There are moments in life that sort of change everything, aren’t there? “Life changing moments,” as they’re so aptly named. I’ve had several, myself. When my son was diagnosed with a class 3 brain hemorrhage, for example. Or the phone call from my friend’s husband informing me that she had died. Those kinds of circumstantial things – events. There you are, minding your own business when, WHAM! The phone rings with news on the other line that takes you on a journey you hadn’t asked for. We often romanticize these moments into sonnets of perpetuated self-preservation or salvation…but the truth is, these moments are all lessons in having control over very little. We don’t necessarily become better people because of them; we simply become more prepared for the next one.
But there’s a moment I’d like to share that involved no phone, no tears, no doctors…just a refrigerator. It was my brother’s “overflow” fridge off of his kitchen, where he and his wife keep their beverages and homemade pizza dough. I went to open it and right at my eye line was a quotable magnet with the following saying. “Life isn’t about finding yourself, it’s about creating yourself.” Think about that for a second. Think about these quests we’ve all been on to scratch that imperceptible itch, or these trips to faraway lands to find peace…to “make sense of it all.” Think about how, even now, we rationalize new careers, new friends, new paths to the people we love with the promise of “finding” ourselves.
Think of all what we’ve compromised for a personal gain that never really pays off.
That moment at the fridge was a life changing moment for me (as they so often are.) Because that little magnet told me what no one else had ever been able to.
Stop looking, it said, and simply become the person you want to be.
