Why?

It's always surprising when I speak about something that I believe with such certainty to be true, and I receive wide-eyed glances and, "I never thought of that"s. When I express something around which I shape my life, and someone says, "Why do you do that?"

It shouldn't be a shock. Really, it shouldn't. Because I know we're all different. I know that everyone thinks something different when I say the word "flower" and everyone sees a different shade when they look at the same color green and everyone will pick their own favorite part of the movie Titanic. We are all fearfully unique.

Now, flowers and shades of green and Leo DeCaprio movies aren't that important in the big scheme of things. But even the significant bits, the things that I'd label "no brainers," aren't universal. I'm always amazed when those around me find it hard to digest the things that mean everything to me. Like faith. Family. Marriage.

I suppose it's time I admit that my standards make me strange. They make me stand out. They make people stop, furrow their brow, and ask, "Why?"

There are so many ways I could answer that question, but I will settle with this: Because I am a child of God. And as terrifyingly awesome as it is to be unique - to have special gifts and talents and ideals and ways of looking at the world that no one else has, to the same degree, as me - what's even more fearsome is the bond that unites us all as children of a Heavenly Father. In that, we are all the same. And this is why, upon receiving those wide-eyed glances of confusion or shock, I am equally as confused and shocked.

I think that shock springs from hope. A hope that, one day, we will all follow the same absolute truth. That our individual talents and ideals will converge in pursuit of the same ultimate and eternal goal.

Until then, I'll continue being strange.