Enigma - Who am I?

Remember the Skechers claim when you wear their tone up shoes?  Well, I think I got the dyslexic version of the supposedly slimming sneaker – my backside got bigger and my topside tinier.

My whole life has been that type of a contradiction.  It started with my vacillating vision of what to be when I grew up.  I had it narrowed down between a missionary and a go-go dancer.  Never conventional were my aspirations.

Not quite raised to be a stay-at-home mom, but not enough college to support myself comfortably, I found Mr. Right and marched my way down the aisle to suburban marital bliss.  Don’t misunderstand me.  Life has been good.  I have been happy.  It just left me wondering – what could I have become if I applied myself to something; anything.

There has not been a moment when I have been on my own.  From the safety of my childhood home to college, from college to apartment living with roommates and then into the arms of my husband and our own home, I have never had to worry about a roof over my head.

It’s time for some worry in my life.  Worry molds you, shapes you.   As long as you keep the clay moist, you can reshape the warbles that alter the shape of your choices.  I may have started out a vase and ended up a cup.  But as long as I find my intended purpose, the vessel is irrelevant.

Fifty was a milestone birthday.  I no longer want to be the dutiful daughter or complacent co-worker.  It sounds so wrong, against everything I was raised to believe.  I know I will still be all these things, but I am anxious to finally learn to be me.

What is Your Purpose?

The other evening I watched, “Signs” starring Mel Gibson.  It had been years since I originally saw it.  Always being philosophical, I loved it the first time and feared the same connection would not happen.  It did.  But why?

Everyone needs a purpose in life.  The older I become, the more urgent the need to discover my purpose.  In “Signs,” each person had their purpose and in the end it all came together what those purposes were.

Unfortunately, while we all have a purpose (and I firmly believe this), many of us aren’t afforded the opportunity to discover what that purpose in our life was.  Like the mother in “Signs,” did she know that her last words were the reason for her existence?  Does it matter that we find out?

Those with children have the joy of simply carrying on a part of them.  I never had children and so am often wracked with grief that when I die, that’s that.  Perhaps that’s why we blog, carve our names into trees, write on bathroom walls, scratch our initials into stone.  We want to visualize that we were here; that we matter.

“Signs” helps me relax that I don’t need to know my purpose.  I have to trust that God will use me as He sees fit and whether I am aware of what my existence means is not important.  Just knowing that my life had purpose is enough.

Until I take my last breath, however, I do not want to live blindly just flowing with the current.  I will continue to always strive to lend a hand to those in need, a shoulder for others to cry on, arms to support an elderly friend, legs to run errands for those who can’t.  I will go forth doing the best that I know how.

Know that you matter; you were created for a purpose.  Now go and live it!