Inspiration

It's been a while since I've felt compelled to blog anything much, but this morning I woke up with a seed of an idea in my head. The morning and family life seem to have sent it off into the four winds though, so I shall scrabble about trying to catch that pesky seed and see if I can help it grow! I suspect it won't turn out to be quite what I thought it would be this morning, but isn't that just like life?

It's been a bit of a bumpy ride around here the past couple of weeks. We've have had the most horrendously stressful year, thanks to the government and a certain Bad Man. Whilst we have generally been hopeful of a positive outcome, the truly shocking news of just what is planned for home ed, should that wretched children, schools and families bill become law, really knocked us for six - one blogger really summed it up when she called it vindictive legislation and Kelly sums up the abusiveness to a T.

We have had long conversations about our options. We have had tears; we have had anger and raging fury; we have had shock, dismay and disgust and we have had a feeling of total impotence in the face of forces stronger than us.

Thankfully, as we have plumbed the depths of despair, other home educating friends have been feeling their strength and power; their joy and sense of wonder; their dogged determination and that has lifted us once more. It's a constant ebb and flow, up and down existence that we are living right now, but living it we are - an organic experience if ever there was one!

A friend of mine wrote this as her facebook status this morning:

"She will reach higher than the mire they spread :) Have a great day !!"

I didn't manage to catch hold of that seed from this morning, but I seem to have found a different one, one that seems more fitting for us right now. I am going to plant it, and I hope to watch it grow into something strong and beautiful, something that will inspire us to look around and find all the joy and beauty that DOES still exist in our world, if we would only see it and nurture it through the dying days of the strangling, ugly weeds that would see us shrink and shrivel with them into the mire.

ETA this wonderful poem, found over here:

RISKS

To laugh is to risk appearing the fool,
To weep is to risk being called sentimental.
To reach out to another is to riskinvolvement.
To expose feelings is to risk showing your true self.
To place your ideas and your dreams before the crowd is to
risk being called naive.
To love is to risk not being loved in return,
To live is to risk dying,
To hope is to risk despair,
To try is to risk failure

But risks must be taken, because the greatest risk in life is to risk nothing.
The person who risks nothing, does nothing, has nothing, is nothing, and becomes nothing.
He may avoid suffering and sorrow, but he simply cannot learn, feel, change, grow or love.
Chained by his certitude, he is a slave; he has forfeited his
freedom.
Only the person who risks is truly free.

Often attributed to the poet and thinker, Leo Buscaglia, the real author of this inspirational verse is Janet Rand.