Hug Corner: Thought for the Week 2/13/17
February 13, 2017
Thought for the Week from “Healing After Loss” by Martha Whitmore Hickman
“A person that never climbs will never fall.“
—William Shakespeare
Sometimes, devastated as we are by grief at the loss of a loved one, we may wonder, Is it worth it? Would it be wiser not to be so invested in people that when they die we feel our own world is all but destroyed?
We know the answer. Such a choice would deny what is most richly human in our experience—the ability to make close and intense connections with other human being.
No more could a parent keep a child from engaging in any pursuit that might involve danger. Of course for children as for adults, there are some pursuits that are so dangerous only the foolhardy are drawn to them, just as there are some relationships so dangerous we enter them at our peril.
Our life choices waver back and forth across the thin line of unwise involvement on one side and rich human exchange on the other. It is a matter calling for wise judgment—to whom we entrust our heart. But to hold back from loving and being loved because there is always the danger of losing is like trying to prevent a child from learning to walk because the child might fall. The child will fall—and will get up and walk again.