The Message behind the Games

One of the advantages of working in a nursing home as I do, is the fact that many of the residents have televisions in their rooms. That and the big screen TV in the downstairs lounge mean that I have been able to watch the Olympics while I work. On several occasions this week I have found loitering on various residents beds while they drink their cups of tea. Most of them have been only too pleased to have my company.

This morning I was passing one of these residents rooms and he happened to have on his radio. The station is not as important as the message that it was broadcasting. A "Christian", and I use the term loosely for it has many meanings, was speaking about what he felt was the message behind the Olympics. He said that he felt it was showing us that our focus and our goal should not be about making money but rather about striving to be the best that we can be. This is a phrase that I have heard quite frequently in the last few weeks, and if you take it at face value as most have, it is all about striving to reach that Olympic goal. It can however be applied to almost any aspect of anyone's life in equal measure.

Whether young or old, that is the sole (or perhaps soul) reason we are here - to strive to be the best that we can in any given moment. Knowing as I do that time is an illusion, that moment stretches on into eternity and reaches out into infinity. To live in the moment is all that we can do, for the moment is all that there is.

The Olympics also show us that is not about winning, but about competing in the spirit of fairness and equality. Those that fail to win medals (and these are the majority) are not failures because of this this, but successes because they tried, and try is all we can do. The journey to coin another well used phrase, is more important than the destination and it is the experience that is the prize for it is that experience that shows us who we are and what we too can be.

The Message is in the Music - Calibans Dream

As the rain tossed above us;

In the garden of the world

But a flame arrives to guide us;

Past the gold between the angles of the stars

Watch you over all the children in the rain;

And the streets where I remember

Where the fire that lights a candle soars again;

A flaring flame,

Hear it call;

Through the darkness,

Hear it call to us all

And start again;

Its beating heart

Comes again

When the light dries all the fields

And the joy drives out our pain

And the nations come to greet us

Waving molten loaves and waves of golden corn

Can you hear us,

Oh, the spirit of the world

May your light be ever near us

Always heal us from the dark that we may fall