Painting by Belynda Wilson Thomas
In every single thing you do, you are choosing a direction. Your life is a product of choices. Dr. Kathleen Hall
Would the girl or boy we were, be happy with the man or woman we’ve become? Wherever we are in life, what would we still like to do, what adventures would we still like to have, and what is still possible?
I see through Facebook that lots of people are having adventures, traveling the world, and living life to the fullest. Average people can do things that were beyond all but the rich in days gone by. We live our lives in peace and plenty; we have technology that makes it easy to share our adventures.
Telling our stories has never been easier and we are interested in different stories at different times in our lives. My daughter is watching women on YouTube sharing their stories of motherhood, potty training, and homemaking. My husband and I are watching RV’ers document their travels and lessons learned along the way. Do we want to find fitness experts, financial gurus, artists, and many others who will inspire us with what they are doing, and help us make decisions about what we want out of life?
We’ve always had choices but sometimes we thought there was something special about the people doing some of the things we’ve always wanted to do. What’s special about them is they are doers, and we are doers, we just have to decide what we want to do and then do it. Nothing happens until we change something we do every day.
Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom. Victor E. Frankl
For years I wanted to write, I’ve always wanted to write, I even wrote it down in my journal when I was fifteen. Why did it take me this long to become a writer? Because, it wasn’t until October 9, 2000, that I started writing as a daily practice and kept it up. I documented how many words I wrote in the beginning, this helped me create a writing habit, and I still document how much I write each day. It’s a way to keep myself accountable but also I know when I wrote or edited that part of a novel.
We can’t do everything, we have to pick and choose how to spend our time and prioritize what is important by what we spend our time on. Writing in the morning works because often no one else is up, so it isn’t taking time away from anyone. We don’t want to be so efficient and productive that we don’t have time for those we love.
Success that comes at the expense of those we love will be empty. That said, if we spend all our time with those we love we might never get done what needs to be done and that won’t work well either. Balance is needed and it isn’t as easy as it seems to find balance in our lives fitting everything we want to fit in. It always seems something has to give; one of the balls we are trying to juggle must be put down to make way for something else.
Family is always the ball we must not put down, drop, or ignore. It is what gives our lives meaning, and purpose, and is the legacy we leave behind. When we are ninety-eight if we are lucky to live that long, family will be what is still left of all we have accomplished. If we have a grandson or granddaughter, or great-grandson or great-granddaughter that will visit us, kiss us on our cheek, tell us about their adventures, and how we helped them along the way, isn’t that what we want, what will make it all worthwhile, and give us peace? If a niece will come and spend time with us because we made time for them and they are making time for us.
If someone pops in with flowers because they are passing through, won’t that make our day? We all have choices until we don’t, are we making them count?
When people are not accepting toward themselves they are often obsessed with acceptance by others. Nathaniel Branden
Nonacceptance is always suffering, no matter what you are not accepting. Acceptance is always freedom, no matter what you are accepting. Cheri Huber
Marrying, founding a family, accepting all the children that come, supporting them in this insecure world, and perhaps even guiding them a little, is I am convinced, the utmost a human being can succeed in doing at all. Franz Kafka
Thank you for reading this post. Please come back and read some more. Have a blessed day filled with gratitude, joy, and love.
