I'm sure that can't possibly be true. I mean, I've only had theme Thursdays for a few months now, and even though the posts often contain a list of items, it's not possible that I've exhausted all the joyous moments of life. And then I remembered that originally it wasn't just supposed to be any random things I adore, but the shining moments of the last week when I did something I love.
So I looked. And then I remembered a shining moment - I sang on Monday. Not a whole song. Not a planned performance. And not brilliantly. But I sang, with my whole heart "This little light of mine, I'm gonna let it shine."
What most of the 80 or so people in the room didn't know was that that's not the first time I've performed that particular song. We sing it regularly in my choir - in the version below - but even that is not where I first performed it.
No, once upon a time 5-year old Shanny in a long white cotton dress with red buttons, holding a white taper candle with a protective tin foil handle stood on her church stage and sang her little heart out. And when we got to the verse "Won't let Satan *puff* it out" little Shanny puffed too hard. And her candle went out. And she thought that had meant Satan had won. And through her tears she watched her cherished Sunday School teacher Gary re-light the candle. And she wiped her tears and sang on.
Last Thursday I was looking for a saying for myself. Something to pull me forward in those moments when I forget who I am. Something Sacred that would restore me to myself and who I truly am. And it came to me, first as a saying. Then as a hum. And then as a wiping-my-tears-and-singing-on proclamation:
This little light of mine, I'm gonna let it shine.
Let it shine, let it shine, let it shine.
And so on Monday, in my seminar, when the seminar leader asked if I'd sing my Sacred Saying, I smiled, and took a deep breath, and began. And then I just stood there and shone.
You go girl, let 'er shine!
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