The idea of resilience is what gives me hope: hope for our world, hope for those I love, hope for the chance to help. Being resilient means bouncing back when things go wrong, taking your licks and getting right back up again, facing your fears and never giving up, no matter how scared you might be.
Our hope is constantly tested by the challenges we face and by the hardships we endure. No one has an easy life. Life is not supposed to be easy. The trick is to live a life that may be hard without becoming hard ourselves. For only those who bend but do not break live within hope, right under its roof.
That being said, it is ridiculous to think we can always make lemonade out of the lemons life gives us. We can't. Sometimes life sucker punches us in mouth and all we can do is reel and bleed. However, if we can remain standing, if we can heal without bitterness, we can live into the hope that is yet to come.
U2 sings that "the sweetest song is the one we haven't heard." Implicit in this idea is the power of the word "yet." Each night ends in dawn, and just because we can't yet see the glow on the horizon does not mean that the darkness will last forever. We haven't yet become the people we need to be to make our dreams a reality, to live our lives as crew rather than passengers. We will though. This is what I hope. And hope leads towards resilience. And resilience leads towards a life of reaching into the possibility of "yet," shaping this potential into a reality suffused with hope as the sky at dawn is suffused with light.
Sunday 27 February 2011
Sunday 20 February 2011
Faith
I have faith in the idea that nothing ever ends, that every ending is but a new beginning. This faith rests on the notion of cyclic metamorphosis. Each year, as winter settles upon the soul of the earth, our world seems to slip into permanent slumber. However, without fail, spring arrives and the world is born again. In fall the leaves descend from the trees and become the earth from which new shoots of growth emerge. Our lives also have seasons which emerge from the one before and fade into the one that follows. It is often difficult to accept change, as it is difficult to accept the times when nothing seems to change - when we seem to be stuck in what Dr. Seuss calls "the waiting place." However, after years of experience I now have faith that change will eventually arrive as a new beginning presents itself.
Last year was one filled with loss that sorely tested my faith. In the end, however, my faith in new beginnings was strengthened by nearly incomprehensible endings. Some people I loved have moved beyond the horizon of their mortality.
I think of the idea of horizons often. In our life we never reach any that we strive towards, as they remain elusive and flee before us. The journey, thus, supersedes the destination, if one strives for horizons. However, at the end of our mortal lives we move the beyond the horizon into "the undiscovered country."
As a caterpillar cannot comprehend the flight that awaits her as she begins spinning the silk of her cocoon, so too is it impossible for us to grasp the new beginning awaiting us beyond our mortal lives. Thus, we must have faith. And living within this faith, we must strive each day to live for each other.
Perhaps we shall not pass this way again, and must do now what we can. Or perhaps we shall pass this way again - an infinite number of times in an infinite number of ways. If nothing ever ultimately ends, truth is an infinite circle of possibility. Thus, any small act of kindness we give each other, we shall receive unto ourselves again, and again, and again.
We live within the gift and curse of each moment, but as the future becomes the present, and the present the past, my faith that every ending is but a new beginning becomes stronger. As a teacher I cling to this faith each June as I see my much loved students graduate :)
Last year was one filled with loss that sorely tested my faith. In the end, however, my faith in new beginnings was strengthened by nearly incomprehensible endings. Some people I loved have moved beyond the horizon of their mortality.
I think of the idea of horizons often. In our life we never reach any that we strive towards, as they remain elusive and flee before us. The journey, thus, supersedes the destination, if one strives for horizons. However, at the end of our mortal lives we move the beyond the horizon into "the undiscovered country."
As a caterpillar cannot comprehend the flight that awaits her as she begins spinning the silk of her cocoon, so too is it impossible for us to grasp the new beginning awaiting us beyond our mortal lives. Thus, we must have faith. And living within this faith, we must strive each day to live for each other.
Perhaps we shall not pass this way again, and must do now what we can. Or perhaps we shall pass this way again - an infinite number of times in an infinite number of ways. If nothing ever ultimately ends, truth is an infinite circle of possibility. Thus, any small act of kindness we give each other, we shall receive unto ourselves again, and again, and again.
We live within the gift and curse of each moment, but as the future becomes the present, and the present the past, my faith that every ending is but a new beginning becomes stronger. As a teacher I cling to this faith each June as I see my much loved students graduate :)
Wednesday 16 February 2011
We have our heading. Here we go...
Imagine the title of this blog said by Captain Jack Sparrow and Peter Pan before the Disney DVD previews begin to play. This is how I feel entering the world of online communication. I am so excited that I am at a loss for words... Enjoy this moment of silence, as it won't last long.
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