Getting Over Me

Let me be real for a moment...Not that I'm ordinarily dishonest in what I write, but I want to just directly address a misnomer about me that seems to have permeated the minds of practically everyone I know.

I do not hate myself.  I do not think I am less worthy of love and acceptance than anyone else, and at the same time, as my parents taught me, I am no more worthy than anyone else.

My earlier post on this blog today referred to the vastness of the universe, and in comparison, my smallness and how in reference to how enormous everything is around me, I am very small and insignificant.

It really bothered people.  It had the opposite effect of what I intended and people who sincerely care about me responded by assuring me that I am worthy of love, that I am not insignificant, that they'd give me more if they had it to give.  Thing is, I don't remember asking for anything.  Not in that post, anyway.  I think perhaps in the flurry of fundraising and talking about transplant and my own worrying over my lack of income due to circumstances beyond my control, I've given the impression that I expect folks to just give me things, or give me money hand over fist.

That is not who I am and it's not what I want.

I appreciate the generosity of everyone who has given money to my fundraiser, my friend Alison who has come up with clever ways to raise money, my daughters and my sisters who have worked on the "transplant campaign" for the last few months more than I could ever express.  I also cannot tell you how indebted I feel to all of you already.  I couldn't ask you for more.

I appreciate everyone who prays for me, who sends me their love, who offers help or a thoughtful gesture.  You all enrich my life so much, and I only wish I knew how to repay your kindnesses to me.

When I say I am small, I mean we are all small.  We are all just specks in a huge mind-blowingly incomprehensible Universe.  To me that thought is comforting, to some it is troubling.  It took a long time for me to find comfort in my smallness, but if I stop to remind myself of it, my heart rate slows down, my hands stop trembling, everything seems better, if only for a moment.

Sometimes I wonder (and this is not a criticism of anyone's faith) if we let our own narcissistic view of the world influence our spiritual beliefs.  If I'm small to God, I must not be very important, right?

Wrong.

Bees.  Bees are small to us, but we need them all the same.  Sometimes they hurt us, but we still need them.  Sometimes they show up where we don't want them, but we still need them.  Sometimes they're deadly to humans, but we still need them.  You can crush one underfoot, and as long as you're wearing shoes, never know it.  The bees from its own nest might have to work harder when one bee dies, but they continue on.  Bees have a job to do, and they do it, no matter what.

We are small and many of us, myself mainly, do not know what exactly we're doing here, so I guess you could say the bees have one over on us.

Really, I was going to go smaller, but on the other end of the "Universe spectrum" are billions of creatures so small you can't see them without some high-powered magnification.  Dust mites, for instance, which sleep with you every night, but you don't even know they're there.  But then, there are creatures even smaller, deadly ones, if they end up in your body....

People are just part of the cycle, part of the program, a small player in the cast of Life itself.

So all I'm saying is, I'm trying to get over myself.

That's all.