A friend wrote me about my book recently. “Your words, like your doodles, are intricate and full of twists and turns, looking this way and that, inside and out, up and down, through and through…” she said.

That reminded me of a cold, grey day in Germany. I was sitting up in bed, exhausted after a sleepless night, staring at my hands. I was frustrated that pain and exhaustion made it impossible for me to stay focused when I tried to pray.

The tiny, almost invisible twirls and whirls on the palms of my hands, specially on my fingers (aka fingerprints) fascinated me. I knew they were unique to me – which made them all the more fascinating.

My reading that morning was from Isaiah 49.

“See, I have
engraved you
on the palms
of my hands…”

I thought of what that might look like—me engraved on the palms of God’s hands. Engraved in the midst of all the twirls and whirls.

As that truth slowly became a part of my being, I pictured myself and everything that is my life carved into the palm of God’s hand. Not just ‘held’ by His hand, or stained in henna that will eventually wash away, but permanently engraved.

I doodled swirls and whirls that symbolized the patterns on God’s palm. Within it I placed my own hand along with symbols representing various aspects of life. Some basic, even laughable; and others more complex.

As I saw my hand sketched into that pattern of swirly lines, what I was left with is this—the unchanging reality that I am firmly anchored.

Permanently engraved. From there, I can ask questions without coming unglued. I find my treasures in darkness—riches stored in hidden places.

~shini abraham, ©2016, duco divina – contemplative doodling