Hold On...

It’s no secret that I love everything prayer involves... I love visualization, meditation, contemplation, music, poetry, creativity, etc. And... today a song entered this sacred prayer space.

I was attempting to leave a place of pain through this prayer when the song began to play.

This song, Hold On, was my personal anthem for at least three years of my chemo treatment. It became my prayer. It revived my soul and it gave me strength. It was the 90s.

I know there’s pain

Why do you lock yourself up in these chains?

No one can change your life except for you…

Just open your heart and mind

Is it really fair to feel this way inside?

Don’t you know?

Don’t you know... things can change

Things will go your way

If you hold on for one more day…

You could sustain

Or are you comfortable with the pain?…

Don’t you think it’s worth your time

To change your mind…

Hold on for one more day cause

it’s gonna go your way…

Every word in this song gave me the strength to just keep going. To just keep believing. And I didn’t even need to live. I just needed one more day. As long as I held on just one day - everything would be okay.

I had my red blood cell t-shirt, like a million trolls, and THIS SONG.

And that was my field of AWARENESS.

Not the cancer, not the chemo, and not the isolation.

AND

I gave my ATTENTION to that awareness.

AND

That awareness grew.

As child I was naturally brave. I didn’t have to focus on my attention so much. I hadn’t “learned” that bad things could happen ... or that “bad things” could repeat themselves.

Today my awareness turned my attention to THIS SONG once again.

There were other things I could have given my awareness to... but then, right then... THIS SONG was the most intriguing.

So my prayer shifted.

I felt the rise and fall in the breath of my poem.

I had less attention for my pain.

The shackles fell with each sigh and I emerged in the presence of prayer... right in the midst of the mystery.

AMEN