smile | Sam Smiles 411

I was busy trying to place student teachers for the spring semester the other day, something that has posed quite a challenge this year with the pandemic in our world. When contacting a student to ask about a different type of placement than what she was thinking, she responded with, “I’m up for the challenge, I mean, if God brought me to it, He’ll bring me through it.” NOT the response I was expecting. Not the response I would have initially given. Not the response many of us, if we are honest, probably give when we are faced with a challenge. Life is so full of challenges this year, and I have to admit, although I try to smile and be joyful, doing so is extremely difficult right now. I’m so thankful for the student that reminded me that nothing is to big for God. I often think that so many things are “too big” to handle and I wonder how I am going to make it through. I know people sometimes say, “God doesn’t give you more than you can handle”…..LIE. He sure does! But as the smart student says, He will get me through anything that he puts in my path. Now that gives me peace, and maybe helps me to smile again knowing that the obstacles in front of me are NOT too big for God.

God’s “Rainbow Promise”

God promised Noah that he would never again flood the earth. What a comfort to know that in the midst of my storms, I can see the rainbow through the stormy waves. Again comes rushing the thought that nothing is impossible, and that I can get through any storm because of the promise that after the storm there is a rainbow waiting for me – I CAN get through it! So can you! Hold tight and ride out the storm. “If God brought me to it, He will bring me through it.” And even better, there’s a rainbow there to remind me. When I was a kid, my sister did a science project on prisms and how rainbows actually happen. I don’t remember much about the project, but for some reason, it brought about a fascination of rainbows and how they form. Rainbows (prisms) come from light being filtered through condensation (water!). I am not a science expert and would love to research exactly what that means, but for years I remember searching for rainbows and finding them in the most unusual places – like a puddle after a rainstorm or in my backyard next to the slip-n-slide. One thing that all of the rainbows had in common was that they were formed by water – usually some sort of water that was formed by a “storm” or a burst of condensation – and sunshine. What a cool God we have to have created rainbows! I smile when I see rainbows and know that I will make it through the obstacle and storms in my life.

Build a Bridge

Sometimes obstacles in my life seem so big that I just don’t have any idea how I am going to get through the crazy path of life where the obstacles are. If I sit back and look around I can see that God places tools in my life to “build a bridge” over the water or over the path. Not far from where I live there is a major roadway and there was a railroad crossing with old, rugged tracks where daily trains stopped traffic for hours during the evening rush hour or during the morning commute. A few years ago, the railroad company invested a large sum of money to build a massive bridge over the tracks so that they wouldn’t have to stop traffic every day. The construction took awhile and the inconveniences were rough during the building of the bridge, but it all paid off and now the problem has been solved. Sometimes, as in the picture above, it is hard to see, but the bridge is right there in the setting where your obstacle is. You just need to take a step back and look around and see what it is that God has provided to build a bridge. It may take some time, but “If God brings me to it, He will bring me through it.”

Light on the Other Side

If all else fails, and I can’t seem to find the promises and hope, I just lift my head. There’s a thing called “Faith” and I often hear God whisper to my heart, “Trust me”. Oh do I struggle with that. Over and over I need to be taught this lesson. I want to know the plan, and I want to know it now! But sometimes I need to just know that the time to “know the plan” is not now. If I lift my head just a little and sit back, I will see that there is light on the other side, and that is all that I need to know right now. That is the hope and the peace that brings the smile – the genuine, I-can-do-this smile, the broken-but-beautiful smile, the confident smile, the true-joy-in-the-moment smile. I sit on the rock and look up at the light on the other side and think to myself, “If God brought me to it, He will bring me through it”, and I smile.

Flowers make Sam Smile. Through a lot of trials, I realized that seeing, smelling and taking care of flowers is amazing therapy for the hurting soul, mind, and body. There are certain flowers and certain colors that really speak to me, especially when I am down. The daffodil is one of them. Any yellow flower speaks sunshine and smiles to me, but the daffodil holds a special place in my heart. The daffodil is one of the first flowers to bloom in the midwest in the spring. It brings one of the first signs of life after a sometimes long, cold, rough winter.

The Language of Flowers

A few years back, while sitting in the waiting room at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, MN, I began surfing the internet perusing flowers and their colors and meanings. I realized that there were so many different meanings for each flower, depending on which website you studied. A friend of mine led me to a very intriguing book of a girl who had nothing – no possessions, no money, no home. Through a series of mishaps, she was drawn to flowers and through this fascination and an observant foster mom, she realized the joy and the hope that came from flowers in many ways. Homeless and rolling in the flowerbeds led her to discover the tranquility and deep-seeded raw emotions that the flowers brought to her lonely life. It was while reading this book that I realized that flowers had meaning, and depending on the time (era), the color, and the viewpoint, many flowers had true meaning that would give me joy and hope in the midst of some difficult days. And of course…smiles!

The Color Yellow

To me the color yellow signals light. Light in the darkness, sunshine and warmth. Yellow is a warm color and makes me feel happy. I think of the smiley face emoji’s when I think of yellow. Yellow is a bold, illuminating color that spreads cheer wherever it shows up in life. Yellow also signifies caution, like in the center of the stoplight – yellow means proceed with caution. This makes sense because the human eye processes the color yellow before any other color, and it is the most dramatic and stands out on the color spectrum. Did you know that in China, adult movies are called “Yellow Movies”? or that in Japan yellow represents courage? Just like the daffodil flower is also called a narcissus, yellow is complex and has many different and somewhat opposing attributes in just a sole unique primary color.

The Daffodil

The meaning of the daffodil breathes creativity and inspiration. The flower symbolizes awareness and inner reflection. A bunch of daffodils begs for forgiveness and suggests rebirth and new beginnings. In other countries, it symbolizes good fortune and joy. In France the daffodil is a sign of hope, and the Arabians look to the flower as a cure for baldness. In the United States, the American Cancer Foundation uses the daffodil to represent hope for a cure from the dreaded disease. It is also the flower of the month of March in America.

The Narcissus

Although the narcissus flower is the same flower as the daffodil, the ardor of the narcissus is quite the opposite. The narcissus flower brings about narcissism and is thought to be egocentric. It predicts misfortune in the future and self-obsession. Even though there are these negative attributes and meanings of the narcissus, it still signals new birth and new beginnings, just with a bit of a different twist! The positive twist is a meaning of self-confidence and ambition.

Mixed Messages

There is a theory that suggests that if you give a single flower – daffodil OR narcissus – there is an indication of wishing “misfortune” but if you give a bunch of the flowers, you are offering “happiness” and “joy”.

One Flower, Two Names, What a Mystery – Makes Sam Smile!

Daffodil, Narcissus – it doesn’t matter! The shared feeling of new beginnings is a reason to smile. There are so many things in my life that have the potential to drag me down, it’s refreshing to think of warm yellow flowers that boast joy. I am in the middle of writing a book about narcissism and dealing with difficult relationships and this post reminds me that although narcissists are self-centered and difficult to relate to, there often is another side to them if we can just look deeper and understand that other side. In my research, I have found that sometimes the best way to handle a narcissist is to just smile and walk away knowing that God created everyone different. And please don’t ever give me a single narcissus – I’ll know what you are trying to say. Give Sam a bunch of daffodils, and you will definitely see Sam Smile!

Sam Smiles 411