Start by doing what's necessary; then do what's possible; and suddenly you are doing the impossible.
- Saint Francis of Assisi
By keeping my heart where my hands are I find that I accomplish the impossible. By doing the next necessary task, by doing the next right thing, the thing that is right in front of me to do I move from the necessary to the impossible.
When I started working on my teaching certificate in special education I was able to take one night class a semester. I worked during the day teaching severely emotionally challenged teens in a locked psychiatric ward. Not how I envisioned my teaching career going, but it paid the bills. At the time it seemed like and impossibility that I would ever get my degree. Five years later I finished that degree. In my last semester I was helping a professor teach her class and she asked if I needed a part time job. The job started at 6 hours a week. It grew and grew as I added more students and 4 years later I still have that job and it is the most amazing job I've ever had. All I did was the next thing in front of me and very slowly the pieces all fell into place.
Now I find myself living all the dreams I dreamed 25 years ago when I was just 18. I've always known that I wanted to teach part time and live on a farm. I just couldn't see how that was ever going to happen. At times during my life it seemed like I couldn't be any farther from that goal. Now that I am here I can see that everything I went through, both good and bad, was just another necessary step on the path that lead to this farm and this life. At the time I couldn't see how what I was doing had anything to do with getting here. Now I see that it was all part of the journey.
I have been truly blessed. You can't get here from where I was. It's impossible. In fact, you can't even see here from there. But in God all things are possible. By taking the next necessary action, God has led me here. By doing the next necessary thing, the impossible has been accomplished. What a beautiful, beautiful thing it is.
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What an inspiring post! I just finished a book I know you would LOVE. It's Running to the Mountain: A Journey of Faith and Change by Jon Katz. Although his circumstances are not quite yours, you have a lot in common with this man. He bought a ramshackle cabin in the mountains of upstate NY which becomes his retreat with his two beloved Labs. He also reads and re-reads all the works of the Trappist monk Thomas Merton, whom he frequently quotes. Katz wrote, "My days took on echoes of his. They included contemplation, simplicity, solitude, and plenty of hard work." This was a book I was sorry to see end. I really hope you will try to locate it.
ReplyDeleteOne truley understands how blessed they are when they look back at how far they have come.
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