So last night, watching the Kennedy Center Honors ceremony I had recorded (how can one miss Joan Baez and Garth Brooks?), I heard Garth Brooks say this, which I promptly wrote down on a post it note and stuck on my desk as food for thought.– “The truth is we all become who we are by somebody else.”
Sitting down this morning at the same desk, post it note nearby, I opened a book to this from Howard Thurman, and had one of those “Okay, God, I get it” moments I felt was too good to not share:
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The Thread in My Hand – Howard Thurman – Meditations of the Heart
Only one end of the threads I hold in my hand. The threads go many ways, linking my life to other lives.
One thread comes from a life that is sick; it is taught with anguish
And always there is the lurking fear that the life will snap. I hold it tenderly. I must not let go….
One thread comes from a high-flying kite;
It quivers with the mighty current of fierce and holy dreaming
Invading the common day with far-off places and visions of bright….
One thread comes from the failing hands of an old, old friend. Hardly aware am I of the moment when the tight line slackened and there was nothing at all — nothing.
One thread is but a tangled mass that won’t come right;
Mistakes, false starts, lost battles, angry words — a tangled mass;
I have tried so hard, but it won’t come right….
One thread is a strange thread — it is my steadying thread;
When I am lost, I pull it hard and find my way. I am saddened, I tighten my grip and gladness glides along its quivering path;
When the waste places of my spirit appear in arid confusion, the thread becomes a channel of newness of life.
One thread is a strange thread — it is my steadying thread. God’s hand holds the other end….
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All of which leads to two questions now on the same post it note —
What threads am I holding?
What is my steadying thread?
It occurs to me... 