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Rumi
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You Are Born With Wings, Learn to Fly!
Let me begin with a quote from Rumi:
You were born with potential.
You were born with goodness and trust.
You were born with ideals and dreams.
You were born with greatness.
You were born with wings.
You are not mean for crawling, so don't.
You have wings.
Learn to use them and fly.
In my last blog post, the first of this series, I spoke a lot about the circumstances of our birth, that mostly straddle us for many years. And I would guess many of us go to our grave without ever having sung our song, or danced our dance. That is without ever having enjoyed this experience called life, let alone teaching others how to enjoy life.
The above words of Rumi, have always inspired me and challenged me. I was certainly one of those Eagles raised as a barnyard chicken who never never knew I could soar higher than the highest mountain, until a certain scripture passage from the Book of Genesis (OT) pierced my heart: "So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him" Gen 1/27. That was a shocker for me. A bolt that slowly woke me up from my lethargy and self pity.
To many the above scripture quote might mean nothing, might not create any stirrings of the heart. But it stopped me in my tracks. It made me take a second look at my self, my beliefs and meaning of life. If it was really true I was made in the image and likeness of God, then why was I behaving like a nerd thinking life (and God) had dealt me a bad hand.
A spark of fire began to burn in me. I began to re-evaluate my beliefs and soon realised that I was living not my life but the life of others - my parents, my teachers and may others.
Late have I loved you,
beauty so old and so new: late have I loved you. And see, you were within and I
was in the external world and sought you there, and in my unlovely state I
plunged into those lovely created things which you made. You were with me, and
I was not with you. The lovely things kept me far from you, though if they did
not have their existence in you, they had no existence at all. You called and
cried out loud and shattered my deafness. You were radiant and resplendent, you
put to flight my blindness. You were fragrant, and I drew in my breath and now
pant after you. I tasted you, and I feel but hunger and thirst for you. You
touched me, and I am set on fire to attain the peace which is yours.”
This is the famous passage from St.
Augustine’s Confessions in which Saint
Augustine states “You have made us for yourself, O Lord, and our heart is
restless until it rests in you.”
Wait for the next post
