Let's Hew You

How are you enjoying the mountaintop? How are you enjoying the isolation? How are you enjoying the rest? How are you enjoying the peace? How are you enjoying? How are you?

In my piece last week, I spoke of the mountaintop destination of the hike. It was a bit of confession as I shared my aversion for hiking, but my passion for getting to the mountaintop where there was serenity and rest. I spoke of the endgame of the mountaintop – to earn the prize and to enjoy the view.

With time, we gain greater perspective and absorb more. As such, over the past week, as I’ve spent a little more time up here on the mountaintop, I have had time to consider how liberating it is to be here:

1. I’m free of the distractions: I am away from the noise of the world that causes me to lose sight of what’s important. I am away from all of the imperatives that confuse, obfuscate and oppress. I am away… and I just am. In the stillness of this environment, there is a bustling of thought, of energy and of momentum that the physical eye cannot perceive, and that the physical ear cannot detect. In this silence of the mountaintop, there is a clarity of sound that guides me.
2. I am free of my attachment to the comfortable: Having struggled through the foliage, strained forward towards this place, exerted myself, built up a good sweat, suffered a few bruises, I have grown past the fear or intolerance of the uncomfortable and now rest comfortably in it. Can you imagine how liberating it is not to be intimidated by the uncomfortable but to face it with aplomb? It’s not hubris, friends, no…that’s not it. It’s freedom. It’s freedom to know that whatever my lot, I will always say, ‘It is well.’
3. Freedom from the Goliath: You know, there comes a point when you know you’ve got to do this, and no one can do it for you. No one can make that climb for you. So, if I want the thrill of the prize of the mountaintop view, I have to come out with my slingshot and pebbles and slay the Goliath. Friends, let me say to you, when it gets to that, it gets lonely. There might be the figurative 1,000 who fall at my side, 10,000 on my right, but I have to know that no one or nothing can come near me, because this Goliath is mine to face. It is lonely, it is scary, but when I slay it, it is finished. What was loneliness, becomes alone time. Once I’ve slayed this Goliath, I become even more embedded in my stronghold and ask, ‘Whom shall I fear? Of whom shall I be afraid?’

Freedom: it’s the new Kingdom, the new stronghold. Work your way towards it. Be strong and let your heart take courage.

Friends, of the Caribbean diaspora, and further afield, on Sunday 01 August 2021, territories in the English-speaking Caribbean celebrate the anniversary of the abolition of slavery. It’s a fitting time to ask ourselves whether we have found freedom, whether we have been liberated.

I challenge you: ‘Emancipate yourselves!’

Until next time, love, peace joy…and freedom!