Ever wonder why fables are such an important aspect of cultures all over the world? Fables are cultural teachers because at the end of the story we are given the lesson we’re supposed to learn. It is a directive and we continue telling these stories to pass on these valuable lessons. In the corporate world teams meet at the end of a project for a “lessons learned” meeting so they can smoke out the problems and create more effective processes moving forward. Pharmaceutical companies do lessons learned in the form of clinical trials. They have a hypothesis, create a medication and then test it on patients to make sure it’s safe and effective.
Lessons learned are often characterized by facts and figures. They are left brained exercises that allow us to approach life quite analytically. It’s not uncommon to hear people talk about the hard facts or the hard data; that’s information that is quantifiable, able to be examined and proven. The problem is that humans don’t work or live by hard data alone. We need to tap into the soft skills, the soft data that we call our intuition, our inner guidance and our wisdom.
The past two days I’ve spoken about Amber Augustin who had a revelation following the birth of her third child. Her son was born 10 weeks early. It was a harrowing experience, but somewhere and at some point there was a moment of clarity and that moment is when Amber would embark on a personal pilgrimage of healing for families who would travel the same road as she, but often with devastating results.
She was able to connect her body, mind and spirit to take the gifts she’d been given and find a way to provide comfort and compassion to families devastated not only the the premature birth of their children, but often the death of these children. There comes a time when talking about our intentions only goes so far; we have to step up to the plate and show up for our own spiritual healing and to guide people who are blinded by hopelessness and despair.
As someone facing a health challenge or a sudden death the lessons learned about living can be brutal. They can lead us down the road of despair and regrets if we don’t halt them in their tracks. The lesson learned is that we probably aren’t the first person to have experienced this particular heartache and we won’t be the last. We part of life’s continuum and that’s the energy we need to tap into, a universal sense of inclusion and community.
What lessons are you learning about life on a daily basis? How do you take those lessons and change how you’ll live your life today? Do the lessons make life more enjoyable? What lesson would you like to pass on to others so they don’t have to learn it the hard way; you create the fable and give us the moral…we’ll be forever grateful.
Pilgrim Pathway/Surviving Strong 