“It takes a grown-up to look at the mirror directly and not run away screaming. The very point of maturity is to have no illusions about yourself.”
The quote above is taken from the piece Marti wrote about Knights, Princesses and Dragons that I am asking you to take the time to read today by clicking on the link below.. I think you will enjoy it. You may also wonder about it. That’s okay; it’s supposed to make you wonder.
But mostly, it’s supposed to make you act, or possibly identify why you are not. Marti primarily wrote it for me. It came out of numerous attempts by me to try to explain what’s been going on lately and why we’ve missed Catches and weekend mailings to MemberPartners and PrayerPartners — things I would never imagine myself doing, yet I have done.
My attempts to explain this were full of platitudes, spiritual cliches, and making confessions without any evidence of change. If I were still writing in my pre-computer style of scribbling on a yellow legal pad, I would be surrounded by wads of crumpled up attempts to write something I could never send.
The dragons in this story all have the same last name: it’s Fear. Fear is my nemesis. Fear is debilitating. It can freeze you in your tracks. But it is also an illusion. Run away, and the fear only grows bigger. Run towards it and it diminishes. Illusions about fear need to be run through, illusions about self need to be faced as well, but in a different way.
“Maturity is to have no illusions about yourself,” Marti wrote. To have no illusions about myself is to embrace all of what I see in that mirror and not run away screaming, but face into each one, and by the power of God, do something about it.
In the final picture at the end of our story, a knight has just let an arrow fly at a massive, scaly dragon. The artist has painted the arrow in mid air. From the looks of it, the arrow is going to harmlessly glance off the dragon’s scales and he’s going to wonder what the heck that little tick was he might have felt. In reality, the little arrow is going to pierce him through, and not only will he fall, he will disappear, because dragons represent fear, and fear dissipates when you walk into it.
So enough said. Read on and let me know if this reaches you in any way. Does it help you? Does it hinder you? What else would you like to explore? And please forgive me for taking so long to get here, and for missing you along the way.
I have much to do today so I am moving on. I’m out to slay some dragons.
The Knight, The Princess, and The Dragon
John Fischer The Catch 