Why is it that we let the world take us over and we forget how wonderful life is? I haven't watched "It's a wonderful life" in years but I can still recite most of the lines and the major plot of the show. What a powerful message that show brings to all of us. How simple it is to understand that the reason we are here on the earth is to let go of the "worldly" things and to hold onto the important.
As children our lives revolve around happiness, learning, and our families - all the important things in life. If we are brought up in loving homes with goodly parents, those things are constantly at our grasp. As we grow up, our world starts to extend beyond the walls of our family/home and there we start to crumble. As teenagers, and through the rest of our lives we strive to prove ourselves, to compete or compare ourselves to others, to find ourselves, and to constantly wonder why. The little stresses of life confound us at every turn, attachments if we are single, children if we are parents, work if we have jobs, deadlines for anything and everything, time and how quickly it flies.
Christ said to return to him, we must "become as little children". I have heard that phrase all my life in Sunday School lessons, songs in Primary, and Sacrament Meetings. Today it finally made sense. I don't need to "find" out who I am, I was born knowing and until the world stepped in, I was happy and content with who I was. I did all the things I loved: danced, sang, played, read, kissed and hugged and loved people unconditionally, forgave easily and with no strings attached. Harbored no grudges and felt pain when I hurt myself but than it felt better because someone cared and patched it up. As a teenager, it took me until my Senior year in HS to "find" myself and discover that I liked who I was and could stand on my own two feet no matter what the idiots around me thought. Senior year was the best year I ever had in HS - I did all the things I loved. I sang, danced, wrote, read, hung out with friends, made life lasting friends and got rid of the ones that didn't matter. Now as an adult, with my own children and friends starting to face these realities - it's finally hitting me - I KNOW who I am - but I let the world influence me and distract me, so I forget.
I'm still that child who loves to sing, to dance, to play and have fun, I still care and love unconditionally and my children have learned to still accept random hugs and kisses. =] I need to not let the world remove "my child" from me - but embrace it so that I don't forget the trust and faith that my Heavenly Father wants me to have. The feelings that the world feels once a year at Christmas time - when we all remember and return to being kids. The Spirit of Christ, the gift of love, and the only way we can return to him.
No comments:
Post a Comment