We've had some good days. We've had some bad days. We are tired, scared, shaken, hopeful, hopeless, determined, desperate, confused, patient, impatient, uncertain... We are, by times, all of that and more. The power balance, that has for so long formed the foundation of our lives together, has shifted; tilted; ground to a near standstill... Moving forward in that realm remains something that is ahead for us, we believe.
And that is the core of what I think we are about -- all of us: we are believing. On so many levels, and in so many ways, we are each clinging to a belief in a future we cannot yet see. We are determinedly believing in the power and strength of what we have had together -- what we've built together. We are working to believe the best of one another, and refusing to believe the worst of each other.
There isn't a lot of wisdom that I have to share about the choice to keep on believing. I feel like I am in the middle of the storm and cannot see very clearly. So perhaps some, with more wisdom than I'll ever manage, can offer some perspective on the subject:
By believing passionately in something that still does not exist, we create it. The nonexistent is whatever we have not sufficiently desired.
Franz Kafka
Franz Kafka
Every person is the creation of himself, the image of his own thinking and believing. As individuals think and believe, so they are.
Claude M. Bristol
Claude M. Bristol
Magic is believing in yourself, if you can do that, you can make anything happen.
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
To love means loving the unlovable. To forgive means pardoning the unpardonable. Faith means believing the unbelievable. Hope means hoping when everything seems hopeless.
Gilbert K. Chesterton
Gilbert K. Chesterton
swan
Your strength and hope are inspiring. I read your blog and am in awe of how dedicated to one another you are. I pray for you and my heart goes out to you. May peace and happiness abound for you all.
ReplyDelete~AA~
Thank you. There is so much power in those quotes.
ReplyDeleteo.g.
I think you've absolutely got it. Life is long, and that's how you hang through the impossible times until you can make a life again. I have had cancer twice, and was proven to be extremely lucky each time, but in the middle of that, it did not seem so. I helped a very close family member die. My satisfying 37 year marriage is that way because we had horrible times and remade it as a consequence as we each changed twice. Through each step was such an unbelievably painful task. It seemed unbelievable that it was even happening, and at so many steps I did not believe I could not do it, but in the end, even then, there were lessons and gifts. You get through what you thought you could never get through, and you look back from your better future in amazement at what you have and how bad it was. I'm sure this better future awaits you at the end of this daily battle.
ReplyDeleteSo, if I may, add a couple of quotes, too? I hope you won't find them irreverent, but I find I need humor to remind me that there is life outside my door when I struggle, that the world is larger than me sometimes.
"Everyhting will be okay in the end. If it's not okay, it's not the end."
[Unknown]
"There is no use trying," said Alice; "one can't believe in impossible things." "I dare say you haven't had much practice," said the Queen. "When I was your age, I always did it for half an hour a day. Why, sometimes I've believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast." Lewis Carroll
I picked up both of these during one of the crisis times with the parents when I had no life, no hope, and was trying hard to hang onto the feelings you relate above. I keep them very visible every day, and try to keep them in mind.
A quote I saw in a coffee shop the other day, that made me grin:
ReplyDelete"rock bottom provides an excellent firm base from which to take wing...."
The 'Believe" post reminds me of this:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LbXiECmCZ94
Best wishes for all of you -
Liz