It doesn’t interest me what you do for a living. I want to know what you ache for, and if you dare to dream of meeting your heart’s longing.
It doesn’t interest me how old you are. I want to know if you will risk looking like a fool for love, for your dream, for the adventure of being alive.
It doesn’t interest me what planets are squaring your moon. I want to know if you have touched the center of your own sorrow, if you have been opened by life’s betrayals or have become shriveled and closed from fear of further pain! I want to know if you can sit with pain, mine or your own, without moving to hide it or fade it, or fix it.
I want to know if you can be with joy, mine or your own, if you can dance with wildness and let the ecstasy fill you to the tips of your fingers and toes without cautioning us to be careful, to be realistic, to remember the limitations of being human.
It doesn’t interest me if the story you are telling me is true. I want to know if you can disappoint another to be true to yourself; if you can bear the accusation of betrayal and not betray your own soul; if you can be faithless and therefore trustworthy.
I want to know if you can see beauty even when it’s not pretty, every day, and if you can source your own life from its presence.
I want to know if you can live with failure, yours and mine, and still stand on the edge of the lake and shout to the silver of the full moon, “Yes!”
It doesn’t interest me to know where you live or how much money you have. I want to know if you can get up, after the night of grief and despair, weary and bruised to the bone, and do what needs to be done to feed the children.
It doesn’t interest me who you know or how you came to be here. I want to know if you will stand in the center of the fire with me and not shrink back.
It doesn’t interest me where or what or with whom you have studied. I want to know what sustains you, from the inside, when all else falls away.
I want to know if you can be alone with yourself and if you truly like the company you keep in the empty moments.
By
Oriah Mountain Dreamer
A Dedication to Mom
She is clothed with strength and dignity; she can laugh at the days to come.
She speaks with wisdom, and faithful instruction is on her tongue.
Proverbs 31:25-26
Mom, I didn’t understand back then why you worked so hard to separate us from certain people and places. I remember many fights on several occasions over this very issue. It has taken forty plus years, but now I truly understand that your intentions had a purpose.
It was not that you thought we were better than everyone else or that certain areas were beneath our standard of living. Simply stated, you just wanted use to have a bigger vision of ourselves. One that reached far beyond our circumstances. One that stretched our borders and allowed us to dream the impossible.
It has taken some time, but I finally figured out that you stretched us to make us better. Not better than others, but better than we thought we could ever be. The journey is not over, but I thank you with all that is within me that you cared enough to sacrifice your heart and soul that we might live the life God intended for us. A life of purpose, fulfillment, and above all else, a life of Love for God, others, and self.
It has been said that you don’t love a woman because she is beautiful; she is beautiful because you love her. Mom, you were and always will be the true beauty of the breath of God. There was none before you and there will be none after. Millions didn’t make it, but you were one of the ones who did. I love you. See you in Heaven.
“All that I am, all that I ever will be, I owe to my mother”
-Abraham Lincoln-