REAL LIBERATION FOR LIFE

Exotic tropical jungle fruits - “Later that day I got to thinking about relationships. There are those that open you up to something new and exotic, those that are old and familiar, those that bring up lots of questions, those that bring you somewhere unexpected, those that bring you far from where you started, and those that bring you back. But the most exciting, challenging and significant relationship of all is the one you have with yourself. And if you can find someone to love the you you love, well, that's just fabulous.”

I had a remarkable conversation with a woman about physical
limitations. Nancy was a sufferer of M.S. She could no longer walk and
spent her waking hours in a wheelchair.

"I'm not 'confined' to the wheelchair," she insisted one day. "It
doesn't confine me. It sets me free."

I had never thought of it that way. And I have never referred to
someone in a wheelchair since as being "confined."

She asked me, "Do you want to know my reason for living?" It seemed
like an abrupt change of subject, but I went with it.

"What is it?"

"To liberate people. To set them free."

She must have studied my face and figured I needed more help. "It's
like me...before I got my wheelchair, I had trouble getting around,"
she explained. "Now I can go places. But other people may be trapped
in different ways. So however I can free people, I want to do it."

"People speak of being 'shut in,'" she continued. "People who have
difficulty leaving a room or a house or a bed are not 'shut in.'
They're 'shut out' -- shut out of activities and shut out of people's
lives. So I try to help people find some freedom, however I can."

I wonder how she'd handle my limitations, though. I can get around all
right, but I hold myself back by my thinking. I say, "We'll never do
that!" or "I just don't believe that is possible" and later find that
somebody proved me wrong. It's my beliefs and attitudes that cause
some of my biggest problems. They are as limiting to me as Nancy's
disease is to her.

"Almost everybody walks around with a vast burden of imaginary
limitations inside his head," says author J. H. Brennan. "While the
burden remains, personal success is as difficult to achieve as the
conquest of Everest with a sack of rocks tied to your back."

It IS a burden, isn't it? Like a sack of rocks. Some people carry the
burden that they will never be able to pursue a passion or achieve a
cherished dream. And some tote around the idea that other people can
experience good things of life, or simply be happy, but they never
will. Our thinking itself can be as much a burden as climbing a
mountain with a sack of rocks tied to our backs.

When I feel "confined" by my thinking, I sometimes ponder these words
from Darwin P. Kingsley, past president of New York Life Insurance
Company:

"You have powers you never dreamed of.
You can do things you never thought you could do.
There are no limitations in what you can do except
the limitations of your own mind."

Now THAT sets me free! Free to live. Free to risk. Free to move
forward. Free to be...me.

It's real liberation.

From Lifesupport.

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