Francisco Miraval
When Dr. Who wants to travel to any point of space or time, he travels in the TARDIS, a space-time machine that looks like an old phone booth and that is bigger inside than outside. When you look at the TARDIS, you can’t really anticipate what you will find once inside.
I had recently that sensation of experiencing something much bigger inside than outside when I read the column “Don’t Give Up”, where Helio Borges provides “seven actions you can take to soar above trouble times”. (You can read Helio’s columns at medium.com/@hborgesg/)
I never met Helio in person. However, I do admire him and people like him who show the courage to talk about our trouble times and who, beyond that, offer sound advice about how to face the turbulence we are facing.
I invite the reader to carefully review Helios’s seven actions. I will not repeat them here. I will only say that in 1800 words or so Helios quotes from Mario Benedetti’s poetry to Victor Frankl’s insights, and from Harvard University reports to lessons from Star Wars.
Like the TARDIS, but this time in real life, his column seems to be something small, an everyday object we already know. Yet, when you open your mind, your heart, and your will, you will see inside deeper dimensions not usually seen by minds, hearts, and wills less open to new dimensions. If you only see one dimension, don’t assume the other extra dimensions are not there.
In reflecting about that discrepancy between the exterior and the interior of the TARDIS, and of minds, hearts, and even people, I thought about another well-known story, perhaps just a little bit less mythological than Dr. Who’s adventures: the Trojan Horse, used by the Greeks to defeat the Trojans and end that long war, according to old Greek stories.
Contrary to the TARDIS, the Trojan Horse was intentionally developed as a deception. It pretended to be a gift, but it was a trap. They thought it was abandoned, but it was left on purpose. They thought it was empty, but it was not. They thought it was a victory, but it was the beginning of their defeat.
I was thinking about that and I realized that many lessons, speeches, sermons, messages, and teaching, either written down or verbally presented at churches, schools, or anywhere else are indeed Trojan Horses developed to hide the true intentions of the sender and to deceive the careless receptor.
Unfortunately, it is becoming more and more difficult, and perhaps it is already impossible, to distinguish the TARDIS from the Trojan Horse, the invitation to become one with the universe from the invitation to perpetuate millenarian wars, the challenge to expand our mind from the deception to close it, truth from illusion.
So, the next time I see a strange object on my path, I will discern if it is the bearer of good news or another destructive deception. And I will remember Virgil: Timeo Danaos et dona ferentes.