in·spi·ra·tional...

I just had to share this quote with you (and the following long streaming bit that follows)::

There is in every true woman's heart a spark of heavenly fire, which lies dormant in the broad daylight of prosperity; but which kindles up and beams and blazes in the dark hour of adversity.

-Washington Irving

I read that recently on a blog I've followed for about a year now. A woman was in a fatal plane crash with her husband (the pilot was killed). She suffered burns over 90 percent of her body and wasn't expected to live. While she slept in a coma for five months, her sister blogged about her recovery and their faith...I was inspired. When she awoke and recovered enough, she took over the blogging on her own site.

She would talk about her pain and anguish...and her love for her husband and her family and her faith in God (she is Morman...but, most certainly, you can relate to her faith)...I, again, was inspired. With every step she's taken in her road of recovery, with every lesson it's taught her along the way, with her strength and her perseverance, and her frailty too...she had never posted a picture of herself, but often spoke of the face she used to know and how much she loved that person that she no longer thought she was. On her worst days, she felt like a ghost.

Women...in adversity. I've seen a lot of that this year...more than seems right at times. But they are there, where none of them wants to be...and they are stepping up with a strength they physically should not possess. They have become a strong and beaming light. You just want to follow them and let the glimmer of wisdom and hope that's in them...that's formed in spite it all (and because of it all)...guide you to be a better version of yourself.

I've seen adversity in my little life...things that I say pale in comparison...but rough spots just the same. Rather than looking back at those times with sorrow, I almost find gratitude...because they made me better...wiser...more keen to my surroundings. I embrace those events...as painful as the memory of them sometimes is. More so than the good times, I've been molded by the worst of times...into someone I'd rather be than who I was before. --- (Isaiah 64:8..."..we are the clay and You are the potter; and we are all the work of Your hand.")

These women I've seen this year have oh so done this and more. To be able to take your worst and turn it into something good that inspires others. It amazes me...and I thank them for it.

On the one year anniversary of the plane crash, this beautiful woman posted a picture of herself in an entry entitled "Me". She included the quote I have at the beginning of this entry. What you see in the picture is a face, that is most certainly not the one she had before the accident. But what inspires you are the eyes...that most certainly are. They are looking at her husband with a love she's always had and in them is the knowing that he is looking at her the very same way. Her ability to struggle through, and fight, and seek and find "Me" {her} under her worn-out skin is truly an (I'll say it again) inspiration.

If you'd like to check out the blog of this very brave women, you may click on the button below.
(to follow the story from where she awoke from her coma and took over the blogging...January 2008, click here)

Thank you for allowing me to share.