Feeling in the Space.

I've been thinking lately about space, and how important it is to make space for all the wonderful humans in this world.  It is just as important to make space within us.  I've been thinking about the many dreams I have... the unknowing, the excitement, and the frustration.  The dreams of what *could have been, and the ones that could still be.  Living with grief makes us do that sometimes, let our minds wander just a bit about how things would be different if they were still here.


I have heard so many people talk about filling the space of grief or hurt with something good, or replacing it with something else.  Whether a hobby, job, or merely ignoring it and keeping busy.




Maybe God doesn't fill the space at all...and maybe we shouldn't, either. 
Maybe God allows us to be bold enough to *feel*  in the spaces of our grief.... rather than just fill them in.


It is the harder path to take.  It causes us to face the hard questions, the hard doubts, the anger, and the frustration.  It calls us to one another, even when it's not convenient.  (Death and grief are never convenient, by the way.)  It makes us give of ourselves from those deep places of tenderness and vulnerability, the spaces that are riddled with doubt.  Sometimes, those are the best places to give from.


I'd much rather FEEL in it all, than fill it in with something shallow and substandard. 


Life is much too short and precious to never feel the grief of what could have been.




(The Offspring made this picture.  The assignment was to draw about giving to one another.  I adore where his heart and brain went with the idea.)