The Inspiration of Hope and Release
I was inspired to think the other morning, as I was walking in the dark, that it was time for ‘change’ again. There was ice on all of the trees and grass, coated like candy on a stick, which made the grass and limbs lean down as if to reach for me from above, or shy away from below. When the wind blew, the popping and crackling from the grass and trees sounded like a fire burning as moisture and sap are consumed. We here in NC, have had our last real attempt at cold weather recently. It’s almost as if Winter has given its last dying gasp of blasting breath, before the ground of North Carolina bursts like a balloon with with the greens, purples, whites and reds, of fresh life for a new season.
Change – the one constant of the universe. Things change and that process can hurt sometimes. As you have read in my blogs from time to time, going back and looking at my past means something powerful to me. But, by the nature of looking back, it somehow changes the past. By merely touching it, the dynamics of looking back can change your perception. Hence you hear and read that people refer to the ‘good ole days’ however, if you were to go back in time and ask them if times were good you might not get the answer you expected.
Change is hard for most. It’s the rare individual that embraces change instead of resisting it. How many of us worry and fret over where we are at in life, what we have, what we don’t… and how many of us try very hard to keep the status quo in our lives just the way it is? Conversely, how many of us have been forced to give up the easy road from time to time, to be pushed off to the side of the road, as others pass by, only to find that there is actually life there also… a really good life! If the mechanism of change means pain, then I think a little revolution and pain in our own lives, from time to time, could be a good thing.
To paraphrase from C.S Lewis, the higher we go… the further in life we travel… the bigger the world becomes. The bigger the world becomes, the more precious and amazing are the little things are. I for one, don’t believe in accidents. Those little things that become something precious, are by design. Though they could be seasonal, those seasons should be appreciated, because they might never come again, and while here, we would do well to drain them like squeezing juice from a orange.
We seem to run very hard from change and though I am no different, I can say change should hold a dear place in the hearts of those that want to breathe fresh life. There is something to be said about letting the safety of the status quo go, and letting life unravel in its divine manner to bring us to a new place as the seasons in our lives change.
In this last morning walk with the trees clicking and popping, I found life anew waiting to burst forth in the next version and season waiting. That has real life application in that no matter what is going on in your life, change is right around the corner, and in change, there is life… a very good life. It might not be easy at times, and it might cause you to have to give up things, places, and people, however, hope says it will be okay to the end and beyond, and in the incubator of change see there is hope for a new tomorrow and a new beginning.
Please don’t let the arteries of your soul become so rigid from the fear of loss that you can’t see the bursting forth of new life all around you and in you, as the seasons fold in and out of your being.
Find the Inspiration and Hope in the release of the old to embrace the new.
Safe journeys this week, travelers…
