✨Word of Wonder: Grace✨

Definition:

• Spiritual Grace — Unmerited favor or divine assistance; a sacred gift we don’t earn but are freely given.
• Behavioral Grace — Kindness, mercy, or clemency shown in our actions toward others.
• Aesthetic Grace — Elegance of movement, character, or presence; beauty that flows naturally.

Grace. It’s one of those words we’ve all heard, maybe even used, but rarely sat still long enough to truly understand. It has a softness to it, like silk against the skin or the hush of snowfall at dusk. But grace isn’t just a feeling — it’s a way of being.

There are many kinds of grace.
There’s grace in movement — the way a dancer glides across a stage, or how leaves fall from a tree with effortless elegance.
There’s grace in action — the kind that forgives when it doesn’t have to, that listens without judgment, that chooses kindness over pride.
And then there’s grace in God — the quiet, often invisible mercy that meets us in our lowest moments, asking for nothing in return.

When I first think of the word grace, everything turns gold in my mind’s eye. The air feels lighter, like something sacred is drawing close. And then I see her — a woman, gliding through my thoughts, not walking but floating, wistful and calm. She wears an elegant gown of white and silver, as if woven from starlight. She doesn’t speak, but her presence says everything: gentleness, dignity, peace. She is the image of grace I never knew I carried.

I’ve been thinking about this word for about a week now, turning it over in my mind like a stone I can't quite polish. And if I’m honest, it’s been a struggle. Grace feels foreign to me. Elusive. Like something I once knew but have forgotten. And maybe that says more about me than I realize.

But that’s why we’re here — to remember.
Together, we will explore what grace means, how it moves through the world, and most importantly, how we can bring more of it into our lives.

Grace is not soft. Not really. It might appear gentle from the outside — calm, quiet, collected — but make no mistake: grace is one of the heaviest things a person can carry. To act with grace in a world like ours requires something fierce. It means holding your ground without needing to prove someone else wrong. It means softening your tone when everything in you wants to shout. It means extending kindness even when you’re met with cold indifference.

I’ve come to realize that grace doesn’t always come naturally to me. I wish it did. But more often than not, I feel the tug of pride before I feel the pull of patience. The fire of anger before the hush of understanding. There’s something in us — maybe fear, maybe ego — that resists grace. It’s like some part of our mind says, If you don’t stand up for yourself right now, you’ll be walked on. Forgotten. Disrespected.

But that’s a lie. Grace is not about lying down. It’s about standing up — just not in the way we’re used to.

There are things that block grace from moving through us:

• Pride, whispering that we’re owed something more than the other person.
• Pain, unresolved and bitter, that tells us grace is only for those who deserve it.
• Fear, that if we give grace, we’ll be seen as weak.
• And a culture that often mistakes cruelty for strength, dominance for leadership, volume for truth.

I’ve failed grace more times than I can count. I’ve spoken sharply when I should’ve been still. I’ve let silence stretch between me and people I love, not because I was right — but because I was too proud to bend. I’ve withheld forgiveness because I thought the wound needed to be acknowledged first — as if grace only follows apology.

But here’s what I’m learning: acting with grace doesn’t mean pretending the wound didn’t happen — it means choosing not to let it define you. It means asking yourself, What kind of person do I want to be in this moment? And then answering with your actions.

Sometimes grace is silence.
Sometimes grace is walking away.
Sometimes grace is speaking up, but doing so with gentleness instead of fury.
And sometimes grace is simply not responding at all — not because you don’t care, but because you’ve already made peace within yourself.

I don’t always get it right. Most of us don’t. But I believe even in our most graceless moments, there’s still a thread — a pull toward better. A whisper that says, Try again next time. You’re not done yet.

“The best revenge is to be unlike him who performed the injury.”

— Meditations, Marcus Aurelius

If giving grace is hard, then receiving it might be even harder.

There’s something about being on the receiving end of grace that unsettles us. It’s almost uncomfortable — like we’re being seen too clearly, too kindly. Most of us are taught from a young age to earn what we get. To prove ourselves. To carry our own weight and apologize properly when we fall short. But grace doesn’t wait for proof. It just shows up — unearned, undeserved, and often unannounced.

And when it does, we don’t know what to do with it.

We hesitate. We second-guess. We wonder what the catch is. We might even reject it outright, choosing guilt or punishment over the unfamiliar comfort of mercy. I’ve been there. Someone forgives me, and instead of feeling lighter, I feel guilty for not suffering more. Someone tells me I’m worthy, and I hear it as kindness, not truth. Why do we do that? Why is grace so hard to receive?

Maybe it’s because to receive grace, we have to first admit we need it.

We have to acknowledge that we’re not perfect. That we’ve said things we shouldn’t have, held bitterness longer than we meant to, let pride win out over love. And once we admit that, there’s a second step — accepting that even with all of that, we’re still worthy of kindness. Still capable of redemption. Still loved.

That’s where grace lives. Not at the end of perfection, but in the middle of the mess.

I kind of think that grace is like rain. It doesn’t ask if the ground is ready — it just falls. Whether the earth is cracked and dry or muddy and full, the rain gives what it has. It’s not up to the soil to deserve it. It’s up to the sky to give it.

And maybe that’s what divine grace really is — a kind of rain that falls on all of us, whether we think we deserve it or not. It’s the quiet presence of God in our most broken places. Not coming to fix us, but to be with us. To whisper, You are still worth loving, even here.

I’m still learning to accept that. Still learning to let people see the parts of me I’ve spent years hiding. Still learning to believe that I don’t have to suffer to be forgiven. That maybe, just maybe, grace is not about what I’ve done — but about who I’m becoming.

And I wonder…

If we could learn to receive grace fully — from others, from life, from the Divine — how would it change the way we treat ourselves? How would it soften the way we walk through the world?

Grace isn’t something you arrive at. It’s not a destination. It’s a way of walking — quietly, consistently — even when the ground is uneven. Even when no one notices.

Living with grace doesn’t mean never getting angry, never making mistakes, or always knowing the right thing to say. It means trying again. It means choosing to soften when you could harden. It means showing up with kindness even when your own heart feels tired. It means becoming a safe place — for others, yes, but also for yourself.

To live with grace is to:

• Listen more than you speak.
• Respond, not react.
• Forgive without keeping tally.
• Offer space for others without erasing yourself.
• Remember that every person is carrying something you can’t see.

It’s in the small moments — the ones no one applauds:

• Holding your tongue when your pride flares.
• Letting someone else speak their truth, even when it’s hard to hear.
• Saying “I understand” when what you want to say is “you’re wrong.”
• Sending a kind word when someone least deserves it — especially then.

Grace is quiet, but it isn’t weak. It’s the voice inside you that says, There is another way. A higher road. A softer step. I won’t pretend I take that road every time — I don’t. But I want to. And maybe that’s where grace starts. Not with perfection, but with the decision to keep trying.

I want to be a person who carries grace like a thread through every room I enter. Sometimes golden. Sometimes fraying at the ends. But still there. Still holding things together. Still trying to mend instead of tear.

If you’re reading this, I hope you carry it too. In your words, your choices, your pauses. In how you speak to the world, and in how you speak to yourself.

Let grace live — not just in definition, but in your hands. In your steps. In your silence.
Let it live in the way you move through this life.

I’d like to take a moment to thank Nathan R. for his Words of Wonder submission on grace. It stirred something in me — made me look at a part of myself that I’m not sure I’ve ever really seen before. That’s the beauty of these shared reflections: they open doors, even the ones we didn’t know were closed.

As always, thank you all for reading. I love you all— truly, I do. Remember, no matter where you are in your journey, you’re not alone in it. Together, we are all perfectly average.

— Average Benjamin
Signing off.