Let the wind blow through you

Yesterday I started reading The Lakota Way, by Joseph M. Marshall III. It contains stories and lessons for living focusing on the twelve core qualities that are crucial to their Native American way of life--bravery, fortitude, generosity, wisdom, respect, honor, perseverance, love, humility, sacrifice, truth, and compassion. 

I used the title from the introduction in the book for this post. The first story is of a playground dispute involving a 4th grader who was bombarded by every derogatory name for Indians that two white classmates could remember. The poor boy was stunned silent from the experience, but finally told his grandfather that evening what had happened. 

The wise old man man told him, "Words can hurt, but only if you let them." Then he explained...

"You cannot forget what they said any more than you cannot feel the wind when it blows. But if you learn to let the wind blow through you, you will take away its power to blow you down. If you let the words pass through you, without letting them catch on your anger or pride, you will not feel them."

Yeah... that's the challenge. Not letting them catch on our anger or pride. 

I needed to hear that. Yesterday was a rough day. Another school shooting. Another! Imagine that.

It's not like we don't know that guns are a problem in the United States. It's not like we don't know what assault rifles do and are intended for. It's not like we couldn't address this issue fairly quickly and simply... if we really wanted to.

But here's the thing... The challenge is not letting all the accusations and finger-pointing and "words" thrown about afterward catch on our anger and pride. At least that's the challenge for me. It's about being able to keep the main thing the main thing, not all the reactionary nonsense.

And... that's really all I've got to say at the moment. I don't want to let my anger get the best of me. I'm also trying to resist letting it turn me cold and complacent. May we not be thrown off course by the wind, but learn to face the truth behind it.

I'm not sure where it comes from, but the benediction from the last few Sunday services we've attended has contained this:

"The world is now too dangerous for anything but the truth."

Indeed.