We are builders, we just didn’t know

How easily the world would change if we understood the opening sentences of the Bible as an absolute, literal truth, and not just as a “let me tell you a story.” 

Here’s how I see it, and I’ll tell you how one “gipsy,” realizing at least a bit that he is a “photocopy of God,” begins to believe that everything is possible for him, just like it is for God. As Jesus said: ‘For truly I tell you, if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you.’ Here’s a small proof: 

A couple of weeks ago, two gypsies came to me to ask if there was any work for them. Since I’m always making something, I always have work for any good and honest person willing to work. The only condition for the job is stated in the previous sentence. I immediately saw, in their eyes, that they met the only condition of the “job application.” 

‘There is,’ I said. 

‘For how long will there be work to do?’ asked the first gipsy, an old man of about seventy. 

‘For as long as you want.’ I replied. ‘Your hourly rate is 400 dinars (more than others), you have drinks in your fridge, coffee, a stove… everything you need to work like humans. Working hours are as long as you want. When you get tired, rest; when you’re rested, work. You don’t have to hurry; just make sure it looks nice. Here’s some music to enjoy while you work (a small speaker, good sound, with bass, unlike a transistor).’

They looked at me “in disbelief,” as if thinking, “this is too good to be true.” I knew they will look at me this way until they realize that only what is “too good” is truly real. “Too good…” is a thought. And in God, the Bible says, there was first a thought. It seemed too good to him, so he wanted to make it a reality. Thus, he created the World. In eight days. And we are, as stated on the first page, his “copy-paste,” “in his likeness and image.” 

‘Boss, what do we need to do?’ asked the young “gipsy,” a “kid” of about twenty (who already has a wife and child and is struggling to provide for them). 

‘Make a platform from old bricks five by five,’ I replied. 

‘But how, boss? We are not masons, just laborers. Masons make platforms…’ he answered, somewhat scared. I smiled and told him, ‘You are masons; you just don’t know you are masons.’ They both looked at me “in disbelief,’ as if I were an alien. ‘How can we not know we are masons…’ muttered the older one to himself. 

‘Let’s do it this way,” I said, ‘stick this stake into the ground,’ and I started to show them how they are indeed masons. The younger one drove in the stake. ‘Take this tape measure and the square (a large carpenter’s square with a 90-degree angle) and measure five meters to the right, then drive in another stake… and keep doing this to the right until you get back to the first one.’ They did it, saying, ‘Okay, we know how to do that.’ 
‘What now?’ they asked me. 

‘Now take this red mason’s thread, wrap it around the stakes, and pull it tight.’ And it was done. 

‘Now, beside the thread, dig one shovel of earth (the height of the shovel is the measure; when it’s done, the builders call it ‘one shovel measure’).’ And it was done. “Now pour sand into the hole, two or three centimeters, and level it with this ‘leveling tool.’ And that thought became action. 

Now lay the bricks like this: one row width-wise, then one row length-wise (I showed them with the trowel), just make sure there’s enough space between them so you can fit this strip (one centimeter wide). This is called ”joints.” I said, and I left so as not to disturb the builders. 
After some time, the younger one came to me with a smile on his face and said, ‘Boss, we’ve laid them; what now?’ 

‘Now put three shovels of sand and one of cement into the mixer and pour water until it’s thin, then let it mix a bit…’ 

‘Oh, you want to make cement milk… we’ve done that… then we’ll pour it into those joints…’ (of course, the builders knew what it was called and how to do it; they just didn’t know they knew it… I thought to myself). 

‘That’s it…’ I said, and they moved from words to action… they soon informed me it was done. ‘What now?’ they asked. 

‘Now have a beer to calm your nerves, listen to some music, and enjoy until the joints dry,’ I ordered. 

‘Ah, we know that we know,’ joked the elder with a smile. 

‘Well, the most important thing is that you know how to feel like people,’ I replied, also smiling. 
‘And then we’ll use that metal brush to remove the excess… right?’ he asked, satisfied that he knew what to do. 

‘See, you know that too…’ I said, pleased that he knew he knew. 

We shared a nice beer together, and the younger one started telling me a bit about his life. 
‘I wanted to go to school, to go to college, but what can you do… there’s no money, it can’t be done… I dream of having a house, so my child won’t be homeless like me…’ 
‘And why are you just dreaming? Why don’t you build a house?’ I asked him. 
‘Well, how, boss, when I don’t have anything to build a house with!?’ he protested a bit. 
‘How can you say you have nothing when you have everything?!’, I countered. 
‘But where is all that?!”, he asked, wondering if I was crazy or just messing with him. 
‘Well, there it is, drinking beer and talking to me,’ I said, surprised at how he couldn’t see the obvious. It always amazes me about people… they have eyes but don’t see, they have ears but don’t hear… 

‘Well, I don’t have a lot, money, materials, or workers…’ the younger one continued, trying to convince me that he couldn’t create his own world and live a good life because he wasn’t God (or at least a wealthy man). 

‘How do you not have a place?’ protested the elder, who was actually his relative. There’s that old plot where my house used to be… overgrown, but we can clear it… and there are people who can work (people used to call this ‘moba,’ when everyone in the village helps each other when needed, so everyone could do everything. People used to know this before someone convinced them they couldn’t do it all, and without money. Leaders are here to remind people that they are faithful copies of God and can do anything). 
This young guy now looked at me “less blankly,” his gaze sharpened somehow; he was no longer such a disbeliever. A seed of faith, “the mustard seed,” had fallen on the soil of his soul, but he still wondered if it could sprout into his dream, his house. 
‘Hey, great, I didn’t remember I had a plot and workers… just that I don’t have money for the materials…’ he said, cheerfully but still a bit sadly. 

‘How can you say you don’t have money for materials when you’re employed, registered, you just open an account and get credit cards… and you can do it without that, without money and credit,’ I said again, surprised that he couldn’t see the obvious, as his eyes widened while I spoke. 

‘Me? To have those cards that you give at the store and they treat you like a gentleman!?’ he exclaimed in disbelief (not believing in yourself is the biggest deception in this world).

‘Why wouldn’t you be a gentleman when the Lord God created you?!’ I widened my eyes, looking at him (we learned in our psychotherapeutic craft that nonverbal communication is very important, so we established a “rapport,” as the NLP folks say, to reprogram him a bit towards perfection). 

‘Boss, I’m starting to wonder if you’re some kind of alien… and where’s your flying saucer?’ he laughed. 

‘I have a flying saucer too… I just hid it in my head, in my thoughts,’ I started laughing as well. 
‘Well, then I have one too, because when I dream, I fly,’ said the alien who thought he was a gypsy and that he didn’t have a flying saucer, just like he thought he wasn’t a builder but just a laborer. 

‘That thing about the credit cards is great, but I’m curious about what you said about getting materials without money, how does that work?’ he asked, now with less disbelief and more curiosity. 

‘Well, once upon a time, people built houses without money. They cut wood in the forest, collected stones for walls from nature, and instead of cement, they used mud and straw to build. Everything was free. Water was beneath their feet, in the ground; they just dug a well. They got light at night from candles, melting wax they got from bees or resin from trees… everything was for free. And it can be done differently. Now, this old brick from which you made the platform, where did you get it?’ 

‘Well, from the bottom part of your lot, where you made a dump. I know where you got it from; it’s been said around the village that you told all the excavators who tear down old houses that they don’t have to take it to the landfill, but can dump it at your place. So, you get all the materials for free, and the excavators are happy too; they don’t have to pay for the landfill. Everyone wins, and everything’s free. Wow, boss, how did you come up with that?!’ 
‘I didn’t come up with it; I saw it from the greatest Boss of all time, from God. I watched how He created nature, where everything is free and simple. Nothing is wasted, and everything that exists serves everything else. Look at that cow. Its food, the grass, is free. And then the cow poops, creating fertilizer, which becomes food for the grass, making food free for the grass as well. The cow and the grass host each other, and everyone is happy, just like me and the excavators,’ I explained to him in understandable terms the concept of synchronicity, which is one of the key principles of God’s methodology of creation. It doesn’t have to be explained through Jung and Spinoza; it can be done through a cow and grass. Clearly, his eyes opened to see, and his ears to hear. 

‘Man, I can start building a house tomorrow, not just dream about it!’ he exclaimed joyfully and with enthusiasm. 

Meanwhile, in synchronization with our conversation, the joints dried, so they scraped them with a metal brush and cleaned them with a broom. They are looking and admire the wonder at the wonder of the platform they had made, as builders, craftsmen, and the younger one said, “I have to take a picture with my phone; no one will believe I’m a builder” (he started creating his own craftsman “portfolio”). The very next week, the younger one realized he was also a sheet metal worker, and the older one became a professional gardener and exterior designer, but I won’t prolong the story. Our great master of words, Đole, beautifully told us that the principle is the same; everything else is just nuances. 

Oh, and the next day, the younger one bought a craftsman’s jumpsuit and said, ‘Since I’m a craftsman, I’ll treat myself and look like one.’ A friend of mine, who had stopped by when I first hired them and asked me about the older one, ‘What do you want with this old gypsy? He’s about to kick the bucket; why are you wasting money?’ came by again after a few weeks. He looked at the yard and asked, ‘Did you hire a landscaping agency? Everything is so tidy!’ 

‘I did,’ I replied, ‘the agency is the Old Gypsy who was about to kick the bucket. My guy has been resurrected and tidied up the yard.’ 

So, that’s how it was. You can understand this text as a lesson in leadership, as HR “people development” reading, as my political stance, a way to change society, my religious preaching, or a psychotherapeutic story… it’s all the same; everything else is just nuances or emanations, as philosophers say. It’s like when a pebble drops into calm water and creates concentric circles around it. That’s how, they say, God created the universe. Physicists call it the “Big Bang.” I prefer to call it the “Big Splash.” I made my splash and am creating my world, my concentric circles. If one of my waves reaches you, if we find ourselves on the same wavelength, splash along with me at the same frequency, and let’s create a nicer world together. Berdyaev called this the “Third Covenant,” the covenant of “Co-Creation with God.”