Rough Morning?

This week has been rough, and I needed this message.

Today is a lounge around the house in the pajamas and eat ice cream from the container kind of day. Today is a question-what-it-is-I-am-doing-here kinda day. I feel awash in the sea of life, drifting with the current with no clear direction.

Can someone send me a boat, or an oar, or a stiff breeze to push me to shore? How about a nice sand bar to plant my feet?

I’m going to try to follow this advice and not give up. I will sit back, reassess my goals, figure out where I am, and find my compass to set a new course.

Sunday Prejudice or Conviction?

“The difference between a conviction and a prejudice is that you can explain a conviction without getting angry.” — Anonymous

On this Sunday, I often wonder about this. How do I share my beliefs without facing the big questions like a deer in the headlights? Are my ideas convictions or just prejudices in the guise of convictions?

Just as we all are tempted, all have a viewpoint, and all have convictions, we also all have prejudices. These require identification, isolation, and examination. If we can stand behind them, they become (or always were) convictions. If we find that with investigation they begin to unravel and fizzle, then we may call them prejudices and begin to work to end them in our lives.

Prejudice is ugly.

Love is beautiful.

Be Your Awesome Self!

I often need to hear this. I put way too much stock in what others think of me.

A stray comment from a troll can ruin my day. Growing a thick skin is hard!

I’ve been listening to my favorite chick rock band and the message is pretty much the same, don’t waste the time you have, be awesome now. You can’t be awesome if you get hung up on moping over what others think. You have to act and be outside of the box.

Do those things that will end in awesomeness.

Be yourself to the utmost today!

 

Helping Sam

I’m posting this for my friend Sam.

We had a long talk last night.

Sam needed to know someone out there was not so negative, and that smiles would come again.

I helped Sam come up with a plan of action for the next steps to get out of her problem. This was Step One.

She wrote a poem about her feelings and what she learned from our discussion. She writes:

You have shown me one thing,
to trust someone full of dark thoughts
is to trust a snake,
a snake that could bite and poison.

I choose happiness.
I choose love.
For the real winner
is the one that sees it all.

She feels a lot better now, a lot stronger.

Keep Going

I stole this (and many more to come) from Voices In My Head.

I need this.

And if I need this, then I know you do too.

In regards to my housework, writing, job, exercise, and all aspects of my life, I need to hear these ambiguous words of encouragement.

These words remind me to set small goals. I can take small steps, one at a time, to accomplish small goals. When I look back, I will have traveled some distance.

And I will feel proud of myself.

Good Deeds

Today’s small stone is found in the kindness of others.

I bought a some things at the store, the total coming to $23.03. The man in line behind me said “I have a bunch of change to get rid of, I’ll pay her 3 cents.”

It was only 3 small pennies, but any sacrifice made for someone else hardly ever happens nowadays. It’s like the story about good people anonymously paying off the Christmas layaway tabs of struggling parents. That’s who we need to be. Givers. We need to emulate this. If we start giving, sacrificing our pennies, helping our neighbors, then others will see us paying it forward and they will feel that they can do it too.

Maybe we can make the world a slightly better place.

Small Stones: New Life

There is a website that encourages you to investigate and fall in love with a small detail each day and write about it. These moments are called small stones. They are currently running a January blitz. I think this concept fits with this blog, so I am going to post today’s small stone.

Though I had a great day visiting with my family over birthday cake and could pick any moment from that, or perhaps shine a light on the hope a new year brings, I’m choosing to relish the new life I found outside in the doghouse. A stray brindle pit bull has delivered a litter of pups. While I am frustrated because she is a stray, part of me coddles the newborn life in my heart. It is sweet, even if unwanted. Tiny whimpering balls of fur, eyes and ears closed, so cute, yet such a burden. A conundrum, a test of my mettle, I cold or soft hearted?

Tweeting is A Lonely Hobby

Have you ever played with ‘That can Be My Next Tweet’? Google it if you tweet and you haven’t.

I just got this jumbled up mess of my recent tweets:
Hurray! it’s all gone. Saddest week of wasting gas 2drive 2 wks of my blog post and I’m THAT busy!

I think it really sums up what my life has been for the past few months.

But this blog is not to promote sadness, rather to seek happiness.
This month is Thanksgiving, where we celebrate and count our blessings in America. I am thankful for water and heat (both things we had to fix in our house), shelter, my dog (who loves me no matter what), my family, and most of all my husband and sons.

When you are feeling lonely, what do you do?
Some people find someone, anyone, to talk to. Some people need to just sit and feel it to get it over with. Others dive into a movie with a tub of ice cream or a warm cup of tea or cocoa. Still others go to Postsecret or failblog or some other website with funny content that will cheer them up if only temporarily. They say smiling releases endorphins in your brain that make you happier. Some volunteer with people in a worse rut than they are.

We all face it, feel it, and get past it. It’s just a matter of how long we spend in each stage.

Fighting Storms of Life with Love

When the storm clouds of life roll in, know that if you just keep going, you will move past the storm.

Even if you just do mundane tasks to get through the days, anything is better than contemplating ending your chances to see the next sunrise.

I was asked, and linked to a site about, whether I lived meaningfully.

Living with purpose is life’s ultimate goal isn’t it? There are countless websites, books, and videos out there hoping to teach you how to do just that. Because we need to have a purpose, it has become a money maker.

So what’s mine? Love. Pure and simply, as long as I can give and receive love, I’m living with purpose. Sometimes it’s self love; giving myself a pedicure, writing in my journal about my feelings, sitting in a beautiful place and taking time to appreciate it; and sometimes it’s showing love to others; making a phone call, chatting, sending an email, writing a letter, giving a gift, hugging a child, visiting a friend.

The seeds I sow here, in love, hopefully will follow me until I am homebound, bedridden, and solitary so that I will never be alone.

VBS

I don’t know if you have experience with Vacation Bible School, but it always brings a ray of sunshine into my life!

For one week, a whole bunch of kids have fun, singing catchy songs, dancing, acting out Bible stories, creating crafts, playing simple games, and eating fun snacks. It always amazes me how profound little ones can be! Listening to their answers to the simplest questions often reveals to us adults that we miss the whole basic point!

Most importantly, we don’t have to follow a prescribed set of motions to be where we need to be in life. We can have fun, veer from the pack, and still get where we were always meant to be.