“We Are How We Treat Each Other and Nothing More"

(This is a repost from a blog I wrote on March 2, 2016) 

“To be humble, to be kind.

It is the giving of the peace in your mind.

To a stranger, To a friend

To give in such a way that has no end.

We are Love

We are One

We are how we treat each other when the day is done.

We are peace

We are War

We are how we treat each other and Nothing More.”

                                                                              ~”Nothing More” The Alternate Routes

What has happened to civility? To kindness? To respect? If you read and watch the news, you would think we have lost our collective minds. We are bombarded daily with hate speech and deplorable behavior. Where is the kindness? Where is the love? Where is the sanity?

How do we combat all of this? How do we get through the day? Do we scream back or remain complacently silent? I don’t know about the rest of you, but I’m exhausted. My heart is tired, but not yet broken. You see, I still have hope. In this turbulent world we each possess the ability to spread kindness, even in the midst of chaos. How do we hold onto this desire for a more benevolent existence in the face of such bitterness and horror?

I believe it is still possible to spread simple kindness every day. Smile at a stranger. Send a love letter to a friend. Bake something sweet for someone struggling. Hate cannot spread where love is present. Fight for justice. Speak your mind with logic, facts, and decorum. Believe in peace. Be a fierce warrior fighting the honorable fight because goodness is always on the right side of history.

I challenge you to spread light today, because as the song says, “To be bold, to be brave. It is the thinking that the heart can still be saved.” Author Elizabeth Berg wrote on her Facebook page about what makes a coward and what makes a person with courage. She wrote, “Probably people with courage don’t bow out of life or hide from it. Probably they find some resolve within and live in the best way they know how wherever they are, and find like-minded individuals with whom they can ride out the storms. Probably they endeavor to pay attention to their highest and best selves and minimize the coyote in them that suggests darker ways.” Don’t feed the evil coyote that lives within. Nurture the one that wants to live in love and light.

“We are how we treat each other and nothing more."

In The Presence of Wonder

“Isn’t it splendid to think of all the things there are to find out about? It just makes me feel glad to be alive - it’s such an interesting world. It wouldn’t be half so interesting if we knew all about everything, would it? There’d be no scope for imagination then, would there?” - L.M. Montgomery, Anne of Green Gables
 
Our daily lives can be a series of frustrations and pain. A simple task causes injury. A phone call brings tears. A distracted driver carelessly swerves in our lane. We wander through the day, grimacing at it all. We complain. We gripe. We glance at the dark clouds and think, “Damn this rain.”

It all depends on our perspective. We can continue to grouse at every inconvenience, sounding like the sad-sack old grey donkey Eeyore from Winnie-the-Pooh.

                                 “Pathetic. That’s what it is. Pathetic.”

But what if we were more like Anne Shirley, Lucy Maude Montgomery’s spirited character in her Anne of Green Gables series? As an orphan who had been abused and mistreated in various foster homes, Anne knew misery, yet when she found Marilla and Matthew Cuthbert and Green Gables, she wrapped herself in joy. Every day was a wonder to Anne. Even when she encountered mean classmates or petty behavior, she chose to see the goodness that surrounded her. Anne looked at life as an adventure, a glorious path overflowing with fragrant wild flowers.

“‘Dear old world,’ she murmured, ‘you are very lovely, and I am glad to be alive in you.”

The challenge is to live each day, hoping to glimpse the presence of wonder. Even dark times possess tremendous beauty. As we grieve or hurt, it is proof we are willing to risk our hearts.

This new blog is an attempt to channel Anne Shirley, to search for wonder in our convoluted, violent, and often miserable world, acknowledging the bruises, and yet discovering the brilliant colors emanating from within. This is the mission, hoping to learn more about art, nature, books, music, and the human condition while living “In The Presence of Wonder."

A storm blew in yesterday, creating this gorgeous vortex of swirling clouds.

Last week a sliver of a new moon winked over the clouds.

There is a careless beauty in weeds that pop up in spring.

“It’s been my experience that you can nearly always enjoy things if you make up your mind firmly that you will.” - L.M. Montgomery, Anne of Green Gables