Remember who we are

Hi Everyone!

A few weeks ago I wrote a letter in response to an individual who was trashing the good people of our community. I wrote that particular piece with the hope that he and others would reconsider their negative attitudes about people and our community and decide, rather, to become part of the healthy solution instead of being part of a bitter problem. I did not expect them to start spreading suspicion and dissention via the media into our community.

Our island is wonderful collection of individuals, groups and organizations who came to live here with a sincere hope and wish to grow in a peaceful, healthy community. This is the reason that I moved to Gabriola. Some dark energies have come here at different times to invoke confusing and difficult experiences for Gabriolans.

But always have the people of our community stood up and held fast to the goodness and richness of our home. I salute our community’s courage for its sense of moral conviction and common decency.

I beseech the writers of such negative letters in our local papers to please put down your pens of abysmal blackness and instead pick up your illuminating pens of encouragement and support. In this way, your spirits can come back to our community’s positive way of life. Gabriola has a wonderful healing energy that one exalts in. Let us all enjoy this and each other. Thank you for being.

Sincerely,
Tony Gibson

Making a Difference

Overwhelmed today with issues such as depletion of our natural resources, global warming, a failing economy, and the sense of hopelessness that can follow, it’s so easy to succumb to negativity and the feeling that there is little one can do to make any kind of difference. I recently came across a little folk tale that had a huge impact on me, and decided to do my part by celebratrating the spirit of the people and place that I call home.

In the forest there lived a hummingbird, a rabbit, a deer and a bear. The forest was their home until the day the fire broke out. No one knew how it started but it swallowed up their nests and their homes. Quickly the creatures scurried away; the bear ran, the deer leapt, and the rabbit hopped. And the hummingbird flew out of danger’s way. The animals stopped to rest at the edge of the woods by a pond. Without hesitation the little hummingbird filled its beak with water and raced right back towards the fire. Back and forth, and back and forth it went, that little hummingbird, until it was so exhausted it fell to the ground. “What are you doing?” asked the bear. “What are you doing?” asked the deer and rabbit. The little hummingbird looked up at them and said:

“I’m doing what I can
With what I have
Where I am.”