“Into Every Life…”

I am staying near Boston in Massachusetts and when I arrived yesterday it was pouring with rain and the temperature was very low for the time of the year. It stayed like that all day and I saw the weather channel referring to it as “Soggy Saturday.” Today was a complete contrast with blue skies, after early morning cloud and temperatures very much higher and more summer-like. After all the rain, it was such a pleasure to see the sun again and not only was the air fresher but the colours seemed brighter too. Maybe it was just that they seemed brighter after yesterday’s dullness.

It made me think how similar this is to our lives and what happens to us. Every so often, no matter how positive or upbeat we may be as individuals, into our lives a little rain must fall. Something appears to go wrong or we react to some external event in such a way that we become upset, unsettled or worried. Perhaps someone on whom we depend lets us down, we lose a close friend or a loved one. Whatever the cause, for us the clouds hide the sun and the rain begins to fall, sometimes a light shower, sometimes a thunderstorm and sometimes persistent, heavy rain. It becomes difficult to remember what we felt like when the sun was shining and we often think it will never shine on us again.

However, if we are patient, the sun will surely shine again and just like today, we will see how much fresher and more colourful everything is because of the rain. We will be able to breathe more easily and see the road ahead more clearly. It is worth remembering also, that sometimes what we consider to be a setback, a disappointment, a sadness or even worse, turns out to be a blessing. It is often impossible for us to see beyond the immediate future and what has caused the rain to fall for us becomes an obsession and makes us blind. It is often the case that it is only with the benefit of hindsight, much later that we realise how our lives have improved as a result of what we considered to be a disaster at the time it happened.

It is difficult of course, but if we are able to do as Rudyard Kipling suggests and, “Meet triumph and disaster and treat these two imposters just the same…” If we could only remember in our sad and difficult times, that the sun will always shine again and the trial we are facing will strengthen us to meet other, sterner challenges later, the rain storms would be replaced by showers. If we could learn to welcome the rain in our lives because it will freshen and brighten everything up for us and enable us to see things more clearly, we would be so much happier and contented.