to tame someone: 1) Be very patient. 2) Don’t get too close at first, but sit a little closer each day. 3) Words are the source of misunderstanding. Don’t talk too much. 4) Come at the same hour each day. Observe proper rites, or what we might call habits or rhythms of life. And the one which the fox says we, humankind, have forgotten: 5) You are responsible forever, for what you have tamed. It is worth it to take the time to get to know someone. It is worth it to take the time to get to know a community, which is why I think so many of you are here at church. This is a safe place, where the values of taming someone, of making friendships, is affirmed in a world which is much too busy dealing with other things--a world of kings, businessmen, tipplers, conceited men, geographers, street lamp lighters--all churning away at its own frenetic pace. The Little Prince’s time with the fox gives us another view, granting us wisdom, on our grown-up world. One of the things I noticed in rereading this book was something perhaps the author didn’t intend, but it was just as illustrative to me. What I noticed was the truly masculine world that the book represents. Everybody, but everybody with one exception is male. The beloved rose is an inexplicable female in a male universe. All those visited, the businessman, tippler, street lamp lighter, king, . . . even the snake, the railway switchman and the pharmacist here on Earth are male. When I first noticed this--I thought generous, magnanimous thoughts, “Oh, it’s just because of when it was written. St. Exupery didn’t know any better. But the more I thought about this, the more I realized that this rather one-sided view also teaches us a lesson--it is a decades before-its-time “Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus.” And ultimately, despite finding the Rose incomprehensible the Little Prince recognizes the true value of relationship. He says, “But in herself alone she is more important than all the hundreds of you other roses: because it is she that I have watered; because it is she that I have put under the glass globe; because it is she that I have sheltered behind the screen, . . . because it is her that I have listened to, when she grumbled, or boasted, or even sometimes when she said nothing. Because she is my rose.” And so we learn, that even with this strong division between the male and the female, this sense of bewildering complexity and incomprehensible interaction--there is still a chance to bridge that gap as we take the time to tame each other. This is all well and good, you may be thinking, if I get some free time--I’d be happy to go and explore my inner-child, work on a friendship, to play. I am just so busy these days working and dealing with all the other little elements of my life, that I really can’t take the time to slow down and smell the roses, or whatever. I really must keep myself going because I just don’t have any choice. For those of you who are feeling that way, there are ways to slow down the pace. I’d like to recommend you consider exploring something called the “Simplicity Movement” or “Voluntary Simplicity.” We live in a complex world with many overlapping demands, and one of those big demands currently is a demand to buy and buy and buy to keep our consumer-driven culture going. The simplicity movement is teaching people that they can live happy lives without so much buying and so much debt, hence, so much money, hence so much working! This is not a new form of an Amish movement, because the goal is not to push out or reject technology. Only to teach that we don’t really need to work at the frantic pace we have come to set for ourselves in this country, in order to always buy more, have more, do more. I want to close with a joke for you, which is perhaps my picture of the elephant in the boa constrictor. It is a perspective on our culture from a friend of mine from a part of the world where the siesta is a daily occurrence--even in the business and the academic world. He always used to joke, “What do you think would happen if they gave you people here in the U. S. a siesta?” Then he’d look at me with a big, expectant smiling face. “No one would take them, everyone would want to work overtime!” We just nod our heads and say “yeah.” But to my friend, who can see the elephant in the boa constrictor, this was incredibly funny, and shows another view of our world that most of us haven’t been able to climb up on to the ridge enough to look over the other side, to the wide expanse of the balanced picture. I wish you luck on your hike, and as you go, I offer you this drink from The Little Prince, “I raised the bucket to his lips. He drank, his eyes closed. It was as sweet as some special festival treat. This water was indeed a different thing from ordinary nourishment. Its sweetness was born of the walk under the stars, the song of the pulley, the effort of my arms. It was good for the heart, like a present. When I was a little boy, the lights of the Christmas tree, the music of the Midnight Mass, the tenderness of smiling faces, used to make up, so, the radiance of the gifts I received. Copyright 1997, Rev. Eva Hochgraf