Every part of your life matters. Every moment of your existence is meaningful. Every opportunity you work so hard for and every opportunity that falls into your lap is a chance to do something wonderful or learn a hard lesson. Your life is made up of pages that will become the book about you. It will contain all that you’ve learned as you make your way in this place. The spirits that ushered you from heaven to earth nudged you to begin chapter one upon your arrival. The first page is a story of celebration and how nature and all its creatures danced and rejoiced when you made your grand entrance. It’s a party like none other meant to leave an impression on your heart so you never stop writing your story. All this day one hoopla is there to help you remember how much the Divine loves every part of who you are so chapter one is pretty important. It’s there for you to read again and again when you fall or when this world hurts you. You’ll always be worth more than all the stars in the universe. It’s all there on page one! It can never be censored, edited or crossed out by you, anyone or anything in this world.

Life’s journey is about remembering and recording the pages of your life. The details matter, your relationships matter, your struggles and triumphs matter, the process of your life matters. These are the things you collect in your book that teach you how to handle what comes next or to help you support those experiencing writer’s block and stumbling to move on. Reflecting on each page in your life and learning from your experiences is what makes us wise. If we get stuck in a particular chapter, it usually means we could use some help from other authors or we need to put down our pen, rest and think for a while. It could mean that we’re writing our book based on what others tell us should be on each page. Gather your own moments and be on the look out for what makes your book beautiful. Don’t rely on the world to tell your story. If you do so, your chapters will be superficial, anxiety ridden, boring, chronically sad and empty in spirit. Tear those pages up. Do your research and dig deeply for the real you, the beautiful you, the you that has a true story to tell. The you that arrived on a party bus! Every lesson you’ve learned, every chance you took, every collapse to the floor and every time you shared your light and held another will be written on your heart. Your book will become a marvelous story filled with relationships, love, miracles, challenges, successes and failures. The beautiful story you compose will make for a fantastic, one-of-a-kind read. It will teach and influence everyone you meet if it tells the story of who you really are. That’s how you pass on wisdom to those caught in dark chapters or how you help yourself recover when words cannot be found.

Writing our book is a process and the process matters. How are you learning, growing and finding a way to love every piece of your life that makes up the whole of your story? What are you noticing, who are you spending time with, how are you holding on, climbing up and doing the best you can to live a life worth living? Each piece of the puzzle and how all these pieces fit together define who we are, what we’ve learned and how we’ve loved or backed away from love. We don’t arrive, we keep moving, keep growing and as we do, our life becomes more interesting even when we put down the pen and run. Spectrums of light and darkness making up the pages of our book keep us engaged and wanting to know more about the wonder of who we are and the wonder of all living creatures that make up the whole.

How we grow, adapt and learn requires taking one step at a time and each step matters. It’s how we eventually learn to crawl, walk, run and feel so much joy we dance by ourselves under the stars at night. Every experience you have grows into the story of you like a single grain of sand that is part of a beautiful beach or a single leaf that makes up a majestic tree. Each element, piece, fragment and thread matters to the beauty of the whole. We are a speck; we are the whole world. Our story is comprised of each letter and the whole book. We are a single canary loved just for being and loved for the part we play in the flock of flying color. Re-read the first page in your book when the journey gets tough. It will remind you that no matter where you are in your story, you will always matter to the One who sent you. Write that all over your heart so you live a life that exemplifies your true worth and are an active participant in the moment-by- moment creation of you. Share some lessons and love too. This way, your story will never end.

Questions/activities to ponder or good journal prompts!

1. Close your eyes and breathe in and out. Now imagine heaven and nature celebrating the arrival of you. What does it look like? What does it feel like?
2. The Divine expressed a deep, deep love for a single canary and loves you even more than a million canaries. How might you connect with that love? Maybe start by noticing all the feathers you find if you stay open to seeing them.
3. How does it come to be that we allow others to write our story? What does that feel like? What does it feel like to take back our own pen?
4. There’s opportunity found in the simplest of moments and wisdom is gathered when we reflect on each step of our journey. Do you focus more on the process or just the end result? Why/why not?
5. You are a speck or the whole world, a grain of sand or the beach, a leaf or the tree, a single letter or a book. What does this idea of being a piece of a beautiful whole mean to you?