Loving with an open hand

Growing up, my parents house was across the street from the elementary I went to. My mom reminds me of a story from when I was young. From one year to the next, I would make friends in each of my classes. Yet, like everyone else, I wasn’t in the same class with every single person every single year of elementary school. So, for example, when I started third grade, during recess time my mom would see me walking around the playground but not actually interacting or playing with anyone. I was sad and my mom could not figure out why. So, when I would get home she would say, “Steve, I saw you walking around during recess by yourself. Why are you sad? Why are you doing that?” And like clockwork, my answer was always the same, “The friends I made last year are not in my class this year. I don’t have anyone to talk to or play with.”

Now, you may think I am exaggerating but I am not. This actually would happen year after year in elementary. Somewhere in my brain, I had convinced myself that if we were no longer in the same class, I was somehow restricted from them and prohibited from playing together. My mom would say, “Steve, just because you’re not in the same class this year doesn’t mean your friendship ended; it doesn’t mean that you can’t have fun at recess and play together. Just because you have different teachers doesn’t mean that you can’t talk and do things together.” This simple advice from my childhood has been ringing in my mind as of late and led me to think on something else.

Some friends of mine became foster parents around two years ago. A short, few months later, they began fostering the cutest little boy I think I have ever seen. He was only one day old when they received the call. A couple months ago, they were finally able to adopt him and legally call him theirs. I remember once talking to them and asking them how they could do this – bringing a child into their home and loving him as if he was their own with the very real possibility that he could be taken back for a myriad of reasons and lately I have been thinking on my friends’ response: You love with an open hand.

What does this mean? I recently read a story that might help: In order to visualize what “loving with an open hand” means, I want you to do one thing: Take your right hand, open it with your palm up, facing the sky. Now, imagine somebody pouring water into this hand. In order to keep the water, probably your first reflex is to close the hand. What happens when you do so? You eventually lose all the water. In a second attempt of the experiment just leave the hand open and see what happens. The water stays with you.”

Consider an airport. It cannot choose to only accept arrivals and not departures; there are valid times for travel in both directions. We cannot force people to stay any longer than we can force time to stand still. We cannot manipulate, coerce, charm or trap gifts to last forever. And should we ever be tempted to close our hand around something, we inevitably have just closed our hand to other gifts as well. Isn’t it ironic that the very gesture of trying to keep one thing can be the gesture that prevents other good things?

Sometimes we're so focused on refusing to let go of one thing that we miss the other opportunities. That which we wanted to keep, we lost anyway. Open hands remind us to engage, to not give up, to expect, to hope and to cherish. They teach us to let go, to unclench, to find peace. They offer us moments of joy and loss, inviting us to find contentment in both.

Elementary Steve was loving with a closed hand. He so badly wanted to maintain the status quo. He did not want things to change. Life was good, so why upset that happy environment? Yet, we learn that loving with an open hand, as my friends who fostered and then adopted that precious boy, can yield incredible results. They had no idea if they would ever get to adopt but they loved anyway. Maybe it won’t work out but maybe seeing if it does will be the best adventure ever