Life's Lesson II

I'm sitting here watching Touched By An Angel, the Christmas special from the first season I have on DVD. I figured Christmas was just around the corner, so why not watch the Christmas special.

I've been thinking--something I've been doing a lot of since I've been here in Rhode Island by myself. The life's lesson I've been thinking about, of all things, is love. I've realized that love is about the only thing we have in our lives. We have our friends and families, but we have them because of love. It's made me think about Christmas, and buying Christmas presents. First, let me caveat this by saying that I don't buy Christmas presents anymore, I buy someone something when I find something that I think they'll like. But, we don't buy people Christmas presents because it's Christmas and it's the chic thing to do (well, some people do, but that's another story), we buy people Christmas presents because we love them and we are buying them something that we think will make them happy. By making them happy, we make ourselves happy. It's love that does it. Love is the one thing in the world that transcends everything--space, time, emotion, it IS emotion, pure, simple and complete, it's the core of our existence, the core of who and what we are--it defines us. Without it, we'd wither away. I know for a fact that I would. I read Joseph Cardinal Bernardin's book "The Gift of Peace" today--yes the whole book. It made me realize the profound nature of life revolves around love--is love. We'll never take our material possessions with us when we pass from this life. The only thing we'll take with us is our soul. Our soul isn't fed by possessions, nor material things, it is fed by love, the love we give and the love we receive. Without it, our soul withers away, as does the very essence of our life. In this thinking, I've realized that perhaps my attitude is too negative. Greg always tells me that attitude is everything, and I'm beginning to realize the he is right. That's not true, I've always known he was right, it's just so hard to be positive in a negative world. I try really hard, and I'm going to keep trying really hard. I just wish the world weren't so negative around me. There I go, putting my own thoughts into it, my own already negative thoughts. I haven't quite figured out how to make them not so negative. But I am working on it. Working as hard as I can, and am beginning to realize that the only way to get out of the negative is to get back in touch with my spiritual side. People around me may say that it's easy to do that, but I don't believe them. Even in Cardinal Bernardin's book, he said it was easy to lose touch with the spiritual side. The theme of his book, though, was the gift of peace. The gift of peace was given to him, by God, when he was diagnosed with cancer and was dying. He said it wasn't easy to recognize that there was hope, but it was his spirituality that allowed him to accept God's gift, even realize that it was a gift from God. And it was that spirituality--and his love for his fellow man--that kept him in touch with God, made him realize that there was hope. Hope in a hopeless world, some might say--I say it isn't hopeless. As long as there are people out there like Kim, and Heather, and Greg, and Sue, and Mom and Dad, and Grandma and Grandma, hope is still alive, will always be alive. And it is that hope that I am counting on to bring me out of my negativity into hopefulness.

Anyway, I've babbled aimlessley for a while now. I'll stop and let everyone, including myself, digest the information. God bless.