We all have that moment in life where we hear something so powerful, it resonates with us and we have to share it…
On Thursday evening, I attended what is known as “Red Mass”. In summary, it is a mass celebrated by Catholics in the legal profession. We ask the holy spirit to guide us in our practice of law. Following the Mass, there is always a lovely dinner and a guest speaker — this year, at the Terminal City Club in Downtown Vancouver.
The speaker this year was Archbishop Sartain from Seattle (a little but about him below):
http://www.seattlearchdiocese.org/archdiocese/sartain/default.aspx
This man’s talk left such an impact on me. I am by no means going to try and repeat word for word what he presented, but rather, summarize the message he left us with in the hopes some of you can take away the message the way I did.
He started by talking about how we have a tendency to take ourselves too seriously, and not taking others seriously enough. The message — don’t take yourself too seriously.
I was like — Wow! I do take myself so seriously. I got to reflecting that I am notorious for worrying about things that 9 times out of 10, never really matter. It tends to be all in my head. The funny part is that it’s those things that never crossed our mind that tend to be our real problems in life. As Mary Schmich says in her famous “Sunscreen”:
“The real troubles in your life are apt to be things that never crossed your worried mind, the kind that blindside you at 4 pm on some idle Tuesday.”
So, my plan going forward is to try and not take myself too seriously — all those little things we worry about end up being things that either don’t really matter, or were things we should have never worried too much about in the first place! We need to instead focus on those things that do matter.
Stay tuned for the next message shared by Archbishop Sartain!
Until then, I will leave you with the link to “Sunscreen” — we could all use the reminder.
https://www.goodreads.com/author/quotes/587136.Mary_Schmich
Remember — Don’t take yourself too seriously!
Happy Saturday — and happy “not taking yourself so seriously”.
M.J.
