i read a few pages from a book the other day
that really moved me spiritually
and i thought i might share them with you
can an object go straight to your heart?
twenty years ago
i walked into a store
and saw some old Amish quilts
i had never seen quilts like that
odd color combinations
deep saturated colors
simple geometric forms
they spoke directly to me
they knew something
they went straight to my heart
and that was the beginning
innocent enough
how opposite of an Amish quilt my life was
my life was like a crazy quilt
a pattern i hated
hundreds of scattered
unrelated
stimulating fragments
each going off into its own direction
creating a lot of frantic energy
there was no overall structure
to hold the pieces together
a tug-a-war was raging inside me
in contrast to the muted Amish quilt
i saw myself in extremes
a black and white person
who only made and organized her life
around black and white judgments
the driven part of me did not
examine values
i valued accomplishments
i valued being special
i valued results
never having enough time
i wanted it all
a glutton of new experiences
excited-
attracted-
distracted-
tempted in all directions
i thought i was lucky to have so many
different directions
i naively believed
i could live them all
a tyranny of lists engulfed me
these list created the illusion
that my life was full
i would awake at 5am
and create my lists
of things to do
and it brought me great pleasure
even though the list was nothing more
than a superimposed heap of choices
representing all things i enjoyed
and all things i had to do
crowding and bumping
against each other
any other person would
have thought this is ridiculous
its unrealistic
no one can accomplish so much
in just one day
sometimes i would stop
in the middle of the day
and rework my list
when the scene of the page
looked especially chaotic
hoping my newly created rows
would keep me from feeling
overwhelmed
i never thought to stop
and ask myself
what really matters
accumulating choices
was my way of not
having to make a choice
by evening
my lists became a
battlefield of hieroglyphics
until the day at the store
a quilt spoke to me
i then had an obsession with the Amish
objectively it made no sense
i, who worked hard at being special,
fell in love with a people
who valued being ordinary.
when i told people i wanted to live
with an Amish family
everybody laughed
"no Amish family will ever take you in"
i didn't know when i first looked at
an Amish quilt and felt my heart pounding
that my soul was starving that an inner
voice was trying to make sense of my life
i didn't know that i was beginning a
journey of the spirit
A path that has heart.
i thought i was going to learn
more about their quilts
but the quilts were only guides
leading me to what i really
needed to learn
to answer
a question I hadn't even formed yet
is there another way to lead a good life
i went searching for a foreign land
and found my way home
perhaps each of us has a starved place
and each of us knows deep down
what we need to fill that place
to find the courage to trust
and to honor the search
to follow the voice that tells us
what we need to do
even when it doesn't seem to make sense
is a worthy pursuit
this story is about the search
maybe you have a dream
incubating
not fully formed
maybe you are on a similar quest
following a path that has heart
offers many lessons
♡
the story goes on
to tell the journey of
one woman
and how she came to live
with the Amish
