I was driving through the city yesterday, a very cloudy grey day, and had not put my sunglasses on. After all, it was cloudy and grey, but not the shade of grey that gives me headaches because it is hard on the eyes. So I thought, “What the heck? I don’t need the shades.” After stopping for gas and then proceeding on to my next stop, half way down the street the sun suddenly burst out from behind the clouds and I was almost blinded from all the glinting off of shiny surfaces. In contrast to the dark grey it was like having stadium lights suddenly turned on. So as I drove I reached into my satchel and grabbed my shades and put them on.
Then it hit me. That is so much like life. So often people get used to the dark grey in their lives. They become accustomed to it. They begin to trust that which is bland and uninspired. They become zombies in the everlasting dark cloud of life. And then, when they suddenly see the rays of Light in their lives, they are unprepared. It blinds them. They search around frantically for something to darken it a bit so that it is not so intense. They will grab onto anything that will support the darker side of life. They will do their best to make sure that the Light is blocked, because in order to live in it one must step up to it. And when the cloud blows in again they actually heave a sigh of relief because they were right, life IS dark and cloudy and grey and uninspired.
When they do this, they miss out on the goodness that is right there in front of them. They become so oppressed and so depressed that the goodness even appears to be a lie. If they cannot prove that the goodness does not exist, then they will squish it until it no longer exists. They actually get into the habit of thinking that if THEY can’t have goodness, then by God NO ONE WILL. So they put on their fierce masks of oppression and force their views on everyone else around them. They can even be cruel to their own children in hopes of raising them “right” in the oppression of whatever belief system they hold dear.
So as I drove the rest of my journey through the city, even with my shades on to prevent headaches (use that as a metaphor if you will), I found myself nonetheless appreciating the glints and shine of the light as it made itself known. I reminded myself to be grateful for every single day that the sun shines and gives life to our little planet. And I readied myself for the day ahead…which was forecast to be overcast and grey and possibly even snowing. But that was not going to ruin my day. And as a result, I had a BLAST.