When You Open That Door
It’s an interesting phenomenon that occurs in life – how our internal struggles are reflected in our outer world. I’ve been dealing with revealing my own vulnerability to others. The web is not a natural friend of mine. Revealing myself to the world…well…I’d rather not…but if you’re going to see a therapist, shouldn’t you want to know who she/he really is?
I look out into the world lately and all I see is a huge amount of fear. Impenetrable walls created to block out any and all chances of getting hurt. Countries refusing to let in any suffering refugees because ONE of them might be somebody who could hurt us. The world saw the image of Alan Kurdi and mourned in a public outcry. And then we all shut our doors and said no. We might get hurt.
Damn it. So what if we get hurt? So what if a mistake is made, and shit happens and we need to deal with it? So what if in our vulnerability we open up and an asshole walks in to our lives? We can deal with the asshole. And in the meantime we have 24,999 good people who will create ripples of goodness. Those people are the ones who matter. Those are the people who are going to change the world.
What do you really want for your life? What meaning do you want to assign to it? Where do you want your focus to go? On 1? Or 24,999?
I am the child of a refugee. My grandparents and my father have lived their lives giving back to Canada in gratefulness for what they were given. I live my life in gratitude to the Red Cross person who gave my grandparents a chance at a new life. That is my life. I think of that RC person countless times a year. I wish I knew who he was so that I could thank him but I can’t. He might be dead. I will never know him. He will never know the extent of the ripples that have formed from his kind act.
He didn’t live in fear. He lived in vulnerability and love and mercy. And from that lesson I live my life. I want to open my door to love. I want to close it on fear.
We can spend all our lives doing the “what if something bad happens.” But what would change if we spent all our lives concentrating on “what if something good happens?” With 24,999 refugees just wanting a better life, can you imagine all the good stuff that they’ll do???
I’m working on opening myself to vulnerability and the magic and good things in life. I’ve had my hopes turned upside down, my life turned into a whirlwind of fear and chaos, my heart ripped into shreds from loss…but I wouldn’t change any of that. I will take the bad things wilth the good and keep trying to open myself up even when that’s the last thing I want to do because to shrink from life means that I will lose. It means that I have given up and am content to live in a closed little safe space for fear of dying. And I know that if I wander that way, I am choosing the way of the living dead. A life without kindness or risk. A life less lived. I want a life fllled with meaning, purpose, excitement, joy, goofiness and fun. Mixed in with the sorrow, hurt and devastation that goes with all that.
I want to keep on giving what that Red Cross worker gave to my family. Hope. A promise of a new life. Kiindness that spreads through generations. Ripples.
The Holiday season is approaching us. I’m going to work on being open to love and kindness. I fail sometimes but that’s what it means to be human. In the meantime I will try my best to let go of fear and be open to vulnerability. To give and to trust. That’s where my heart lives, and where it connects with yours. That’s where we all connect with each other. 🙂