Travels through Life by Millie Jackson

LISTEN

Listen. That one word means so much. It doesn't mean to talk or give me your answer. It means to be quiet and let me talk. I need to express my feelings and thoughts. I don't need you to figure it out for me, I can do that in time my way. I just need someone to talk to. I don't want to know how you feel about what I'm saying. I'm the one who needs someone to listen to me right now. I'm not stupid, I have the right to talk about my feelings. Please don't butt in and tell me I should look at it that way.

I am trying to get you to listen to me. Listen is to be quiet, and let other people talk without giving advice. I know at times you think you know what's best for me, but how could you? You need to listen to find out that. Until you learn to listen to me, you will never know where I'm at. Or what I really felt.

We think we know what's best for that person, but until we learn to really listen, we don't know them at all. We don't know their fears, and hurt and feelings about life and things. Maybe we want so bad to help them that we forget that until we know their thoughts and feelings we could be guessing wrong and causing more problems and confusion. We will find that we can get to know the person if we will be willing to be quiet and listen. They're not asking us to fix it, just to listen to us and allow us to make the choice. Don't give us advice, we didn't ask you to do that. All we wanted was for you to listen.

It seems that we can listen to strangers and not to the one we love. They are the ones we need to be listening to most. At times we treat strangers with more compassion than the ones we claim to love. If you really love that person, we would care and listen to them. Not talk. Just be quiet. And listen.

One day our paths will cross again, I don't know when or where. Only God has that answer. I do wonder how we will act, will it be cold and indifferent, still angry and hurt. Or will we have learned from our mistakes? Did we learn that we as humans are not willing to listen to God, and we had to do it our way. The small voice was there; we weren't listening. We were listening. We will listen to Man more than God, and then blame Him for our problems. Satan made it all look so right at the time. But it's all right to hurt people as long as you get what you want or what you think you want at the moment.

But it takes a very big person to admit our mistakes in life, and learn from them. We find it hard to say "I'm sorry" and just say I wasn't willing to listen to you. Or to try and understand your feelings. And what would it take to straighten it out. We are too proud to admit we made a mistake. Sad, isn't it? I wonder if we knew that we had only a day to live and knew that for sure would it be so hard to say "I'm sorry for the hurt I caused, and the tears that were shed." Until we can become as humble as Jesus Christ, we will always lose. To be too proud to admit our mistake we will never learn the hurt and bitterness will always be there and it will destroy us in the end.

We talk about forgiveness, but it seems we haven't learned how to do it yet. It's so much easier to blame someone else for our own faults and shortcomings. Never taking the blame for our own. But until the day that we can accept that at least a part of it was our fault we will never become a better person. If tomorrow comes and it is our last day on this earth, how many hearts could we heal. Would it be better to admit that we are so afraid of losing face with the world. But the sad part God already knows. So who are we trying to fool? The truth is, only our self. God knows what happened

Tonight I listen to the sound of the train along the track, thinking back to my childhood, when I dreamed of traveling that train. Of the places I would see and go there was a whole new world outside there, and when I grew up I would see it.

If only I knew the problems growing up would bring, I wouldn't have longed so much for that. They say we all make our choices in life, and I guess we do. About people and things. Can also control our thinking and we follow the wrong path at times.

Like the train we can jump the track at times and hurt or get hurt in life. It's strange at that age I thought the world was so grand and the world had so much to offer. The hurt and heartaches I've had to travel to learn that even a train can have problems. And at times jump the track. That life has no guarantees that everything would turn out as we planned.

I know that at times things happen that you have no control over and we make choices in life that our childhood dreams or how to or how determined we are to make them happen. As we grow we find that other things have taken their place. But we keep saying "One day I will do that." Then suddenly one day is here, it slipped up on us and we didn't even realize it.

The sad thing is that train still goes down that same track tonight, even though years have passed by in my life and I never did get to ride it. I never got to see the places I had only dreamed about.

I talk to people who's traveled and they say that people and places are the same. It's how you live your life that matters. I guess like the train we all keep coming back to the same place and people. That's what life is about. It's not places and people, but it's how we live our lives where we are at the time. That we can take people, places, and things and make them a heaven or hell. The choice is ours. That we can make our life have meaning anywhere we are. We don't have to ride that train to find what our soul is searching for; it was there all the time. God had given it to us the whole time.

To find true happiness we have to let Him lead and to put our lives in His hands. He knows where we have to go and what we need to do to bring us true happiness.

Today the time grows closer to the surgery and I know that God will give me the strength to deal with what's ahead. That whatever happens I'm in His hands. And His will be done. I can't change a thing. But He knows where I'm at and where I need to go. I can only hope that the people I've loved will forgive my faults and to know I did the best I knew how at the time. That with the boys I've loved them and only wanted what's best for them.

Today I know that they'll have to travel their own road and find their own way in life. And at times we pay a big price for our mistakes. We have to grow and learn from them. If we only would put God first we won't go wrong. But that's a lesson we all have to learn. One day when we get older and we look back, we would all do it different, but we can't change a thing. We have to learn to accept it and go on. Life's a learning process. We all have to go through it to get to the end of our journey.

If every one of us will tell our life story we could learn from each other. But we'd never believe that can happen to us. It only happens to other people. So we keep making the same mistakes. I've traveled a lot of roads in my life, trusted people I shouldn't have and been disappointed and hurt. But through it all God was there to pull me through and to help.

I know today that He's the only true help we have. When we get down to the final journey that He's the one we need to be traveling with. If we listen He will lead us through our journey safely. Why don't we humans see that. Today the world and things have no hold over me. The people I love I will pray that God will hold them in His hands and lead them and pray that they will let Him do that.