Quiet the noise in the world and discover the beauty in you

I had a friend say to me yesterday, "I am truly jealous of your gift to write. I feel I can think deeply, but there are so many hurdles to getting those thoughts out, regardless of print or verbal."

I thought about that yesterday.

I do think we all have gifts. I'm pretty sure one of mine is writing. But I also know this. I've been writing and sharing what I write for a couple of decades now. When I go back and read some of the stuff I wrote 20 years ago, some of that work looks far more gag gift than gift.

In many ways, writing has been the gift that has allowed me to remove the hurdles to my thoughts. Writing has been the gift that has allowed me to turn down the volume of the world around me long enough to hear and discover my own voice in the world.

Turning down the volume had always been the hard part for me. Finding the words to put with my voice - the me I've discovered in the quiet - I guess that part has always come easy.

Once the world got quiet.

I've never been great at relationships. I suppose that's because for me, noise was always more comfortable than the quiet. Pretending to be someone else was always easier than discovering who I really was. Going non-stop was always a more peaceful path than stopping and reflecting.

But writing has introduced me to the beauty in the stop. In reflecting. In me.

I don't write because I have something to say. I write because in the quiet of this morning, I have discovered I have something worth sharing. What a beautiful thing, if we could all discover that we ALL do indeed have something worth sharing.

A requirement of sharing isn't talent. It's beauty. And we all have beauty.

I would encourage you today, don't go into the world looking for what it is you have to share. Instead, quiet the world around you long enough to discover it right where you are. Within you.

Maybe you don't write. Maybe you like to paint. Or knit. Or play the piano. Maybe you like to bake or garden or put a puzzle together.

"Creative work" can sound intimidating. But it's not. We are all creative. You don't have to be published to be a writer, on an album to be a musician, in an exhibit hall to be an artist, or in a home and gardens magazine to be a gardener.

You simply have to quiet the world around you while you create something. Anything at all that you simply want to make. The beautiful discovery in the act of your creating - whether it turns out to be famous or simply hangs on the fridge - is there is something beautiful in the creator.

You the creator, and the One who created you.

There's a lot of noise in the world. I fear it's drowning out a lot of our beauty. So, I encourage you - find a way to take a few moments today and quiet the noise. Create something.

Maybe it won't turn out beautiful. But creating beauty isn't always the point. More often than not, it's about discovering it.