Lessons from "UP"

Once again I wrote this two days ago on August 24th. Just now connecting to the internet. :)

“UP” is my favorite movie of all time.  Yep, that's right.  The cute little animated children's movie that came out a couple years ago.

Seeing as I’m not really a movie person, you can do with my opinion what you will.  But seriously, this movie is where it’s at.

I got to watch it again tonight for probably like the 50^th time.  But tonight it was different.  Because I got to watch it with my grandparents.

There are many reasons why I love the movie UP, but in order to keep this from sounding like a 4^th grade book report, I’ll just tell you one.  I love it because it is a story that struggles with the idea of regret and how to be free of it once and for all.

Because sometimes, you just have to let go of that one life-long dream before you can start a new adventure.

(If you haven’t watched UP in a while, go watch it, like right now.  You’ll understand what I’m talking about).

This is where I’m at right now.

I’m stuck at a crossroads between my dreams and the life that God has actually given me to live.

And I just can’t let go of all the Things I’m Going to Do”.  Or at least the things I thought I was going to do.

But the truth of the matter is that if I’m ever going to fully set sail on this new adventure that I’ve already embarked on, I have to let go of this line that’s holding me to the shore.  And I have to accept that I may never come back to this same shore again.  And that’s ok. 

Because God has something better that this.

Somehow.

I asked my gramma tonight how old she thought we’d all be in heaven. 

“I don’t know”, she said, “but it will be very green.”

She told me that she had once read a book of 20 or so stories that people had written of coming back from the dead in the ER.  She said many of the stories were very similar. 

She said that, in these accounts, everything was beautiful and bright and green.  And that these people had been met by loved ones whom they knew when they first got there.  Some of these people had apparently wanted to stay, but they’d come back because someone had told them they should.

She told me that she wished she was ready to go there.  But she just wasn’t ready at all.  And maybe she was a little bit afraid too.

And this all got me thinking: how can we be ready?  What needs to happen in our lives so that we can truly be ready to leave it all behind and set off into the unknown?  For good.

And how do you live without regrets?  So that when the time comes to leave, your last parting glance is one of peace and not sadness. 

How. do. we. live. without. regrets?

Let them go I suppose.

This is all I've come up with.

And maybe when you do, you’ll find that they were just holding you back from really living.

And that a new adventure is waiting.

One more beautiful than we could ever have imagined on our own.