11/5/08
We have a new president today, Barack Obama. Each of us has partaken in a distinct moment of history in this past twenty-four hours. We, all together, have opened a new door of possibilities, not just for ourselves, but for each other. We have finally shown ourselves to be what we have always said we were: a melting pot of diverse cultures, ethnicity, where all are welcome and given a chance to live differently and with freedom. We have finally been awakened to the reality of possibilities and the changes such an attitude may bring. We might want to take a moment and mark this one down. Let ourselves think about what this momentous experience means to our own personal attitudes, beliefs, and everyday experience.
Are we up to the challenge? Can we be open enough, within our own minds and hearts, to greet this moment as a good place to begin living in a new manner? One that is freer, than any before it, in a nation that is firmly embedded in the concept of freedom, or at least states repeatedly that it is. Not long ago, we all together, honored the loss of innocence we, as a nation, underwent on 9/11. Now, we have collectively chosen to take a new step toward replenishing and refilling that gap of ignorance such innocence reveals. We can’t go back and undo that other experience, no matter how much we may desire such a thing. All we can do is learn from that past experience. This is our opportunity.
Will we grasp this opportunity to prove that we are no longer ignorant, therefore vulnerable? Take it for the opportunity it is, to learn the lessons we need to grow away from even more ignorance, toward a future strength that is not based in right through physical might, but one that has been tempered in the crucible and pain of that loss? A strength born out of healing, rather than retaliating in bitterness and further anger? Will we, each one of us, take the time, this one moment, to examine one small thing we can do, today, to show that we will move forward, take this momentous opportunity to become one degree more of what we say we are, and less than what we have shown ourselves to be?
With these words, I have proclaimed that I, as one individual, intend to stand up, to take this moment to risk being visibly counted as one who truly believes, that together, we can be better than we have ever been. Will you?
1sojournal 