IMPRINTS ON THE HEART.

 'If you have come to help me you are wasting my time. But if you have come because you liberation is bound up with mine, then let us walk together'
 Lila Watson, Australian Aboriginal Leader
For the two months I have been contemplating the last year and a half I spent in Goa.  I have returned for now, I dare not say for good, you never know!  And so, digesting every moment and every memory of Goa has been quite a process.  Some of that process will continue and last a lifetime as the realisation of what I have learnt in that time hits home or better still, is used in where I find myself now. One thing that inspires me daily is the understanding that through the love that I have towards those I worked with and was honoured to know in Goa, my role is not over.  God has shown me through my own aching heart how much more He must love them.  I must use the love He has blessed me with and in the overflow, continue to share His compassion for them with others, in order to support the people and the projects. 

If you can imagine the joy that you feel when you see a friend or relative after a long time or perhaps imagine the warmth when you see their smiling face in a photo.  Every single one of these faces below fills me with that same warmth, one after the other, and they are not even all there! The photos come to life in my memories and with them my heart smiles a little more each time.

“To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything, and your heart will certainly be wrung and possibly broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact, you must give your heart to no one, not even to an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements; lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket- safe, dark, motionless, airless–it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable.” -C.S. Lewis (Four Loves)

I have been blessed.  My heart aches for these kids.  I have been blessed.