Simply Amazing
A Chinese proverb reads, “The journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.” I love that wisdom of life’s journey and we can all agree on its truth. But what happens when your personal roadmap becomes tattered and worn through the years? What if that same single step launches you a thousand miles away and into uncharted lands?
In life,
many of us have traveled into dark and frightening places rendering us uncertain of what our next step should be.
My personal life’s journey became unrecognizable between 1999 and 2008 during which time all four of our sons died. My two sons, and my husband’s two sons, were all in their twenties. Their deaths were unexpected and completely unrelated in circumstance. Shocked and stunned we managed to stumble onward‒reeling a thousand miles away from civilization and not knowing what it would take to make the journey home. We wondered if we would even recognize it when‒or if‒we ever arrived there.
At every pivotal point in life we are forced into choices, whether we choose to acknowledge them as such‒or not.
Not to make a choice is, in fact, making a choice. At that juncture on my own journey, I knew clearly and undeniably what I needed to do: Simplify…as though my life depended upon it—and trust me, it did.
Simplicity. Sounds simple, right?
I liken it to going from 60mph to zero‒in reverse! Where do we channel the chaos and complications? How do we deal with daily distractions and the psychological aftermath of burying four young men?
What I learned on this journey, as I teach to this day, is the importance of recognizing and acknowledging the amazing resilience of our sacred self. Heaven only knows what I might have done had I been gifted with any form of ‘intuitive vision’ or if I had been forewarned about the coming rapid-fire tragedies.
In a state of ‘humanness’ it’s the anticipation that can harm us. I may have surrendered to the circumstances had I known beforehand‒but who would that have honored? No one‒and certainly not our children. Instead, I was bestowed with the gift of just enough amazing simplicity to carry me onward to face the rising sun of a brand new day.
Take a peek through your life’s journey.
Envision times when you were simply amazing‒times when you stood your ground, though you didn’t think you could. Or when you fought for something you believed in, when others thought you shouldn’t. Maybe a time when you simply smiled at a stranger because something told you they needed one.
Seek yourself in the Sacred and know that by nature‒and by God‒you are simply amazing!
