Changing the World

I wrote this as a response to a forum on Paulo Coelho’s blog in which he asked for people to share the “most beautiful story”.

 

Just over a year after losing my first teaching job, I found myself working as a substitute for an after-school child care organization.  It was a part-time job that did not come close to paying my bills, but it was the closest I dared come to working in the field I had studied.  After losing that first job, for which I had prepared for five long years in college, I was utterly demoralized.  I felt as though I had wasted my education, and that I had failed at the one thing I thought I might be good at.  I was afraid to try to teach again. 

At this time, not only was I broke and underemployed, I was pregnant with my first child, often cranky and impatient, irritated to no end by the countless people who believed that it was okay for them to touch my belly simply because I was pregnant.  Really, would we ever dream of doing that to non-pregnant women?

 One day, the organization I worked for assigned me to work in a center in a very liberal, “hippie” area of Austin, TX.  Earlier that day, I had gotten an ultrasound and learned the sex of my child – a boy.  Near the end of the day, as parents arrived to pick up their children, a strange woman in a flowing gypsy skirt and tie-dyed t-shirt approached me.  “Oh, boy,” muttered one of my co-workers.  “This woman never made it out of an acid trip in the 60’s.  She’s a little nutty, but harmless.”  Great, I thought sarcastically, I really need some whacko giving me unsolicited advice about how to be pregnant.  I haven’t heard enough of that!  I braced myself to politely ignore her.

The woman purposefully strode up to me and placed her hands on my bulging belly.  (Arrgh!).  Then she looked me directly in the eye and said, “Your son is going to change the world.”  At that moment, her own son trotted up to her, she took his hand and they walked away.  I never saw her again. 

I was a little shaken by the event, but put it out of my mind.

After Stephan was born, I realized that I needed to bite the bullet and get a teaching job in order to support my family.  This time, my teaching was a success.

Years later, I was talking to the mother of one of my students, and I told her about being fired from my first teaching job and not going back until after Stephan was born.  Somehow, the incident with the strange woman at the day care came up as well, and I laughed, saying that although I knew Stephan was a remarkable child, I didn’t really think he was going to change the world.

The woman did not laugh with me.  Instead she looked at me seriously and said, “But don’t you see?  He already has.  It was because of him that you went back to teaching.  Your teaching has changed the life of my child, and hundreds of others.  They will all go into the world and do something to make it better, because of the influence you have had on them.  Your belief and dedication to my child has changed me, because I now have faith in the goodness of people, and I trust that people can be generous and kind, so I try every day to be that way with others.  So, you see, your son did change the world.”

Since then, I never underestimate the power of one person to make a difference, and I am constantly aware of how fortunate I am to have known people who have changed my life, and therefore the world.

Finding Faith

Igrew up a midwestern, middle-class, Christian girl.  I went to church semi-regularly, sang in the choir, danced in the “interpretive choir”, was active in Young Life in high school, etc.  I guess you could say that I was a faithful follower.  In college, I fell in with a group of highly intelligent, intellectual, rather cynical people who challenged my beliefs, and honestly, the beliefs lost.  My newly awakened intellectualism could not grasp of a white bearded man in the clouds who was either vengeful or kindly (depending on which testament you read), I couldn’t reconcile the paradoxes of the bible or of Christianity in general, and I detested the hypocrisy of all organized religion.  I lost my faith. 

For many years, any mention of God or Jesus made me a little squeamish unless they were spoken of in the course of an intellectual discussion.  I would politely thank those who offered prayers for me, then turn away and giggle at what I perceived as their ignorance  and naivite.  I respected them for their beliefs in God, but I was having none of it.  I was offended when others tried to “bring me into the fold”.  I still have some unresolved issues with my sisters (one of whom has since passed away) because they told me that my mother was in Hell and I was going because we were not “fully devoted followers”.  I disliked my late sister’s husband because he used every conversation we had as an opportunity to instruct me in God’s laws.   I was married twice: once by a justice of the peace, once by a minister of the “Universal Life Church” which ordains through a 10 dollar mail-in donation.  I did not baptize my children, and until very recently, my 17 year old had never been in a church except for weddings and funerals.  I did not endorse a candidate for a job in my department because her background was working in the church, and I feared that she would make her classroom a pulpit.

Incidentally, Lizzie got the job anyway, and not only has she been an unspeakably amazing addition to my department, she has become my close friend, and in a sense, my newest spiritual advisor.  Over the past few years as I have begun to really look at myself, I’ve started to wonder about my aversion to anything relating to God, and admiring people who believed.  I’ve stopped being hostile to or ridiculing those of faith, and started asking questions.  I’ve started to look for my own faith.

Perhaps my son has felt this change in me, for he has chosen to do his graduation project about religion, and for his practical experience, he is attending church with friends.  His first experience was with a small, Southern Baptist church, whose congregation is overwhelmingly African American.  He was fascinated by the experience, and said, “I finally got to see what God is to people, rather than in a textbook.”  I thought that was an incredibly profound thing to say.  Through the course of this project, he also plans to attend a Catholic mass, a Buddhist service, and participate in a Wiccan celebration.  I look forward to hearing his thoughts on all.  By the way, Lizzie has agreed to be his mentor for this project, and I’m sure she will have some interesting insights for him to ponder!

As for my own spiritual quest, it has been rather private, as most of my deepest thoughts are, initially.  It started in earnest through reading Paulo Coelho, who speaks of God as a presence in all of us, the “Soul of the World”.  I’ve started to make friends with more people of faith, and to speak honestly with them about my doubts, to ask questions about how they reconcile inconsistencies in doctrines, and to ask them what they really believe.  I have been reading a lot by Anne Lamott, who is a great example of a devout Christian, who is a painfully real and flawed person — and is therefore much more believable and accessible than any righteous holy-roller who tries to convince me that I will burn in hell unless I repent all my misdeeds.  I’ve started to really pay attention to coincidences and have come to the conclusion that they must mean something in the grand scheme of things and that some force must be in charge.  I don’t pray yet, and I certainly don’t attend formal services, but I am listening, and I am, if not a believer, no longer a disbeliever.  I have talked to Lizzie many times about the things that are happening in my life and in my mind, and recently she said to me, “Something is happening within you right now.  I don’t know what it is, but something is awakening, and you need to pay attention.”  It’s been very strange, for while I’ve been on this journey for awhile now, just recently it’s picked up speed.  It’s like a go cart racing down a hill:  it started slowly, but the further down the hill I get, the faster things seem to be happening.  Let me tell you, it’s an intense, frightening, and thrilling ride.

I don’t think I’ll ever be able to conceive of a God such as Jews or Christians do, but I do believe in a divine force.  I think the Bible is a fascinating piece of literature, and that Jesus was the best example of how great humanity can be.  If he was the son of God, though, I believe, it is only because we all are.  I believe that miracles can and do happen every day — I need only to look at my sons to know that.  I believe that prayers are answered, but that nothing is free.  We have to answer our own prayers sometimes.  And I believe that sometimes we do have to let go and put our lives and hopes and dreams into someone/thing else’s hands and let nature take its course.  Most of all though, I believe that we all have a purpose on earth, and that each person’s purpose is unique to them.  We each have our own “personal legend”.

My son said to me this morning as we had yet another conversation about these issues, something about “faith in God” not being exactly accurate, but that faith within us is what makes us believe in God.  Well, I’m finally finding  faith within myself.  I’m believing in my own goodness and worth and beauty, and finally owning it, and through that I’m finding faith in others as well, and  in the world around me.

And it’s good.