This statement is the proof between maturity and immaturity.
It is the difference in the choice driven life and victim driven life.
It is the challenge of every human being alive.
You can either grow through your pain or allow it to consume you.
You can either choose to let it change you for good or for evil.
You can either live with determination or excuses.
It is up to you, and what you choose, what you allow will determine not only your outcome.
It will very likely determine the outcome for your children and/or those around you.
So, what will you choose?
How will you grow?
And who will reap the benefits ..or consequences?
Choose wisely, please.
And if it seems evil to you to serve the Lord, choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve, whether the gods which your fathers served that were on the other side of the River, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land you dwell. But as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.
As I noted in another blog, peace is the one thing I carry with me at all times, and it is the positive emotion I try to have and to feel most often.
Peace is a key to unlock so many more positive emotions.
I’m usually not a real dramatic person, not a person of high emotion; so, this emotion might seem to come to me more easily than some. However, I work on it as well.
If you’re a person of lots of drama or a person of high emotion, it might take a little more work to get to a peaceful state, but it really boils down to your thought life.
What you think, you become.
If you dwell on fear, you’re gonna deal with lots of anxiety and fear.
If you dwell on sadness, you’re going to be sad and even depressed.
If you dwell on anger, you’re going to live in a state of anger and rage.
If you dwell on doubt and never ending questions, you’re going to be consumed in a cloud of confusion.
You get my point.
Negative thoughts breed negativity.
Positive thoughts breed positivity.
The beautiful thing is we get to CHOOSE what we think about.
Some would say, But thoughts just pop into my head. Yes. You are truthful in that.
However, it’s the thoughts you choose to keep that produce the outcome.
The thoughts you choose to nurture, strengthen and continually go back to, these are what you become.
So, I ask you: What positive emotion do you feel most often?
And maybe a better question would be:
What positive emotion do you choose to feel most often?
For as he thinks in his heart, so is he.
Proverbs 23:7
You will keep him in perfect peace, Whose mind is stayed on You, Because he trusts in You.
Talking with a friend the other day she said, “We’ve been walking through the fire together, haven’t we?” My first thought was my fire is a small kindled ember compared to her recent turmoil, but the statement brought with it two kindred hearts and souls.
A mentor of mine once said to me:
You always need someone ahead of you in the journey to help you navigate the next steps, as they’ve been there and can help to give wisdom, challenge, reproof, and strength.
You always need someone beside you on this passage of life to link arms with, to uplift, to cry together, and to fight together.
You always need someone coming behind you into whom you can pour love, encouragement, guidance, and provide some shelter from the storm.
If you find all three, you can count yourself blessed.
If you cherish and nurture all three, you will be a better person for it.
If you seek all three, you’ll find you will forget more about your own problems and become a wounded healer, helping others across the broken bridges and rocky roads of this life.
And you’ll be receiving healing, affirmation, and compassion in the meantime.
So that even if you’re walking through the fire, you have a sister (or brother, for you guys) spirit joined with you to share in the heat and pain.
I am eternally beholden to my fire walkers who are blazing the path before me, showing me it can be done.
I am so grateful for those who are fire starters for whom I am able to spread the ashes to give some respite.
And I’m especially thankful for those right now who’s feet are as scorched as mine.
Bear one another’s burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ.
Galatians 6:2
Fear not, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by your name; You are Mine. When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; and through the rivers, they shall not overflow you. When you walk through the fire, you shall not be burned, Nor shall the flame scorch you. For I am the Lord your God, The Holy One of Israel, your Savior;
We run to get dressed. We hustle to get the kids ready for school. We hurry to get to work. We scurry to get our jobs done.
We dash to get the kids home, to eat, to practice, to do homework and off to bed. We bustle to get ourselves to sleep to start the new day all over again.
We rush, rush, rush like a hamster on a wheel.
Even our breaks and our vacations seem to fill up with more scheduling and more doing.
But why the rush? What is so important?
Our breathing, our health, our expressions of love?
Our legacies, our memories, our impressions of care?
What is really vital? Our advancements or our investments?
What really makes a difference? Our successes or our impacts?
Can we take a breath and inhale a little peace and exhale a little gratitude?
Can we take a pause and look around us and reach to the ones coming behind?
Slow down a minute and really see who is watching you.
Stop seeking the approval of those who won’t matter tomorrow.
Seek the One who will be there for eternity.
Encompass those who await your calm.
Envelope those who need your adoration.
Take a rest and make a memory for life.
Be still, and know that I am God; I will be exalted among the nations, I will be exalted in the earth!
Psalm 46:10
The work of righteousness will be peace, and the effect of righteousness, quietness and assurance forever. My people will dwell in a peaceful habitation, in secure dwellings, and in quiet resting places, though hail comes down on the forest, and the city is brought low in humiliation.
I always heard as a child that practice made perfect; so, I practiced playing the flute, and I practiced riding my bike, and then, I didn’t.
Because I wasn’t practicing accurately. I was just putting into rhythm the actions that wouldn’t make me better.
Practice truly makes permanent what you are doing, but it doesn’t make perfect if you’re doing it all wrong.
If your words are bringing pain, the continuation of those will only continue to wound and harm.
If your actions are bringing trouble to your life, to your family, or legacy, that turmoil will not stop as you continue the same steps.
We must change our practice to change our outcome.
We must alter our path to alter our destination.
Actions become habits. Habits become lifestyles. Lifestyles become character.
So, if change is to come, change is the action that must be taken.
You’ll never climb a mountain if you don’t start hiking.
You’ll never succeed at anything until you first, begin the task.
And today is a great day to commence!
Be consistent in truth. Be faithful in love. Be reliable in kindness. Be dependable in joy.
These are some great places to start.
Let’s get ready! Let’s go!
And whatever you do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through Him.
Colossians 3:17
Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for He who promised is faithful. And let us consider one another in order to stir up love and good works…
What is the most important thing to carry with you all the time?
The most important thing I can carry with me at all times is peace.
But peace can be hard to come by in a culture that is full of chaos, in people who are full of flaws, and certainly in a self that can be up and down like a yo yo.
Material possessions can come and go. This world cannot be counted in for my security.
People whom you thought were dependable can let you down, both intentionally and not.
Family and friends are wonderful, but they are still people, still human.
They’re not meant to be my stability.
Anything of this world can fail tomorrow. Nothing is truly perfect or reliable.
But I have found One.
There is One who is ever faithful, ever dependable, and ever stable in all His ways.
Jesus.
Some hate Him. Some love Him. Some choose not to know Him.
But I have found He is all I need.
He has peace beyond our imagination that will surpass our circumstances.
He has love that is unconditional and will sustain us in spite of ourselves.
He has joy beyond our emotions that will consume us regardless of our environment.
And all that He has is free. It costs nothing. It requires no work. It demands no sacrifice.
All we have to do is believe.
…that if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart one believes unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation. For the Scripture says, “Whoever believes on Him will not be put to shame.” For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek, for the same Lord over all is rich to all who call upon Him. For “whoever calls on the name of theLord shall be saved.”
Romans 10:9-13
You will keep him in perfect peace, Whose mind is stayed on You, Because he trusts in You.
Too many people claim they’re gonna live better, gonna do better, gonna act better, but they’re still holding onto that which brings them down.
Some assert they’re gonna eat right, but the cabinets are filled with junk, and the menu is filled with fast food and calories.
Some proclaim they’re gonna get fit, but the weights gather dust, the shoes stay in the box, and the gym membership rolls through a year with the door never opened.
Some declare they’re gonna speak right, yet the music is turned to trash, the podcasts are filled with perversion, and the languages are covered with cussing and crudeness.
Some affirm they’re going to act better, yet the friends stay the same, the words ramble on with no change, and the actions are as redundant as the clock hand.
If you desire change, it must be proven within.
It you desire an alternate path, it must first be evident in your walk, then the journey will follow.
If you’re still entertaining the demons from which you claim to have been freed, then your receptivity will be the burden on your own shoulders.
It will be the nightmares of your own dreams.
Wake up!
Then Jesus said to His disciples, “If anyone desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me. For whoever desires to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake will find it. For what profit is it to a man if he gains the whole world, and loses his own soul? Or what will a man give in exchange for his soul? For the Son of Man will come in the glory of His Father with His angels, and then He will reward each according to his works.
They claim we simply must be more kind, more loving, and more peaceful.
Yet, when love is proclaimed so elementary by pointing fingers at others and declaring what you must do,
I believe we are neglecting to look in the mirror at our own souls to see what we must do.
When kindness is demanded from others so readily, and it is said to be performed so smoothly,
I believe we are avoiding the reality that our flesh never truly desires to be gracious and kind.
No one is born good. We are not birthed in righteousness.
Our natural tendencies do not lend themselves to be like Christ without first dying to self.
If we long to truly be like Christ, we must remember He had a wilderness where He was hungry, tempted and had to be bold in faithfulness.
If we truly long to be like Christ, we must remember He had a Gethsemane where He was alone, discouraged and had to be brave in love.
If we long to truly be like Christ, we must remember He had a cross by which He was broken, disgraced and had to be truthful in kindness.
If we truly long to be like Christ, we must remember He had a Judas by whom He was betrayed, ambushed and had to be confrontation in peace.
When we profess others should be Christlike, we need to actually know who Christ is and what He did.
When we confess a desire to be Christlike, we need to actually recognize who our Savior is and what He did.
When we assert there is a common ground with a mighty King, we must acknowledge and embrace what must be crucified within us to become someone we are never capable of becoming
Without first, surrendering all to Him.
This is to be Christlike.
But what things were gain to me, these I have counted loss for Christ. Yet indeed I also count all things loss for the excellence of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them as rubbish, that I may gain Christ and be found in Him, not having my own righteousness, which is from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which is from God by faith; that I may know Him and the power of His resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death, if, by any means, I may attain to the resurrection from the dead.
Philippians 3:9-11
And you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.
In our modern age, it seems there are becoming more and more polarizations to right and wrong.
Yet there also seems to be more twisting to truth than I believe I’ve ever seen before.
Too often, good is being called evil and evil is being called good.
Too often, those fighting for justice will de over and connive to achieve their purposed goal rather than seeking for truth no matter the cost.
And for certain circles, if you disagree with the relative truth they’ve created, you are relegated as hateful, rude, and even wicked.
Where is the logic in any of this?
Where is the sanity to this altered reality?
There is none.
And my statement of fact will send many into a tumultuous and relentless battle of words.
What happened to the days when truth was sought above all?
What happened to the lives who sought truth at all cost?
There has to be an absolute truth on which to hold firm.
And even if you disagree with that truth, it doesn’t make you a demon of the abyss.
And it doesn’t make you freakish, deformed, or necessarily of a nonredemptive evil.
It just simply makes you wrong.
An absolute truth does not move for modernity.
And absolute truth doesn’t change with new winds of doctrine, opinions or even popularity.
An absolute truth stands firm in it’s truth.
An absolute truth stands true through the tests of time.
And an absolute truth is a rock upon which you can fall and it will sustain you.
I have found this absolute truth.
I will hold on to it.
I will bind myself to it.
And I will run to it in torrential times.
It is a truth that with change you forever.
And unless you’ve found it as well, please know that when my absolute truth disagrees with you, it is not hatred I bring.
It is a love, a peace and a hope that will transform you, heart, mind, body and soul.
He is the Rock, His work is perfect; For all His ways are justice, A God of truth and without injustice; Righteous and upright is He.
Deuteronomy 32:4
The Lord is my rock and my fortress and my deliverer; My God, my strength, in whom I will trust; My shield and the horn of my salvation, my stronghold.
Psalm 18:2
Woe to those who call evil good, and good evil; who put darkness for light, and light for darkness; who put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter! Woe to those who are wise in their own eyes, and prudent in their own sight!
As my husband would say, “Go and get off the asphalt!”
Too often, we stay in the grind, and we wonder why we have no peace.
We keep our head down, our hands busy, and our feet on flight.
We rush through the routine, seeking more and coming up empty.
But instead of continuing the toil, you’ll find that if you’ll stop to breathe, you’ll actually find more energy.
When you pause, reflect and take a minute, you’ll find the world can stop spinning.
So, go take a deep breath and soak in the mountain breeze.
Stand by a waterfall and remember it’s not about you.
Hike the hilltop and see that you can accomplish and win.
Walk beside a creek and find your laughter again.
Do some star gazing and be reminded of the Creator who causes your heart to beat.
These are never times wasted.
They are moments refreshed, restored and rejuvenated.
They are glimpses of peace and serenity.
Go get you some.
The heavens declare the glory of God; And the firmament shows His handiwork. Day unto day utters speech, And night unto night reveals knowledge. There is no speech nor language Where their voice is not heard. Their line has gone out through all the earth, and their words to the end of the world.
Psalm 19:1-4
You will keep him in perfect peace, Whose mind is stayed on You, Because he trusts in You.
My journey didn’t stop with mere time travel or writing; it led me to become one of the most sought-after empaths, a soulful psychic who reads the hidden depths of the human spirit. I’ve been blessed—or perhaps burdened—with an ability that allows me to feel the emotions of people from every corner of time.
I am a licensed psychologist based in Greece. My love for housekeeping has inspired me to create this blog about home management and family relationships. I hope you enjoy reading as much as I enjoyed writing!
Dedicated to movie nerdom, nostalgia, and escape. In the late 90s, I worked at Blockbuster Video where they let me take home two free movies a day. I caught up on the classics and reviewed theatrical releases for Denver 'burbs newspapers and magazines. Today, while raising two young, beautiful daughters with my amazing wife, I look forward to anything rated R and not Bluey. Comments and dialogue encouraged!
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