The Ultimate Hero's Journey

“Are you and the woman together?”

That’s generally the first question I get asked when I share my story - the fact that an Instagram post from a woman in France inspired me to write Love Letters to the Virgin Mary.

It’s a sensible question.

To be sure, the moment I saw that post I knew I was looking at something transcendent.? Instantly, I was flooded with a sense of Déjà vu.? I was stunned.

She’s a schoolteacher and semi-professional bodybuilder.?

Many of her posts are of her showing off her chiseled physique after a competition or celebrating a weekend in the Alps while camping with one of her girlfriends.? Always classy, always a refined sense of Old World elegance and strength, blended with modern independence and creativity.?

This post wasn’t like any of those.

In this post, she was wearing a black dress, standing in a field of golden wheat, looking off to her right.? Wheat is very symbolic in the Bible. The wind shown by the wisp of hair that graced her cheek.? In the background were green hills and an etching of clouds.?

I saw that image on Saturday April 4, 2020, just one month after the world locked down.

Over the past few years, we’ve been in touch infrequently.? She has a copy of the book.

There are some extraordinary coincidences.? For one, her birthday is December 8th.? That’s the date when Catholics celebrate the Feast of the Immaculate Conception, when the Virgin Mary was conceived.

Then, last year during the holy week leading up to Easter, one of her health and fitness ads appeared on my newsfeed.? That had never happened before.

From seeing that post in April, it took me until August of 2022 to fully appreciate…the beauty I saw in her was a beauty that existed in me.? Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, right?? It was the beauty I’d spent my entire life searching for.?

It would take me more than three long and often painful years to understand, it wasn’t about her.

It was about my relationship with Jesus.? The light I saw in that Instagram post led me to believe.

Spending my whole life looking for someone and believing I’d found her at the start of the pandemic?? That part of the story of my life, I enjoyed.? It brought with it a relish and sense of satisfaction. All those missteps I'd taken in love, the decades of frustration and second-guessing, and the pain I'd caused other people, only to finally see the light at the end of the tunnel.

Realizing I had to turn away from the very thing I’d been searching for to accept Jesus?? That was hard.? With what I’d written, accept him how, exactly?

By the Fall of 2023, Love Letters had been out for nearly a year, and I’d written 80% of a sequel.? I hadn’t done any marketing for the book; my goal had been to get it published in time for the woman’s birthday, which I had.?

I’d also left Cisco in February of 2023, the only company I’d known since leaving the Marines seventeen years prior.? I loved working at Cisco. Writing the book had taken a toll on me, and both my boss and I knew I wasn't performing at the level the company needed me to be.

In September 2023, I had no idea that King David didn’t ascend to heaven.? It’s covered in one sentence in the Book of Acts.? I wouldn’t discover that until 2024 while doing research for my next book.? That’s when things began to shift.

That’s when I began to realize...maybe the path to our ultimate destiny is found in the story of King David.? There is a promise made to David of an everlasting kingdom and an eternal throne.? This promise is made to a human.? Shouldn’t what applies to him apply to everyone?

Life is all about the hero’s journey.? It isn’t about being comfortable.? It’s about getting out in the world, learning lessons, and constantly seeking growth.? It's about testing one's faith by having the courage to accept other people's experience of life is, by necessity, different from our own.

?It's also about digging deep within ourselves. It's about believing in a greater good that unites us all. Most importantly, it's about bringing that good to life within us.

Every hero is measured by the strength of their opponent.

What kind of hero do you get to become, in overcoming life’s greatest opponent?? What kind of faith does it take to believe that Christ is already victorious, and most importantly, how do you bring that faith to life within you, now?

#herosjourney #leadership #love #faith #Jesus #passion #determination #resilience