We Are All Tiny Tim

All of us are dragging around some part of ourselves, a part that just doesn’t work right, a lack in us that makes us wonder: What’s wrong with me? How come I can’t do that?

 These discoveries and comparisons begin when we enter school and by high school most of us have raging comparison fever. We are too short or too tall. We wonder if we will ever make the team? We are consumed with who is “popular” and who isn’t. Why do we eat when we know we shouldn’t? Why do I have pimples and she doesn’t? Why do I break a sweat if I have to speak in front of the class? How come I completely fail to understand geometry? Everyone else gets it.

You know this territory.

We feel surrounded by people who do it—whatever “it” is---or maybe everything-- better than we do.

And so we come into adulthood with some scars and a strong sense of our deficiencies, but hopefully, over time, we also acquire an awareness of what we are good at, where we do have strength and competency.

With wisdom and experience, we come to terms with the fact that although we may be very clever at something, there will always be someone who is even more so. That’s just life.

With adult insight and perspective-- it’s OK.

 But what I want to emphasize here is, that whoever we are, however numerous our glitches, we all express something in the world that is unique. Look at it this way: no one exactly like you has ever been born before and no one exactly like you will ever be born again. It is imperative that we all express what we came into this world to express—whatever it is, at whatever level we achieve.

 And remember this. Tiny Tim was the center of his family not because he was cripple, but because he was bright-eyed and sparkling with love.

What does that tell us?

Written by this left/right- ambiguous, directionally impaired, moderately dyslexic, Blogger.