January 25-A, 2023

**False Hellebore 03, 04/20/2010 Oil Paint Rendered — Blue Ridge Parkway, Floyd County, Virginia**

Being true to ourselves 
is living out of our original nature,
expressing/exhibiting/serving
our innate virtues/traits/characteristics,
in rising to every occasion
and meeting each situation as it arises
as it needs/deserves to be met,
doing in all the here/now's
what is called for then/there,
when/where/how it is called for,
and being ready to do it all again
in the situations that flow
from this one,
time after time,
no matter what,
all our life long.

If you think there is ever any more to it
than that,
you haven't lived long enough.

Everyone wakes up if they live long enough.
Eventually, there is nothing more to get
than this.
It waits for everyone,
who then have to live with it having taken
so long,
when it was always right there,
winking at them,
whispering their name,
the entire time.

And it is never more difficult
than see/do--
again and again--
the Sisyphean Task
one situation after another
shrunk to the metaphor
of a rock and a hill.
Except for the symbol
and a few other changes,
when you talk about us,
the story is the same one.

Get it?
Then get with it!
Laughing all the way!
Amen! Amen!

And don't forget the laughing part!

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Published by jimwdollar

I'm retired, and still finding my way--but now, I don't have to pretend that I know what I'm doing. I retired after 40.5 years as a minister in the Presbyterian Church USA, serving churches in Louisiana, Mississippi and North Carolina. I graduated from Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary, in Austin, Texas, and Northwestern State University in Natchitoches, Louisiana. My wife, Judy, and I have three daughters and five granddaughters within about twenty minutes from where we live--and are enjoying our retirement as much as we have ever enjoyed anything. View more posts