"I wish you a life of purposeful fulfillment" Coretta Scott King

Martin Luther King III with Mother's Letter, originally uploaded by artist_charleentouchette.

"a life of purposeful fulfillment."
Despair is a heavy weight on our youth and many not so young today.
Too many are choosing death over the pain of living life in this dark time.
How can we help stop this loss of our youth and convince them life is worth living?

I often think about what makes people choose to embrace life despite hardships and others to be destroyed by adversity.

When Martin Luther King III came to New Mexico, one of the places we took him was to the African in Mexican Art exhibit at the Hispanic Cultural Center Museum in Albuquerque. Martin was particularly moved to see a letter handwritten by his mother to the then President of Mexico on the occasion of the issuance of the first postage stamp bearing the portrait of the Late Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. In closing, Mrs. Coretta Scott King wrote that she wished the President "a life of purposeful fulfillment."

Those words stuck with me, and in the time since, I have come to understand that Mrs. King had summed up the key to life well-lived and the best wish we can have for each other. Coretta King didn't define "purposeful fulfillment", that's up to each individual to discover for themselves. That life of "purposeful fulfillment" seems so unattainable for too many of our people. But it is possible for everyone. Remember what our indigenous grandmothers world wide did with grasses, willows, mud and animal hair. It is my hope that the many people who live a life of "purposeful fulfillment" whatever their chosen work will be living examples for the sad ones that there is joy in simple things and life is worth embracing.
Peace,
Charleen Touchette
March 14, 2009
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Photo by Charleen Touchette June 2007 - Martin Luther King III with Mother's Letter at Hispanic Cultural Center Museum