When life gives you lemons...

For those who don't know, I have a mild case of cerebral palsy.  Just a quick google search and you'll realize just how blessed I am.  And I know it.  I did my Senior Project on this topic and met and interviewed one of the most inspiring people I have ever met living in a wheelchair, audible, but you must listen close, and unable to control his movements who teaches a form of martial arts to others with disabilities.  I have a different form of it that affects my balance, coordination, and fine motor skills.  It is also mild so it can be unseen.  I am blessed.  I know it.

But sometimes, sometimes, I forget.  Sometimes I wallow.  Because sometimes my fingers just can't work a necklace and sometimes I look like an idiot because I can't stand on one foot in yoga and sometimes boys ask me why I limp and sometimes all I can see is what I can't do.

Because life is imperfect.  And life gives you lemons.  And life doesn't make you the prettiest or the most perfect or gives you the best day everyday.  Because life is messy and we're sinful and imperfect people.

But dwelling on your imperfections and your have-nots?  Well, that's like living like the men in The Allegory of the Cave who never knew of the sun and grass and flowers and life outside of their world in their cave.  That's like refusing to go out and see and believe their friend who experienced it for himself and came back to tell about it.  It's a life without color and three-dimensions, only shadows of the real thing.  It's a world without truth and light and hope.  It may be painful adjusting to the light after the many years in the darkness but it is well worth it to really live.  .  

While I was stretching the parallels of that story, there is so much to be and do outside of your cave, so much to be thankful for, so much to experience far past our imperfections and limitations.  So much laughter to be had in-spite, and rather, because of our limitations.  Because since when was taking yourself so seriously something that was okay?  Life is to be experienced fully no matter what comes, living means to love with everything in you and to laugh and cry with others in their trying times and to give all of what you were given away.  It means risk and pain and living in moments and constantly moving forward.

Because I know one thing and this one thing covers over my imperfections and my bad days and the things I can't do and don't think I can be.  This one thing gives me sweet peace that it will all be okay no matter my lot in life.  It is the one thing that makes me rejoice in the lot given to me no matter the possible suffering or future sorrow to come.  It's this hope, this hope that reminds me Someone greater is leading and life is meant to be really lived no matter the uncertainty of the future...

"More than that, we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not put us to shame, because God's love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us."  Romans 5:3-5

And when we stop and reflect on that we consider the painful times to be joy!  I may be blessed because I was given two legs to stand on but the man I interviewed those years ago is blessed where he is now because he didn't see his imperfections and wallow in them, he asked himself how he could use the lot he was given and help others despite them.  And that's exactly what he did.   And in that way, he is the blessed one.  Because lemons are just a part of life and in one way or another, it can all be used for the better.