You cannot write if you do not read,” the blind man said. “You cannot eat if you do not chew. And you cannot play if you do not” – he grabbed for the boy’s hand – “listen.
But you cannot change your past, no matter how you craft your future.
Yet all around you, timekeeping is ignored. Birds are not late. A dog does not check its watch. Deer do not fret over passing birthdays. Man alone measures time. Man alone chimes the hour. And because of this, man alone suffers a paralyzing fear that no other creatures endures. A fear of time running out.
Personally, I always wondered about authors and celebrities who loudly declared there was no God. It was usually when they were healthy and popular and being listened to by crowds. What happens, I wondered, in the quiet moments before death? By then, they have lost the stage, the world has moved on. If suddenly, in their last gasping moments, through fear, a vision, a late enlightenment, they change their minds about God, who would know?
Sometimes I think the greatest talent of all is perseverance.
Love comes when you least expect it. Love comes when you most need it. Love comes when you are ready to receive it or can no longer deny it.
Tell me about your family,” I said. And so she did. I listened intently as my mother went through each branch of the tree. Years later, after the funeral, Maria had asked me questions about the family – who was related to whom – and I struggled. I couldn’t remember. A big chunk of our history had been buried with my mother. You should never let your past disappear that way.
Every loss leaves a hole in your heart.
This is part of what a family is about, not just love, but letting others know there’s someone who is watching out for them. It’s what I missed so much when my mother died – what I call your ‘spiritual security’ – knowing that your family will be there watching out for you. Nothing else will give you that. Not money. Not fame.
You humans are always locking each other away. Cells. Dungeons. Some of your earliest jails were sewers, where men sloshed in their own waste. No other creature has this arrogance – to confine its own. Could you imagine a bird imprisoning another bird? A horse jailing a horse? As a free form of expression, I will never understand it. I can only say that some of my saddest sounds have been heard in such places. A song inside a cage is never a song. It is a plea.
Secrets. We think by keeping them, we’re controlling things, but all the while, they’re controlling us.
Truth is light. Lies are shadows. Music is both.
You cannot ask things to do what they are not meant to do. Eventually, they will break.
There is a reason you glance up when you first hear a melody, or tap your foot to the sound of a drum. All humans are musical. Why else would the Lord give you a beating heart?
There are moments on earth when the Lord smiles at the unexpected sweetness of His creation.
You cannot unplay your notes. Time, like music, is indelible that way.
Things that happen before you are born still affect you... And people who come before your time affect you as well. We move through places everyday that would never have been if not for those who came before us. Our workplaces, where we spend so much time – we often think they began with our arrival. That’s not true.
No act done for someone else is ever wasted.
At a certain point, your life is more about your legacy to your kids than anything else.
But just because you have silenced a memory does not mean you are free of it.