no small deeds of Kindness … (04/10/12)
“Pilgrim, are you walking with your heart or with your head?”
~ graffiti seen along my Camino de Santiago pilgrimage (back in the fall of 2008)
That really is the question, isn’t it? Whether we are going to work or tending the baby, sharing time with a friend or being attacked by an enemy, the only thing that truly matters is whether we are in those moments with our cold & analytical heads or with our compassionate & courageous hearts.
Today marks the one-year anniversary of the very first step of a 900+ mile Peace Pilgrimage I walked last spring from Chattanooga, Tennessee, to Lighthouse Point, Florida (a bit north of Miami) … I walked 700+/- miles of that way carrying no money, no food & no water, and I never once asked for assistance of any kind. In the wild, dangerous, terrifying place that is “the world”, I was completely penniless and completely alone.
In the beginning, I was often “in my head” — cold and afraid and hungry. It was less than pleasant … And yet something happened on day three that I will always remember: I chose to stop worrying about myself and whether or not I would “make it”, and I started opening up to folks — simply trying to make their days a bit better. And an amazing thing happened when I did so: my fear disappeared, and my hunger faded away along with it. I wasn’t even cold anymore.
And as I began reaching out and connecting with the people around me, I rediscovered something truly wonderful —
… I rediscovered that people are quite simply amazingly GOOD.
Indeed, even though I was literally sustained for a large portion of my Trek by “the Divine” (whatever that is), I still wouldn’t have survived were it not for the courage of the hundreds of folks who reached out to me along the way.
Conservatives and liberals, black folks and white folks, the dirt poor and the exceedingly rich — over and over and over I was shown that real LOVE exists at the core of the human heart.
And all we need to do to feel it blossom again in our own lives is to have the guts to Care —
… especially for the strangers we meet,
… especially for those who annoy us,
… especially for our enemies.
Rest assured, every small act of Kindness is VERY important for the one receiving it …
Indeed, without such “small” acts of Kindness, I would already be dead.
So to all those who woke up and did the courageous thing back then —
to all those who swallowed their very reasonable fears and reached out instead to this big, gangly, strange-looking stranger …
THANK YOU!
LOVE to you is LIFE to someone else …
… got LOVE?
“A Pilgrim does not quench his thirst with whatever is offered, and yet touches each cup with gentle lips.
A Pilgrim knows that breathing is praying, and thereby becomes himself a prayer.
A Pilgrim sees insecurity as the possibility of possibilities, allowing his dread to dance joyfully under the sun.
A Pilgrim knows that, even though he may travel in circles, with Love he can never go astray.”
~ inspired by Bodvar Schjelderup
…
“Where there is Kindness and selfless Love, God is truly present.”
~ Latin saying (Ubi caritas et amor, Deus ibi est.)
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