for my daughters and my sons

You were born with love in your heart and fire in your soul, and don’t you ever forget it.

You were born with love in your heart to share with those who will love you back. Those who will laugh and cry with you, and want to be with you most of all.  

You were put here to love and be loved, and because you are fiercely and terribly loved, you are capable of fiercely and terribly loving.

You were put here to love those who will love you back, but you were also put here to love those who can never love you back. Those who can’t or won’t or don’t know how because their own hardened hearts were twisted when they were still tender, and now they can’t find the love that once sprouted green and fresh inside them.

Love them anyway, in spite of themselves.

Don’t you ever let them harden your heart until it forgets how to love.

Love them anyway, in spite of themselves.

Don’t you ever let them harden your heart, and don’t you ever let them quench your fire.

You were born with fire in your soul burning through your veins like lava spilling through the streets after a volcano has lain dormant for too long.

You were born with fire in your soul meant to spread through the world, burning everything around like it was nothing more than kindling, like bone-dry kindling crackling from the heat of the soul inside you.

Go out into the world and set it on fire.

Even when it’s hard, even when you’re wrong, even when they don’t like you.

Go out into the world and set it on fire.

Even when it’s dark, even when you’re scared, even when you’re all alone.

This world was created for you, you were not created for this world, and don’t you ever forget it.

This world is yours for the taking. It’s waiting for you to fill it with a life of love and fire and heart and soul. A life only you can create, fueled by the one who fashioned your soul and formed the beating heart inside you.

You may be afraid of this monumental task, this world-blazing, love-spreading life you have been called to live. You may be tired. You may be lost. You may be tempted to hunker down and hide from it all.

But. Don’t. You. Dare.

There is no one else who can share the love in your heart. There is no one else who can spread the fire in your soul. This world needs you because you are here, you and you alone, with a white-hot life no one else can live.

So go out there and live it.