Article from LCResource Newsletter - February 2008
Celebrating your continued development.

Title: The Seed

by: Sharon Sorrell, M.S.L.C.

As night closes in
all around us out here
so deep we can hardly see
to turn, let me feel a seed
right under our feet, down there
in the even deeper dark 

Burst open.*

I was not happy when we first moved to this small seaside town with my family last July. I had left behind my beautiful Saltspring Island home and all my beautiful friends, who so lovingly surrounded me for the past fourteen years. 

It was very scary coming to what my daughter referred to as the end of the world, the farthest northern town on Vancouver Island — one of the most beautiful places I have ever lived and one of the loneliest. 

Our small town made its living for many years on logging, mining, and fishing, and, because its economy is resource-based, has gone through many depressions. It has lived through mine closures, logging strikes, and disappointments one right after the other, including promises from the government that were broken time and time again.  

However depressed my small town seemed on the outside, deep within its heart beat the true town — the living breathing community —filled with the people who greet me, a stranger, with a good morning and a how are you every time I walk along the seawall or into town. Filled with people like the school bus driver who stopped to chat with me about his daughter’s fight with cancer; the young woman on the first floor who is not only taking care of her own seven children alone, but her mother and her brother too; the young boisterous man who stopped me one day to ask me why I walked with a cane and to tell me about his struggles with his disease, multiple sclerosis; and, the elderly lady upstairs, whose husband has been in the hospital for over a month now and has no idea when he will come home — yet always has a cheerful smile for me. 

I began to feel more and more that living, breathing heart beat deep within me. Each beat seemed to plant a seed until enough gathered together and burst through with an unshaped indefinable idea. An idea that I did not recognize or remember until walking past an empty storefront on the main street of town one morning. 

Looking through the picture window, instead of piles of boxes strewn about the wood floor, I saw people practicing yoga, relaxation, or meditation together. I envisioned a beautiful space just for my Spirit Life Coach clients and my husband offering creative writing classes by a water fountain in the corner. I saw a home of personal and spiritual growth for a town whose spirit had been crushed so many times — a home where people can bring their bruised spirit and tired bodies for spiritual, emotional, physical, and practical inspiration. 

In my early twenties, I woke up one day with these words roaming about my head: serve God by serving others. I’m not sure now how this phrase developed so as to unfold so clearly that particular morning, but it stuck with me and I spent the past thirty years figuring out how best to do this. 

I understood that I could serve others and the world by simply lending a listening ear, kissing a bruised arm, visiting someone sick and in the hospital, or laughing with a sad friend. These are things I did quite willingly—and hopefully selflessly—but, I was sure that I had been called to do something bigger, something grand and far-reaching, something impressive and magnificent, something great. 

As I walked through my life, I gathered experience and knowledge in hopes of finding out how best to serve the world. I suppose that I was expecting a sign of some sort—maybe not a lightning bolt, but a sign obvious enough to get my attention. 

But as I stared through this storefront window, like the smallest piece of flint had sparked the tiniest flame within me, I realized that by serving the people in this small sad town I am indeed serving the world. The gift of calming meditation to a woman who cares for her seven children, mother, and brother is a gift that is not only healing for her, but also resonates back to her family and all the people she meets throughout her day, carrying the gift out into the community and beyond—maybe the world. 

It, of course, would have been nice if could be staring through this storefront window years back in my healthy energy filled twenties, but I would not have been emotionally or spiritually ready then and may not even have seen this storefront in the same way. I may be weary, filled with chronic pain from my neurological diseases, and over fifty years of age now, but I‘m also filled with a new joy and determination. A kind of determination that I have never known before this. A kind of determination that gives me the energy I need to plunge ahead through the ins and outs of starting and promoting a non-profit corporation dedicated to the personal and spiritual growth of my small town. 

So, I am not unhappy to be here anymore. I don’t feel alone or stuck at the end of the world anymore. The beauty that has risen up out the struggles and the triumphs of my life has settled here in my new home. And the beauty that has risen up out the struggles and the triumphs of my small town has settled here in my heart. And the calling that nestled so deep like a seed within me for so many years has quietly burst forth here in this remote and unassuming part of the world. 

No poof or flashing lights, just a sudden and quiet, “Oh yes. Of course.” 

END.

*Openings to Lighten the Way by John Sorrell

About the Author: Sharon Sorrell holds her certification as a Master SPIRIT LIFE Coach. We are ever grateful for the contribution that Sharon has made to our newsletter over the last years. Should you wish to contact the author, please contact our corporate email: rhema-int@shaw.ca. 

Copyright Notice: Sharon Sorrell.
This article is copyright of Sharon Sorrell  © 2008. All rights reserved.
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