Good morning, Chaverim/Chaverot,
I have been thinking a lot lately about “ripples”, not the cheap wine we used to drink in college nor the Grateful Dead song (though it’s a good one!), but the way our actions and the energy we put out into the world make an impact upon others. So, when I turned over my calendar this morning to this “Note from the Universe”, it felt like a prompt to share some thoughts about how we all leave our mark on our world.
Here is today’s Gratitude Thought in the Midst of a Pandemic:
“There’s a reason you chose Earth,
exactly when you did, as exactly who you are,
with those already in your life and those who soon will be:
To be an example, to shine your light, and to give hope.Yeah, you were needed….super bad.”
The Universe
There are a few recent events that got me thinking about the impact I have had/will have on the world…I got a LinkedIn message out of the blue from someone whom I barely knew more than 20 years ago who thanked me for being kind to her when her mother died and let me know that she still remembers me and my kindness all these years later; I heard from a former client (with whom I had worked about 7 or 8 years ago and who has since moved to Colorado) that she often uses some of the things she learned from me in her work with her clients; and another former client (from about 2010) just reached out this week to ask me if I could help her sister as I had helped her. Needless to say, I have been both grateful and humbled to learn of the impact I have made on the lives of these three people…and others whom they have touched…my ripples.
And, I am not special in any way….this impact, this “ripple effect”, is not at all unique to me. What each of us does in our day-to-day lives…in the way we work, in the values by which we live, in the words we speak, in our smiles and those simple gestures of kindness we do without thinking and promptly forget, in the “example” we try so hard to set for our children and grandchildren…MATTERS…what we do affects those around us, those lives we touch, in ways we may never know. For better or worse, this is a truth to which we must all pay attention.
I know many will think this is a bit “woo woo’, but I am pretty clear that G-d, or the Universe, or some other force (for good) that I may never understand, put me here to be a “good example”, to share and “shine my light” as much and as often and with as many people as I can, and to open doors to possibility and “hope” for others in my work and my relationships. And, again, I am in no way exceptional, I believe that we are each unique, each sent here to fulfill our own unique purpose in ways no one else can. Yup, we are all “needed…super bad!” and we all have our own work to do…after Shabbat, of course…to put our special goodness out there and, then to wait and watch and see where our “ripples” will go!
Wishing you all a peaceful Shabbat!
Marci
