When Waiting for the Dawn, Help the Twilight

I’m always amazed at the power of goodwill.  The world’s axis is not perched on the hands of Atlas, it’s supported by the hands of those who lend one to someone else.  Our goodwill is free much of the time.

When waiting for the dawn, how about helping the twilight?

I have had hands extended to me at important times.  Some I have accepted, and some I have declined.  But, each gave to me a seed of something more than the hand offered: the seed that goodwill is a positive contribution, no matter how or when we offer it, and no matter whether the gesture of giving is accepted.

Nothing says the power of goodwill more than when you’re working on building a new career.  You are aware that there are many doors in front of you.  You want to see the red ones open to you:

On occasion, someone new flashes in front of your path.  If you spy their goodwill quotient, you are most wise.

This quotient is the sense that the person likely offers goodwill.  The point is not that he or she might offer goodwill to you.  This could not be more distant from the point.  The issue is whether that person offers goodwill to people in the world in general.  This quotient is often found in the eyes or the smile.  Goodwill likes to hang out in open, twinkling places.

Sharing goodwill with people who have a high goodwill quotient means that in offering goodwill, you become more like what you find compelling in that person – their lighthearted good nature, their openness to growth and change, their willingness to engage with the world.

Recently, I became inspired to share my goodwill in a professional context.  It was gratefully received.  The rewards to me are immediate, and I’m sure, long term.

The benefits to extending goodwill and feeling the vibration of shared gratitude is one that I will not soon forget, and one that I believe now is the true fuel of success.

In order for goodwill to find you and flourish, you must be willing to give because the cause is worthwhile.  You must rally against any notion that you may benefit.  When you take this approach, you will not only find friends, but you will perhaps find the highest form of personally driven destiny.

Try it:  Give what you can to someone where a need exists.  And, watch the world turn, your hand at its base.

Listening, Letting Go, and Letting In

I’m Fifty now; I’d like to think my complexion stills begs the question. But, recently I’ve been feeling my age. It’s as if an entire Self has shed – I can see it behind me like some snake skin wrapped around a post.  I don’t know what’s gone, but I know I’m somehow less and somehow more; but, definitely not the same.

Periodically, there’s a piece that runs on CBS, during a news segment – “Everybody Has a Story”.  A reporter throws a dart behind him at a map of the United States.  Where it lands, he goes.  Then, when he gets there, he interviews a random name from the phone book.  I’ve been finding archives of interviews like that in my own psyche – stories that are complex, tragic or compelling, waiting for a someone to come by and ask the questions … and listen.

I’ve been through some of life’s downsides in the last few years – deaths of animals, deaths of people, my Sister’s sudden, serious illness.  The abrupt necessity for me to drop my career and writing lives to work 60+ hours per week for over a year – for the benefit of my sister, who needed my help.  Now, the horizon is clearing, and I can see far enough ahead to see that very soon, I will be able to devote time to my career and my writing again.

Enter the parts of my psyche who have been waiting for someone to listen to their tales – to the fear, the weariness, the disappointments.  To listen to the soldier in me who had to narrow her focus and march through territory – a territory that demanded everything, and perpetuated only Itself.

The soldier in me wants to speak now.  And, I need to listen.  So, I can acknowledge the sacrifice she made, and begin the integration of my psyche, my current life, and the future I long for.

Sometimes, if we choose to stop and listen to the parts of us that wait beside the road to be fed, we find that we fill ourselves in a way which is necessary to walk on.  In this way, we Let Go, and can Let In.  I am ready.