The Kite
I have begun to realize a mental picture that I always tend to see whenever I think about my life, trials and spirituality. God gave it to me a long time ago but I have suddenly realized just how much I think of it. I have come to the conclusion that it is my special and very personal connection with my Savior and that he wants me to view this symbol he has given to me, as mine! :)
I am a very visual person. I love imagery. Some of my favorite songs, books, art or movies all tend to be rich in visual imagery, or have hidden meanings. I have many favorite country songs that when I hear them I have certain mental pictures. I love movies with deep color (such as very green grass, or very blue sky). One movie that I saw a long time ago was The Virginian. It is a western and I have no idea what the story line is, but every time I think of the movie I see the deep green grass in this huge open field and the deep blue skies in the film. Someday I want to find that movie and watch it as an adult. Maybe Netflix has it. Anyway, I would like to tell you about my life symbol....the Kite.
From the time I came to know Jesus as my Savior at age 19 until I was about 24 I was a very happy person. I had never felt depressed. Yes, there were times when I was sad or angry, but generally I was very happy. Very happy with my life, family, etc. Then one year a lot of trials started hitting me. I felt as if my life as I knew it had been thrown up in the air and that I was trying desperately to catch little pieces of the happiness I had once known. I would try to catch these pieces and try to fit them together into a puzzle. There would be a chunk missing here, and a chunk missing there that was never to be found, or so I thought and felt.
During this period in my life I felt as if I was flatlining, spiritually. As if my prayers were somehow inhibited, that is if I could even pray with focus, or pray at all. During this time, I had a very strong mental picture that was constantly in my brain. I would think back to when I was a happy person, and I saw myself as a beautiful, colorful, free kite. I always saw myself floating high in the sky and I always for some reason pictured my husband as the person flying the kite, as if it was up to him to bring me happiness. Of course, as you know with flying a kite you occasionally will lose wind speed and your kite can sort of dip down like it is going to come down. At times, if I was sad or angry I know that my kite would dip down, but all of a sudden the wind would whip back up again and I'd be back to flying high. Then, one year my kite was flown right into a tree. With each trial I felt as if someone was pulling me down and I would get stuck on the next branch. With every tangle I felt myself ripping, and the wooden parts of the kite breaking. I couldn't see out of the tree. All I could see was green leaves. I always pictured my husband at the end of the kite, pulling me through all these trials, as if it was all his fault. Every time I hit a branch and ripped, I hated him more. I felt like I would never get out of that tree, and would never see the light of day, again. All I could see were these green leaves in front of me and all these branches below me....(more trials and tangles to fall into....or get PULLED into, as I thought). One day I fell out of the tree and landed under it, in a pile of broken kite...full of depression, anger, resentment, hate, bitterness, ad hopelessness....all ripped, tattered and torn, with no hope of ever being the kite that I once was. Beautiful and happy. Then one day someone picked me up, sat down with me on His lap under that awful tree, and for months that person tenderly sewed and mended the rips. Slowly, carefully and with great love. My wooden braces felt as if someone was strongly tying, at each junction, a cord of three strands. I started to feel as if my flatlined, cold, spiritual life was seeing the light of day again. That, as if two years of Winter were finally turning into Spring (picture The Chronicles of Narnia, here- another favorite movie of mine)! That, color was finally coming into my life again. That finally, I could see a color other than green. As we all know, the color green usually means growth and while I hated that color while I was stuck in that tree, I came to realize later, as I looked up at that tree I had fallen from, that it was actually a beautiful green...the sign of spiritual growth. And I then had respect for that color and I became thankful for it. I also changed my perspective. I realized that the One holding the end of the Kite was my Heavenly Father....that He had been in control of my life at all stages (even getting flown into a tree) and that I no longer had to visualize my husband as the flyer of my kite. That it wasn't up to my husband to make me happy. He never flew the kite. It has always been God, whether I saw it or not.
And so, here we are now, four years later. I feel as if I am even more beautiful than I was before. With all my mended rips and tears. Stronger for it, and with a changed perspective. I know there will be more trees. I know now that I will get through them and I will grow with each one. In between the trees, I can fly high in the sky with the Holy Spirit flying my kite and no one else. It is so freeing!
My life symbol....THE KITE! What is yours????
