From the ashes comes character

Listening to the radio this morning, the presenter was narrating an incident involving one of his friends.

You see the friend's house had burnt down the night before and he had accompanied him to the site to see what, if anything, could be recovered. As it would be, all that was left was ash and cinders.


The outer brick wall of the facade stood erect and blackened the windows had all been blown out and the window frames in pieces and frail with perhaps a residue of paint holding it. The grand piano, which at one time had probably graced the centre of the living room, was nothing beyond ash and steel wires.

The fire it seemed had consumed everything without remorse. However, as his friend sifted through remnants of old photographs and twisted, charred furniture he came across a small blue ceramic dove. When he picked it up from amid the debris and wiped clean the soot off of the bird, he was amazed to see that aside from a few tiny fractures on the surface the bird remained in one piece, in defiance of the destruction around it.

To that friend that bird was a glimmer of hope that the worst was behind him and that there was light ahead. The friend commented that if the bird could just talk it would have had an amazing story to relate about the heat, the smoke and the destruction of the night before.

When one thinks about it, while it is truly amazing that a small ceramic bird could survive in an inferno that claimed everything else, what is worthy of contemplation is to realise why that bird had survived in the first place.

In a simple explanation, that little bird was created through trial by fire. Those of its batch that did not survive unscathed by the flames of its creation were shattered and sent back through the manufacturing process anew. Only those that were able to weather the heat and the flames thrown at it were worthy of their shiny ceramic armour.

In that way, many of us are tested by fire in life and those of us who can withstand the heat are rewarded with a similar private badge of honour. And those who cracked were left behind; perhaps only scarred but afraid to continue.

In my opinion that little bird serves as a metaphor for our survival. If we live a sheltered life and have never been tested against fire, our journey may end if we cannot cope when times are hard. So it is equally important to grow up safe but be tested through each development phase so that when our character is tested against seemingly insurmountable odds – we, like that little bird, can wipe ourselves clean of the soot and stand proud.