I heard some incredibly wise words several years ago that I’ve often thought about but never really shared with anyone else. By chance, I happened to bring it up in conversation today, and it reminded me of how profound the idea was when I first heard it, so I thought I’d share.
The words were about loss and relationships. The particularly profound observation is that when you lose someone, you don’t only lose them. Every person brings out something unique in the other people that are around them. So when you lose someone among your family or a group of friends, you also lose a little part of everyone else that was sparked by the one who is gone.
I think about this a lot with my kids. When you are young, you are possessive of your friends, and can easily get threatened when someone new enters the circle and seems to threaten a relationship. Watching them work through this has been super interesting, and I’m glad to have some of the language above to help them see what is happening in a positive light.
Personally, I think a lot about this because it’s clear that there are things about my daughters, my wife, and myself that are uniquely tied to each one of them. We would not be the same if not for each other. When I lost my Dad years ago, I lost a bit of my Mom, my brother, my sister, and myself too.
This was not meant to be so depressing. Actually, when I brought it up today, it was in a very positive context. We all value the people in our lives, but I think the value each one of us brings is perhaps even greater than we realize. It’s sort of a multiplicative effect because of our profound inter-connectedness to one another.
I can’t recall who to actually attribute this idea to. I think I recall hearing it from Tim Keller at one point, but I’m pretty sure he was quoting or referencing someone else. Regardless, I’ve found this to be a very good thing to reflect on today, as such a great sense of divisiveness and alienation seems to be all around us.
