Two of the most beautiful passages of War and Peace happen when Prince Andrew is wounded in different battles. He has clarity in these moments about others and himself, feeling compassion and love instead of his usual contempt and ambition. Fame reveals itself as the small thing it is. He remembers how it felt to be a child.
I think of these scenes, and they remind me of the goal: to experience life in a more welcoming, childlike way. If I did, I could enjoy warmth, comfort, compassion, companionship, and love more easily. There would be no room for grudges or worries. A child trusts; a child seeks joy; a child accepts the gifts around him as reality.
In another War and Peace passage, Pierre, the restless seeker, realizes,
God is here and everywhere… He felt like a man who after straining his eyes to see into the far distance finds what he sought at his very feet. All his life he had looked over the heads of men around him, when he should have merely looked in front of him without straining his eyes.
-War and Peace, ch XII
I sat in a concert about a month ago I had a War and Peace moment. It was neither sought-for nor earned; I was actually tired and a little frustrated that I couldn’t find a good seat. During the long concert, I looked around me at the families who had come to support their children. I felt how they loved each other. I smiled at the grandmother who hugged her tough son and grandchildren. I noticed a middle school aged boy sitting alone, holding a bouquet of flowers carefully in his hands during the whole concert. I strained to watch him give the gift after the concert, but lost him in the crowd. He was love. I loved him. He loved someone enough to sit alone and bring her flowers. I was love. I could see beyond my usual categorization of people and just see their goodness. This was a welcome rest. This was happiness.
These moments of pure love are rare, so I am writing it to remind myself it’s always there. I just need to develop a capacity to receive it when it is revealed to me.
“I was then wiser and had more insight than at any other time, and understood all that is worth understanding in life. because…because I was happy.”
Pierre’s insanity consisted in not waiting, as he used to do, to discover personal attributes which he termed “good qualities” in people before loving them; his heart was now overflowing with love, and by loving people without cause he discovered indubitable causes for loving them.
-War and Peace, ch XIX