Ohhh look its that day again,

 

You know what day I am talking about

 

No you can not get me to say it, I won’t.  For those of you just now joining us today is officially, at least on this blog, The Day that Shall Not be Named.

 

Its a day like any other, no better no worse and I am not buying into the oh groaness of it.

 

 

Well except to rename it, that might be kind of adding to the myth, the legend the ….   yeah well let’s move on we all know what day it is.

 

Today’s Mental Moment

 

 

is about being part of something bigger then just us and the here and now.

 

On an elementary level, we all know that we are descendents of people who were here long ago, who have done great things or bad things or just normal everyday things in their lifetime.

 

People just like us, except they wore funny clothing and maybe were a little uptight and let;s not forget they were in black and white.  Ok maybe just their pictures, nevermind that the ability to snap someone in an unguarded moment was nonexistent and therefore the information of those who came long before us  is from stories passed down and their likeness only viewable in formal portraits if at all.

 

Day to day, we probably don’t think much about them.  Who they were, what they looked like and whether they were lucky enough to have donuts, or if they liked peas.

 

We may even have lost that feeling of belong connected to people in our past,  not sure how they  help us connect to the bigger picture.

 

I have always had a feeling, deep down, not something that consumed me or caused a great deal of discontent or disorder in my life, not compared to the obvious disorder anyways,  the feeling was of not quite knowing …   to put it simply,  not knowing why.  Much of the why has to do with why I have bipolar disorder, why I am the way I am of course, and not being able to fit the pieces together of the puzzle that is me.

 

I always have felt like a bit of a mutt, a good combination of the best of my parents and  similarities to mom’s side of the family,  quirks and characteristics from dad’s side but nothing that firmly planted me and said  – this is why and where from, I am.  Nothing really solid that helped me better see the shape my puzzle piece is or where it may fit into the bigger picture of the puzzle of life.

 

This past weekend I was startled – I don’t a better word to use, to discover another piece of the me puzzle,   one that opened up a whole new bigger picture.

 

 

My daughter brought me a photo that has been on my mothers shelf for quite some time, an old one, black and white, of a lady who I had no idea her name, or even which side of the family, mom or dad’s she was from;  She asked me when I had gotten it done (as in she thought it was one of those old fashioned photos that you put on the props and they make it look like it’s from a long time ago).

 

I looked at the photo and saw no resemblance to the lady in the picture and said so,  She insisted it was the spitting image.  This was a couple of weeks ago.  I put the picture back and thought no more of it except that I wanted to ask who it was.

 

I have seen pictures of the women on my mom’s side when they were younger and heard plenty of stories about them and their antics, but my dad;s side of the family is somewhat of a mystery.

 

I have never seen pictures of my grandmother or great-grandmother or others when they were young but I have heard some stories, not as many or varied as from my mom’s side, but enough to relate to them in small ways.

 

I took a picture of her picture and someone else remarked they saw a resemblance, not just a kinda look like you, but striking to the point of it could be me.  Out of curiosity and because I was missing the resemblance,I still didn’t know who she was, except that my mom told me she was one of my dad;s grandmothers, I added some color to the photo, then put mine and her faces side by side. I saw then there was actually more than just resemblance, so I put one over the other.

 

 

It was a moment of ..  wow.  I got goosebumps and suddenly felt very connected.  I wish I could describe the feeling accurately but it was as if someone showed me where that piece of the puzzle belonged.  Where, essentially I fit in and how the piece that is me, came to be the shape it is.

 

 

 

Consider This: 

 

See we are all pieces of something bigger, something that was begun long ago and will continue long after we are gone (hopefully)  If you think of it like one big puzzle with a bunch of pieces that are puzzles too, i.e., this is me and all my pieces of my puzzle create a piece to a much larger puzzle.

 

When we put a puzzle together we can only fit the pieces in if we have the surrounding pieces.  Until then its just a piece floating around, its purpose to find a place so that the next pieces can be added.  You can;t hope to truly grasp the contribution  to the big puzzle if you don’t know where you are supposed to be and what anchors you.  Until those pieces are clear, you are just another piece in a pile that seems a mystery because it is but a small glimpse of the larger picture.

 

Mostly, day-to-day we are concerned with the smaller puzzle that is us, and it seems fair to say that as we are more and more sure of the shape of the piece our little puzzle makes, we start to look at where our piece, or us  as individuals fit into the larger puzzle in relation to everyone else’s piece.

 

Do we ever put more thought into the puzzle that piece belongs in?

 

Individuals, families, community, culture, history, the world, the universe, ….  there is a bigger puzzle for every one we find a place in.  We are part of something bigger and without our piece, the ones that come after us will not be able to find their place, or may have a much harder time.

 

Our puzzles overlap and connect to others whose lives we touch puzzles, and the possibilities and the connections are endless and there are even some puzzles connected only by that one piece that is you.

 

Every single piece of a puzzle is important.  We can surely still put a puzzle together without some pieces but there is never quite the satisfaction of being complete and the whole picture together as it is meant to be.  One piece can throw it off, if that missing piece is an anchor or a bridge, then there is much that is lost by that one piece being lost.

 

One person.

 

JUst one can make all the difference in the world, life, community, connections to each other, then the universe.. and so on…

 

You can get caught up in the complexities of it.

 

Kind of like a puzzle.

 

To your Mental State, whatever it may be