We Are Not Seeing The Whole Thing: "Nothing Is In It's True Form"

Sometimes while guiding I will spot a big fish and try to show it to those I might be guiding. I often get excited saying, “Its huge, can you see it”.  If the client is a beginner he will understandably often have a difficult time seeing the fish or at the very least not see the whole fish and misjudge its size.

I have learned from experience that often the biggest fish, particularly Brown Trout, will have an uncanny ability to not reveal their true size. They have an amazing ability to lay low, blend in, and remain concealed. I might even say to my clients while sight casting to a big Brown, “You are not seeing its true size; trust me, this thing is 25 plus inches; so get ready.  If you hook this fish all hell is going to break lose”.

I also tend to think a lot of life is this way. I often get that feeling that I am not seeing the whole thing. I get the feeling that “nothing is in its true form”, as CS Lewis once said, and that,  “We live among mere shadows and broken images”.

This “not seeing” would include not only the fish we stalk, but even the rocks along the river, the fishermen we meet on the river; and all of nature. We see “dimly as through a glass”.  I get the sense that we cannot even see ourselves accurately.  We cannot clearly know and feel how “alone” we are in this world.

In C.S. Lewis’  fantasy story called Perelandra, a human, by the name of Ransom, is on another planet that has not “fallen”. Ransom’s experiences on this planet are strange.  Toward the end of the book he finally meets the first man and woman of this planet, the king and queen, un-fallen creatures. Ransom, like us on earth, has never truly seen a man or a woman in their true form. He lies on the ground before the king and queen saying,

“I have never before seen a man or a woman. I have lived my whole life among shadows and broken images. Oh my father and mother … Do not move. My own father and mother I have never seen. Take me for your son. We have been alone in my world for a great time.”

Perhaps we too are alone. We are alone because no one is in their true form. We too have never seen a true person.  It has been a long time and our loneliness is great even to experience our own true selves and what we truly long for.