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Today's
Meditation:
I
sometimes wish that Emerson had been my grandfather or uncle
or something like that. I'm sure that if I had had the
chance to hear his wisdom over and over again while growing
up, some of it would have rubbed off on me and I would have
avoided many of the problems I've gone through. Many
of those problems have been caused by fear, for I grew up
fearful of many things. The fear is gone, for the most
part, but I certainly can vouch for Emerson's words
here: the storm within endangers us. I can't
count the number of hours and days that I've spent with some
fear in the front of my mind, overwhelming all of the other
things that I've been trying to do. I can't count how
many of my actions have been motivated by a fear of what
would happen if I committed another action, rather than by a
desire to do what I felt should be done. If
we were to be given safety always, we would never find
ourselves in positions in which we have to test ourselves,
in which we would have to learn and grow. Danger in
whatever form causes us to make decisions and re-evaluate
our priorities and beliefs. But if our reaction to
danger always is fear, we don't give ourselves the chance to
deal with that danger in a productive way. Instead, we
retreat from confronting it, and we end up losing the chance
to take something from it. If
we can calm the storm within ourselves by finding peace and
trusting life and God, danger of whatever sort no longer
holds the power that it once did. Instead of causing
us to feel terror, it will cause us to examine the ways that
we will confront it, and hopefully overcome it. |
