Random Thoughts of a Writer

SOUND

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The sound of lofigirl life plays softly in my ears. The taps on my keyboard adding to the symphony. My heart fills with silent joy as the words create sentences and story on the screen. I get lost in the life of another.  Their emotions becoming my own. The scene playing out in my mind like a movie. 

Each minute I write, I get excited as my passion unfolds in front of my eyes. I get excited at the thought of sharing my dream with others with the hope that they enjoy it too. 

A writer can't write even when they aren't. Words play in our mind all the time. We imagine and create with each daydream. The weather tells us a story. The sounds of people encourages us to create relationships. 

REALMS

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Life for a writer is a realm to be explored. Hills to climb to watch how others live. Mountains to reach to view the eagle's perspective of the ants below. 

I yearn to finish so others can feel what I feel when they read what I have written. A writer holds on to their muses like a unloved child but wants others to get drawn into another world.

EXPRESSION

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Art is expression and I express my art through my fingers, through the words on my screen to anyone willing to read. 

Your expression will be criticized and judged because not everyone understands your voice. Not everyone has an open mind to learn to understand our voice. But someone out there does and wants to hear it, read it and see it. 

How do you express your art? 

I look forward to the day to share mine with you. It might take a while but I will get there. My words are not meant to stay my own. My story is written for others to imagine and to journey. 

I pray that you are able to express yourself in whatever makes you happy as long it causes no pain or harm to you or others. 

The Realisation of Reality

We look in the mirror to avoid aging. We reflect to avoid regret. We stop thinking to avoid the lesson. We avoid realising to ignore reality. 

What does realisation of reality mean for you?

Reality in 2021 is like a Rubik's cube. Each side can either be one colour or many colours but it never seems to stay the same even if it looks the same. Reflection on my 2021 reality has been filled with illness, grief, success and wonderment. Growth in faith, fiction and family too. 

Like each person, COVID-19 has become a part of life. Experiencing it, voicing it and adapting to it. Making decisions based on facts and fiction surrounds our minds with information. I have watched COVID come into my life, I have had COVID and now, we deal with it every day. 

Life in a pandemic time for children is sheltered with exception. It's trying to encourage exploration within limitations and boundaries not necessarily set by parents but the world around us. 

Working full-time is another new reality for me and balancing home and work has become my new aerobic class. The need to provide and stay sustainable has become my work reality again. Passion and purpose is reserved again for after hours. 

Fatigue ends my day. Sleep becomes me like a warm blanket on a cold night. Fatigue drains my humor and wearies my body. Fatigue is my new companion, embracing me at times when I need energy and focus.

There is no important point of this post but a tired woman's rambling, random thoughts of the ending of another year. 

The older I get, the more loss I experience. Loss of loved ones, loss of self and loss of time. 

With all the rambling written and shared, I will always remain blessed, faithful and smiling. God is my eternal rock who allows me rely on Him, my family are my pebbles who help me keep moving and my friends are the gravel beneath my feet, tickling me with laughter on many days.

As I say farewell to 2021, I look with eagerness, passion and promise towards 2022. 

May your 2021 end off with life, love and laughter and 2022 be filled with blessing and purpose.

This F..... Year

All around us, we hear and read about 2020 and how everyone just wants to pass it and leave it where it belongs....in history. I don't usually focus too much on letters and what they often represent but this year, my letter has been F!

FAITH

Man, has my faith been tried, tested and taken a dive into the abyss. I still pray but my prayers have been "sheltered", "quiet" and lacking emotion. The pandemic has caused a lot of us to stop doing the things we love, need and appreciate. Church is community but also a place of peace, especially when you don't have your own personal space. 

I believe that God is testing our faith, our ability to pray and reminding us, like Matthew 6: 6 to go into a room, close the door and pray where no one can see you and hear you. This is one of my favourite verses because your prayers should be private and personal. This is the time you spend alone with God, your space to cry out, praise up and dive into yourself with God's guidance. 

My faith this year has been a necessity but also a failure. How has your faith felt this year?

FINANCE

Are you shaking your head at that word like me? Oh, how money has been a constant cause for worry lines, grey hairs and coffee binging....From resigning over a year ago, to unable to find a job because of the pandemic, I realised that since leaving college I have been spoiled because I have never hit rock bottom until now. 

Debt is like sin. It is something that we choose to do but often irresponsibly. Debt can be damaging to your being, mentally, physically and emotionally. 

However, this year, I have learnt that money can easily become your master and rather than let it happen, do your best by paying it as best you can this year but also let God guide your swipes, your pocket and your budget. 

FEAR

Fear of the unknown is real in 2020! So, return to faith - believing in the unknown but not being afraid of it! Is God giving us the exam of a lifetime or what?! A pandemic sweeps the earth filling us with fear, faith and reflection.

I walk around outside wearing a mask, sanitising my hands, feeling uncomfortable and feeling like an alien in my own country. We fear the virus, we fear the person next to us in the shop, we fear to touch and we fear to try. 

Fear is a real emotion that we face everyday at some point. If we are able to express how much faith we have in our God, then why do we fear? Doesn't God tell us to fear not because He is near...always!

FUTURE

How are you feeling about your future? Faithful? Financially stable? Fearful? Or are we not even going there? 

2020 has caused me to make some tough decisions about my future. From trying to get a business started (which I'm always working on) to returning to work full time, I have had to sacrifice being a work from home to a working mom. It dampens my mood but for the sake of my family, it must be done. 

My passion will always be writing but I do enjoy helping others get organised and motivated to encourage them to succeed. Like my faith, my future cannot be seen, it is unknown but I believe that God is guiding me to succeed at His plans that will make me prosper and fulfil my purpose.

In closing, of course, I can add a few other "F's" but I think my post might be removed - LOL!

What letter represents your 2020?! 

So, as I social distance myself into 2021, I pray that we all have a better letter year, the discipline for us to help rid of this pandemic but most of all, appreciate all that God has given us and ask Him for forgiveness and return to Him.

Happy New Year to you all!!

Failing Faith

FAILURE

 

Failure is a part of life. Failure is how we learn through trial and error. Without failure, we can't succeed. But what about failing in faith? I don't mean failing in faith through sin but failing in faith. Failing in the things we can't see but feel.

FAITH

 

Faith is the ability to believe in the things we can't see. Faith is what makes us keep believing in God. We can read about Him, speak to Him but we don't always see Him but we know that He is always there. If we know all this and feel so strongly, deeply, rooted in our faith, how can we fail in faith?

MY FAILING FAITH

 

We fail by losing our way, distancing ourselves and stop studying God's word. Many times, we find ourselves listening to the devil more than God's voice. The devil's voice which convinces us that things won't get better, that sin is fun, that "trying" is useless and being blessed is not as good as it sounds. Listening to the wrong voice lays the path to fail in our personal faith. God doesn't leave us, we leave God.

Personally, my faith is failing through my human nature, being lazy and feeling lost. I can feel cracks starting to form in my faith foundation and that bothers me. Not going to church and reading my Bible has also been part of my faith dwindling. My prayers have become minimized to next to nothing. And I know exactly what you want to say - WHY?  That's a good question!

Life changed, decisions I made didn't turn out the way I wanted and so I allowed the devil's darkness to circle around me, causing me to lose my light from God, my faith of foundation to dwindle and losing my voice to turn to the one voice that never fails. When my faith fails, everything else gets put aside, especially the gifts God has blessed me with, like my passion for writing, my love for reading and the desire to share it with others.

FROM FAILING TO FINDING FAITH

 

Failing faith is like seeing grey, rain clouds floating in the sky but never sharing the gift of rain drops. So, how do we turn our "failing faith" to "finding faith"?

We do this by going back to basics, where it all began. For me, it's a quiet room, alone, with my own thoughts and talking it out with God, letting Him know that I am failing and asking Him to teach me so I can learn. Thanking Him for the things I have, whether I "really" realise it or not at the moment. When your faith fails, you fail with the people around you too. Every action has a consequence!

Failing faith is personal and often difficult to explain or share with others because we all have different relationships with God and view our faith differently.

YOUR FAITH

 

How is your faith looking?

Are you where I am or are you flying with faith, fully in sync with God?

Nothing to Give

 

Their eyes widened as I told them that I had nothing prepared. I told them that I had nothing to give them, no profound word to share. But God had prepared me; I just didn’t know it until I started talking.

The firefighters who I share a verse and a prayer with couldn’t believe that I arrived unprepared. I’m sure they were thinking how can she come unprepared to help us? Didn’t Jesus tell us to prepare for rain even if it doesn’t look like its coming?

Ignoring their surprise, I told them about my cup. I had nothing to give them because my cup is empty. The stresses and worries of life have dried my cup out, leaving it dry like a desert.

I’m going to ask you now….what does your cup look like? Is it empty like mine? Maybe it’s half full or half empty? Or, it’s overflowing, and if it’s overflowing, is it overflowing with blessings or burdens?

As I told them about my cup, I realised that I have a choice…to either leave it empty or find how I can fill it up again.  I have the faith to ask God to take my cup and fill it with his blessings.

Having no scripture verse to share with them, I encouraged them to read their favourite Bible verse and think about how it relates to their cup.

What are you going to do about your cup?

Leave it or ask God?

God is our living water that, with faith and belief, will fill our cup with blessings and even make it overflow it with His grace and love but we have to be willing to give Him our cup and allow Him to fill it His way.

Will you allow God to pour His living water into your cup?

Ask God to fill it and overflow it with all the gifts He can give.

But for me and my cup, I place it at God’s feet, asking for the guidance I need, for His water I thirst and the grace He bestows.

“I tell you the truth, whoever gives you a drink of water because you belong to the Christ will truly get his reward”. Mark 9:41

 

Day 19: Unexpected Apology

My memory these days and for many days before is like a sieve. It rolls around my head until it finds its way through the draining holes disappearing into thin air, never to return.

Day 19 is remembering receiving an “unexpected apology” and for the life of me, I can’t think of ever receiving one. This fascinates and gives me a headache thinking about it because I wonder if someone has ever done anything to me which required an “unexpected apology”.

On the flip side, I remember giving someone an unexpected apology. Don’t ask me what it was for or why but I vaguely remember the person being quite surprised at me for apologising which made me realise that I have a bad habit of thinking that I am always right and I still have that bad habit. Shame on me!

What about you? Have you ever received one or given one?

Difficult recalling it, right? Or is it just me?

Apologising is a respectful habit to have because it shows others that you know when you have done wrong and have the courage and courtesy to realise it, embrace it and apologise for it.

Thinking about it, people today, in general, don’t like to say sorry. We feel so entitled that we don’t have to say it regardless of whether we know we should or if the other person actually deserves an apology.

If you can recall getting or giving an “unexpected apology”, please share it with me and others because this is how we learn more about ourselves and how we can change to be better.

When we look in the mirror, we want our reflection to like us just as much as what we see and how others see us.

So, in closing, to anyone I have offended, hurt, scarred without knowing it, please accept my humble apology. I never intend to hurt others and I never desire to.

Like Jesus says, Forgive them, Lord, for they know not what they do…..

Actions speak louder than words

Your actions speak louder than words. This is true to me as I sit in the middle of the night in the dark. Why don't people realise that sometimes the things they do (or even don't do) tell you more about how they feel about you more than the words that come out of their mouth.

Sometimes I wish people's eyes were staring back at them so they can see their actions and how these actions make others feel or think. Your actions can make a person feel unattractive, unloved, worthless or feel unimportant in your life.

I'm sure I do it too but I wish I wasn't like this because often my actions don't seem to match my emotion. Is it the same for you?

It seems the people we care about seem to do this more often than others; or maybe we just notice it more because of the bond we have with our loved ones. What we don't realise is that their (or our) actions hurt the ones we love.

Every action has a consequence and it seems, for me, at this present moment, sitting here, the consequence runs deep and the hurt is real. I wonder if the person acting a certain way actually realises how they are making the other person feel?

Who knows? Do you know how your actions affect others? Do you care?