Dear Spiritual Companions,

I read these words by Father Richard Rohr this morning, “How you do anything is how you do everything.”  Rohr is a great Wisdom figure of our day.  Individuals who speak with the gift of Wisdom say things that reach right into our hearts.  What they say is meant to be pondered in the deepest recesses of our minds.  It is intended to percolate so our rational mind can interact with our mystical spirit.  This allows our human adventure to embrace the eternal presence of God.  Here is what Rohr’s words mean to me.  I relate my ideas not to have you think like I do – How boring? – but rather to spur your thinking.

Every day when I come to the end of my morning walk I stop into the Shell Convenience Store for my morning coffee.  They pay minimum wage to the clerks so they come and go quite frequently.  I try to reach out to them as quickly as possible.  Another new clerk started recently and so when I paid for my coffee I gave her my smile, some kind words and told her I would see her the next day.  After a couple of days of responding to her question, “How are you today?’ and my usual response of, “Great because I am here with a person like yourself” we began to bond.  Today when I went in and handed her my coffee card to be signed so I would eventually get a free cup, she checked three spots instead of the usual one.  I was deeply touched.  It wasn’t a big thing she did, but it spoke of a kind gesture on her part to me.  We connected spirit to spirit.  Could it be the little things we do make a difference?  I wonder.

We often are caught up in the big things in life aren’t we?  What is my talent we ask ourselves?  As we look for it in the big things we do, how many times do we miss it in the anything we do?  So much of life is the little things isn’t it?  How we greet our mate or partner first thing in the morning.  How we rise up out of bed saying, “Oh no another day or wow another day to live!”  Whether we look someone in the eye when we say hello or just pass them by without a word.  The funniest thing about how we do anything is mostly about who we are.  Others may not even notice us but all those anything’s result in a life time of everything.  What we bring to this life in attitude ends up becoming the life we live.  We see it over and over again.  The same thing can happen to two people, but with radical differences.  Two people grow up in the same miserable family system and one comes out smiling and rejoicing in life while the other spends their life time bemoaning how this could happen to them.  The littlest anything we do is found in the way we see life unfolding for us.

This life is a gift.  Everything in it is meant for our good, even the bad!  When do we learn the most, good times or bad?  I have discovered it is in the bad.  Don’t get me wrong, I love when my life is going along smoothly.  It is delight when my sports team wins or I have a success.  But when I encounter a defeat, illness or problem this is when life opens at my feet.  I need to be willing to embrace the unfairness of what is happening with another or the pain of my illness.  Now I see the more found in the supposed bad of life.  I am not defeated by it, but rather strengthened when I face the supposed negative times.  Suffering comes not from facing the pain, but from running away from it.  It’s true, how I do anything is how I do everything.  My life can be full of various defeats, but the victory is found in growing through them and finding the gift in them.  I can enjoy my life or suffer through it.  The choice is up to me and I believe the same is true for you.  The answer will be found in how we do anything today which will result in a lifetime of everything we do.

Watch out someone may punch your coffee card more than once because of a little thing you did.

Peace,

Gary