How To Celebrate Your Birthday With The Whole World!
ServiceSpace
--Ilonka Wloch
3 minute read
Sep 4, 2013

 

1. Decide you’re connected to everyone
 
I had a very unusual birthday last month. I was in Vancouver alone, a city where I didn’t know anyone.
 
This was just fine with me because since we’re all interconnected and truly, never alone, I get to practice feeling connected to strangers on my birthday. So this is how my adventures started.
 
Sometimes I get shy about asking a stranger for something. Why is this awkward? I’m not sure. Perhaps in our society success is measured by how self-reliable (and therefore more isolated from others) we are. I was going to challenge myself around midnight on my b-day. That’s when, having crossed the border to Canada, I would be asking someone on the bus if I could use their phone. I needed to call my friend’s friend who was going to pick me up at the station. I didn’t bring my phone on purpose so that I could amp up my experiment of connecting with the unknown.
 
It went well. The person I asked even seemed pleased to be able to offer. And I instantly felt like he was my friend.
 
2. Act as if everyone is your friend
 
The next day, (the official birthday) I woke up feeling the friendliness of this city all around me. But it could have been any city, not just Vancouver. The trick is that we get to decide that we’re in a friendly place and surrounded by friends.  Albert Einstein once said that “One of the most important decisions we humans will have to make is whether this universe is a friendly place.”
 
The day unfolded with many pleasant greetings, and lots of eye contact interspersed with asking for directions as I explored the neighborhood.
 
I had a feeling that I would ask a stranger to dinner. Scary! And exciting! While wondering around the university campus looking for a place where I once ate, I bumped a few times into the same person. Including directly in front of that restaurant. Aha, that was my cue. I introduced myself, told him it was my birthday and inquired whether I could invite him for a bite.
 
He said yes, and gave me a birthday hug. We both recognized how out of the box this connection was. I learned that J, a young man of Tunisian origin moved to Vancouver from the mainland to sell home security systems. He didn’t do so well in that profession since many people don’t even lock their houses. He switched to selling psychedelic drugs instead.
 
I learned a lot about what it’s like to be a young person trying to create a life of their choice. And he listened to me sharing experiences of mind-expanding consciousness without drugs. The evening went by fast and it was time to head home.
 
3. Repeat 1 & 2
 
On the way home I passed a homeless man. More accurately: a house-less man who set up a place to sleep in a storefront nook.
 
I kept on walking, like I have many times in my life when passing a houseless person. But this time was different. A voice inside me said, ‘you still have one cookie left in your bag. Go share it.’ I wheeled around, heeding this voice yet again on that day.
 
I asked the man whether he would accept a cookie on this special day. He suggested we share it to celebrate together and broke it in half. A sweet moment.
 
This wise, heart-tender street pirate had a lot to share. Why do I call David a street pirate? Because pirates defied authority’s rule on the seas, and he, (and countless others) does so within cities.  I watched a huge heart-shaped pendant resting on his chest while listening to his story of being a US army vet, of being shot at, and of the creative ways he and his buddy would stay alive during a severe winter in Toronto.
 
The biggest gift I have received that day, was being treated like an equal by an old man living on the sidewalk.
 
I think of him often and of the day that the whole world came to celebrate my birthday… What a day!

 

Posted by Ilonka Wloch on Sep 4, 2013


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