You gotta share when you see a great flick, and Akeelah and the Bee is one, without a doubt. Grab a kid (or don't) and head out to support this totally charming movie! Not sappy, not hokey, just adorable.
And there was a quote that was featured in the movie, which I have heard before, and totally dig on. It's by Maryanne Williamson, and Nelson Mandela famously quoted it in his inaugural speech in 1994.
"Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness, that frightens us most. We ask ourselves, 'Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, and famous?' Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that people won't feel insecure around you. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It's not just in some of us; it's in all of us. And when we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others."
As I heard this quote again, I was thinking about how I'm not really afraid of other people or outside situations. (This is not to say that I am not scared in the face of real danger.) But if you really want to scare me, put me in quiet room by myself with nothing to do, no way to communicate, and nothing to look at, for a totally unspecified period of time.
*Nightmares*
A long time ago, I concluded that I suffer from an intense fear of mediocrity, in all it's forms. Years later, I concluded that the middle is the new edge. Maybe sometime I'll go into depth more about these ideas, but basically what I think it all boils down to is that not being who I am scares the crap out of me. I am a staunch feminist who believes in teaching my daughter to dress modestly, a highly-fashion-centric dresser who believes that aesthetics are an evolved language yet eschews (most) labels, and an intelligent person who enjoys nothing more than admitting I know nothing and learning something new.
And you know what? That's all okay, 'cause it's true....
