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 :)