Being my Best Self

Covid 19 and post-Covid certainly has exposed a lot of the best and worst in the world. And in me.  It’s been a journey to see what I’m made of. Not just how I take care of our earth in minuscule ways but how I can build better relationships or at least the potential for better relationships, closer relationships.

I once read that what comes from the heart, goes to the heart. Watching someone in their zone, moves me. Someone skilled at what they do – a musician, an artist, a homemaker. They make their craft look effortless. It not only entertains me but moves me inside. It touches my heart.

Why don’t I get moved on the inside with others things? I believe it has to do with God. It wasn’t until MS forced me to give up employment altogether that my dreams of writing or making a real difference that it sprang back like a parched plant. God was telling me that since MY plan was a wash now, he could do something with me. And that’s when I started really living, when I entered life.

I’m born with certain talents, gifts, or passions – we all are. But because of the relationship with Christ, developing mine excites me even more and that excitement seems to touch other lives around me. Moves them, and I believe it’s his spirit through me that is doing the work. Not me, I just said yes, and made room for Him.

I hang around with people who do the same thing. They’re enlivened by the things they do because of their relationship with Christ. I have a girlfriend fascinated with her new retirement life and all that she does. She living it her best-self engaged in a diverse range of activities. She inspires me to invest in new hobbies and interests regardless of my health condition. I took a ‘How to Listen to Classical Music’ course, something completely foreign to me. Or paddling last summer. I joined an MS Outriggers team. I see those things as God calling me to keep engaged in the here and now, in hope, and in life. True, I can get over-busy perfecting my surroundings, nit-picking something or another, worry about popular opinion but it isn’t long before I’m empty and He has to get me back on track.

When I look deep into who I am, what I am made of, and am open to Him abiding with me, and I Him, things happen. He gives me the opportunity galore to be a better person. He inspires me to do my miniscule part like mindful consumerism, lending an ear, or dropping a hello card in the mail. And through that relationship with the Creator, I am learning how to become who I was intended to be. MS or not, I can still do that.

And the very first step begins with desire. God won’t go where’s he not invited. But when I invite him in, he walks with me every step of the way to become all that I can be. Then life became truly become fulfilling, vibrant, and meaningful.

Not just busy.