Dear Reader:

While many of you are still sleeping Doodle, Lassie, and I are meeting at 6:00 this morning to head to Daniel Island. We always leave early and manage to usually get a good parking place…meaning one that you can actually get out of when you are ready to leave.

As I thought about the race this year it suddenly dawned on me that it is really a walk (or run) of faith. No one who shows up to participate is guaranteed one minute more of life than anyone else. The difference is that somewhere along life’s path, some people have come to understand that life is about others, helping others…not just about our individual wishes.

I once read a quote that said: “If it doesn’t add to your life, it doesn’t belong in your life.”  After much reflection and many life experiences now…I do understand this quote. Life is really too short to donate too much of our time for wasteful activities that, not only don’t add to our lives, but eventually bring them down.

Then came a God Wink in the form of an article that just popped up on my computer and it was talking about the same idea of unnecessary busyness in our lives that distract us from our true callings.

Reengineeing Our Patterns
by Eknath Easwaran

When I recommend to someone that they slow down, they often raise a legitimate question: “There is so much that I have to do; how can I go through it slowly and get it all done?” I usually answer by referring to my own experience as a teacher in India. As chairman of the Department of English at a large university I had heavy responsibilities. But I wanted very much to train myself to do things slowly and without tension because I knew it would be a help on the spiritual path.
I began by making a list of all the activities I engaged in on the campus, the things I was expected to do and the things I liked doing. It turned out to be a long list. I said at the time what people tell me today: I simply cannot go slowly and take care of all these vital matters.

Then I remembered my spiritual teacher, my Grand-mother, who had great responsibilities in our extended family of over a hundred people and in our village. She always fulfilled those responsibilities splendidly, and I recalled that she had an unerring sense of what was central and what was peripheral. So using her example, I started striking from my list activities not absolutely essential.

I was amazed at the number that could go. I began to avoid those functions that I could not justify to myself. Putting aside my likes and dislikes, keeping an eye on what was necessary, using as much detachment as I could, I struck more and more from the list. Soon half of it was gone, and I found I had more time to give to what seemed likely to be of permanent value.

Re-engineering our patterns in the way I have mentioned will not be easy or painless. It will require persistent efforts for a long time. But the benefits are magnificent and we begin to receive them from the very first day we try to make a change.

I have told you on several occasions that the first thing that pops in my mind upon waking each morning is the scripture: “Today is the day that the Lord has made, Let us rejoice and be glad in it.”  It is on automatic pilot now….it is my first conscious thought each morning. Every day that God gives me really is a gift.

So when I came across the title message: “God didn’t add another day in your life because you needed it, He added it because someone out there needs you” a light suddenly came on. Again, by putting others first, we get a whole new perspective on life.

Each year when “Legally Pink” walks the race we, unknowingly, are providing someone we might never know, see or meet in our lifetime, a chance at life where before there was no chance. I am a prime example of this…if it hadn’t been for the new market research medicine that came available to me  (just when I needed it) almost four years ago…I would not be here this morning typing this blog. It is just that simple.

So if I am being kept alive because “someone out there needs me” then I best be ready to show up and do my part to help!

And that, in a nutshell, is why we walk…to give back to others what we have been  given…another chance at life. What a gift that is!

Donations are still being accepted so if anyone would like to help us meet our new goal this year of giving….here is the information you need…and thank you from the bottom of our hearts!

***RACE FOR THE CURE – Saturday, 10/15/16.  Gates open at 7:00.  Participate in a morning filled with hope, love and strength as we lace up to run breast cancer out of town!

To give electronically:

http://lowcountry.info-komen.org/site/TR/RacefortheCure/CHS_LowcountryAffiliate?px=13398752&pg=personal&fr_id=6459

To mail in a donation, please make checks payable to:
Susan G. Komen® Lowcountry
50 Folly Road Blvd. | Charleston, SC 29407
Phone: (843) 556-8011
Email: forthecure@komenlowcountry.org

So until tomorrow… We walk, we run, for tomorrow’s hope.

“Today is my favorite day”!!! Winnie the Pooh

*Rutledge loves any service that helps others like the police and firemen. He always says that he wants to be a hero when he grows up. After Mollie sent me these photos yesterday I wrote back that Rutledge is already a hero for participating in the Race for the Cure! He might never meet the people he has helped by fund-raising for them and walking each year…but lives will be saved because of him. And as for Boo Boo he is always a hero to me. (And to his little brother-Lachlan)