Be Ready

I heard the phrase again last night while washing dishes and letting a television program keep me company. The rebels had committed to getting the hunted out of the city. They knew who they were, what guerrilla tactics to use, what was at stake. The only thing that could possibly go wrong was if those who they were trying to help were not prepared.

“Be Ready,” he said, looking hard into the eyes of the hunted. He was saying “I got you. Make sure you ‘got’ yourself.” This was the third time I had heard those two words in as many months: amplified, emphasized, insistent. Be Ready.

Last week as I prepared for Easter Sunday service the DJ played a song that arrested me with the first lyric, “This is not the time to get distracted.”  I bought it immediately; Your Destiny by Kevin LeVar. By the end of the day, I knew the entire song, verses, chorus, ad libs, everything. At the very end LeVar says “My victory is days away, so I’m-a get ready…” He says “get" but the spirit of his declaration is "I’m gonna Be Ready when it gets here. I’m not going to miss it or not know what to do with it when it arrives.” 

Earlier this year my friend and I talked at length about the difference between the two phrases, Get Ready and Be Ready. We laughed as we remembered how our parents would Be Ready at 4 o’clock for a 6 o’clock event. My mother would be dressed to the nines and sitting quietly in the living room chair, thumbing through a magazine; waiting, while we scurried around, teasing her for being so earrllly and talking about how we still had time to get ready. She was never moved by our teasing; Mama was Ready. When we finally got our act together, my mother would quietly arise from her chair, smooth her skirt, and proceed to the car. Unperturbed. Self-possessed. She always seemed to get more out of the event than any of us. Wonder why?

My friend’s father would also Be Ready two hours early; fussing until it was time to go because he was Ready and what the hell was taking everybody else so long?! He was point-perfect when it was time to pick her up from an event or take her mother out for the evening or keep a promise to a friend. It was the same for work: he started work at 6 am; he was Ready a 4 am. He, like my mother, was never late for anything. Ready, they were. Always.

So here we are at the beginning of the second quarter of 2015. It’s no longer a new year, but a year in gear and we’re expecting great things to happen. Expecting to make great things happen as we implement our plans and strategies. Good, good. Just remember that the devil is in the details. Minor distractions can cause the best of us to break focus, get off course, and get trapped in the maze-phase of ‘getting ready’…

...when the charge is to Be Ready.

Ready,

Karen