In full transparency, until about six months ago, the only signs I ever paid attention to were the ones made to keep us safe on the road: STOP, GO, YIELD, RAILROAD CROSSING, etc, etc.
In a short amount of time, my work life was turned upside down, my mother passed away and my father was in poor health. While I was greatly enjoying my sabbatical on a personal level, I was feeling directionless. If you remember the iconic scene at the end of Cast Away where Tom Hanks stands in the middle of a four-way intersection on a Texas highway that seemed to go forever in each direction, this is the best way I can describe it. I'll pause there because more to come on that in my next post.
Throughout those months I stayed connected to one of my closest friends in education. She would often tell me to look for the signs. Now I know in today's world, people can think of signs in many different ways: religious, spiritual, universal, or just by happenstance. I'll let you make your own personal connection to what you think signs mean.
For me, the signs are now so clear at times, I simply cannot believe that they are mere coincidences. Please know, I don't go walking around trying to make everything a sign. Just to share one recent sign, this week I had to attend a meeting that I was not looking forward to. It was on my calendar for a week, so for seven straight days I had to live my best life, while still keeping this albatross around my neck in focus.
On the morning of the meeting day, I dropped off my daughter at school and drove to work in a completely different direction than normal. I could not tell you what made me go that direction, however about five minutes away from work, I came to a red light and noticed the license plate of a car right in front of me. It was a vanity plate. Of course, for privacy concerns, I won't share the vanity plate. How about this, I'll do my best to share an analogy. Imagine an innocent person spending 20 years in prison and one day getting his wrongful conviction overturned. A friend picks him up from jail and at a stop light, the man sees the car in front of him and the license plate says, VNDICATD.
While my meeting was not connected to vindication, I know without a shadow of a doubt, it will one day lead to that. The license plate I saw was no doubt the greatest sign that I've seen in the past six months, since I've had my eyes open for them.
Keep your eyes and ears open for them. Maybe it will be a song you hear while sitting at your local coffee shop. Perhaps it's a random address that leaves you thunder-stuck, shaking your head thinking, There's no way that this can be dumb luck.
In closing, if you've never seen Signs, the 2002 movie written by M. Night Shyamalan, you should queue it up on your movie list. In true Hollywood fashion, it's taking signs to the extreme, but the lesson Mel Gibson learns at the end is exactly how I felt sitting in my car just three days ago seeing that license plate.
If you've seen Signs, you probably remember its iconic quote, "Swing away, Merrill." As it turns out, I did just that a few days ago.