Everything is Beautiful

Everything is Beautiful

In 1970, the year I got married, Ray Stevens wrote and sang a song called Everything is Beautiful.  This is a song about finding beauty in all things, in all people and in all situations.  It's about keeping an open mind and not judging and it's about peace.  He proclaims that everything is beautiful in it's own way.  Click here to listen to:  Everything is Beautiful  by Ray Stevens

I talked with some young people at a college campus today and shared some of my history with them going back to the 70's.  I told of a day when things were simpler.  Of a day when you knew all your neighbors and you had block parties and everyone came out and everyone shared what food they brought.  I told them of a day when there were no fences between the houses.  I shared about a day when people were kinder and more considerate of one another.  I shared about a day when we actually talked to each other and formed lasting friendships. And about a day when the kids could walk to and from school without a parent.  About a day when a penny would get you a piece of candy and a day when wages were $1.50 an hour and we were happy.  A day we could play outside all day long and not get called home till dark when my dad whistled for us and our parents weren't worried.  A day when we rode the bus and not everyone had a car.  It seems everything was so much more beautiful then.

These young people actually got dreamy eyed as I was describing those simpler days.  And they asked, "What happened?"  I have to wonder that myself sometimes.  I suppose they call it progress - new inventions, new ideas, new this, new that...is there beauty in a cell phone - yes, when it is used to make a 911 call to save a life.  But there is so much more now, it seems, that is not beautiful - or maybe we just hear about the ugliness more.  Or maybe our definition of beauty has changed over the years.

They always say things get much worse before they get better.  I dream of the day it gets better and everything once more is beautiful.   Maybe that will not be until the day I reach heaven, but I keep hoping for it sooner.   Or maybe I just need to look harder.

I think it is up to each person to try to make their own little world beautiful.  Not just for themselves, but for all those around them as well.  It's up to each person to find the beauty in everything and acknowledge it.  Everything can be beautiful again if we work together to make it so!!! 

"He has made everything beautiful in its time."  Ecclesiastes 3: 11