[00:00.89]001. Life Is to Be Whole

[00:13.83]Once a circle missed a wedge. The circle wanted to be whole, so it went around looking for its missing piece.

[00:22.28]But because it was incomplete and therefore could roll only very slowly, it admired the flowers along the way.

[00:30.35]It chatted with worms. It enjoyed the sunshine. It found lots of different pieces, but none of them fit.

[00:39.15]So it left them all by the side of the road and kept on searching. Then one day the circle found a piece that fit perfectly.

[00:48.24]It was so happy. Now it could be whole, with nothing missing. It incorporated the missing piece into itself and began to roll.

[00:59.13]Now that it was a perfect circle, it could roll very fast, too fast to notice the flowers or to talk to the worms.

[01:07.85]When it realized how different the world seemed when it rolled so quickly,

[01:11.45]it stopped, left its found piece by the side of the road and rolled slowly away.

[01:18.48]The lesson of the story, I suggested, was that in some strange sense we are more whole when we are missing something.

[01:26.56]The man who has everything is in some ways a poor man.

[01:30.72]He will never know what it feels like to yearn, to hope, to nourish his soul with the dream of something better.

[01:38.08]He will never know the experience of having someone who loves him give him something he has always wanted or never had.

[01:46.60]There is a wholeness about the person who has come to terms with his limitations,

[01:51.40]who has been brave enough to let go of his unrealistic dreams and not feel like a failure for doing so.

[01:59.32]There is a wholeness about the man or woman who has learned

[02:03.03]that he or she is strong enough to go through a tragedy and survive,

[02:07.65]who can lose someone and still feel like a complete person.

[02:12.39]Life is not a trap set for us by God so that he can condemn us for failing.

[02:18.60]Life is not a spelling bee, where no matter how many words you’ve gotten right,

[02:23.21]you’re disqualified if you make one mistake. Life is more like a baseball season,

[02:29.30]where even the best team loses one-third of its games and even the worst team has its days of brilliance.

[02:37.15]Our goal is to win more games than we lose.

[02:41.15]When we accept that imperfection is part of being human,

[02:44.87]and when we can continue rolling through life and appreciate it,

[02:48.93]we will have achieved a wholeness that others can only aspire to.

[02:53.86]That, I believe, is what God asks of us - not “Be perfect”, not “Don’t even make a mistake”, but “Be whole”.

[03:03.55]If we are brave enough to love, strong enough to forgive, generous enough to rejoice in another’s happiness,

[03:11.18]and wise enough to know there is enough love to go around for us all,

[03:15.67]then we can achieve a fulfillment that no other living creature will ever know.