Profound Reflection

“Profound Reflection” isn’t something you commonly see painted on the sides of rail cars or buildings. I’d hazard a guess that you’ll generally find it in print, digital or otherwise, and wholly tied to an idea of personal development, progress, or some other sort of life circumstance. I’ve even written about it here, though not in so many words, as it’s central to where I am at this moment in my life.

A part of me resonates with Phillip and his winter-blessed moment of profound reflection. However, I’d probably not enshrine this more profound, reflective moment on the side of a castaway rail car in the middle of nowhere. But, to each their own, as they say.

What is “profound reflection,” and why is it important?

It’s a bit esoteric in my mind because we define our lives so very differently from person to person. What may be the result of a ketamine-induced whirl through galaxies and astral planes (a la Musk) may be less profound to someone who takes a more sober view of their roles and responsibilities to church, state, and family. As you can tell, the definition will be nuanced, so I suppose I’ll chip my two-pence in for the moment.

To me, “profound reflection” results from carving out the space, time, and intention to look at your past and present to see what’s what. It’s more than just an idle shower thought; it’s doing the work necessary between your mind, will, and emotions to drag out the written logs and histories and sort through them. It can be cursory or in-depth; I don’t arbitrate the level of engagement there.

For some of us, this dredging up of the past is painful and replete with memories, trauma, and experiences that cause visceral reactions. Perhaps these are the moments we leave buried and only uncover when we feel safe and with someone who can embrace our hearts. For others, it’s almost pathologic, the need to satisfy our histories by reliving the moments over and over again, obsessing about the “what ifs” and “whens” and “whys” to determine where we went wrong or right, a futile attempt to change our forward trajectories into some disruptive boomerang.

There’s a continuum here, and just like politics, it’s more of a circle than a straight line. We often fall into our analysis paralysis in these moments, choosing to obsess or laser-focus on small details that, in the course of a whole life, are inconsequential to the end game. A long-lost love is, frankly, long lost and should remain as such. Hungering for the past only leads to present discontent and future pain, so perhaps our profound reflections are more narcissistic navel-gazing than helpful.

Phillip perhaps made the right choice by absconding from the scene of his graffiti crime and simply acknowledging that at that moment, in the middle of January 2023’s winter, he was finished with his reflection and moved on. Transient though this moment may be, it’s a signpost and stake in the apparent ground that it was done. How many of us can say that we’ve done that?

I suppose the most significant challenge in all of this is to signify somehow, if only to yourself, that such a moment has been done. I find that these milestones, however few and far between they may be, contain a personal history worth remembering. These are the moments where life changed, sometimes for the better, sometimes for the worse. They stand as monuments to the moments that changed us, made us recognize our worth a little bit more, tossed our lives into the blender, and spit us out the other side, recomposed, recompiled, and reinvigorated to tackle what comes next.

So, to Phillip, I say a hearty “thank you” for this seemingly innocuous graffiti scribed on the side of a rusted-out railcar in Millers Falls. You’ve caused me to reflect, in whatever way “profound” means, on the story of my own life.

May it ever be so.