Hills and Valleys

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It’s all about perspective. That’s what I was reminded of today, sitting in the front row, tears streaming down my face already after the first refrain of God, You’re so Good. Whether I am standing, celebrating at the highest height or collapsing to my knees, deep in the trenches of despair, the force at work guiding my life is so good.

I remember a time where I was doing what I thought all good rebellious young adults are “supposed to” do, shedding what felt, at the time, like the chains of my religious upbringing. I looked to the seemingly cruel Old Testament God of destruction and scoffed at the idea that this same angry God could want good for me. What a joke! I looked to the flawed humans that claimed to be mouthpieces of the Divine and rolled my eyes at the hypocrisy of their words in relationship to their actions. Do as I say not as I do, hmpf! I found a disdain for the narrowness of religious dogma and even as I began to turn my face back to the God of my youth, I was determined to seek Him my own way.

And what I found, in my seeking and searching in the dark and in the light, was that the natural activity of all living beings, creatures, matter, is aimed towards growth. Even the moments of life that seem desolate, the bare winter landscapes or the cleansing fires that spark in the forests, are necessary to make space for new life.

In the microcosm of my own life I found that the times I felt torn apart, buried, and barren were inevitably just what I needed to make space for something better. I also found that the amount that I suffered was in direct proportion to how tightly I clung onto the aspect of my life that was transforming whether I liked it or not. Maybe it was those deep roots of my childhood church experience, maybe some of us are just more inclined to trust that there is a plan that we don’t fully understand, maybe it was trial and error, whatever it was there came a point where I refused to wallow in my circumstances knowing that something better was coming. Good was coming and whether I saw it on the horizon or not was inconsequential for its arrival in my life, but trust, a loose grip and an open heart, those were absolute requirements.

When we arrive on the top of the mountain, surveying the landscape beneath us, reminded of the valleys, the struggle through thick and thorny forest, or the exhausting climb up steep terrain, it’s easy to see the reward, but what about while we are in the thick of it? How do we know without a shadow of a doubt that the view will inevitably be worth more than what the climb might cost us?

We say so. That is how.

Our words carry tremendous power. The frequency and tone with which we communicate makes a significant difference as to how they are received. I am sure we can all recognize the difference between feeling barked at and asked to do something politely, even without use of “the magic word.” The words we choose to describe people, places, and things, can impact other people’s experiences before they have ever even come into contact with them. If I tell you about bad service at a restaurant chances are you will find yourself on the receiving end of the same treatment, if for no other reason that that is what you were looking for based on what you had been told.

The power of positive thinking, the fame and success of The Secret, the use of specific chant and mantra or positive affirmations, all come from this line of thinking that our words carry a frequency that is strong enough to attract into our lives exactly what we are speaking, if for no other reason at all then the fact that what we say we seek, the words we use color the outcome whether we realize it or not.

That being the case, why would I choose to do anything other than speak growth into my life?

Why would you?