Gifts are something received, usually from another person. Yet, there are times when gifts are received from Above or from within, not from a person. The origin of the gift does not diminish or change its value. In fact, it will often enhance it.
In conversations throughout my career with people going through turmoil I will often ask whether someone believes that God has a plan for them. After they briefly reflect, the answer I usually get back is “no,” they do not believe in destiny. God does not steer them through life. They choose their own path and choices.
“What if,” I urge them on, “What if God whispers into your mind options that exceed your present mindset? What if ideas come randomly that tell you that there is more to life than what you know now? It is then becomes your choice to follow the voice or take the path that is most familiar.” In other words, I suggest, God has a plan for us but we can turn aside from it or remain indifferent to the directional.
Pain and the fear of pain is one of the strongest impediments to change and growth. Those who can reinvent themselves or change life’s direction may find deep reservoirs of creativity and strengths they never knew existed.
Renoir uttered as he struggled with painful arthritic fingers, “The pain passes, the beauty remains.”
The artist would not be deterred from his passion despite the pain. For Renoir, the gift needed to be released. Nothing would stand in his way of making artistic masterpieces.
That is our challenge. Can we muster the internal fortitude to live up to God’s expectation of us and our potential?
The Talmud declares, “Growth or death.” Of course they do not mean to say that if we do not grow we actually die physically; but we do kill our potential.
Once, when we were young, we were fearless. Challenges were taken to be opportunities. Then with age, we learned to take fewer challenges to avoid failure. This decision limited our ability to learn and transcend what we are. Of course that does not mean that we should immediately take up skydiving. Or does it? In any event, the risk of failure is worth the price paid as it results in a more meaningful life.
In “Living with Loss,” the authors declare, “Ultimately whether grief destroys you or strengthens you is something only you can decide.” I suspect that throughout our lives, God gently encourages us to move out of our comfort zone – to learn new skills, take a Hebrew class, become an adult Bar Mitzvah, travel to Israel, stand up and speak out for our beliefs, sing more loudly, take up dance lessons, enroll in an on-line course in Jewish thought, take the class in creative art that you’ve always dreamed of… Listen to the whisper of the Voice.
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