I have a dream!

It is surreal to think that another month has flown by O_o I comfort myself with the thought that at least it hasn’t been a WHOLE month since I last wrote :) Anyhoo, lots of things have been happening at 13thFLOOR, things that have challenged me in my thinking and my dreaming about the future. This has been made worse (actually better) by very honest talks with colleagues who know me, want the best for me and don’t hold back. And so I have been chewing on a few thoughts – not all of them pleasant ones, I have to add. All these thoughts were brought to a head when seeing a part of “Akeelah and the Bee” on Friday.

I have realized/am realizing how naturally and quickly I (we?) tend to blame other people, circumstance and/or things for our not getting where we want to go and doing what we want to do. Now sure, there are such things as the reality of dealing with politics, structures and egos in any organization; but how much of our experience of “being held back” is actually caused by any of the above factors. And how many times are we simply held back by our own lack of confidence. Sure, I can moan about opportunities not given to me…but did I honestly try my best to gain those opportunities? Or was I sitting back, waiting for someone’s permission? And then, of course, blaming that person when the permission didn’t come.

It is not an easy thing to realize that you have been lazy. That you have been spewing about passions but not taking the initiative and doing the work. It’s as easy and as difficult as “trying”. As starting to do the things you talk about wanting to do – not waiting for someone to ask you before you begin, but showing them your end result. Yes, they might be surprised. Yes, they might shoot you down. But at least you have started on the journey! At least you have something to show for all the talking!

And, of course, I had to ask myself “why”. Why do I take the back seat? Why do I wait for permission? Why don’t I try? And this is where “Akeelah and the Bee” comes in. Specifically the following quote she is asked to read: 

“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won't feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It's not just in some of us; it's in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.” - Marianne Williamson

I do not push myself because then I cannot fail. I do not initiate because then I cannot be rejected. I do not try because then my efforts cannot make anyone else feel small/inadequate. I don’t delve into the potential I think is there because then I don’t ever really have to worry about it and work at it. And I still get to whine about my untapped potential, blaming it on everyone else other than me.

But this is to sin. This is to throw back into God’s face everything He has given me. Everything His Spirit has awakened in me. Most of all, this is cowardice – no matter how noble the intention of it might sound. I will now stop waiting, stop hiding, stop making excuses. I will reach and I will strive. May God grant me the courage and the grace to do what I am setting out to do. May He grant us all the grace and the courage!

Isn’t it funny?

Life will always remain a strange thing…an enigma…the biggest variable in any one of our individual life’s plots…filling it with both pain and beauty. We can experience death and new life all in the span of one week. We can reach the most glorious highs on some levels, while simultaneously experiencing the lowest of lows. Funny that. Funny using an expression like “isn’t it funny” for something that’s actually not “funny” at all, but rather difficult, bizarre or uncomfortable.

When the writer of Ecclesiastes says, “there is a time for everything”, he makes it sound so neat in a way. 

Yes, he mentions things like a time to cry and a time to die; but it still sounds so ordered – like there is a rhythm even to those times, that they will follow on each other, that you will always be able to move from the one to the other. And yet, in our living life, we come to realise that those times aren’t “neat” or “rhythmic”, mostly they are intertwined – joy with tears, success with disappointment, and life with death. Which is so contra-instinctive for us – we WANT life to be more “reliable”, more predictable. We NEED life to be simpler. We NEED to hold on to the belief that tomorrow will be different…will be better…will be more. 

But life continues on its “merry” way, and tomorrow usually ends up being the same as today – complicated. Which means that we can (and often do!) spend a lot of time questioning the meaning of our existence, the sense our living holds, the reason for our being. Getting so caught up in thinking about life that we don’t live it. But, you might say, such a complicated mess is not worth calling life, never mind living it! And yet, it is what it is, and it remains so no matter our thoughts on the matter.

So why is it worth it? What is the significance of this quagmire? Where is God in all of this? “Our life is a faint tracing on the surface of mystery, like the idle, curved tunnels of leaf miners on the surface of a leaf. We must somehow take a wider view, look at the whole landscape, really see it, and describe what’s going on here. Then we can at least wail the right question into the swaddling band of darkness, or, if it comes to that, choir the proper praise.” – Annie Dillard “Let children walk with nature, let them see the beautiful blending and communions of death and life, their joyous inseparable unity, as taught in woods and meadows, plains and mountains and streams of our blessed star, and they will learn that death is stingless indeed, and as beautiful as life.” – John Muir

We should not strive for peace and calm and simple, for it is only in the difficulty and the chaos and the mess that we can plumb the depths of who we are. You cannot be truly brave and courageous without having felt fear tinge your being and overcoming it. You cannot truly live without confronting the complex reality that life is. “I don’t believe that life is supposed to make you feel good, or make you feel miserable either. Life is just supposed to make you feel.” – Gloria Naylor In the fullness of the total experience, in our giving ourselves over to every piece of it, in our looking every part of life and death straight in the eye and conquering it; therein lies living. For if you’re not ready to die, then how can you live? So…hoohah! “To live in this world you must be able to do three things: to love what is mortal; to hold it against your bones knowing your own life depends on it; and, when the time comes to let it go, to let it go.” – Mary Oliver