Several years ago during a trip to England, I noticed an interesting phenomenon in the English countryside. In the United States, when properties were divided by some sort of boundary, this was usually a fence of some kind. In England these boundary markers were hedgerows, which were broad, fat hedges made of thickly-bunched bushes. They were obviously meant to keep tractors or vehicles from crossing into a neighbor’s property, and they were highly effective. It would have taken a tank to crash through the accumulation of brush!
Wonderful metaphors...
The memory has stayed with me all these twenty-five years because of the wonderful metaphors that hedgerows present. Obviously they were meant to keep things and people from invading a protected area, but they could keep other things trapped within the hedgerow from getting out as well, and it is but one step from watching the outdoor hedgerow become an imaginary boundary which encloses the mind. Let’s consider: If there are certain things we do not want to hear or think about, we set up a “hedgerow” around the mind, something that keeps us from examining new ideas or concepts, and, in contract, such mental boundaries can prevent us from bringing some of our most important ways and means out into the world due to fear of making a disturbance.
Valuable awarenesses...
Hedgerows around the mind do prevent an important, healthy flow of mental activity within the mind. There may be valuable awarenesses that could develop within us if we weren’t so cut off from the circulation of ideas. There also may be needed thoughts that we could bring to life if we weren’t so choked by fears and misgivings. Is it going to take a “tank” of some kind to break down the unseen barriers…or could we, with borrowed wisdom, begin to dismantle the mental hedgerows bit by bit through curiosity and the willingness to know more than we know now?
What we're missing...
Wouldn’t it be worth a try to see what we’re missing?
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You may also enjoy "On Telling Our Stories."
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