Monday, September 25, 2017

Writing Prompt: Standstill

Writing prompt: "For a moment today,time stands still — but you can tweak one thing while it’s stopped. What do you do?"


"Tweak" looks likew such a small word, representing such a small change to be made in something, but it is a deceptive word. A tweak is only small in the first moment it is done. After that moment, the impact of a teak grows and spreads. It has the power to impact total strangers in another part of the world, given time.

Keeping that in mind, what small, insignificant change would I make in my life, or in my immediate environment? Honestly, despite the problems and flaws in my life, I would tweak nothing. I would not want to risk losing sources of happiness and joy in my life, and in the lives of others, by second-guessing the things that have happened in my past. Do I have regrets? A few, certainly, but they have been instrumental in making me the person I am today. Would I tweak the past so that I did not wash out of Basic Training? So my first marriage did not happen, or did not end in divorce? So I made better choices in jobs and schooling? Somehow, impossibly, to keep from going blind? These would all be tempting, if a moment in time gave me the power to change one of them, but yielding to that temptation would change too many things, and erase too many priceless memories.

If time stopped for a moment, and I had the power, in that moment, to tweak just one thing, I would use it to add that moment to the string of moments I spend in prayer each day, and I would give thanks for one extra moment to spend worshiping my Lord, and thanking him for all the past moments that have made me who I am in this moment.

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