Last week was a tough one.Too many things were going on and I felt overwhelmed and I was telling my husband how it was just ten days into the new year and I already was fed up and wanted to hit the reset button.
Nothing bad, bad, but just this feeling of being let down.When a new year emerges, you feel like you are given a clean slate and can start whatever it is, from scratch. But in a few days, I was jolted back to reality. Life, actually goes on. Like it did the day before.
A couple of days ago I was telling my husband that the law of averages applies to everyone. Reading a book about the holocaust, I found that a survivor of something as horrendous as that, succumbed to cancer. You would think he would have a long life just for dodging death at the concentration camps.But no.
My brother was just forty. My aunt was lamenting about how desperately she prayed to God to spare her son and how much she hoped a miracle would happen. But no, we lost him.
Nothing ensures anything. Even the American dream-work hard and you will be rewarded is true in a broad sense but again, doesn't exactly happen to everyone.So,like I said, life happens.You can of course, work hard, try harder, do your best, but ultimately settle for less. Statistically speaking, your chance of getting exactly what you wanted would still be, maybe 50%.
Once the realization hits that we are not special and no accommodation is going to be made for us, I think life becomes easier. We have realistic expectations and learn to soldier on.We take joy in the smaller victories rather than disappoint ourselves with the ones that got away.
Again, a book came to my rescue (books, very interesting things no?). It was about a soldier and nurse who met during WWII in a hospital, who were separated when he re-enlisted, but finally made it to each other after the war.The soldier mentions so many Bible verses that kept him going through the horror that was the war.And he mentions the loss of life around him. He takes a hit to his leg, but recovers.Was it because he prayed? Maybe, but the law of averages applied here too. He made it but so many of his compatriots didn't. But that faith kept him going.
Last Saturday we celebrated MLK Jr day in our church.We had a choir from a predominantly Black church sing at the Cathedral that day. The closing song was, of course, 'We Shall Overcome'. That eternally hope giving hymn that can move anyone who listens to it in an instant.
They sang it slow, the melody was haunting, the lyrics, simple, yet so overflowing with hope and faith that it almost brought tears to my eyes.
And then it struck me, what is life without hope? What is life without faith?
An entire enslaved population held hope, hope that some day they or their descendants will have freedom. They soldiered on.They fought tirelessly. They protested, risking their lives. And in the end, they prevailed.
But the reality is, they are still fighting. Fighting for equal rights. 'Black Lives Matter' is ample proof that the law of averages still applies.There is racism still prevalent in pockets of society. But what if people had given up in the 60s? What if Rosa Parks had figured that sitting in front of the bus would make no difference and had remained seated on the back of the bus? What if the bus boycott had never happened in Montgomery? We wouldn't even be talking with pride about Obama! Hope and faith-that is what sees us through. To feel forlorn is not wrong. But to stew in that is unforgivable.
If life were all about keeping yourself alive day after day, what a chore it is to live like that! I look at my droopy, leafless plants and they look so forlorn that they almost look dead and you want to lop them off and put them out of their misery. But give it a few more weeks, and then a trip to my garden will yield a whole new meaning to the word 'life'. Wispy leaves uncurling tentatively and looking up to the sun, waiting for warmer days to give them life and help them restart that cycle called life.
Every time we fall, we get up and resume walking. Staying on the ground gets you nowhere. And we have places to go and things to do don't we?
So, I've decided, chin up!!!
I looked closely at the problem that so demoralised me and decided to do something about it. I've begun working on how to solve it and I have the faith that I will, if not surmount it, at the least make a dent!
Carpe Diem!!
Nothing bad, bad, but just this feeling of being let down.When a new year emerges, you feel like you are given a clean slate and can start whatever it is, from scratch. But in a few days, I was jolted back to reality. Life, actually goes on. Like it did the day before.
A couple of days ago I was telling my husband that the law of averages applies to everyone. Reading a book about the holocaust, I found that a survivor of something as horrendous as that, succumbed to cancer. You would think he would have a long life just for dodging death at the concentration camps.But no.
My brother was just forty. My aunt was lamenting about how desperately she prayed to God to spare her son and how much she hoped a miracle would happen. But no, we lost him.
Nothing ensures anything. Even the American dream-work hard and you will be rewarded is true in a broad sense but again, doesn't exactly happen to everyone.So,like I said, life happens.You can of course, work hard, try harder, do your best, but ultimately settle for less. Statistically speaking, your chance of getting exactly what you wanted would still be, maybe 50%.
Once the realization hits that we are not special and no accommodation is going to be made for us, I think life becomes easier. We have realistic expectations and learn to soldier on.We take joy in the smaller victories rather than disappoint ourselves with the ones that got away.
Again, a book came to my rescue (books, very interesting things no?). It was about a soldier and nurse who met during WWII in a hospital, who were separated when he re-enlisted, but finally made it to each other after the war.The soldier mentions so many Bible verses that kept him going through the horror that was the war.And he mentions the loss of life around him. He takes a hit to his leg, but recovers.Was it because he prayed? Maybe, but the law of averages applied here too. He made it but so many of his compatriots didn't. But that faith kept him going.
Last Saturday we celebrated MLK Jr day in our church.We had a choir from a predominantly Black church sing at the Cathedral that day. The closing song was, of course, 'We Shall Overcome'. That eternally hope giving hymn that can move anyone who listens to it in an instant.
They sang it slow, the melody was haunting, the lyrics, simple, yet so overflowing with hope and faith that it almost brought tears to my eyes.
And then it struck me, what is life without hope? What is life without faith?
An entire enslaved population held hope, hope that some day they or their descendants will have freedom. They soldiered on.They fought tirelessly. They protested, risking their lives. And in the end, they prevailed.
But the reality is, they are still fighting. Fighting for equal rights. 'Black Lives Matter' is ample proof that the law of averages still applies.There is racism still prevalent in pockets of society. But what if people had given up in the 60s? What if Rosa Parks had figured that sitting in front of the bus would make no difference and had remained seated on the back of the bus? What if the bus boycott had never happened in Montgomery? We wouldn't even be talking with pride about Obama! Hope and faith-that is what sees us through. To feel forlorn is not wrong. But to stew in that is unforgivable.
If life were all about keeping yourself alive day after day, what a chore it is to live like that! I look at my droopy, leafless plants and they look so forlorn that they almost look dead and you want to lop them off and put them out of their misery. But give it a few more weeks, and then a trip to my garden will yield a whole new meaning to the word 'life'. Wispy leaves uncurling tentatively and looking up to the sun, waiting for warmer days to give them life and help them restart that cycle called life.
Every time we fall, we get up and resume walking. Staying on the ground gets you nowhere. And we have places to go and things to do don't we?
So, I've decided, chin up!!!
I looked closely at the problem that so demoralised me and decided to do something about it. I've begun working on how to solve it and I have the faith that I will, if not surmount it, at the least make a dent!
Carpe Diem!!
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