We will rise

The year 2011 has been a year of many blessings. Sometimes I think that God was trying to make up for all the tears I've shed.
The greatest blessing for me is the grace of insight. I have discovered that I am a strong person. I have always thought that I couldn't handle big difficulties. It is perhaps because of this that I have tried so hard to avoid conflict and precarious situations. But something happened for which I was unprepared. It was like being pushed into a wall with no way out. I have spent a long period of time groping in the dark, just living one day at a time, without any ambitious thought of miraculously emerging from the pit. All throughout this time I prayed that I wouldn't let anybody suffer because of what I was undergoing.
Then one day I just woke up with a very secure feeling that everything is going to be well. This feeling didn't change my situation, but it changed me. I know that I have paid due respect to my experience, that I have let it touch me to the depths.
The miracle was, it didn't engulf me into darkness. Instead, it made me discover that bereft of everything I still had the gift of life, and with this life comes the gift of a God who is with me, the Emmanuel.
So as I say goodbye to 2011, I thank God for making me rise again.