I’m cleaning out my files – always an unpleasant task for myriad reasons. For a start, it makes me nervous to find things I dropped through the cracks months ago. I also get depressed thinking about things I wish I had done differently. And then there are the things I don’t know how to act on or I’m trying to forget. That’s why I buried it in a file drawer in the first place. And trust me, buried is the right word.
I am however, turning over a new leaf, as they say. (I have to. I lost the old one.)
Before that can happen, I need to sift through these piles of papers, just to make sure I’m not throwing out anything important, like my passport or the only existing copy of whatever. While I would rather set the whole mess on fire and move on, I’m old enough to know that this doesn’t work – in life or filing. I have to face the music.
So it’s late afternoon and the vultures are circling, the dark clouds descending and I’m muttering to myself something about quitting when suddenly, a wrinkled photocopy falls into my lap – words from Mother Teresa, tucked between an old Christmas script and handwritten notes from a Madagascar trip. Don’t ask why these three items would be in the same file. It might have something to do with the color blue, I don’t remember.
But I don’t believe in coincidences. I think God meant for me to see these words today – words spoken by a woman who is my personal hero – to remind me, to center me.
People are often unreasonable, illogical, and self-centered; forgive them anyway.
If you are kind, people may accuse you of selfish,ulterior motives; be kind anyway.
If you are successful, you will win some false friends and some true enemies; succeed anyway.
If you are honest and frank, people may cheat you; be honest and frank anyway.
What you spend years building, someone could destroy overnight; build anyway.
If you find serenity and happiness, they may be jealous; be happy anyway.
The good you do today, people will often forget tomorrow; do good anyway.
Give the world the best you have and it may never be enough; give the world the best you’ve got anyway.
You see, in the final analysis, it is between you and God.
It was never between you and them anyway.
It’s between me and God.
What I do, I do for God, because of God, with God, in full sight of God – no matter how it turns out.
I also remind myself that I am often part of the problem – unreasonable, illogical and self-centered etc etc. But forgiving myself wouldn’t be out of line.
On the contrary, it would be healing.
I swat feebly at the vultures. I’m not dead yet. I blow fresh breath to scatter the dark clouds and tape the graying paper to my wall. It’s between me and God – which is both comforting and terrifying. But I won’t quit today.
Now back to my files. Where did I tuck those matches?
