Warehouses

Our life is like a warehouse. It's vast and can be filled with anything we want. But we can only see outside. And we are always looking outside our warehouse for everything that will make it feel full - love, happiness, security, wealth, contentment, and so on. But we are not inside the warehouse looking out, we're outside, keeping all the doors and windows blocked - even from ourselves. So we continue searching outside for everything we need. We search the ground, we search the sky and we search other people's warehouses. Sometimes we can find almost what we're looking for, so we take it and store it anyway, even though it isn't really what we want. But we convince ourselves that it's good enough, or that it's the best we can do, or that we don't really deserve anything better. Then we try to paint our warehouse so that it looks good - from the outside.

But what's going on inside? It's hard to tell because we rarely go in there. It's dark and cluttered. We know that there are some very dear treasures in there, but they're guarded by ghosts and demons. We never get very far before the demons are upon us. We try to take a light in with us, but it's from the outside and it stays outside because the doors and windows are shut. So we live with the dark demons taunting us from the inside. And no matter how much we bring home (which is quickly thrown in and the door slammed shut behind it), it still feels empty.

Not only is our warehouse guarded on the inside, we guard it from the outside, so that others won't find out what we have hidden away in our Warehouse of Secrets. Sometimes, we let certain others in, but not very far, and they never get to see everything. Even we can't see everything. So, here we are with a pretty warehouse that feels empty; guarded on the outside by pride and guarded on the inside by fear. And we keep telling ourselves that "Someday" our warehouse will have enough things in it to make it feel full. So we keep looking outside.

All we have to do is open the door and look inside. Because where we thought that there was only darkness, there is a light that always burns and no demon can stand in the face of it. Everything we ever wanted or needed comes from the Light - it is the Light. We can stop looking outside for things to make our warehouse feel full. It is full. It always has been. We just need to find the Courage to go through the dirt and the clutter and the demons that conceal the Light. Yes, the Courage is in there, too. All the Light asks of us is to open the doors and windows and let it shine out.