The circle always starts small, from the warm wet comfort of the womb to the fenced in kindergarten playground I was afraid to leave in case those “big kids” were hungry that day. It echoes from the mind of a frightened kid who longed to be knight in shining armour so no bully would ever mess with him again to the 23 year old man who had trouble making that first scared step through the door of an airplane.
From grade school to high school to university; from the family to humanity, this world is often terrifying. For who can tell what lies ahead, through the next set of doors or around that next corner? It could be love or hate, a mentor or a bully, a true friend or a liar, a beautiful relationship or a broken heart. It’s hard, because you never know what to expect when you walk down that next street or into that next room. What will you find? Pain? Joy? Something so unforgettable that it leaves a permanent blessing or scar? Or something so dull and boring that you want to tear your hair out and scream for mercy?
What choice do we have really? We either keep risking, keep reaching out, expanding, caring, loving, sharing, striving, dreaming, becoming...or we collapse in on ourselves, contracting into a hard shell, fortress walls we hide behind, shielding ourselves from a hostile world – a hostage who has built his own prison from the four walls of fear. And I would be lying if I said that this world doesn’t scare me, but nothing compares with the terror I feel thinking about these dungeons of the mind. I keep going because there is no love behind a castle wall, and there is only freedom in an expanding circle.
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