"It is what it is."

People throw this slogan around, much of the time – I think – not really understanding what they are saying.

In a period of five years, my stepbrother Dennis (just in his 40’s) was required to make the decision to take off life-supports, his youngest brother, Jim (complications from a kidney transplant) and his wife, Barbara (hit by a car). During this same five years, he was present at the hospital bed of his older bother, Pat (also complications from a kidney transplant – kidney problems run in the family), as Pat’s wife, Pam, had to make the same awful decision.

When, a couple of years later, I heard him say, “It is what it is”, it took my breath away. Here was someone who has faced the worst of “what it is” can be. If he has found within himself the courage and spiritual depth to hold this stance, then what of me? Can I find within me that level of spiritual surrender to the difficult realities of my life? Thinking of Dennis often helps me to get there.