The Light of Albom's Heaven

It may start with one simple spark in the darkest of times. When the walls of the world seem as though they are squeezing the life out of you, and you're trapped under the demands and desires of an overwhelming society; when you feel so broken inside, your identity is almost unrecognizable. When this pain feels as if it is too much to bear, it may be that one spark that suddenly lights your world anew and in some cases changes your life forever.

I read it over the long hours of one night, unable to put it down, until suddenly the light of the sunrise penetrated my blinds. As I closed the book with a satisfied smile, tears streamed down my face until the title of the book became one big blur. Mitch Albom's The Five People You Meet in Heaven had sparked a much-needed emotional reformation inside my heart. It had quenched my thirsty body with a hope and comfort I had been seeking for the longest time.

In The Five People You Meet In Heaven, Mitch Albom simply represents his version of what heaven could be like. Ideally, in this heaven people who felt unimportant here on earth would realize, finally, how much they mattered and how they were loved. "This is the greatest gift God can give to you: to understand what happened in your life. To have it explained. It is the peace you have been searching for." This is what I had been searching for as well, a piece of heaven--a moment to learn five lessons about life, love, relationships, sacrifice, and forgiveness. These five lessons taught me how to live.

In explaining the circular nature of life, Albom begins his first lesson:

"It is because the human spirit knows, deep down, that all lives intersect. That death doesn't just take someone, it misses someone else, and in the small distance between taken and being missed, lives are changed." I learned that all lives connect somehow and that our choices affect others whether we know it or not. "Strangers are just family you have yet to come to know," perhaps one day in heaven. I began to realize the nights I spent thinking I was alone were the only true nights I wasted in my life because through this interconnection of lives, "you can no more separate one life from another than you can separate a breeze from the wind."

The second lesson relies on the emphasis of sacrifice:

"Sacrifice is a part of life. It's supposed to be. It's not something to regret. It's something to aspire to. Little sacrifices. Big Sacrifices...Sometimes when you sacrifice something precious, you're not really losing it. You're just passing it on to someone else." I learned the importance of sacrifices, both large and small, beginning with the greatest sacrifice on the cross to the daily sacrifices of those who shed their blood for our freedom and protection; from a mother who works to send her children to school to a daughter who moves home to take care of her sick father. Sacrifice is everywhere, and yet when we analyze our lives, we tend to forget those who sacrificed something precious on our behalf. We forget the sacrifice of a hero, which makes our lives have meaning. My life has meaning because of so many people, especially my parents, for what they sacrifice for me every day so I can have a good education and live a healthy life.

Forgiveness is the next important lesson discussed:

"Holding anger is a poison. It eats you from inside. We think that hating is a weapon that attacks the person who harmed us. But hatred is a curved blade. And the harm we do, we do to ourselves." It is easier to build anger than forgive. In my case, it was much easier to be angry with the person who destroyed