The Gift of the Coronavirus

    This morning I am reminded that every event that brings a "disaster," also offers a gift. With the panic and fear we are also offered the opportunity to deepen our understanding of Life. Consider, if you will, much like this toxic virus, those toxic stories we tell ourselves about relationship conflicts; whether they are with family, friends, coworkers, bosses, or people we meet in a grocery store who are taking more than they need for 14 days or even 30 days during this time of social isolation due to the coronavirus. How quickly we begin a story in our head about what might happen, how someone over reacts, misinterprets, misjudges our motives, or whatever communication word we use when a conflict occurs. 
   Most likely the story does not begin with, "Once upon a time," nor does it have an happy ending. Instead, not so pleasant descriptive words of the person generally begin our story, and end with some sort of judgment word that is less than favorable about the person's actions and character. 
    As we confront what is in front of us with this current unfolding of a new and unfamiliar virus, now might be a good time to consider looking in the mirror at your personal reactions. Is your story adding a positive, hopeful spin on the situation or is your view one of despair, fear, and pointing the finger at who is to blame for the situation? Or, how we're ever going to recover from the financial devastation, and who's going to pay back all the federal money being offered to support those in need? Such questions are important to consider since having our head in the sand and our rear exposed does little to find realistic and solvable solutions; however, the issue to examine is our reaction, our story we create in our head.
     Perhaps if we choose to focus on all the tremendous love being shared by our neighbors, churches, employers, employees, government and charitable organizations will help us pause to consider the often overlooked kindness that underlies the actions of the masses. IF we will "begin within" to examine our contribution to the environmental energy being emitted while confronting and witnessing this mysterious virus, we might find the gift this virus offers. We have the personal isolation time to reflect on our priorities, examine the stories we create in our heads and discover the underlying energy we carry towards our family, friends, communities and government. We all need each other. All of us love someone and want their lives to be rich and full; including our own. We all want our world to be safe.
     When I learned to type in middle school, the practice sentence was: "Now is the time to come to the aid of our party." I offer this practice sentence to carry through the next few weeks and/or months (or perhaps your life), "Now is the time to come to the aid of our world!" May our hearts open to the opportunity put before us to re-examine the stories we create in our head and ask ourselves if it carries a message of hope, faith and a knowing that we are more alike than we are different! It is then we will see and feel the gift such "disasters" offer for us to re-member our heart's purpose. With that remembering we will know precisely what we have to contribute to the world we wish to see.