For the past many weeks I have been going to the gym to walk the track while my daughters participate in a volleyball class there. When circling around, I often notice a mother doing laps with her two daughters, one of them disabled. I marvel at the mom’s determination to get this child moving, despite the challenge it looks to be to guide her along the track. I also admire the support the sibling offers her mother in this process. You can tell that together they have a single focus, to offer the disabled girl a chance to move her body and get some exercise — to give her the best quality of life they can. It appears to be a family priority and their commitment of compassion is beautiful to witness.
Perhaps the mom and sibling would like to be doing other things with their time had they another reality, but instead they seem to be clear and at peace about the work that is before them — this particular invitation in their lives to love deeply. Our culture sometimes distorts love by equating it to only good feelings, easy roads, and traveling light. In my experience that can often be the start of a journey but rarely the fullness of it over time. Instead there is something more meaningful, more powerful, about love than what comfort affords us.
Too often we miss going where we are be summoned by love because we are fixated on what our egos think we want, rather than on who our souls are asking us to become. How much more serenity might our day to day living hold if we surrendered to love whatever situation lies before us. What invitations to deep love have we received in our lives, and how might we embrace them wholeheartedly? May you be inspired!