Look up!

Daily walking has been a physical and spiritual practice of mine for years. I playfully have called it my time of exorcising all the demons that distract my mind and perturb my general wellbeing.

As the sun was rising one morning while I walked in the neighborhood of Springfield, IL, where I lived for a season of my life, an inaudible voice spoke into my ear, “Look up!” My head jerked skyward. To my amazement the heavens were ablaze with an array of colors cast against unusual and splendid configurations of clouds that caused me to come full stop and stare reverently into the magic show above me.

When I, as a child, would get wrapped up in minutiae that would unnecessarily absorb my attention and often cause me to grouch, bicker, or major in the minors, my mother would quietly whisper in my ear, “Sharon, remember you are bigger than that!” Her prompt would remind me to pay attention to a larger reality that held me in being and called me to a purpose that transcended the shallowness and narrowness embedded in any one moment.

Today, when I get yanked to and fro by the volatile political winds that seek to impose, divide, conquer, and harm the people and creatures who live with me on this planet, I remember the two voices that often even now speak into my ear, “Look up! Remember, you are bigger than that!” They lead me out of my immediate consternation and self-interest and toward the higher ground that will save our human family and planet from our petty, worst and even cruel, corrupt selves…and draw us as many parts into one body—if we but look up, remember, and heed.