StOM 1811 StOM 1811 | Page 3

Change can be Beautiful Every year the autumn season seems to me to be prettier than last year’s attire. Spectacular, isn’t it? I find it exhilarating to walk the dogs in the evening through such a fashion show as this. And yes, it also gives me time to think and reflect. This is another autumn, a clearly pronounced time of change. Everything “looks” so beautiful. However, in times of dramatic change in my life, maybe yours too, not everything feels so beautiful. It’s a mixed bag. All sorts of feelings are jam packed in there. Some of these feelings are buried so deeply that I cannot even begin to find let alone identify them fully. Change is always the name for the long bridge to traverse. I am leaving one “place”; an act of letting go of something familiar and cherished…and I am intentionally crossing step by step to another “place” that I cannot see yet. Maybe you are too. There is a life-giving death involved here. The unavoidable, life-giving death which will – eventually- lead to resurrection! Autumn in its dying gasp of creations beauty will lead us to “the dead of winter.” We will go there, kicking and screaming perhaps, but we will go nonetheless, we have no real choice. Every living thing has this cycle of birth life and death. Change is apparent within us along the way, unfortunately we humans do not have the natural ability to show beauty at the point of drastic change. This is something we really ought to get better at. Natural grace and beautiful countenance are difficult for most of us, but when we see it in others’ lives it is spectacular. And the winter of loss will be engaged and endured if we have learned anything about life. Especially if we have witnessed and experienced the joy of slowing down, the gift of time to reflect, share, pray, and be grateful for a season which was. 3