Wednesday, February 18, 2009

Eternalities

I normally don’t consider myself a wordsmith, but every so often a word will give me pause. Today I was reading an affirmation by Ernest Homes in The Science of Mind “…the Good, the Enduring, and the True are Eternalities in my experience.” Try saying that phrase a few times fast. Every time I tripped over the word “Eternalities.” I wasn’t the only one who had problems. Microsoft Word flagged it as a misspelling, but would let me look up Eternality: “Something that lasts for all time without beginning or end.” The pop up window even gave me some clues as to how to pronounce it.

The word “Eternalities” is like a neglected child in a large extended family. It has five syllables in a world of short words. It describes a very, very long period of time in an era of short attention spans. It describes something very spiritual in an era of consumerism, though the era may be ending. Yet, “Eternalities” seems to be invaluable to anyone who wants to think of the Divine. It is like the kid with insomnia who wakes up the family when he smells the gas leak. He finally gets a little respect.

Now all I need to do is use it three times in conversation and the word will be mine forever—or so the theory goes.

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