Believe, Hope, Love!

They say that seeing is believing and there’s no doubt that physical evidence of something is a good way to validate its existence. Cynicism seems to be part of human nature. For years we have been saying “If it seems to be too good to be true, it probably is!” We have stopped believing in altruism and the ability of people to take the moral high road in difficult or unfair situations mostly because our experience has taught us that people are broken and society is a cesspool of corruption and ulterior motives. The goodness of life has been sucked dry by the selfishness of mankind. Belief in the idea of unconditional love or selfless sacrifice is next to non-existent. Even when we can see something, how do we know it’s real? There are famous illusionists who are so skilled at their craft that things we know are physically impossible appear to happen before our very eyes. Special effects can be mind blowingly realistic and the media can manipulate images and edit sound bites to get them to look or say just about anything they want.

So how can we believe in anything or anyone? I have a one word response to this question~Hope! One source defines hope as more than wishful thinking. It is akin to the word confidence. I have been both blessed and cursed by an incredibly resilient and optimistic spirit. Some call my optimism refreshing, while others call me gullible. I always seem to see the best in people first and tend to minimize their deficiencies. I say that this has been a blessing and a curse because I have suffered a lot of disappointments, betrayals, and hurts because I have chosen to see the positives in situations; but it doesn’t mean I’m oblivious to reality or that I don’t use wisdom and discernment. Nothing could be farther from the truth. Belief is not ignoring the realities of brokenness, but embracing them and trusting that there is more to the situation than meets the eye. It is seeing the potential of what someone or something can be and encouraging that potential until that reality unfolds. Do I 100% trust something that I can see is broken? Of course not! But do I believe it can be restored bit by bit? Absolutely! I am not so arrogant as to believe that I have to be the one to fix everything that is broken or restore people that are seemingly damaged beyond repair. That would be gullible and naive. However, (as my dad often says) as long as there’s life there’s hope and I refuse to believe that anyone is completely, utterly hopeless. No matter how vile someone or something is, I still believe that somewhere inside that person or situation there is a spark of something good, true, and worth restoring.

Maybe I’m for the underdog because I have been an underdog. There were times in my life that I didn’t think there was anything in me worth salvaging. I felt completely worthless and hopeless. Even after I had given up on myself, on life and on hope, there were others along the way that refused to give up on me. They loved me when love wasn’t in any way deserved. They saw in me what I couldn’t see, and they wouldn’t leave me alone even when I purposely tried to annihilate them so they would be force to protect themselves and abandon me. That’s the kind of thing you can believe in...an unstoppable love and belief that no person or situation is so hopeless that giving up is an option.

The proof is in the pudding, or so they say. I look at my life today and thank God that I wasn’t allowed to give up, that I didn’t take my life into my own hands, that I was given chance after chance to change. Sometimes I still pinch myself and think “If it’s seems too good to be true, it probably is!” but my life is better than any dream I could’ve imagined for myself. Time has helped me to believe and trust that no situation is impossible and the best is yet to come. The flip side of being cursed with eternal optimism? Sometimes you actually get to see the seeds of promise blossom into beautiful flowers...and that makes it worth the pain.

All Things Are Possible (Not Guaranteed) to Those Who Believe

Yesterday, my son-in-law’s dad passed away.

January's Word for the Month~ "Believe"

The other day I was watching the 2005 movie "Serenity" which was the finale of a failed TV series called Firefly. I was turned onto the show by a friend of mine in China and was really disappointed when it was cancelled after only 14 episodes. Anyway, this movie was about a rebel group of space warriors who had banded together against the control and dominance of another powerful group called The Alliance. The rebels and the Alliance were both convinced that they had the true ideals about how life should be lived and the true way of viewing the world. In a very poignant scene, just before the most spiritual guy in the film dies, he says this, "I don't care what you believe, just believe!" I thought about that for a long time, and it just didn't settle with me. It didn't make sense. How can just believing in something be enough? Does believing in itself make something right, even if it's wrong? Is fervent belief in an ideal more powerful than the truth of that ideal? I don't think so. In our pluralistic society, no one wants to stick out their neck and say that they think they are right and someone else is not. We don't want to appear judgmental or insensitive so we have made it Ok for everyone to be right and no one to be wrong. Really? Does that make any sense? How can everyone be right, and no one be wrong? It's impossible. That's not how the truth works. There's ultimately always a right and a wrong. The problem is we're cowards. We don't want to take a stand. I'm not saying we need to see everything in black or white. There are many shades of gray in life as well. We don't need to beat our opinions or beliefs into other people in condemning hurtful ways either, but we do need to figure out what we believe and why we believe it. Over the years I have come to the conclusion that it's the object of the belief rather than the belief itself that really counts. I agree it's important to have beliefs and convictions, but it's more important to believe in something that is fundamentally true and sound than just to "believe it something."

The Power of Words to Transform

It's the beginning of 2012, a time for new beginnings, goals, hopes and dreams. Never mind that everything I said last year has long since been forgotten. I have a chance to start something new, (which let's face it) is always more fun than sticking with something that is old, tedious and sometimes boring. Yep, that's always been an issue for me. I'm a grown up kid with ADD and unless I'm totally, 100% committed to it, it's hard for me to stick to anything for any length of time. Therefore, I making one more attempt at being a grown up and following through on something I have started. Thus this blog with a "word for the month". I will change my monthly "word" and express some of my thoughts and meanderings about how this word is influencing and changing me during that month. I figure, that gives me 12 times a year to change my focus while allowing me to maintain a singular blog for an extended period of time. For me, that would be a mini-miracle. Feel free to follow me on this journey or better yet join me. If you want to, choose your own word for the month or write comments on mine. Who knows? I might just end up becoming a grown up yet!