I have always loved the word remembering. Our ability to re-member leads us to healing in so many ways.
United States citizens and residents experienced a dismemberment of it’s people, it’s previously-exempt-from-war land, it’s emotions, it’s New York skyline, it’s Pentagon building, it’s Pennsylvania field, eleven years ago today.
We gasped in horror, we swore in vain, we collapsed in pools of tears and guttural pain. In an instant, everyday women became widows, men became widowers, children became orphans.
We were paralyzed in fear, staring at televisions, glued to radios, punching into our cell phones for meaning, for connection, for hope, for answers. Then we subconsciously shifted gears much like we mindlessly do in driving manual shift cars, and searched for ways to help. How could we contribute? We could give blood, we could pray, we could band together and hold each other; we could LIVE through whatever would come next. We would lay down partisanship, race , and socioeconomic distinction, we would see everyone as human and worthy to love or befriend.
Propelled to somehow erase the rage, the bewilderment, and the helplessness, we eventually strove to put one foot in front of the other. The confirmed widowed, the grieving families of missing-and-presumed-dead occupants of each–the towers, the Pentagon and the airplanes–NEEDED the country and the citizens of the world to respond with a sense of re-membering that which had been rendered separate. And while the departed exist on a different plane other than that which we know, we have experienced countless communications with them, assuring us that they indeed remember us, and that they are completing far different missions, including guiding our steps and contributing to the healing of our nation and world.
We know from far lesser loss situations (and from the Indian saying) that holding a grudge against someone is like drinking poison and waiting for that person/those persons to die; it’s senseless and more than that, it is deadly to US. Our personal health depends upon our ability to re-member ourselves, our neighbors, our country, our world.
How can we erase the hurt? We will never forget the hurt. We can, however, help get through the hurt, by remembering what we are grateful for, and writing those down. We can reach out and give something to someone–a smile, a quarter for a parking meter, a knowing, empathic head nod, a hug, a phone call, a card, the gift of our presence. And when you give, you get, have you noticed? When you feel more like a victim than a victor in your life, I implore you to muster the energy and marshall the strength and initiative to GIVE something to someone. If you can’t start with yourself, start with someone near you, yet GIVE.
It is what has saved America and the world from the beginning of time, and it is the formula for our survival and certainly for our thriving. GIVE … and watch what grows. My harvest has often been HOPE, followed by CONFIDENCE, and with CONFIDENCE and HOPE, there is no stopping us; We Can Do It Women!™
