Life Learning and Joy

Most of us come into the world crying. Why?

Are we hurt? Scared? Sad? Angry?

Or could it simply be the result of taking our first deep breath of new air and letting out a mighty roar to let the world know we have arrived!

After all…babies are small. Insignificant, perhaps. An unwrapped gift of which as time passes, we discover what’s inside.

Transition from one place to the next can be scary…like being born into a “cold, cruel world” as the saying goes.

But is our world really all that cold? All that cruel?

Perhaps.

Perhaps not.

Or…could it be that our transitions are not to be feared or dreaded at all because they allow us to grow? To stretch…to love in a way we have never loved before…to live in a world we never knew existed?

After all, a baby can only grow to the capacity of the womb in which it lives. At some point, when it’s time to become more than what its immediate environment can hold, it must pass through from one place to the next.

That’s exciting! It’s a whole new world of opportunity to explore, taste, feel, and touch. Just like when each of us moves from one experience in life to the next.

Doesn’t that make you want to roar!?! To laugh. To giggle….

It’s empowering! It’s challenging! It’s life building and love enriching when you move from where you are now, one step closer to where and who you are to become.

And leave the past in the past.

I doubt that a toddler, or a teenager, wishes for one minute to return to the cramped and confining world of the mother’s womb. As comforting as it was “once upon a time”, in the present moment, well, it just wouldn’t fit!

A very wise woman wrote: “I believe that when we are tested, we have the greatest opportunity to grow and learn and become stronger.”

To roar!

Think about how you go about putting a puzzle together. You have an image – a picture of how you want the end result to look. Then, you dump a whole bunch of pieces onto the table. Lots of shapes and sizes. Some fit, some don’t, and sometimes, you may find a piece or two in there that actually belong to a different puzzle.

You throw those ones aside! They are not part of your masterpiece…they belong to someone else’s puzzle.

When you try to force the pieces together, it just doesn’t work as well as when you allow what fits together naturally to just…click.

It’s a game, really. This whole life thing. And…it’ meant to be fun. Joyful even!

Many times, you don’t see that in the beginning. You’re dealing with a lot of unknowns. Learning new skills. Building new relationships. Opening lots of doors. And closing some too. Finding your voice. Using your voice. Building Love. Living life with compassion…and determination…and confidence.

Accepting Grace.

And then, slowly at first and then suddenly, when all the pieces are put together an image is revealed. Perhaps it’s the one you envisioned in the beginning. Perhaps it’s something even better – beyond your wildest imagination.

And then…you roar!