The Safest Place On Earth

One Thanksgiving morning, several years ago, I woke up feeling a little depressed and discouraged about my work. My marketing efforts seemed to have fallen flat and I found myself wondering if I was dumb as dirt to think enough people would want to come and sit with me in my pasture in podunk Pickens. And then I opened my emails and received one from a client who'd written a poem of our time together. It was called "Why I Am Thankful For the Place By the Creek."

Line by poetic line she expressed her thanks for the sights and sounds and the things that had touched her. And as I read, the soft tears came, until I reached the line that cut like a knife straight to my heart - "and a lightweight plastic lawn chair becomes the safest place on earth." 

My little plastic chairs, some from the thrift store, one picked up from the side of the road, had become someone's safe place! In one fell swoop that simple line yanked my little ego-rug of self-doubt and I'm-not-enough right out from under me. And it all came crashing down as it hit me that all I ever wanted was to help someone feel safe, with me and the space I've created, and that it's enough - what I'm doing is enough, who I am is enough, and helping one person is enough.

And with all the enoughness came tears of gratitude - gratitude for the gift of sitting with others and hearing their stories and for the unique and humble privilege of creating, if for just one person, the safest place on earth.

Happy Abundance Day to all of you!

(See client's poem below).
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Why I am thankful for the place by the creek . . .

​- feelings that haunt the edge of life come into thoughts and expressions . . . finally         escaping into reality
- wooden slats in a simple bridge catch tears and laughter, spilling them into the           disappearing waters of the creek
- words that have never felt safe tumble into the peace of the mountain woods
- a soul, new and unknown, offers a way to touch Grace
- time belongs to the moment, not the future
- butterflies roam and flitter, feeling safe enough to land on those gathered to talk
- spirit and grace encompass all that is said or thought or felt
- a lightweight plastic lawn chair becomes the safest place on earth
- the creek moves and trickles, steady and unaware, accepting all that it passes by
- in fear, in the pain of life, in the words that never come and the feelings beyond touch,
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There is always at the creek . . . the presence of God.
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