As I was peacefully slumbering and trying to recover from my five time zone difference in London this morning, the fire alarm went off in the hotel bringing this blissful process to an instant end. I bolted upright in bed and started to move immediately!
Thankfully it was a "false" alarm, in the sense that the hotel did not burn down with all my gear in it, but it was an astonishingly quick way to get the day started.
Recently I have had other fire alarms go off in my life. This past year my mother and also my only sibling died. The loss of them in my life has had many of the same effects in my life like the fire alarm this morning.
The close relationships in my life have incredible value for me, and they require much more effort than I have been allocating them over the last decade. Losing my mother and brother one after the other made me stop and take stock of how I have been working this garden of relationships in my life.
A garden is the perfect metaphor. Relationships, just like gardens, require a level of regular cultivation and attention that Westerners don't naturally or easily do. We compartmentalize our time and our relationships to the point that we become offended if work relationships overlap into our "family time" or our "personal time." Even those designations are weeds in our garden of relationships! The mutuality of one single solid relationship is worth far more than a cut and dry compartment designated as "personal time" or a "family time."
I for one need far more intentionality in all my relationships, or these amazing flowers in my garden are going to wither and be gone from my life.
