Spiritual Journey Thursday: New Life/Spring/Easter

Violet Nesdoly has the spotlight this month and she's going to be talking about New Life/Spring/Easter. If you want to check out her blog here is the link Violet Nesdoly

New Life

Of course, we all think of babies at the mention of new life.  But, I like to think outside of the box.

Isn't the moment we take Jesus into our heart the beginning of a new life... and I don't think new born Christians are babies... maybe in verse but not in body.

When we marry or finish college or just move into a home of our own don't we start a new life.  All these things and many more that I've not mentioned change us... we are no longer the same

Spring

A time of un-flawed beginnings.  The blossoms on a tree or a first date.  Maybe a chance encounter with a stranger who might become your very best friend.  

Easter

I know many people see Easter as a new beginning but I see it as a end.  When Jesus died, he mended the rift between God and humans.  The sins of Adam and Eve were washed away and the beacon of hope was handed to us all.  We answer only for our own actions... good or bad.

So, to conclude, I think all these words mean one thing... I grow, expand, learn and become a better me

Spiritual Journey Thursday: Connection

So first I have to say... I'm really bad... I broke my promise to myself to blog twice a week.  I know everyone is saying WHAT!!!!  I promise I will not promise again.... I'm going to break the connection.... hahahaha..snort!

Okay deep breath, stop laughing and get serious.  Doraine is counting on you to connect with the others in this group. 

Today's word is Connection:  to check out  my friend's one little word go to her blog at Doraine Bennett

Again I want to give the definition for connection: 

a relationship in which a person, thing, or idea is linked or associated with something else.

"the connections between social attitudes and productivity"

The something else in my universe is ME.  The seconds, minutes, hours or lifetime of connections with friends, family, strangers and GOD broadens the borders of who I am.

I had the pleasure to have lunch with Doraine last year.  We had beliefly met at SCBWI conferences but never really talked.  Irene Latham, Sheila Renfro and myself traveled to Warm Springs, Ga for a writers retreat filled with writing, debating, and reading .... and of course history.  Oh what wonderful shops we visited in Pine Mountain.  I connected with Doraine that day and she became a part of my connection circle.  

Connection by Ramesh Kavdia

The connection begins with words
As prayers, praise, poems.
Words connect the feelings.
Feeling connects the emotions.
Emotions connect the heart.
Heart connects the heart.
By waves and energy
By love and frequency
Then we fly higher
Or we drown deeper
We see the soul.
We see the soul full of
Joy, truth and love all together
We move towards Eternity.
We move towards Divine.
We move towards Bliss.
And we meet God.
Then we see God in every heart.
Then we see love in every heart.
We connect with all universe. 

Spiritual Journey First Thursday

I'm taking part this year in Spiritual Journey First Thursday and will be hosting it in July

Today I will be commenting on 
Leigh Anne Eck  histurn.blogspot.com
one little word for 2017

What fun to get and receive impute from so many different personalities.

Here we go:

I like to get the down to brass tack part first... definition
Noun

1. 1.

   an upward movement; an instance of becoming higher.
2. 2.

   an increase in amount, extent, size, or number.

   
   

   

   synonyms:

   increase, hike, leap, upsurge, upswing, climb, escalation

   
   
3. So those are nice words to becoming higher, to leap, to climb
4. My question is why... the answer is easy (I like easy answers) to become more, better, to evolve into a more complete you.... yea I'm in.

5. At her blog Leigh Anne talks about her rise for this year.  It sounds like she has the perfect road map to a year escalated with joy, happiness and goals reached.  

6. 
   Okay rise to me for the year...I'm so bad... I set goals but never reach them... I start them but always another project lures me away.

7. 
   My rise will be to stretch for the next branch on the tree of my goal.  I'm going to leave those other projects on the ground (or in my case the kitchen table) until I'm finished with what I've started.

I've already started my spiritual rise with meditation... I stop for just a few minutes to realize how blessed I am.

here are some of my favorite quotes about rise

An individual has not started living until he can rise above the narrow confines of his individualistic concerns to the broader concerns of all humanity. 

Martin Luther King, Jr.

“Great minds have purpose, others have wishes. Little minds are tamed and subdued by misfortunes; but great minds rise above them.”Washington Irving

 and finally I want to share one of my favorite poems, why??  because we're all slaves to something

Still I Rise

You may write me down in history
With your bitter, twisted lies,
You may tread me in the very dirt
But still, like dust, I'll rise.

Does my sassiness upset you?
Why are you beset with gloom?
'Cause I walk like I've got oil wells
Pumping in my living room.

Just like moons and like suns,
With the certainty of tides,
Just like hopes springing high,
Still I'll rise.

Did you want to see me broken?
Bowed head and lowered eyes?
Shoulders falling down like teardrops.
Weakened by my soulful cries.

Does my haughtiness offend you?
Don't you take it awful hard
'Cause I laugh like I've got gold mines
Diggin' in my own back yard.

You may shoot me with your words,
You may cut me with your eyes,
You may kill me with your hatefulness,
But still, like air, I'll rise.

Does my sexiness upset you?
Does it come as a surprise
That I dance like I've got diamonds
At the meeting of my thighs?

Out of the huts of history's shame
I rise
Up from a past that's rooted in pain
I rise
I'm a black ocean, leaping and wide,
Welling and swelling I bear in the tide.
Leaving behind nights of terror and fear
I rise
Into a daybreak that's wondrously clear
I rise
Bringing the gifts that my ancestors gave,
I am the dream and the hope of the slave.
I rise
I rise
I rise. 

Maya Angelou

Spiritual Journey Thursday of 2017

I've agreed to host this journey on Thursday July 6, 2017 but I will also be sharing each post.

Clink on the link and read Carol's joyful blog about her one word.  Beyond Literacy Link

Since we're talking about words lets learn some new ones:

1 .propagate    _______     A. excess, superabundance

2. anomaly      _______     B.  environment, setting

3. innocuous   _______     C.  irregularity, abnormality

4. surfeit         _______     D.  produce, multiply, spread

5. milieu         _______     E.  harmless, mild, innocent

see how many you can get correct


I'm going to post answers in comments.  Good Luck

Today's idiom:  a feather in one's cap

If you get all these words correct, it will be a feather in your cap.

Did you make a New Year Resolution??

Why do we do make them because no one ever keeps them!  It's like whispering a secret then yelling just kidding.

 Here are my desires for 2017...

be more patient with annoying people...
whether it's family, friends or strangers

to shut my mouth and listen more

to keep my opinions to myself unless I'm asked and by saying this, I will need to work on my expressions.... my face is an open book

work less and play more

I want to learn to paint... going to make that happen this year.  I have no expectations for greatness but one more thing off my bucket list


I'm going to say I love you more to my family.  I've been in a bad place as far as voicing my love... they know I love them but sometimes they need to hear it.  I told my kids every day that I loved them... and I taught them well because they never leave or end a call without telling me they love me... of course I say I love you too but if you're like me, that statement seems like a automatic response instead of a statement

I'm going to take more walks... I love to walk, stroll, sit and reflect in quiet unpopulated places.

Now for the BIG one.  I'm going to start riding horses again.  I've not told Ronnie yet because after I broke my hip he's a little worried about me riding ... but I love it and miss it

My Word for 2017 is Junket

I'm going on a journey of promises...  

 I promise to write every day                                                            

 I promise to blog every week                                                           

 I promise to submit every month

                                                            
Junket definition: a journey taken for pleasure  

Southern Christmas

Where you can Christmas shop in shorts at 2:00 pm and at 6:00 pm have on two coats and four pair of gloves.  That this time of the year the Southern winds hates everyone.... I truly think they punish all because they miss the sun and flip flops...

In the south, Christmas means tinsel it, put lights on it, or spray paint it.  Because of this, I was so excited when I found this book... The Official Guide to Christmas in the South or, If you can't fry it, Spraypaint it Gold by David C. Barnette.

Here are some of the Chapter titles
1. Stockings must be stuffed beyond recognition

2. Y'all get in line

3.Unplug the smoke alarm

4.Never mix Dirty Santa with Dirty Dancing

5. If you don't believe in reincarnation follow a gift bag around this Christmas

6. Guidelines and paint lines

7.The Divinity Code

8. Holidays are for celebrating the ties that bind.  And nothing binds quite like cram of chicken and Velveeta



I really enjoyed this book because I could see snippets of my family on it's pages.

Here are a few of my Christmas memories

1.  Momma crying every day the week before Christmas... after she married Daddy she never spent another Christmas with her mother and sisters... Thank you Lord for keeping my babies close

2. Getting the BIG package from Granny Dugan and Auntie Vi  They lived in Rhode Island and liked to spoil me and my brother.

3.  Getting up in the middle of the night to carefully open gifts that was in BIG package ... then tape them back... yes I was a bad child

4. Granny Trousdale's house... it always smelled like love but at Christmas the smells embraced you, wrestled you in a bear hug and pulled you to the kitchen

5. Everyone in one place... Granny and Granddaddy Trousdale.. their eight children... their spouses and 14 grandchildren...You had to be tough to withstand all that love... or sometimes the lack of it...   Ah, the Christmas fights   Remember I said I was a bad child so I might have started a few of those fights... but really it wasn't my fault... the Aunts were so easy to crank up

6. Perry Como and Jimmy Reeves singing Christmas songs all day and half the night

7. School being out so I could ride my horse every day, play football with the neighborhood kids or shoot some hoops, play with the dogs or ride my bike