Reaping what we sow

I think most everyone has heard this saying, so many times. I actually have thinking a lot about it lately, because I'm realizing how true it really is. Time-worn phrases are time-worn, because they are so useful to explain sometimes difficult concepts and yet so true at the same time.

A friend of mine has a neighbor who spends her life trying to mind the business of all her other neighbors, calling the police on every little thing, getting upset and blowing things out of proportion. While it's never ok, more then a few young teenage boys have selected to play the most awful pranks on this home and family, time and time again. It has reached the point where as one family's boys grow up and become young men, they stop the revenge, only to find that another family's young boys are going through that stage and taking their revenge out on the family. Most recently, my friend's son reported that many of the boys in the high school that don't even live in the same neighborhood talk about this family, as their snoopiness, frequent calls to the police for everything have been shared with so many of the boys' peers as they share their frustration. The actions of this neighbor are legendary at school. Now people far outside the neighborhood travel there to just pull off their pranks.

Can you imagine what kind of a life this woman and her family are living? Some pranks are truly awful, such as feces on the door, to relatively mild, power boxing (shutting off the power from the outside using their power box) the house. My friend has never had anyone try to do anything to her house. I know that she has made efforts to be sociable with the kids in the neighborhood. She'll listen to them and admire their new toys, (motor bikes, scooters, 4 wheelers and what not, I'm sure I don't know what they all are), instead of finding any misuse to immediately call and report to the police. Most every single young boy on her block has had the police called on them at least 2 or 3 times. This is not a neighborhood of juvenile delinquents, or even close. However, the young men are being treated as if they are.

I've been hearing about the stories of this woman for at least 5 years. She carries her behavior out towards others, not just the young men. Her pettiness, rudeness, nasty comments and etc. continue to amaze me to this day.

After hearing the latest tales what's happening in that neighborhood about her life, I kept thinking, how can she not "get it". All this awful stuff that happens to her, how can she not look around and see that no one else has to live with this stuff done to them. I'm definitely not saying any of the actions of revenge are justified. However, an imperfect world has people who are imperfect, and it shouldn't be surprising that some retaliate. How can she not realize that she is sowing some pretty awful seeds of discord and they are definitely being reaped. I guess I shouldn't be surprised. I think many of us never really see ourselves honestly, nor see the actions we send out and connect them with what comes back to us.

While this woman lives her life of unhappiness, aggravation, pettiness, and continues to be attacked, everyone else in the neighborhood is going about their lives in peace. She is clearly reaping what she sows. Whether we know it or not, we are all doing the same. What we put out is what we are getting back, day in and day out.

In my life renovation process, I've begun to realize that so many things I blamed on "X, Y and Z" in the past were actually what I was reaping, after some dysfunctional sowing. As I've made changes and made progress in some of the different areas of my life in the last year or two, I've begun to reap so many good things, so many blessings, so many joys.

While I'm only human and have hard times, issues popping up here and there, I'm finding that even amidst and between all this, I have so much joy and happiness coming at me. I constantly marvel now and wonder how I got to be so lucky. My perspective has surely changed from the person I used to be, who felt life was so awful, I wanted to be dead before I hit 50. Taking care each and every day to be grateful for at least 5 things, is causing me to appreciate life, appreciate what's happening to me and revel in it. There are times I have found myself starting to take wonderful things for granted, but as I struggled each day to find my 5 items to put into my gratitude blog, my ability to appreciate, enjoy and savor the joys in my life increased. I wish all of you, my readers a bountiful harvest of life's sweet joys.