Spent some time, the other night with a father whose grown child is in federal prison. Accused of a white collar crime and convicted of embezzlement, she will be home in less than a year.
We spent some time talking about our legal system, and the whole experience, from his point of view. Guilt or innocence aside, he is making it through the appeal process but with no more than a 15% chance of having the verdict overturned and not a chance of that happening until after her time has been served, he is looking at this the only way he can, life is not fair.
When life seem unfair, we usually don't look at how to move on but rather on how to make it fair again. The truth is, we should be starting more in the middle and end strong with moving on. When he ask point blank, what to do - I pointed back to the religion that he holds so dear.
Either Jesus is who he said he is and you have to leave it all with him...or he isn't and you really don't believe.
He asked... one could drive yourself insane with the What If's or the Life isn't fair. If you believe in Something, now would the time to express it. Now would be the time to acknowledge that life isn't fair, and move past it. If your Something is Jesus, he isn't just fire insurance, he is for the here and now.
I have never walked in his shoes. I have no idea of the experience that he, his daughter and family are going through. It won't be over when she comes home, they will all have to negotiate a new normal. Life will never be the same and the unfairness, will go on.
There are all kinds of prisons. Not all physical yet the bars feel real. Whatever that may look like to you, understand first, that life isn't fair and then, start to learn to move on. It may be a new way of thinking, a new way of doing but comes from a Place of understanding that while it doesn't look like you thought it would, there is still Life to be had. The sun will still come up, the birds will still sing and each of us has, what we need to let that happen in our lives. Not only believe it with my whole heart, I also, am counting on it...
