I met the Easter Bunny this week.
Seriously. I asked a guy in my kickboxing class how he met his wife. He'd been telling us funny stories about his marriage, and I was curious how his partner, this fiesty, fiery woman he obviously thought the world of, had entered his life.
"Well, I was dressed up in a bunny costume," he began.
Hold it right there.
This guy is over six feet tall, covered with tatooes, wears an earring in his ear, and scared the heck out of me when he first started classes. He's tough, strong, and fierce about his martial arts training, often coming to two classes a day. He intimidated the heck out of me.
Yet he's telling me he was the Easter Bunny for a local organization for many years.
"Was it a PINK bunny suit?" I asked cautiously.
"Nah.... It was white, with a pink tummy and pink ears."
Oh. Well, then.
We all burst out laughing, and I later told my teacher I would never be scared of that guy again.
Turns out that, despite a formidable appearance, he's a good guy. Inside and outside of class he is respectful, considerate, easy-going and hardworking. And, it turns out, he has the heart of a marshmallow. He agonized about coming up with the perfect Valentine's Day gift for his wife, carefully thinking about what would please her. When he finally figured out the perfect gift, he excitedly told our class all about it. It was sweet.
But he wasn't always "nice." He confessed he'd been a "bad boy" in high school, making bad choices, hanging out with bad people, doing bad things.
He probably WAS scary back then.
So what did I learn from this?
Several things. The most obvious, of course, is you can't always judge a book by its cover. The guy that looked like he'd just as soon whack me as look at me, turns out to be a decent guy with a big heart.
But it also brought home to me the power of choice.
This guy probably looked like a hopeless case in high school. And here he is years later, holding down a good job, happily married to a good woman, working hard to learn the disciplines and skills of a martial art. He makes different choices now, and he is a better person for them.
There are so many people who make choices that lock them into tiny boxes, into small ways of thinking. They are stuck, and complain that they have "no choice." But they do.
Maybe it's true that (most) people don't change.
But people CAN change. Because they choose to.
And perhaps even if they can't change who they are, they can change how they act.
We now know Mother Theresa battled profound depression. Yet this tiny woman with a great heart touched the world with her love and dedication to the world's poorest. We know Princess Diana had her own personal demons, yet she touched the hearts of millions. We know Christopher Reeves and his wife Dana both had their monsters to slay. But the face they presented to the world was one of bravery, partnership and positive action to help those even worse off than they were.
On one hand, we can say, "So even if you are changing the world, you can feel like sh_ _."
Or we can say, "Even if you feel like sh_ _, you can change the world."
If these people who faced tremendous hardship because of things they could not change--life-challenging hardships--could accomplish so much...
what could WE accomplish, who are simply unhappy with things we CAN change?
