This cracked me up since I groom dogs and its true!!!When you frown you give off bad vibes. If you smile (not forced please) the vibes are much better!!!!! Bad vibes scare dogs!!!
Today early we sang Carpenter songs at work, none of us can sing but it was FUN, and the dogs chilled AND I worked through one of the hardest dogs I've ever had.
Are you a frowner???
Do you chase people off by the look on your face??? With out knowing it we convey a feeling of negativity even if its just concentration. Frowning is contagious!!! Do you spread it to all you meet??
Are you a smiler?
Smiling is even more contagious. Especially if you manage a happy dance!!! Yes, I know many of us with autism on here have trouble with eye contact, but just look at some one and smile and then, they are going to smile at some one else.
So if your a frowner try hard....really hard to turn it up side down. if you see some one with out one...give them one of yours. If you are having trouble smiling sing a favorite song in your head....think of a good joke
We have been talking of heaven on earth.....what better way to spread a little heaven than a little smile!! So smile baby smile!!
30 MARCH
Give up sitting. Get
up, stand up, take the
stairs, walk around the
block, put on music
and dance.
OK!!! I'm a dog groomer with a salon with no stools. I have ummmm a lot of dogs and cats to feed when I get home.. When we are off we hike and walk.... so not sure how to give up sitting. So I thought and I thought and thought!!!
I decided to use this as a metaphor for seats in a church, temple or masque. Going to these can be very important to you spiritual life. You pray, you sing or chant, you hear inspiring sermons, have fellowship and then what?? Speaking from experience as a person that has worked food service, a lot of it doesn't seem to last past the parking lot.
We need to find projects with meaning. Don't wait on your spiritual leaders. Find projects for you and yours.....remember the project a few weeks back...try that again....go to the store and buy ten dollars of food for the hungry. Clean out your closets with the winter clothes you haven't touched the last few winters and give them to good causes. Those shorts and summer tanks that will never ever fit again??? off they go!
MY new favorite...the flower bombs? J and I are doing those on Sunday.....maybe we can take a trash bag with us and fill it up with trash and drop it off at the trash can. If you don't feel like doing flower bombs still take a walk with the trash bag even if just around the corner.
Smile, pat a shoulder, give a hug, write a little note,or squeeze a hand. All easy!!!
These are all small but sometimes baby steps is the way to go. Wanna start bigger??? GO FOR IT!!!
Reach out and touch
Somebody's hand
Make this world a better place
If you can
Reach out and touch
Somebody's hand
Make this world a better place
If you can
(Just try)
Take a little time out of your busy day
To give encouragement
To someone who's lost the way
(Just try)
Or would I be talking to a stone
If I asked you
To share a problem that's not your own
We can change things if we start giving
Why don't you
Reach out and touch
Somebody's hand
Make this world a better place
If you can
Reach out and touch
Somebody's hand
Make this world a better place
If you can
(Just try)
If you see an old friend on the street
And he's down
Remember his shoes could fit your feet
(Just try)
Try a little kindness you'll see
It's something that comes very naturally
We can change things if we start giving
Why don't you
Reach out and touch
Why don't you (Why don't you)
Reach out and touch somebody's hand
Reach out and touch
Somebody's hand
Make this world a better place
If you can
Reach out and touch
Somebody's hand
Make this world a better place
If you can
29 MARCH Give up trying to change other people. Leave that to God. Consider instead changing yourself and how you respond.
There are so many ways to take this challenge. I'm also looking at it from the point of view, if you're okay, don't change to fit THEIR mold....but I guess I have to remember the mold is theirs to have the way they want. IT may not be what we think is fair and just. It may hurt us....and we have every right in the world to speak up for ourselves and others. Some how we need to learn to do it with out passing judgment, with out trying directly to change them...but letting them know who we are.
I am Carrie Lynn Humphreys Farris...in no special order I happen to be..autistic, legally deaf, a doggie foster mommy, a groomer, a daughter, a fiance'/GF, a friend, a mentor, epileptic, a writer, a student, a want to soon to be pastor, and educator . Besides my name those are all labels and a small but important part of me. BUT most important I am CARRIE a child of God/dess!!!!!!
“If someone isn't what others want them to be, the others become angry. Everyone seems to have a clear idea of how other people should lead their lives, but none about his or her own.”
― Paulo Coelho, The Alchemist
Gods Word Transation
Matthew 7:1
"Stop judging so that you will not be judged"
The greatest need in the world is the transformation of human nature. We need a new heart that will not have lust and greed and hate in it. We need a heart filled with love and peace and joy, and that is why Jesus came into the world.
BILLY GRAHAM, Just As I Am
Never look down on anybody unless you're helping them up.”
― Jesse Jackson
“Once in a golden hour,
I cast to earth a seed,
And up there grew a flower,
That others called a weed.”
― Alfred Tennyson
“Why was the judgement of the disapproving so valuable? Who said that their good opinions tended to be any more rational than those of generally pleasant people?”
― Shannon Hale, Austenland
So in about ten minutes I found all these quotes about judging. Yet we each face it every day. Yes some more than others, and some of us are more guilty of judging then others.Why do we cut each other down? To stand to taller? To look good, when more often it makes us look bad?
I think there is a triad of lessons to learn today....1) don't judge its not our job 2) don't listen to those that judge us, and 3) as the challenge says change your self not others....learn ways to not take the judgment so harshly (easier said then done) while we try to educate others about ourselves and continue to not to try to change them but allow them to grow.
I've meet an amazing young friend though his mom on face book recently, he too is autistic. When talking to his mom about being upset about being different his mom explained that different is OK, it made him unique. Still having problems with some words, but no problem with the concept he was like "OK cool I'm runick". When I first heard this story, I was having a rough day of many these last few weeks, and thought "how cute", but then my thought went to well how true....being unique seems to ruin everything and here is a great mash up of words!
Then later during my quite time I looked at the words differently..."runick" turning ruin into unique. Out of the mouths of babes!!! I love you little man even though we haven't meet yet!
Now look into those proud eyes and tell me you can judge or want to change this child. Come on...I dare ya!!!
My challenge for the next few days....look at parts of your life you feel are ruins and figure out how to make then "runick".
28 MARCH Give up anxiety. It’s no fun. What is fun is peace. Anxiety takes over the place where peace wants to play in our hearts.What about losing it? Even for 12 days— the rest of Lent.
ok folks. This is where team work comes into play and on this one I need you my readers. Any thoughts on this one? Not platitudes or cliche's or "it gets better". I've been dealing with this same bully since this summer and am getting little to no help out of any but my close circle of friends. I have been made to feel like the problem to fix is mine.
I would love to give it up for 12 days and that will be my goal , if I'm not mistaken part of the problem has a vacation at the end of that time.
SO here is me...raw and honest......THIS this out reach and ministry is my calling....that feeds me and medically insures my family.
THIS here brings me joy and fulfillment....that empties me and hurts. I ave never been a huge crier unless in total autistic met down mode or Hallmark commercial. I do wonder how much longer I can take it..so suggestions for a 12 day break in anxiety would be amazing!!!
Yes It is well with my soul. But right now....my heart and feelings hurt so much that the anxiety does not go away. So again I ask, because I know I'm not alone......what do you do my friends??
27 MARCH
Learn how to make
flower bombs: go to
www.guerrilagardening.
org. Make plans
with someone to go
out flower bombing
abandoned lots,
untended verges,
and ugly ditches
next Monday.
This seems a little more complicated but this is the one originally suggested
My suggestion of seeds is phlox. You get a lot in a pack amazing colors AND they are amazingly hearty little flowers.
Or poppies but thats just because they are my favorite outside flower!!!
I talked yesterday about the world being a gift/credit to us for God/dess/ What better way to make it beautiful and give the earth and your neighbors some beautiful flowers!!!
So many times we think we can't help or come up with excuses for making this world better. Yes flowers are simple, but who doesn't smile when they see them? Money is tight...but a packet of seeds and a little soil or healthy dirt can make some one smile down the road. True you may not see it when it happens. But isn't that what a true gift is about. A gift to some one else, not a gift of satisfaction to yourself. Be brave, be bold, give a little gift that is all about some one else!!!
Reach out and touch
Somebody's hand
Make this world a better place
If you can
Reach out and touch
Somebody's hand
Make this world a better place
If you can
(Just try)
Take a little time out of your busy day
To give encouragement
To someone who's lost the way
(Just try)
Or would I be talking to a stone
If I asked you
To share a problem that's not your own
We can change things if we start giving
Why don't you
Reach out and touch
Somebody's hand
Make this world a better place
If you can
Reach out and touch
Somebody's hand
Make this world a better place
If you can
(Just try)
If you see an old friend on the street
And he's down
Remember his shoes could fit your feet
(Just try)
Try a little kindness you'll see
It's something that comes very naturally
We can change things if we start giving
Why don't you
Reach out and touch
Why don't you (Why don't you)
Reach out and touch somebody's hand
Reach out and touch
Somebody's hand
Make this world a better place
If you can
Reach out and touch
Somebody's hand
Make this world a better place
If you can
Shelama and Rhkma
Peace and Love thy neighbor as Yeshua would have said it......not easy standards to live up too...as every one is our neighbor, not just those that loo and sound like us.
26 MARCH Give up credit cards. Or at least try not to use them this week.
How to write about credit cards when I don't have the money to have a credit card? Sure I have a bank card that comes right out of my account so that really doesn't count as a credit card even tough it says Visa. It seems my friends and blog followers are in two groups...we either don't have credit cards (or use what little we have for food and medical) or it seems some have money and credit and since that is beyond my scope I really can't offer an opinion. So I thought I was at a loss to be able to write on today's topic. Then it hit me...the greatest credit/trust we are given, is this world we live on.
So much of humanity forgets we share it with one another. With the animals, with the wild life and with the future. Yes, its not ours alone to consume. We have been intrusted with its care.
Genesis 1:26
Then God said, "Let us make human beings in our image, to be like us. They will with be intrusted with the fish in the sea, the birds in the sky, the livestock, all the wild animals on the earth, and the small animals that scurry along the ground."
MOST a of us, if we are parents or not, if we "favor" children or not do not want the world to end. We want to save it for some one, for some group..... I for example want to see young gay teens grow in a safe world and for the word to be here for the day that all HUMANS are equal. I want the world to be here when people find out that autistic individuals are not a burden but a gift!!! And most of all I want there to be an earth to worship and celebrate on when all religions lay downs arms of destruction and reach out human arms of welcome to one another and realize we really are actually very much alike.
I have friends that the concept may be more conservation minded, that love to fish, to be out on the open water and want future generations to have that joy. For the waters not to be fouled to the point those very fish don't die out and future generations are not trying to boat through muck.
If you love animals how can you want anything other then keeping the environment safe for them? We may be able to protect our pets, but what about the wild life? Jamie and I have recently found out our local water is so bad we can't even purify it to sustain our fish and frogs...we will have to start buying bottled water. (How many of you here are old enough to remember when the idea of buying bottled water to drink was rather odd and funny? It wasn't that long ago . Personally, besides the very odd soda machine that had it in a can at a state fair I had never had bottled water till college)
This is repaying a credit. This making heaven on earth. This is repaying a credit bigger than we can ever comprehend. The gift of life. The gift of this planet. The gift of love. AND most of all the gift of each other.
If we step back and look at this beautiful world from a distance...how can we not only repay the credit but make it better and save it for the future.
P.S. Some times God/dess likes to wack us with a 2x4 . I kept looking at songs that I thought would work (most Christin songs and for some reason amongst gospel and other Christian music this lovley Jewish lady and her beautiful voice and song kept appearing. So I guess God/dess wanted it here for you. )
25 MARCH
Today is the anniversary
of the Triangle Shirtwaist
Factory Fire. Spend some
time considering your
clothes and who made
them under what conditions.
Pray for those
who make the things
you wear;commit to
buying sweatshop-free
clothing.
I know many people including my friends and I often (not always) make very conscious decisions about where and who the products we spend our money on comes from.
How do you educate yourself about these choices? Do you go with whats popular in your circle or culture to avoid? To you follow the news? Do you jump on a band wagon? Do causes you follow that sways your choices?
I have to admit....when I first read this challenge I knew nothing about this tragedy that happened right here in our country. The fact that it happened at all is horrible. That people in power...that literally held the key to safety ran and saved them selves in shameful. The story also has common man heroes, which is amazing yet not surprising. Those in the same boat always seem to be the ones to help, when those in the yachts sail on by.
I know the topic for today is working conditions and purchase choices.... but I keep thinking about how so many people look down on those that serve them. Crack jokes and are rude to "burger flippers", don't even make eye contact with the person that bags your groceries, assume because some one work's in the "service industry" they are less then others.
This is all I have to write tonight....I want you to join me in thought and meditation on not only where you spend your money....but how you treat and think of the people that serve you when you spend it.
Shalom
26 MARCH
Give up credit cards.
Or at least try not
to use them this week.
24 MARCH Give up stress. Ask stress what it has done for you lately. Bend towards the cross. There is a lot on the other side of it.
So this is what I'm suppose to be writing about today. As I sit here in teas in a public place reading and learning more about a person, a human, a YOUNG PERSON'S death. Tayven Martin was shot down cold blank after being chased because he was in a grey hoodie. But wait, that's not the whole truth is it?? If we are going to tell it why not tell it it all. He was a young black man whose family dared to have money and live in a nice gated neighbor hood not on a slum ghetto street where he had nothing to do but hang on the corner. HE went out and bout him self some iced tea and his younger family member some skittles. How dare he. How dare his family live in a nice place that some one thought he didn't deserve. Yes he had on a hoodie. Yes he was black.....but his crime was that he and his were daring to up set the status quo just by where they lived!
I don't know what to say people. I started to leave the bottom part of this "challenge" out , the part about the cross, then I was going to make it more "well rounded" by using other symbolism of places to leave your stress. But I decided not to, for one main reason. How many of you, especially those that are Christian know why Jesus ended up on the cross. (Besides the Beloved Son of God and for our sins and it was his destiny to die for us.) What was the excuse? Why was he arrested in the first place?
Jesus was a rebel. Period. He didn't live by the rules of His time so the leaders were looking for an excuse.
The Aramaic Bible in Plain English
Matt. 21:12
And Yeshua entered The Temple of God and cast out all of those who sold and bought in The Temple and upset the tables of the money changers and the seats of those who sold doves.
Matthew 21:12-17
New International Version (NIV)
Jesus at the Temple
12 Jesus entered the temple courts and drove out all who were buying and selling there. He overturned the tables of the money changers and the benches of those selling doves. 13 “It is written,” he said to them, “‘My house will be called a house of prayer,’[a] but you are making it ‘a den of robbers.’[b]”14 The blind and the lame came to him at the temple, and he healed them. 15 But when the chief priests and the teachers of the law saw the wonderful things he did and the children shouting in the temple courts, “Hosanna to the Son of David,” they were indignant. 16 “Do you hear what these children are saying?” they asked him. “Yes,” replied Jesus, “have you never read, “‘From the lips of children and infants you, Lord, have called forth your praise’[c]?” 17 And he left them and went out of the city to Bethany, where he spent the night.
So as a friend of mine shared in a sermon, Jesus broke Pax Romana , the peace of Roman. He didn't follow the rules. HE caused a ruckus.
If you know the history of the time it is much more complicated then those few versus. People sod animal sacrifices at the temple, not because people didn't have their own to sacrifice, or that they didn't have fruit and grain to sacrifice, but because their were "special guards and priest hired by ROMAN to decide what was good enough. You can bet if you bought your own sacrifice it was not going to be good enough. Then you were not allowed in to pray and cleanse yourself.
The next part is you needed temple money to buy these things, most people didn't have it so they went to the money changers and lost money there making the exchange, before they went to lose money to buy a sacrifice to/for those of the temple. Yes I said temple. The wording may have been to God...but come on really????
So Jesus stood up!! Made it know how he felt, that a place of worship and prayer, well should be about relieving stress, gaining peace, communing with God/dess and learning. Not losing everything you worked a year for.Let's not forget Hs cousin John got beheaded for some pretty radical thinking too. MAny of both of their disciples, did not live to die a quite death in old age.
So enough of this story (though important) we will hear plenty of it the next few weeks. If you want to learn more, ask me, ask a pastor, google, research...don't just accept the few tid bits tossed to you.
We do this over and over through history. WHY? Why are we so scared of change?? Are we scared if others start getting what is FAIR our fair share will feel like less? Do we think if we keep beating down people AND making laws to make it ok or wrse the government does the beating down its really ok??
Witches (wise women, healers) were burned at the stake like common criminals. Jesus and his followers were crucified beside thieves and murderers. Queer people are killed by governments while rapists are celebrated.
Wars are fought over so many things. Transgendered people are beaten in a public places and people film it rather than help or even call 911. Politicians that try to make change are gunned down in the street. Leaders for equal rights have their lives cut short by other peoples hands. And suicide. These poor young people. Yes it was by their own hands but again lets be honest......its murder by bully, culture or pulpit. (People say to this...get a stronger back bone, thicker skin. I say you try it every day. It breaks you back and erodes your skin. Day after day. Before long you believe it and start helping to destroy your self.)
On the flip side I hope people do get thicker skin and grow a back bone. Not to only to survive, but to have the strength to stand up for what you believe in. Those that have survived, need to not just look away, but be a rebel.....turn over some tables....shake up some ideas. Lead the the cause. Make your life worth something. Do NOT sit here and say you survived so can they......make it better!!!!
So yes give up stress and take up passion!!!!
If the cross is your symbol of who you are...wear it for the world to see, but not to brag you are Christian , but to remind you what you should be standing up for and what can go wrong if you don't!! Do we need another Yeshua to suffer and die for us before we can get this right?
What is your religious symbol? The star of David....the Om symbol...the pentacle? So many things, so pretty....use them for reminders not decorations!!
Lets take the beauty and wonder of this song and go further. Stop imagining and start believing. The time is now!!! We are already walling side by side with our God/dess. There in your neighbors face....even if that face is brown with a grey hoodie. God/dess resides in us all. Red and yellow back and white. We are created in God/dess image, we have HER in us, we are created from HIM. No matter the religion or the name, we are the divine. That my friends is a crazy power. Use it wisely.
Momentarily back to my Christian up bringing.....don't let the cross stand in vain. The star of David is your back ground.....remember the middle is where divine meets human....where we are suppose to be...don't let the men and women that wore that sewn on there shirts death be worthless. The pentacle, so full of life....earth, fire,water, air, and spirit. Never ever let it go to waste.
Again I say yes yes YES give up stress take up passion. Live up to your spirituality and the symbols each have.
Shelama
If you wear it, live it!!!
Me
“Be who you are and say what you feel,
because those who mind don't matter,
and those who matter don't mind”
― Dr. Seuss
23 MARCH
Give up apathy. Stay
informed, speak up,
vote, pick an issue
and learn all you can
about it
What do you believe in? I mean TRULY feel passionate about? Your pets? How about kids? Maybe its queer rights, women's rights, freedom to marry, autistic rights, transgender rights, spiritual freedom, racial profiling, etc. These are just a few of mine that came off the top of my head in thirty seconds or less.
Go ahead and find a piece of paper or a space on your computer and write your list. Give yourself a full minute and just write what comes to your mind. Go ahead.....do it....we'll wait for you...........................
Welcome back. Now that you have your list, are there any on there that you feel particularly strong about? How about a couple that may have surprised you? Do your friends and family KNOW these passions? Do you vote? Do you belong to equal rights groups? Do you get yourself educated or do you educate?
Pick one. Pick the one that means the most to you. Research it. Learn about it. Share about it. Educate others.
"All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing." (Edmund Burke)
"I don't care if no one likes it, unless no one likes it". (Story People)
“The opposite of love is not hate, it's indifference. The opposite of art is not ugliness, it's indifference. The opposite of faith is not heresy, it's indifference. And the opposite of life is not death, it's indifference.”
― Elie Wiesel
“Once Upon A Time Nobody Gave A Fuck.”
― Kidder, j
“...the opposite of love is not hate -- it's apathy. It's not giving a damn. If somebody hates me, they must "feel" something ... or they couldn't possibly hate. Therefore, there's some way in which I can get to them.” ― Leo F. Buscaglia
Why do we wait and wait and wait? Is it human nature? Is it American nature? Or have we just gotten lazy? Look all around you and you will see plenty of people up in arms (some even bearing arms) about the state of the economy, the price of gas, teen suicide, same sex marriage, abortion, and the list goes on. Do you feel passionate about either side of these issues? If so, what do you do? Do you shake your fist in the air? Do you talk until your friends get tired of the same words over and over? Do you blame the lack of your brand of religion in today's world? Have you given up and decided God/dess has given up on us and is raining down punishment upon us?
As I've said in several posts through lent, LIVE YOUR LIFE!!
Get off your ass, and DO SOMETHING!
“Unless someone like you cares a whole awful lot,
Nothing is going to get better. It's not.”
― Dr. Seuss, The Lorax
24 MARCH Give up stress. Ask stress what it has done for you lately.
22 MARCH Give up forcing happiness. Let it come to you.
FORCE:
Verb: Make a way through or into by physical strength; break open by force.
HAPPY:
Adjective:
Feeling or showing pleasure or contentment.
Having a sense of confidence in or satisfaction with (a person, arrangement, or situation)
Can you achieve happiness with out FORCING it faking it or requiring things? Sometimes to me in this world of more and bigger is better we lose sight of why we want it . Also if you notice the definition.....its about contentment, confidence, and satisfaction. Not elation, not greed, not more....but to me it is saying enough.
Are we in today's world able to be satisfied with enough?
I only have two simple things I want to share to and then I want YOU to share you idea of happiness and how you get there.
First this chart:
If you have had therapy or are on the autistic spectrum and had classes on "acting normal" I'm sure you have seen it. If you've seen it or not look at it and really think about your day. How many of these have you gone through today......and notice the happy face is just that...content. I feel we need to learn how to be happy with contentment and enough again.
And this song this AMAZING song.....just sit back and listen....you can watch or not but listen to those words!!!
When I was a boy, each week
On Sunday, we would go to church
And pay attention to the priest
He would read the holy word
And consecrate the holy bread
And everyone would kneel and bow
Today the only difference is
Everything is holy now
Everything, everything
Everything is holy now
When I was in Sunday school
We would learn about the time
Moses split the sea in two
Jesus made the water wine
And I remember feeling sad
That miracles don’t happen still
But now I can’t keep track
‘Cause everything’s a miracle
Everything, Everything
Everything’s a miracle
Wine from water is not so small
But an even better magic trick
Is that anything is here at all
So the challenging thing becomes
Not to look for miracles
But finding where there isn’t one
When holy water was rare at best
It barely wet my fingertips
But now I have to hold my breath
Like I’m swimming in a sea of it
It used to be a world half there
Heaven’s second rate hand-me-down
But I walk it with a reverent air
‘Cause everything is holy now
Everything, everything
Everything is holy now
Read a questioning child’s face
And say it’s not a testament
That’d be very hard to say
See another new morning come
And say it’s not a sacrament
I tell you that it can’t be done
This morning, outside I stood
And saw a little red-winged bird
Shining like a burning bush
Singing like a scripture verse
It made me want to bow my head
I remember when church let out
How things have changed since then
Everything is holy now
It used to be a world half-there
Heaven’s second rate hand-me-down
But I walk it with a reverent air
‘Cause everything is holy now
As most of you know my mood has been a roller coaster since before my surgery. I try to stay on the positive sides of emotions, and you know what. I AM happy. For many reasons that I have posted in other post . I want to save my happys because I want you to share yours. My autism often make me get stuck in happy face mode and I don't express all the others as well. So a personal goal I'm sharing with you it to try to share those other moods with friends. To remember there is something above happy before I hit "bonkers" and something below happy before I hit "melt down". When I hit "melt down" its hard to remember where happy is unlike when most people who just flow through the motions you can flow back. The big thing is to remember what happy feels like so you can get back there. What ever it takes, to visualize something, to go to a happy place in your head, or just deep breaths...get there and remember it.
The song above is amazing.....I think it will become my happy place!!!
Shelama
23 MARCH
Give up apathy. Stay
informed, speak up,
vote, pick an issue
and learn all you can
about it.
21 MARCH
Cancel the graduate
degree in despair.
Find a degree program
in hope. Study hard.
Try to get an A plus
in hope—so the
resurrection doesn't
surprise you.
Many advance degrees require a lot of independent study and sharing what you learn with just a few people at a time. As you learn and share, you add your insight, your thoughts and the ideas grow. You add these to what you have learned. Hopefully, as the ideas grow the people you are sharing with start to study along side your path, or at least adjoining paths , and add their thoughts and insights, so the hope is that the ideas and knowledge grows even more.
I promise you not a moment will be lost as long as I have heart & voice to speak & we will walk again together with a thousand others & a thousand more & on & on until there is no one among us who does not know the truth: there is no future without love.
(Story People)
This is from one of my favorite group of writers called story people. They make me think a lot and in a good way. It's also interesting I think God/dess often leads me to their site so I read just what i need to hear.
It's often hard to "fight the good fight"when you feel alone.BUT.....what if each of us start small? We turn the big goal into a bunch of small goals? My friend Trig over at Epochalypsis(an amazing site)is working on a huge movement by making baby steps.
We all need love to hope and hope to love. Jesus/Yeshua thought a path and way of LOVE! It's simple LOVE. He came to clear up a lot of the harsh judgment of the old testament and taught love. Other prophets have taught love. Yet, somehow so many people want to twist words, to twist ideas and follow hate.They call it hate in the name of love, or don't even call it hate. They call it tough love, but where is the love?? I keep going back to the idea of An it harm none, do what ye will.
If we could follow loveand this creedhow much better would it be? The idea of doing it with YOUR voice and getting a few people at a time to join you is amazing. How can it not succeed if filled with sincerity?
How many of you would want to make that kind of change? Just a heart at a time??
I'm often asked how while being autistic or an aspie I can reach past the communication problems and share.
While it is not easy how can I not. How can I KNOW beyond a shadow of a doubt that God/dess loves us, created us to spread that love and not do it??
I sit alert
behind the small window
of my mind and watch
the days pass, strangers
who have no reason to look in.
Honestly this is ow it often feels, but I learned long ago I didn't want to be an observer of life. I wanted to live it, to be a part of it. I also have always felt the love and security of God/dess in my heart and soul. So even if I felt stuck behind that window She is always, always with me.So I had to work to not wait on othersto stop being strangers....I had to stop being a stranger, and reach out to others who may feel the same way. Many people get stuck behind that window. Not just autistics and aspies. If you are not behind that window help others get out. If you are....your not alone, we are here....the face boo page with this blog has 53 followers plus me. Not so huge as to be scary, but a big enough size if you say you need help from behind your minds window some one will be there. Yes its online but we are HERE, together!
Lets get our degree in hope by giving it to others. Reach out, help, make a friend, be an example, and above all love one another.
Blessing my friends....Shelama (a wish for peace in Aramaic as Yeshua would have said)
hang perfectly balanced
between light
and dark, day and
night. The word Lent
comes from the lengthening
of the daylight
hours. Pray that your
life will tip toward
the light.
How wonderful to have this Lenten "challenge" . How can you turn spring hope into a negative or angry post?
I don't know about you but its about time for spring as far as I'm concerned. Maybe in this area we have had little winter but some how I feel my heart and soul have had one...but now its time for a new day!!!
From a scientific stand point the Vernal Equinox is an astronomical event, it's one of the four quadrature days of the Earth's orbit. However for people both modern and ancient, the Vernal Equinox marked the transition from winter into spring. The Vernal Equinox occurs on March 20th or 21st and is one of two days during the year when there are 12 hours of daylight and 12 hours of darkness, the other day is the Autumnal Equinox.
People have been marking and celebrating the Vernal Equinox for thousands of years. The Great Sphinx which was constructed over 4500 years ago on the Giza Plateau in Egypt, faces due east on the Vernal Equinox. The monoliths located at Stonehenge, which are estimated to be over 3000 years old, mark the position of the rising sun on the Vernal Equinox. In Central America the Ancient Mayan Caracol Tower and Temples of the Sun and Moon also have alignments that coincide with the sun's position on the Vernal Equinox. (must be pretty important for all these huge creations to be built centering around it!!!)
Most historians believe that this knowledge was important to ancient cultures in choosing a time to plant their crops. In Iran they celebrate Norouz (which roughly translates to "new day") on the Vernal Equinox. In China they celebrate Chunfen on the Vernal Equinox. In ancient Europe they celebrated the arrival of the goddess of spring Ostara on this day. Ostara was also known as Ostera and Eostre in different parts of Europe. Many historians believe the Christian holiday Easter gets its name from Eostre, as she had an enchanted rabbit that could lay eggs. In more modern times the Vernal Equinox marked the first Earth Day celebration in 1971.
One of the odd traditions that that occur on the Vernal Equinox is egg balancing. The story goes that it is possible to balance a raw egg on its oblong end on this day. IS there any truth to this rumor is it really just as easy (or hard) to balance an egg on its end on this day as it is any other day? Try it and see and let us know!!!
How many of you feel new hope when the days get longer, the air gets warmer and some how softer? Why do we get the winter get so many of us down?
I've been watching the calender so I knew spring was coming. There are also signs out doors that its on the way, and of course the time change. Some how I've been having trouble getting ME to feel the hope of spring. The joy the renewal the excitement. Then I read this quote from story people:
The birds brought seed & flowers & bits of brightly colored string & placed them in her hair while she slept so that she would remember the wild joy of spring when she finally awoke.
It got me to thinking what if we could be spring and hope to each other during all seasons? To notice some one down and to bring them something "bright and shiny" to make their day lighter brighter and more hopeful. This doesn't mean a physical gift necessarily, but something that makes their burden lighter and their hopes higher.
To all my friend,s it is well with my soul as I hope it is with yours.
18 MARCH Sunday is your little Easter, your day to abandon whatever discipline you have taken up for Lent. But if you are reading this calendar today, does that mean you gave up our calendar for Lent? Wow. Let's all give up being too literal.
(this was last nights post, but our internet went kablewy on us!!! )
I was really excitedtonight's post.
See first I think it is kind of cheating to take Sundays off from Lent. If we are making a change or a sacrifice or in some people's cases, adding something better, why should we take a break? I agree Easter is a celebration. However, do these other things have to be thought of as negative when really, to repeat a friend again, Lent should be a time of spiritual cleaning, much like spring cleaning. Out with the old, in with the new.
My plan was to talk positively and be excited about "it takes 21 days to create a new habit". Most of you have heard of this theory and no where does it say you get a break. So, if we are creating good Christ-like or spiritual habits, why should we get a break from them just because we are going to church on Sunday?
But instead of elaborating on the above, I have started to wonder if it takes 21 days to create something like a new habit, how many days does it take to tear something down like a person's spirit?
In my experience, it is always much much quicker to tear something down, then to build something up. You drive across town, you see a wrecking ball take a couple of swings and down goes the building. How many weeks or months did it take for that building to go up? From childhood, we start building. We build with blocks, we build card houses, we even build with dominoes. We take justified great pride in these accomplishments. Then, along comes a younger child or a bully (not comparing the two) who takes two seconds to knock them down. Several times, we will have the strength of self confidence to rebuild, but after the third or fourth time, frustration hits, self confidence fails, and our creativity and building is gone. Not to mention the many tears that flow, not by the bully, but by the builder.
This is a very simple example of what bullying will do. It will take even a self confident, self assured adult and bring them to tears. A person, whether adult or child, can only take so much beating to their ego. We start building that self confidence and ego at birth, and a single bully, in a matter of weeks, can destroy it. Can we even begin to understand how long it takes to rebuild the rubble of what was once self confidence.
I took literary license with today's challenge/topic because I feel this is something we can never speak too much of and never allow ourselves to become numb to. I'm a 42 year old well educated, well loved adult, and my self confidence has been shaken to the core by a single bully. I have loved ones, good friends, and amazing face book friends to help rebuild my self confidence with many hugs, sweet words, and awesome comments. However, contact with this bully again can shake it right back down.
If a bully can do this to me as a strong woman that understands psychologically where a bully is coming from, how can we begin to imagine what this does to a child or adolescent? So again, the question is, how and who do we educate? While I believe it is very important to give the one being bullied tools to deal with the abuse, I don't beli\] ve we want to remove their sensitivity. While surviving bullying as a child and now as an adult, I still cherish my sensitivity. Yet how do we educate the bully without giving them the "reward" of special attention?
“When another person makes you suffer, it is because he suffers deeply within himself, and his suffering is spilling over. He does not need punishment; he needs help. That's the message he is sending.”
― Thich Nhat Hanh
“If you're horrible to me, I'm going to write a song about it, and you won't like it. That's how I operate.”
― Taylor Swift
The Hebrew greeting Yasher Koach! means "May your strength be firm”
יִישַׁר כּוֹחַ
This is my prayer/blessing for each of you tonight.
Yes this song has the F word in it and I have shared it a few times before. BUT the song reminds me that I am just fine the way I am!!!!
We made the video when we were just learning, many of the people in it are life savers and some were at the time, but the friendships have moved on...but regardless.....
p.s. new friends I hope to get a cord for my other computer to keep making videos again...who wants to be in them????
20 MARCH
Today is the Spring
Equinox, when we
hang perfectly balanced
between light
and dark, day and
night. The word Lent
comes from the lengthening
of the daylight
hours. Pray that your
life will tip toward
the light.
