Happy Wingsday!

Yay it's Wingsday - no not Wednesday - Wingsday! That day of the week where we think about angels a little bit more than usual. We pause in the middle of our week to be still and consider... which is really meditating. 

Recently we read a story that gave us a new perspective in the "pauses" of our lives. The unwelcome interruption of a phone call at dinner, the person who could have turned on that green light but didn't so now we sit through a red light, a child who asks us to play with them when we have dishes to clean...the interruptions and pauses are many and come in all shapes and sizes.

The author went on to tell the story of how she and her husband were rushing about in the midst of a family crisis at a nursing home. They were leaving (or trying to leave) a parking lot on their way to their next thing - only to be interrupted by an elderly slow man with a walker and downtrodden face walking in front of their parked car. "Could this man walk any slower? We have places to be and things to get done." they thought.

Then the author and her husband looked at this man with different eyes - not the rushed get out of my way eyes - but "eyes to see the sacred." It appeared this elderly man may have just lost his wife. He had some dolls in his hands and was placing them ever so gently in his car. They were witnessing what appeared to be a moment of loss, of grief, of memories.

She said it best: "How often do we pass by someone, irritated by their attitude or even their lack of interaction with us? We may have taken a cursory glance at what's going on - at who they are - and not seen the burden weighing down their heart, shaping their response. A sharp tone may be a hint that someone is in physical or emotional pain. Reticence might mean someone struggles with hearing or vision loss ... or emotional loss. Someone's interruption of our lives might be an intersection of the normal with the sacred - but we have to be willing to stop and see them anew, with eyes of grace."

Today I created a pause in my schedule. I searched out my hiding kids and tickled them incessantly and without mercy. It was a moment that they delighted in and I was glad to have given up for them. My to-do list didn't shrink while I was doing that. But our connections to each other expanded because I paused and look at things differently.

Take some time today to pause and see someone differently.

#interruptions #thingstodo #wait #pause #kids #differently #life #moment
#angels #whereisyourangel