I'm in a time of enormous gratitude for the blessing of my life. It feels like a golden time for me and I’m enjoying it enormously. My life is so good that it borders on embarrassing. My family, my work, my community, the weather, yummy food, my house, my dogs, my health...the list of things I’m grateful for goes on and on.
I was in my house, listening to my favorite Pandora station, Shake it Off, when The Best Day of My Life came on. I felt the sentiment of those words deep down in my heart. I started dancing around to the rhythm, and singing along to the life-affirming words.
As I’m singing and dancing, feeling the joy of being alive, I’m blindsided by a picture on my laptop; The heartbreaking image of a preschooler’s body, washed up on the shore of a beach, is at the top of my Facebook feed. I know immediately this is a Syrian refugee who never made it to safe shores. Instantly, tears stream down my face. Imagining his parents’ pain causes me to sob out loud.
How can my life be so absolutely awesome when there is so much pain and suffering in the world, so much of it human made? How is my life connected to that little boy? How can I keep my sanity and feel empathy at the same time?
I had a good cry about that little boy and the refugees and victims of war. Then I kept on going with my day (minus the dancing). I can't continuously hold all the pain of 7 billion people or I would actually go crazy. But occasionally something breaks into my soul and I recommit to investing in something bigger than myself. Something that will bring just a little more love and a little more justice into our hurting world.
I was in my house, listening to my favorite Pandora station, Shake it Off, when The Best Day of My Life came on. I felt the sentiment of those words deep down in my heart. I started dancing around to the rhythm, and singing along to the life-affirming words.
As I’m singing and dancing, feeling the joy of being alive, I’m blindsided by a picture on my laptop; The heartbreaking image of a preschooler’s body, washed up on the shore of a beach, is at the top of my Facebook feed. I know immediately this is a Syrian refugee who never made it to safe shores. Instantly, tears stream down my face. Imagining his parents’ pain causes me to sob out loud.
How can my life be so absolutely awesome when there is so much pain and suffering in the world, so much of it human made? How is my life connected to that little boy? How can I keep my sanity and feel empathy at the same time?
I had a good cry about that little boy and the refugees and victims of war. Then I kept on going with my day (minus the dancing). I can't continuously hold all the pain of 7 billion people or I would actually go crazy. But occasionally something breaks into my soul and I recommit to investing in something bigger than myself. Something that will bring just a little more love and a little more justice into our hurting world.
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