Do we not each go through what we can call the personal “seasons of life” during our lifetime on earth? We have all known, according to our years and experiences, the sweet springtime of youth, the deep summer of fulfillment, the bittersweet fall of letting others do for us what we can no longer do, and the chill of winter? Coming to the close of one’s life is itself but a passing season in an unseen greater one. Do try to see the timeless beauty in all of this change, and you will.

Is any one of us less than a rose, or the single raindrop that – in falling to feed and refresh the flowers – makes it possible for them to open and reveal their rainbow of colors and fragrance for us? The answer should be evident.

We are more than the rose, greater than the solar radiance that stirs her essence to bloom. For neither rose nor sun’s radiance is conscious of the great story they serve as they let go and give themselves up to life.

In truth, we human beings are created unique among all things that take life and then give it back on the stage of life, for we are made to witness this eternal story… and more.

We are not made to have only a relative role in this Great story, to be – as are all other creatures – just a minor, passing actor upon its stage. No, the promise of our potential far outweighs even our ability to imagine it, for we have been created to consciously participate in its timeless telling.

When Abraham Lincoln, the great American president, looked at his country so torn apart by the conflict of racial hatred – born of individuals clinging to ways of life that sorely compromised the soul’s longing for an inclusive love – he said of this world of troubles: “This too shall pass.”

Of what world was he referring to in that moment? Did he speak of a nation at war within and upon itself, that it would pass? Or did he address the state of his weary heart, so heavy with despair over the condition of man, so filled with doubt as to the course he must choose to help change the consciousness of the United States?

Clearly he was referring to all of these conditions, and more. He was saying that these trials, along with their attending troubles, will pass. But how could he know this truth when darkness had spread itself out both before and within him at once?

Lincoln knew, as can we in our battles with unwanted moments, that the events he faced – as awesome as they were – represented only a single page in a far larger story. His eyes could see the truth behind what the world remains blind to: this unending and ever-unfolding Life in which we dwell requires the passage of all the pages that have gone before it.

Letting go, at its heart, is an act of agreement with Life. It is an accord on our part with what the present moment tells us about ourselves as it unfolds before us, asking of us what it does. And what is it that Life is asking of us moment to moment? It’s simple, really:

Life is asking each of us: will you be a witness to my Story? Will you let go of your short-lived moment in the sun of passing circumstances – in order to realize that just behind all such shadows dwells a Life whose Light never fades?

Will you choose in favor of entering into a Life whose story never ends, and in which fear and failure simply do not exist?

And what must we choose so that we can participate in this Greater Story?

We must choose to let go.