Traveling companions

I first started to understand this principle when a friend explained it to me maybe about five years ago.  I know, I’m slow.  I’d always had an underlying sense of guilt for the blessed and extremely easy life I’ve led.  And along side that, a deep sorrow and pain for those living in impoverished countries threatened with starvation and sickness.  Which is why I can hardly read my National Geographic magazines any more.  Yet, in an inconsistent way, I’m drawn to books on current issues about (usually destitute) peoples all over the world.  This guilt, I could tell, was unhealthy but I couldn’t reconcile my feelings or understand why I had so much when others had so little.  It wasn’t fair.  It didn’t make sense.  I felt that because I was so heartily blessed, I needed to do and give that much more.  And yet it taxed me, the feeling that I could and should do more.  Because just doing the basics seemed to keep me busy.  The extras I should be doing weighed on me; fatigue was constant.

But she helped me by asking me questions.  How did I know I was the lucky one?  What if they were actually the ones with the more choice lives?  Dwelling with extended family where love abounds.  Their major concern being gathering enough water and food.  That sounded pretty heavy to me, but she pointed out that many of them are perhaps peacefully content with their simple days.  My life and the lives of others in similar circumstances could potentially be riddled with stress, loneliness, contention, worry, cynicism, depression, and hopelessness.  Certainly not always peaceful.

It wasn’t until recently when what she’d tried to teach me really clicked for me.  Knowing that part of our life’s purpose is to see if we will love and serve others, I wondered how a test could administered to all of us in such unequalled circumstances.  And then I was reading yet another one of my books about people in dire situations, a group of refugees who were traveling to a camp in Ethiopia.  Some travelers were selfish and greedy; whereas others in the same situation were generous and helpful.   While some excluded and rejected a young orphan boy trying to make it on his own, others accepted him and nurtured him, sharing their meager morsels of food with him.  Some hearts were hardened and full of hate.  Other hearts were warm and soft, kind and loving.  Then I remembered a short book about the Donnor Party I’d read not long ago.  I was appalled at their greed and selfishness, their disregard for another’s comfort or well-being.   Contrast that with many other traveling parties of the time who were bound together through their struggles, sharing the last of their already inadequate provisions and bits of strength, encouraging and aiding one another in such trying times.

I’m learning that it doesn’t matter whether we wander all our days on hot sand or cold snow.  If we rest in a well-furnished suburban house or under a mosquito net.  It matters so little where we live, what we work at all day, what size our families or bodies or bank accounts are or what opportunities we have.  What does matter is what we do with our agency—how did we love and share and serve in whatever situation we found ourselves in.  In all honesty, I hold fast to the idiom, “where much is given, much is required.”  And so I still feel I have the privilege and duty to give in accordance with what I’ve been given.  But without guilt as a motivator.

I know, you could certainly argue that some of us are beneficiaries of having had strong teachers who directed us toward good paths; others have had only misery and discouragement as tutors.  And yet, within each of us is a light that can help us make decisions.  It doesn’t necessarily matter what we call it.  But we are never without agency and the ability to share our last few drops of muddy water with a parched neighbor or our last few ounces of strength to buoy up a friend on the phone or really be attentive to a child at the end of a long and stressful day.  Different but similar.  It’s about where your heart is, what you’ve done with your blessings—however meager or abundant.  It’s how you’ve loved and supported your traveling companions.