If you're reading this blog you're a Point Of Light...  

 

My lighthouse is named Terpsichore and her simple encouragement was light enough to save this ship, me, from crashing into the jagged rocks.

 

If not for my friend Kim, I'd not be doing this blog. Why? Because living life had put me on a dark journey, and the journey was leading me perilously close to crashing me into the jagged rocks. Honesty demands I tell you had I not noticed her bright beacon of light, I'd never have avoided those jagged rocks! I can also say with all honesty that Kim was the friend I needed at just the right time in the journey of my life lived. I love my friend and she'll always be a light in my heart.

 

For the largest piece of my life, that resembled forever, I not only lived with dark despair, but it also seemed to perpetually envelop me. I've been deeply affected by mental and emotional issues that arrived like ugly beasts in my childhood. I've often felt I was no more than a wisp of smoke floating from room to room, nearly invisible—never noticed by anyone. I felt, as far as my family and friends were concerned, nothing I said or did matter to anyone. Having no self-awareness, I lived a life not knowing who I was and that made me feel unknowable. Worse still, I felt unloveable for the feeling I possessed no light, no color, no beauty; and as a result, I only ever experienced extreme emotional pain. In my emotional pain, my life had become so unmanageable I felt only suicide would make it stop.  I'd attempt suicide more than once and would consider it more than that. But through all of this, I always managed to find a way, to be honest, even fiercely honest, about the very ugly things in my life. It's a funny thing though: life is not simple nor simply understood. And so although I felt like a wisp of smoke no one noticed, Kim was there. Noticing. She noticed and, in doing so, became my lighthouse. In a simple paragraph, using just a few sweet words, she encouraged this man (me). In that encouragement, she found a way to show me her lighthouse's beacon, which unexpectedly afforded me an opportunity to turn the opposite direction of the jagged rocks—on three or four different occasions, Praise God!

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In gifting me that encouragement, that hope, Kim has given me something priceless I can now share with you. You see, I desired to understand why she'd do that for me. To accomplish this, I had to be supremely honest and sincere with myself, and it did take quite a while, but I slowly began to see I was my own Point Of Light. When I finally began to notice even the tiniest fragments of light within me, I began to find color—color in me, me. Then when I discovered I had color, I slowly came around to understand that this color made me beautiful! I think it's that beauty Kim noticed, even while I unloaded the ugly self stuff in my fierce honesty. Very slowly, a little here and a little there, I found happiness in my beauty; and for the first time in my life, I gave myself some long-needed and well-deserved tenderness. I allowed the first genuine smile to cross my face; I think I even giggled! 

 

I took to heart this new acceptance of all the good I possessed, and for the first time in my life, I dared to think I could write something worth being called a gift. And as a small gesture of gratitude for everything she'd done for me, I decided to write Kim a birthday gift. Of this gift, I desperately wanted to write for her something that would speak to her heart all the love one might expect on her birthday. As I sat down to write her gift with a desire to speak love into her heart, I paused to wait for honesty and sincerity to overwhelm me. Suddenly everything I'd ever written flooded my mind. By ultimate serendipity or the Remarkable Grace of God, I honestly and sincerely feel I found light when I wrote Kim's gift in 2019. And in finding that light, I found the meaning and purpose for my life: something I'd been forever seeking. All my written words spoke to me; they wanted to show me the wonderful and priceless thread of light, color, and beauty that had always been present in everything I write. I felt compelled, as if I had no choice, to stitch that thread into her birthday gift! I constantly wonder how that gift, meant just for her, unexpectedly returned so much back to me. But I am certain of this: it was a beautiful circle that only happened because I was fiercely honest and a listening Kim became my Terpsichore by showing me her beautiful beacon of light. 

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The following is what I wrote for Kim as a birthday gift...

 

If you held a palette in your hand, it would seem to have an endless spectrum of color to choose from—as you give away the gift of encouragement. I'm serious, in this gift you want to always give it away because you'd never choose to hold onto it. In this giving, all the colors leave and go with it, a free choice on their part. These colors stay for the long duration with the person they're encouraging, and the person is always free to use them to draw a picture here, paint a picture there, reflect on the colors, soak them in, meditate on them, and then smile a warm smile of contentment. I looked up on Google and found these precious things about encouragement: the action of giving someone support, confidence, or hope...persuasion to do or to continue something....the act of trying to stimulate the development of an activity, state, or belief. I tried counting all the colors I found in those words and concluded that while endless might not a big enough word, it seemed an appropriate choice for the number of colors I found. Kim, through the years I've taken those colors you've given me to paint an almost seemingly endless number of pictures. Sometimes they've been so abstract I didn't even know what I was looking at. Sometimes I choose to use only the brightest colors from the palette, and the picture was impossible to look at without being blinded. Sometimes the colors seemed to coalesce on their own by finding their perfect spot on the canvas and the pictures beauty was obvious with no meditation necessary. But every time, with your encouragement I was free to draw a picture with all the colors it gave me; I was able to reflect on those pictures; I soaked them in; I meditated on them; and every time, well most times, I got to smile a warm smile of contentment because I painted those pictures. For a long time, I painted the pictures to find myself, and each one gave me a glimpse, never a whole. But I have to think of you when I say that every glimpse was a beautiful thing of priceless worth that meant everything in the world to me. I'm almost certain I'm finally making pictures that reflect the whole of this man. Now, I want the lines and strokes to draw and paint something authentic, something very real and honest. Thanks to you I've not run out of colors to choose from, though I'd have to confess I'm always choosing some colors over many, many others. I think in this, Tod Thomas Price is getting glimpses of authenticity, and that is priceless. And Happy Birthday Young Lady...I hope you have an awesome day that's plenty blessed!