Daily We Are Handed the Same Experience: The list goes here. It is the same every day. How can we be made new in all this oldness; have sparkle and shine? It has been said many times to those who care for loved ones, 'You have to have a life; you deserve a life.’ I understand the remark, but I do have a life. Ultimately, we all need to iron out the life we’ve been given, not fear what may happen, or want a different life for a loved one faced with caregiving. It’s true that sometimes my life feels confining, less free than I’d like, but that is only an illusion. I am as free as anyone. Freedom doesn’t always include mobility. Freedom isn’t the ability to do what you want, it is the ability to do what’s right.
Most days I love my life and wouldn’t want any other and I find it extremely purposeful and artful…and free. I have learned to love my life and the Life Giver.
This Ground Hog’s Day (the movie) existence has been my reality for nigh on seventeen years now and like Bill Murray’s character, I have figured out a thing or two, I am still excited when something new presents itself no matter how small; a new way to enjoy the same old thing because….this is my life: Groundhog’s Day'ish. My eyes look for ways to add color to the gray of redundancy. We can be swooshed right into a new day, a new time when we look through open-thankful eyes. The situation stays the same, I change, sometimes the situation changes, but always, we should remain playable to being transformed into the new creation God envisioned when He began re-creating us in that, “look with your whole being (behold)! all things become new”, way. This isn’t just a nice saying, I have found this to be a living truth.
For Instance, two days ago my son and I were outside playing in the frosty yard, as we do every day rain, snow, sheets of ice etc…sometimes it is as simple as looking at what I have and being thankful; a view, the ability to do what I do, a day without rain, steam rising from a hot mug of something (I was very thankful for the nearly full length Patagonia down coat my kind husband bought for me this winter). The scene was the same as every day, but I saw and appreciated what was there. Sometimes something new needs to be dropped into “same”. Say, a small mobile iPod speaker, now we are showered with inspiration as we kick balls from one side of the yard to the other; same was new. I recently found it astounding that such a small thing as a new kind of tea can bring on a wide smile.
www.teavana.com
The soothing blend of rooibos tea and coconut drifting under my nose can take me mile after blissful mile down the road of boring. Old made new because I choose to see blessings, I look, I behold what God is creating inside of me. I might go my whole life without looking; observing with my body-soul-spirit what is really going on behind the curtain of my skin.
Today a Little Glitter in my gray, I got up early to work on this post and found our boy sitting up in bed with his entire library piled upon his brown bedspread with a Berenstine Bear book open before him as he worked through the stack; a change up from the confines of the usual; sitting on the floor and playing with his bin of stuffed animals. Shine and a mom smile.
We Were Created with an inborn desire to make art; clean crazy creative, with our minds, with our eyes and our hands. When we can’t read a book because we are tending; ear buds and an audio book work like magic. When we can’t paint, or write…we study with our eyes, build stories in our head and take audio notes on our iPhone. If we can’t bring culinary desires to fruition, we plan a gourmet meal in our head, lay out how the table will look with an antique table cloth, wooden candleholders and wheat grass as centerpiece and think…someday soon. There are ways to enjoy redundant, there are always ways to enjoy life.
Open Wide the Eyes of Our Faces, of our hearts and minds. I’d love to know what you come up with. Creating and creativity of all kinds make me feel alive.
