www.invisiblechildren.com
**this entry unintentionally became a bit of an explanation on invisible children, and if you have no clue as to what that is and want to know more, i might as well promote it now; it's an incredible story that greatly impacted me, so i hope you look into it for interest's sake. www.invisiblechildren.com for the story. okay, now that this forward is out of the way, on to the actual entry i wrote...**
ooooh my goodness, i'm quite tired. i'm at work... have been since 5am. let me tell you, it is a dangerous trek walking across campus at 4:45 on a Friday morning. we've had two girls attacked completely randomly and i guess not knowing what could be out there absolutely freaked me out; i was praying out loud the entire time (for safety, but also so that perhaps whoever was out there might think at very least that i was crazy for talking to myself...)
however, walking gave me just a glimpse of what the kids in Uganda have to go through every day of their lives. Sure, they walk every night in groups (i hope) but they live in a constant state of fear of being taken from their families to be beaten and tortured and potentially killed: made into soldiers against their will. i don't know what's out there at my school, perhaps some random guy who is just feeling out of his mind or drunk or something one night, but that's not very likely and i have a chance of escape and a good chance of surviving even if i'm hurt. these kids walk knowing exactly what's out there intentionally hunting them. they know what will happen to them. and they walk every night with that knowledge; with that fear. even children who have been captured and then escape have no peace after their escape. they keep walking with their peers, and have to be all the more cautious, because it is unlikely that they will be so lucky as to get away twice.
we are so blessed. i suppose we can ignore the rest of the world - and when i say world, i am scoping everything, from the nations on the other side of the globe to the struggles occurring in our own country; towns; neighborhoods - and we can choose only to worry about the little struggles in our own lives, but perhaps learning more about what's going on out there blesses us with an appreciation for what we have. perhaps it can help us gain humility in the knowledge that we can't do everything, while also encouraging us that we have the abilitiy to do something... and we'd be free to stop focusing on ourselves each time we did a little bit of what we can to help.
i say that not as a guilt trip but as a bit of encouragement that there are ways to stop worrying about ourselves so much - i think everyone needs a little freedom from focusing on him or herself from time to time. it can become so constricting, and nobody is informed that relief can be found in no longer trying to make the world revolve around you. we try so hard to get it to do that most of the time, but it's not meant to work that way and that's why we can never seem to get it right. take a breath and don't worry - i don't have to make it all about me. who knew that letting go of that concept could bring not only relief, but a strangely better sense of self than we had in the first place?
i think one has to experience it, even for a moment, before one can understand and actually believe it to be true.
ooooh my goodness, i'm quite tired. i'm at work... have been since 5am. let me tell you, it is a dangerous trek walking across campus at 4:45 on a Friday morning. we've had two girls attacked completely randomly and i guess not knowing what could be out there absolutely freaked me out; i was praying out loud the entire time (for safety, but also so that perhaps whoever was out there might think at very least that i was crazy for talking to myself...)
however, walking gave me just a glimpse of what the kids in Uganda have to go through every day of their lives. Sure, they walk every night in groups (i hope) but they live in a constant state of fear of being taken from their families to be beaten and tortured and potentially killed: made into soldiers against their will. i don't know what's out there at my school, perhaps some random guy who is just feeling out of his mind or drunk or something one night, but that's not very likely and i have a chance of escape and a good chance of surviving even if i'm hurt. these kids walk knowing exactly what's out there intentionally hunting them. they know what will happen to them. and they walk every night with that knowledge; with that fear. even children who have been captured and then escape have no peace after their escape. they keep walking with their peers, and have to be all the more cautious, because it is unlikely that they will be so lucky as to get away twice.
we are so blessed. i suppose we can ignore the rest of the world - and when i say world, i am scoping everything, from the nations on the other side of the globe to the struggles occurring in our own country; towns; neighborhoods - and we can choose only to worry about the little struggles in our own lives, but perhaps learning more about what's going on out there blesses us with an appreciation for what we have. perhaps it can help us gain humility in the knowledge that we can't do everything, while also encouraging us that we have the abilitiy to do something... and we'd be free to stop focusing on ourselves each time we did a little bit of what we can to help.
i say that not as a guilt trip but as a bit of encouragement that there are ways to stop worrying about ourselves so much - i think everyone needs a little freedom from focusing on him or herself from time to time. it can become so constricting, and nobody is informed that relief can be found in no longer trying to make the world revolve around you. we try so hard to get it to do that most of the time, but it's not meant to work that way and that's why we can never seem to get it right. take a breath and don't worry - i don't have to make it all about me. who knew that letting go of that concept could bring not only relief, but a strangely better sense of self than we had in the first place?
i think one has to experience it, even for a moment, before one can understand and actually believe it to be true.