I hope you dance - Part III

Ever since I was a little kid I have loved music, and have been emotionally moved by song lyrics. There is something about words put to music that touches my heart. But it has to be a song. For some reason I have never been moved by poetry in quite the same way.

I first heard I Hope You Dance on the radio last year while driving to Michigan to visit with my second family. In those days I spent a lot of time wondering what the next chapter in my life would bring. I had been slam-dunked by one thing after another for several years. I was finally healing, but was still tender and skittish about what might hit me next.

This song moved me because I suddenly realized how much of my life I had wasted sitting on the sidelines, feeling unworthy and too scared to join in or try something new. Some of you reading this may be surprised, because I have on occasion done something you might see as daring or brave. But the truth is most of the time my smiling face was hiding a perpetual wallflower, afraid to even get to know my neighbors. I lived in our Michigan house for six years and couldn't tell you the names of more than two people in the neighborhood.

I could write all night, but I would never be able to say it better than this...

I hope you never fear those mountains in the distance
Never settle for the path of least resistance
Living might mean taking chances, but they're worth taking
Loving might be a mistake but it's worth making

or this...

I hope you dance (time is a wheel in constant motion always)
I hope you dance (rolling us along)
I hope you dance (tell me who wants to look back on their youth and wonder)
I hope you dance (where those years have gone)

or this...

There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under heaven...a time to weep and a time to laugh, a time to mourn and a time to dance... (from the book of Ecclesiastes)

It's up to you. Only you can decide whether you will live your life as a wallflower or as a dancer. Either way there will be times of weeping and mourning. Those cannot be avoided. But why not spend the rest of your time living life to the fullest, taking every opportunity to learn and grow, doing the most you can with the talents God has given you, enjoying His blessings and sharing them?

That's my plan.