I’m not on vacation again, but I could write about the trip for days.
Maybe I will.
In this picture we’d turned off the main road and followed a dirt road to this opening. The boys were exploring the interesting black rock, collecting unusual shells, and in general, not realizing how scorching hot it was out there.
I was watching from a distance.
As breathtaking as the view may have been, I was sweaty and hot. I wanted to be in that blue water instead of standing up on the rock. But they wanted to explore. So I took pictures, hoping they’d not want to stay too long. When suddenly this thought filled my mind:
I hope they never lose this sense of wonder.
What I was experiencing as hot, sweaty and dragging on and on, they were experiencing as a once-in-a-lifetime excursion. They were wide-eyed and fully engaged. The obvious difference?
They are children and I’m grown up.
I’ve been shaped by extraordinary privilege and comfort, expectations, classroom learning, stressful deadlines, pain from relational wounds, responsibility, my beliefs and a million other things, both good and bad. Overall, I’ve been conditioned to quiet, discount and minimize my sense of wonder. And you have too. Because, after all, ain’t nobody got time (or energy) for that.
But what if you did?
What if today you set an intention to look for beauty? What if you decided to embrace curiosity instead of giving in your conditioned judgement? What if you recognized an old belief before the opportunity passed to explore what else is there? What if you noticed the pain from an old relational wound causing you to be defensive instead of curious?
If you open your mind to notice, you could open your heart to heal.
It’s not easy to let your guard down and try to regain that childlike sense of wonder. It might be painful, hot and sweaty. It might take a really long time.
But the person you’ll become on that journey is worth it.
to more love,
Crystal
