Keep Holding On!

Sometimes the simplest things speak volumes to me.  (Maybe they have to be simple for me to grasp them!) This afternoon was one of those gloomy, grey, wet, nasty, cold days of winter.  I was outside working around the barn and happened to look up at one of our pecan trees.

Barren Pecan Tree

The leaves have done their little dance to the ground and lay in crumple heaps on the ground beneath what used to be the canopy of the pecan tree - lifeless, dull, and brown.  If you step on them, they crunch under your feet and shatter into many pieces.  This is a normal cycle we call Fall, for obvious reasons.  All the leaves fall to the ground and eventually turn into soil in a marvelous cycle that enables the leaves to nourish the tree that once nourished it.

Dead leaves beneath the Pecan Tree

As a sharp north wind began to blow, I looked back up into the tree.  All the leaves have fallen to the ground...  Wait.  Check that.  What is that I see?

A lone GREEN leaf hangs on for dear life, long after all of his comrades decided to leave (pardon the pun). Every single leaf that once fluttered alongside it has given up and let go and fallen down, except for this one. This made me scratch my head.  There's a lesson to be learned here.  I want to be like this leaf.  Not content in following the pack, this leaf is holding on.  He's persevering.  He's fighting the good fight.  He's resolute, steadfast.   He perseveres.

Everyone else has deserted him and it looks bleak and hopeless.  He's at the end of his rope and he's tied a knot at the end and is holding on for dear life.  That's what I want to be like - a fighter, an over-comer, someone who never quits.

It's not easy being green.

You may feel some solidarity with the leaf in the old pecan tree. If so, don't conform! Even though things don't look good, against all odds, Live to Fight Another Day! Keep Holding On!