It has been said that we, as soul beings, choose our parents because we have lessons to learn from them as well as lessons to teach them. While no one can say for certain this is true, there is a place in me that believes it might be. Recently, I had the extraordinary honor of officiating two deeply sacred rituals. In the span of one week, I officiated my father's memorial service and my daughter's wedding ceremony. I have conducted countless funerals and weddings over the past thirty-one years but never for my own parent or child. The awareness I had in both cases is that the circle of Life really is a divine continuum wherein these two human beings embedded in my heart a piece of themselves that will remain forever. To imagine having lived without either of them leaves me feeling empty...incomplete.
As a son and a father I'm thankful that I "landed" in the middle, exquisitely sandwiched between two generations of soul beings who have proven to me the lesson I most need to learn and teach; how to give and receive unconditional love more freely. My life is better because they both shared theirs with me. That makes me a blessed man and I know it.
How about you? What lessons have the generations on either side been able to exchange with you? I hope that it is love. Perhaps that is why we have all come here; to teach and learn how to love without condition.