Photo by Ev on Unsplash
Some time ago, I was working with a group of formerly homeless individuals to create a video about their experiences of being housed and the difference having a home made in their lives.
One of the participants, I’ll call her ‘Gladys’, when asked, “What did you fear most when you were homeless,” replied without hesitation. “Dying on the streets.”
Someone else responded with, “I’ll die and no one will find me for days.”
Another, “No one will know I’m gone.”
Gladys is living in an apartment now. In her new way of being she is supported by people who understand her fears, and who believe that with compassionate care, she can thrive in community.
Her thriving will not look like yours or mine. It will be different. But then, mine is different than yours and yours is different than someone else’s. It is our differences that create the vibrancy of our communities. It is our diversity that builds strength into the intersections of our lives.
There is possibility in our differences. There is connection.
In my life, I have done many things and learned many lessons. Some, I’d like to keep. Some I can live without. What I’ve learned most though is that all things make a difference. It’s up to me to determine what kind of difference I want to make through my experiences. And while the past is a good teacher, it can also be a lodestone.
It all depends on what I do with my experiences.
My experiences make me who I am today, but my past does not define me. I do.
When our experiences lead us to believe the past is a closed loop of repetition, repeating again and again what happened then, we close off possibility of better.
When we use our experiences of the past with the intent to inform our actions for the better today, we can create better, we can make a difference and make our world a loving kind of different place for everyone.
There are people living on our streets today, and in our emergency shelters, who have given up on believing there is another way. They live with the constant fear that dying on the streets will become their future.
In the streets they walk everyday, they have lost sight of possibility. They have lost hope for a new way of being present in the world.
There are people living in our communities today, who have given up on believing there is another way. They live with the constant fear that without high fences, without holding on to what they have, they will be unsafe in their homes and in their community.
In the streets they walk everyday, they have lost sight of possibility. They have lost hope for a new way of being present in the world.
To be present in this world in new and loving ways, we must see this world in new and loving ways.
When I see it through eyes of fear, I know fear.
When I breathe into possibility, when I open myself up to allowing possibility for another way to arise, my world becomes a reflection of what I want to create more of in the world around me.
We all know fear. We have all been touched by change and its constant hammering away at the walls of our comfort zones demanding we learn to stretch and find new moves to take us away from where we are into that place where anything is possible. To do that, we must let go of holding onto to what we know and free ourselves to let go of what we fear.
Just as Gladys is learning to let go of her fear she will die on the streets, the possibility exists for each of us to let go of our fear the future will be a repetition of the past. In letting go, we set ourselves free to create the kind of world our children will be free to live in without fearing the past will never end.
To find a new way of being present in the world today, we must we let go of believing the past is the only door we can walk through to get to a better future.
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Dare Boldly 