To Help Us All Manage the Big Picture

As I worked down to the last three pages of Maya’s graduation book, I reviewed all the quotes and wisdom shared thus far. With the last few pages I wanted to bring it home, share what I think will make the greatest difference as she moves towards being an adult. I cherish these words from Helen Keller and thought they brought home the topic of faith:

Faith is the strength by which a shattered world
shall emerge into the light!

– Helen Keller 1968

Becoming an adult means we now have responsibilities, obligations, different relationships and all manner of problems that we may or may not feel prepared to handle. There are things we can learn and practice to solve problems, handle challenges, even learn to know how to deal with people. Above all else, I think Helen Keller has grasped THE most important element of living our lives – faith! Everything can be made better when we apply faith.

I believe faith is a multi-tiered word:

We need to have faith in people, even when they continue to cause us grief. Faith helps us believe that people can learn and change and grow…as we hope we learn, we change and we grow! It means we can give the person who drives us batty a lot of grace to become, learn and change. Or faith gives us strength to deal with them even if they do not change, maybe we need to be the one who changes.

Faith gives us hope that problems are not always as insurmountable as they appear. It gives us the power to believe that things will get better with hard work and persistence. And when what we try still doesn’t make things better, faith gives us hope that there is a solution out there if we just keep looking.

Faith in ourselves means building our own internal trust, peace and knowledge base. It means learning, growing, and being willing to learn when we are wrong, when we are right, and how to stand by both. With faith we understand that we are important, powerful, worthy and need to employ the faith we build in ourselves to grow and manage the life we want with faith.

And above all else, a faith in God makes all the difference in how we handle every area of life. Knowing there is a God, believing in a higher power, surrendering and growing within a community of other believers allows us to take a deep breath to know that there is a plan and we are not alone.

So, with all the art and quotes and comments I have made for Maya, I believe that FAITH is the key to making it all work. Those with faith have the ability to handle when things get shattered by heading toward the light. Helen Keller – a blind, deaf and speechless woman – brings words of faith and hope to help us all manage the big picture. If she knows faith is powerful, so should we!