Looking For Answers On Your Yellow Brick Road
Who walks with you makes the difference.
“What’s that noise?” I asked Del. It was a low hum. It sounded as if it was coming from the basement. We conjured up a few possibilities, but none seemed right.
We sat quietly, drinking our morning beverages, thinking, and listening. Finally, Del asked, “Is it the fan?”
We always have a ceiling fan running in order to move the warm air from the fireplace down, but previously, it made no noise. However, the day before, I had cleaned it and not turned it on at its regular speed.
Yes, that was the answer. The new speed made a humming sound.
So, although we thought the noise was from the basement, it was actually immediately above our heads, right in plain sight.
It perfectly symbolizes how we usually look for answers in all the wrong places.
Instead, solutions, answers, and help sit in plain sight, just waiting for us to pause and listen in order to find them.
Isn’t this what happens on the yellow brick road in the story The Wizard of Oz?
A tornado whisks Dorothy away from home, and she has to find her way back.
She meets the cowardly lion, the scarecrow, and the Tin Man on the yellow brick road.
They are all looking for something.
Dorothy is looking for her home, the Lion is looking for courage, the Scarecrow is looking for a brain, and the Tin Man is looking for a heart.
We know they eventually discover that they all had what they wanted all along.
Here’s the question.
Would they have discovered what was hidden in plain sight if they weren’t walking the yellow brick road together?
This little band of adventurers, off to seek answers, represents a community.
People who are traveling on the same road, going in the same direction, and with the same desired outcome.
I first discovered the joy of community when, a few lifetimes ago, I founded a small dance company.
As a little band of dancers traveling on the yellow brick road together, we discovered our own gifts, along with each other’s gifts.
We also discovered, as did the Wizard of Oz adventurers, that it was an advantage to all of us if we used our own unique spiritual blessing to the fullest.
Like them, we offered protection and encouragement to each other. We all became better dancers, or in my case, a better choreographer, because we walked that road together.
Community is something for which everyone yearns.
Sometimes, we try to make a community out of people who are not traveling the same road, not going in the same direction, or who do not have the same desired outcome.
This always leads to disappointment, and eventually, we learn it is best to let them follow their own calling.
Everyone has their own timing, and there is a guiding system in place for every element of God’s universe. We can trust in this and let them go, knowing they are safe.
Everyone has at least one community that travels the same path, going in the same direction, with the same outcome in mind.
However, we don’t always see them because we often look for them in all the wrong places, or perhaps they don’t look the way we expect them to, but they are there just the same!
Just as sometimes solutions to problems appear to be somewhere else but are really in plain sight, once we shift our perceptions about them, we will see other fellow travelers.
Who is traveling the Yellow Brick Road with you today?
Whoever they are, they will help you discover your unique spiritual blessing because they know that as you discover theirs and yours, everything becomes better for everyone.
There is no need to settle for just one community, either.
There are many yellow brick roads, all leading to the answers you seek.
All of them contain the joy of having like-minded travelers walk with you.
All it takes is that you step on the path and head in the direction you want to go, and they will appear—no longer hidden—in plain sight.
(I still run communities. Interested? Check out the Perception Circle.)