A poem for Sunday

A dose of inspiration...

Sunday for me tends to be a nice lull in the week. A quiet morning of flicking the Sunday papers, lots of food (I'm currently living up to this one and making my way through a chocolate egg!) ... it is generally a day set aside from the demands of the rest of the week and to be filled with things I enjoy!  Positioned at the week’s end Sunday has always seemed to me an opportune day to take stock of the week just past, and to look ahead to what the next one has in store. It is a day for pausing. In fitting with this, I have decided Sunday is an apt day to offer some poetry or lyrics for your musing.

If

If you can keep your head when all about you

Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;

If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,

But make allowance for their doubting too:

If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,

Or, being lied about, don't deal in lies,

Or being hated don't give way to hating,

And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise;

If you can dream-and not make dreams your master;

If you can think-and not make thoughts your aim,

If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster

And treat those two impostors just the same:.

If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken

Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,

Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,

And stoop and build'em up with worn-out tools;

If you can make one heap of all your winnings

And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,

And lose, and start again at your beginnings,

And never breathe a word about your loss:

If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew

To serve your turn long after they are gone,

And so hold on when there is nothing in you

Except the Will which says to them: "Hold on!"

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,

Or walk with Kings-nor lose the common touch,

If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,

If all men count with you, but none too much:

If you can fill the unforgiving minute

With sixty seconds' worth of distance run,

Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,

And-which is more-you'll be a Man, my son!

Rudyard Kipling

‘If’ is a really lovely poem that I was reminded of quite recently. In reading the words of a father passing on the wisdom of experience to his son, the poem is warm and sincere. I personally can’t help but feel comforted and buoyed with a little self-assurance with each passing stanza. The ‘If’ is comforting in the sense that it suggests mastery over our dreams is conditional, that is to say it takes practice. There will be challenges along the way, and inevitably we will get things wrong. But this is okay. Kipling expounds the virtues of confidence paired with humility, of dreaming big paired with a sense of realism, of being open to and unafraid to face failure and start again. Essentially nothing is impossible with the right attitude and approach.

So, as Sunday draws to a close, draw some inspiration from Kipling’s ‘If’ to see you through the week ahead – here’s hoping it’s a good one!

(How was that for a fix of inspiration? If you’re feeling it too then why not check out this post from Daniel Edward on the wonders of memory – maybe you’ll be inspired to reflect on your own! http://danieledward.weebly.com/memorylane)