The Impact You'll Never See | Letting Go of the Why

An experience in connecting with the far reaching impacts of your actions

To those of you who took the time to read the letter to our daughter last week, from the bottom of my heart — thank you. It is a heavy topic, especially for this time of year, and I received plenty of “whoa, I wasn’t quite ready for that on a Friday morning” type messages (all of them very loving, mind you).

A 2,000-word post is no joke; that’s one-fifteenth of a legitimate book, and there was heaviness in those words. The wild thing is that was the slimmed down version of the letter to Lucy. This week’s post completes what I feel has been the continuation of our lesson on finding meaning and purpose in life and continuing to wake up and aim for your best within each day despite not fully grasping the why behind your life.

For the first time in my life I’m opening up a Bible on my own accord. Early in recovery, I began developing my own personal relationship with God and felt substantial early progress. As I have grown and looked to further that relationship, I realized I knew nothing of substance from the Gospels and it felt like the natural next step in my personal journey of faith.

So, I pulled out a Bible that had been gifted to me after my Confirmation when I was young and had never genuinely been opened and I started reading and exploring.

There’s a story I read in a Gospel that I haven’t been able to shake because of some of the parallels that I have seen regarding suffering and meaning in our own story. It’s the story of Jesus healing a blind man (John 9:1-7). To read about Jesus resolving a single man’s blindness feels a bit like watching a pro golfer moseying around a putt-putt course.

But this time I read the story differently. I paid attention and thought deeply about what was going around outside of the healing portion of the story.

The disciples ask Jesus why this blind man suffers… who sinned to justify his suffering? Jesus explains to them that no one sinned, but that this man was inflicted with his blindness to be healed in that very moment by him; to show the works that Christ can do in his life. The man is healed, and Jesus’ ministry keeps growing.

In the past, I would have read this and thought — ok, put another check mark next to healing a blind man. But now, my perspective has shifted. I have thought a lot about purpose, meaning, suffering and the Whys vs. Whats of life. And this story spoke to me.

Here’s who I thought about when reading that story. Not the blind man, nor Jesus and his disciples. I thought of the blind man’s parents. I thought of the blind man’s uncle or aunt. Yes, I am about to expand on something that is not documented and likely didn’t happen, but hear me out.

During the life of the blind man, as he was growing up, more than likely was picked on by others or feeling like a burden to his family, do you think that once in their lives his parents questioned, “Why are things this way in our lives? Why is our son blind?” It would be shocking to think that they never had this thought.

I imagine them opening up to a relative, the blind man’s uncle or aunt in my mind, about the hardships of raising a blind child. What if, in that moment, the relative gave just the right amount of encouragement to keep those parents going?

They likely would never realize the extent of their words of encouragement nor the sheer magnitude of the purpose that they lived out in their lives to get that blind man to the spot he needed to be to be healed by Christ.

I was able to experience this in the most surreal manner with Lucy. Not a small moment where I impacted others, but a significant moment where I felt everyone involved in a person’s life leading a group of people together for one definitive moment. Standing outside of Lucy’s NICU room as the team stabilized her in the moments after birth, I was in awe.

I saw a group of professionals, executing processes and operations that they had practiced an uncountable number of times. To me, they seemed perfect in their movements. But unexpectedly, I started seeing more than just the people in the room; I started seeing the people that encouraged them along the way that led to everyone being brought together for this exact moment in life to fight for Lucy.

I visually saw these people, standing behind their loved one that expertly worked at stabilizing our daughter. The number of people in the room grew, yet there weren’t new bodies entering the space. I could both see and feel all the encouraging teachers, mentors and parents that guided each person in that room up to that moment together.

The team worked tirelessly and confidently. They were supported and guided there by people that I would never know on earth, but I suddenly felt a deep and real connection with standing in observation of the scene. I saw those people in the room with her and felt their presence with me as I watched from the outside. I felt an indescribable peace and trusted that everything that they had done to encourage those people working alongside you were put there for a very exacting reason.

It was surreal. Words don’t do it justice, so I relent in my attempt.

Tomorrow marks two years since losing Lucy. We were lost leaving the hospital without her, pushing our luggage across the lobby floor like we were headed to some far-off gate to catch a flight. The world was bleak as we drove home. We didn’t know what to expect, but I felt something real.

Fear. Fear that I would forget, that these memories, lessons and her legacy would be lost.

Two years later and I feel the fear has fully resolved as we live our lives with Lucy in our constant presence. There’s a natural longing that any parent would be forgiven for feeling, but more than anything we’re comforted by her presence. We’ll forever cherish these moments together and the many lessons you imparted in your time with us.

Until we meet again.