“Be careful of whom you let speak for you or work on your behalf. As well meaning as a person may be, no one is you. No one else knows the words inscribed on the walls of your heart.”

This was my horoscope for Friday, April 13th. I have not written for some time about my horoscope but this one reached right off the page and grabbed me by the neck. I quickly tore it out of the paper and put it in my book bag where I could keep an eye on it, and it on me. It seemed an important admonition, one I needed to keep close, lest I forget its warning, its wisdom.

Reading these words reminded me of something we often said to our children when they left the house. I am not sure how it began or how young they were when we began saying these words to them. As they were heading out the door, when what we wanted to say was “Don’t do anything dangerous….or stupid.”, what we said instead was “Remember who you are.” Implicit in those four words was the deep hope that in the face of whatever pressures existed outside them, there were stronger ones etched on the walls of their hearts. These cave drawings pointed to the unconditional love we hoped we and others had dished out, the confidence we had in their intellect and their spirit, the deep trust we held onto that they would, in the face of uncertain odds, be true to their soul. Depending on their ages and the happenings of the days before, we said these words with varying degrees of confidence and large heaps of faith.

“No one knows the words inscribed on the walls of your heart.” Recently our Seattle Son had an interview for which we all hoped he would do well. At some point as parent, you begin to realize that you no longer have a good sense of what your child’s skills really are. Once they begin college, and maybe even before, you know they are learning skills and arts that are informing them in ways that are foreign to you. This is a good thing. They are creating their life…..what you birthed them to do. Whether or not he has the skills for this particular position is, for the most part, unknown to me. So in wishing him luck on this endeavor, I found myself reaching for words that get at the core. “Remember who you are.”, I heard myself say.

For each of us, if we have lived a reflective life, one that allows us to know and claim the words inscribed on the walls of our heart, we will be able to handle whatever happens in most life situations. If we know well the words written on that place that breeds passion and its sibling, compassion, we will never find ourselves being untrue to our nature, untrue to the movement of the Spirit within us. We will speak with assurance and clarity for ourselves and work on our own behalf. We will remember not only who we are but whose we are.

What are the words written on the walls of your heart? Today might be a good day to celebrate them. Write them down. Shout them out an open window. Dance them in the privacy of your home or for the whole world to see. Cherish them. No one else has your heart or your words.

And isn’t that a wonderful thing?