The Call
Do you hear a call? Do you think you might hear it? Does something keep coming to mind? Does something nag at you?
I love a good anonymous quote or fifty, so I’ll add some here.
"Underneath all worldly sense of ambition is a soul's longing to live out its potential. Listen to the call."
“The wind take you away where your soul calls you.”
“If you can see your path laid out in front of you step by step, you know it's not your path. Your own path you make with every step you take. That's why it's your path.”
“If the path before you is clear, you're probably on someone else's.”
“If you do follow your bliss, you put yourself on a kind of track that has been there all the while waiting for you.”
“We must be willing to get rid of the life we’ve planned, so as to have the life that is waiting for us.”
“Instead of judging your efforts by how good you think you did, note what you learned, what interested you, where you came alive or connected with others, and build on that.”
Danielle Steel said in an interview once: "When I was first starting out, I had the same agent as Agatha Christie. I was about 19 years old and she was in her nineties. I met her once, and I remember she said, 'I want to die face-first in my typewriter.' And I feel that way. I mean, I want to go on forever, just writing."
I want to die face-first in my typewriter!
Maria Shriver interviewed the poet, Mary Oliver, for Oprah Magazine in 2011 and asked: “Mary, you've told me that for you, poetry is and always was a calling. How do you know when something is a calling?”
Mary answered: “When you can't help but go there. We all have a hungry heart, and one of the things we hunger for is happiness. So as much as I possibly could, I stayed where I was happy.”
I read a story this weekend in the Reader's Digest about a man in Clemmons, North Carolina, named Tom Brown, who is reviving apple varieties. Apparently, there were over 7,000 types of apple in 1900 which dwindled down over the 20th century to just the few we know at the grocery store. Mr. Brown has reclaimed 1,200 varieties since he started his quest. The 2-page article told a quick tale about the Junaluska apple, and I swear I remember this one from my childhood(?).
Come to find out there are online Apple directories, and I couldn't go on. I was just so glad to know about Mr. Brown and his Southern network of apple bringer-backers. I wanted to keep the thought of Mr. Brown in his orchard.
When you answer God’s call, you surrender to what’s on your heart and soul. Mr. Brown is honoring God with his apple bliss.
People sometimes talk about this feeling as a knowing, and sometimes, as getting lost in time. Suddenly, after doing something you’re called to do, you look at the clock and hours have passed. And you’re content.
My last quote applies to me, personally. When I decided to move from the Midwest to the Southwest, I had that knowing feeling. I didn’t have a doubt or second thought. There was that inevitable resistance in what I refer to as the 25th hour, but even while pushing through that, I still knew. I have spent more time here writing just for the feeling of writing than at any other time in my life. Surrendering to the knowing, the call, opens up flow, peace, joy.
“The desert will lead you to your heart where I will speak.” ~Hosea 2:16.
Photo credit to: Edu Lauton on Unsplash