You know to have a family is to have Gold; It's true riches for sure. Hard times puts this truth in proper perspective. It's the places you can go and the people upon which you can rely in tough times that gives your soul it's salt of survival. These folk need not be blood relatives to be called Family, and many times as we know, they are not. We must treat our families well however, blood and otherwise, for we are nourished by them and through them. They are our lifeline, just like Spirit, Food and Water. To forget this truth is to isolate oneself from the greater good of Family and Community and to suffer loneliness at your own hand, self inflicted and self created.
I remember when I traveled a little through Latin America years ago this edict was driven home through my exposure to this Family based culture. The third question I was always asked upon first meeting a native Latin person was, "Do you have a Family?" At that time I did not have an immediate family and so I would reply with, "no, not at this time" knowing what they meant: a wife and kids. Immediately they would sincerely lament, "Ooh,...I'm so sorry", and they meant this from the bottom of their hearts; you could see it in them, and no sooner would I get to know them they would tell me all about their families and if they had them, out would pop the pictures. I can distinctly remember one man in particular asking me,"Don't you feel poor without a family of your own", he said, in his best English? I said, "Well, I haven't thought of it like that". Then, I saw the Joy in him totally Light him up as he told me about his wife and children and that moment has always stuck with me. The spiritual health, stability and joy that these people derived from a way of life rooted in a strong tradition of family was overwhelmingly aparent in their day to day living. Their life was and is hard by Western accounts causing the human spirit to dig deep, sweeping aside the chaff to discover what is truly important and meaningful. The importance of this discovery when life is difficult and the resultant purity and happiness that it has imbued into their culture made a deep impression on me. This, combined with their reverent spirituality gave them a solidity that I haven't seen since, not as a society at any rate. The first question that they would ask me was, "What is your name"? The second question was, "Where do you come from"? That tells you a little of the implied importance of that next question that would unfailingly follow, "Tiene esposa? Hijos? Hijas(Do you have a wife? Children?)? I was asked these same questions, in this order, over and over throughout my travels.
These people knew that Family was Gold. Was it a coincedence that they possesed a kind of austere happiness and peace? I don't really think so. You know, as I walked around in these farming villages high in this Volcanic region known as The Guatemalan Highlands I would continually hear these people singing as they went about their daily work and chores--Everyday! They are farmers who work the land and who, for example, still to this day make their own clothes and grow their own food. They are a happy people: hard workers and deeply spiritual. They are really poor by material standards, yet so rich by others. They are rich where it counts: in Spirit and in Family. These are the tings they hold as Sacred.......and Rightly So.
It's easy to lose perspective of the Sacred Gold in a society filled with distractions of every sort. Take away those distractions and life becomes remarkably simple and the sacred sublimely clear like stars in the firmament.