You’ve Arrived
I’ve literally made it my business to be a life-long learner, to practice “being here now,” and to absorb the power and peace that goes along with it.
Yet in the midst of a leisurely Skype call with my Dad in Israel, he caught me by surprise when he announced, “You’ve arrived.”
Huh?
To be sure, I have more than a few woes. My 80 years young mother has cancer – again. My younger sister was recently diagnosed with stage 4 lung cancer – doesn’t smoke. I can’t shake a cold after 10 days made worse hanging out in the emergency room when my mom was rushed 911 style to ER due to a seizure caused by a mixture of coumadin (a blood thinner) and an over-the-counter sinus congestion nasal inhaler. (She is stabilized and doing remarkable well.) Oh, and my dad is about to go in for a heart procedure. Please, allow me to stop there.
So I’m musing with my 82 years young father. “Despite all I have going on with my life, Dad, I feel good. I am happy. Most of all, I feel peaceful. How could that be?” Without skipping a beat, he says, “Sounds like you’ve arrived.” And you know what? In an instant I got it. I reached my destination. Me.
Surely, it’s been a bumpy ride and I don’t pretend that this arrival marks the end of the road; it simply validates the work, the process, the integrity in which I strive to live, albeit at times messily – the continuous search for authenticity – now realized. A sense of being at home with myself, living according to what matters to me, honestly, heartfully, gratefully.
Are you there yet? If so, good to be with you. If not, continue on your journey, wide-eyed and present to your opportunities and choices. You have the power. And the power if now.
Wherever you are, I will surely run into you on the road one of these days. In fact, we already have. Right here.