Thoughts from here and there…How much time do you have?

Thoughts from here and there…How much time do you have?
I was deeply impressed with this story. Mary Ann O’Roark in an interview with Anne Lamott talks about her friend Pammy and herself.
“I was raised to keep all the family secrets and present myself in such a way that people would be either envious or approving. But keeping up a facade like that takes so much energy.
“When my friend Pammy was going through chemotherapy, and I asked her if the dress I was wearing made me look fat, I was making a fuss about the dumbest things, and Pammy looked at me and said, Annie, you just don’t have that kind of time. It was so profound, it was like I was in a cartoon and somebody conked me over the head. I got it.
“Pammy died seven years ago. But I still live by her words: You don’t have time to live a lie. You don’t have time to get the world to approve of you. You only have the time to become the person you dream of being. You only have the time to clean out your mean and ugly spots, areas that drag you down and hurt other people. You only have the time to accept yourself as you are and start getting a little bit healthier so you can be who God needs you to be. In a way, it’s exhilarating to say, This is really who I am, and I’m not going to pretend just because I have the sneaking suspicion I’m not good enough. God meets you where you are.”
God meets us in so many ways and in so many places. God meets us during Lent to reminds us of the brief nature of life and on Easter to loudly declare that there is life after life. Get the message?
Mary Ann O’Roark, an interview with Anne Lamott, reprinted from Clarity magazine.