Aspects of Being

Gabrielle Perreault

Do you ever wonder, doubt, when lost in a flurry of seeming chaos and untoward circumstances, if what you're doing and where you are is what is 'supposed to be'? Is the path still 'true'? Was there a wrong turn? Are you true to yourself - Your Love? Can you still see the ground that you walk upon at each step...and if it is so, why is there still so much turmoil to be encountered. There are times to learn, times to change things, and yet there are also times to yield. Perhaps part of our journeys are about knowing the differences...though yielding is not something that we are commonly taught.

I heard a story (among many - for this is how we teach each other more easily) about an ancient form of metallurgy and forging that made for the strongest sword, impermeable and invincible. The steel was heated, bent, and shaped repeatedly, in fact folded 200 times for it to come to be thus. I suppose if one looks at this as a metaphor, it doesn't seem all that pleasant. Yet many of us have felt like we have been in that very forge!

Our trials have taken us to places we would never have imagined. Nor did we suppose at the time that we would not only survive, but thrive against odds that cannot be fathomed by another who has not traveled there. Think on it - truly - others have not been there and may never know in this lifetime what we have endured to become, as well as that we are still becoming! To the end of our days, we do not cease, though some have chosen to pursue a certain stagnancy as a goal. Perhaps, or rather more surely, it is those who have passed through The Forging that stand witness to the power of one's journey. Truly it has always been so. It is why we summon or seek out and revere "heroes" in our midst as well as from the past. Yet each person leaves their own mark among those that they encounter while they are here. We touch each other like ripples, whether famous or obscure, and none ever really leave, for the legacy is what we carry with us from all that ever came before. Take heart and choose to remember, all that you have chosen to learn...
 

~ A peaceful heart knows that Time is but a measure, and not an obstacle...
 

"I heard a nice little story the other day," Morrie says. He closes his eyes for a moment and I wait.

"Okay. The story is about a little wave, bobbing along on the ocean, having a grand old time. He's enjoying the wind and the fresh air - until he notices the other waves in front of him, crashing against the shore.

" 'My God, this is terrible,' the wave says. 'Look what's going to happen to me!'

"Then comes along another wave. It sees the first wave, looking grim, and it says to him, 'Why do you look so sad?'

"The first wave says, 'You don't understand! We're all going to crash! All of us waves are going to be nothing! Isn't it terrible?'

"The second wave says, "No, YOU don't understand. You're not a wave, you're part of the ocean.' "

I smile. Morrie closes his eyes again.

"Part of the ocean," he says, "part of the ocean." I watch him breathe, in and out, in and out.

~ From "Tuesdays with Morrie" by Mitch Albom - Published by Doubleday - copyright 1997