It's been a while since I posted here. I got a boost last night and well, here I am.
Speaking of last night, we had an artist way reunion. The ladies from my second group met. It was alot of fun and I was so excited to see everyone. I love hearing about everyone's lives, family, and interests. I was a little sad when I left because I realized that was probably the last time I'd see any of them. The only bummer I found to attending groups is that when they are over people lose touch.
Life has been so hectic lately. I took on schooling Hannah. I just couldn't be satisfied with our options for her and well, I'm hoping I can cater to her learning style and needs more easily. We did join a MOPS group that meets every Tuesday morning. She enjoys playing with the kids and I enjoy the fellowship of other moms. Oh, and we joined a homeschool group that we can sign up for varying activities throughout the month. On top of that we will soon have speech therapy and are setting up occupational and physical therapy too. She's really improved in the few weeks I've been working with her.
I never posted the previous two paragraphs so I'm going to continue with my post today following. 10/21/06
I find myself really overwhelmed lately. There is so much that needs and requires my attention. My mind is constantly at wonder as to how other families manage. I know other people have it as hard or harder than we do and they do it well. My expectations have been altered. I don't expect perfection. Well, is all I want or desire. What does "well" mean? O.K., so I looked it up and it could easily be just a baby step from perfection. LOL! Interesting. I guess my expectations haven't been altered as much as I thought they had. So, expectations. What are my expectations? I think I just want right and good. Is that too much? Something for me to continue to ponder. At any rate, I am overwhelmed and I really need to do something about it.
Besides being overwhelmed I am feeling tremendously guilty. For all of Hannah's 5 yr old life I have worked like a dog to give her everything she needed. Somehow it hasn't been enough. I'm frustrated and maybe a little angry that I just cant' seem to get things right. I focused on her health. Researched epilepsy, prematurity, and any number of other health concerns we have had with her. The first 3 1/2 years were totally focused on her health. Development took a backseat and now because I wasn't able to focus on both or balance both health and development we are in for some really intensive therapies. Just when I thought we might get a break. How do other people do it? Why did I miss this? How did I miss it? Did I choose to ignore it because I knew it was something I just couldn't do "right"? So many questions. This is her life. I need to get it right.
I can't live in guilt though. Guilt and blame keep a person stuck. They are unable to move when they are stooped in it. I refuse to not be moving. I cant' stop moving.
The only thing I know to do when things get this way is to stop, regroup, and have a meeting with my best friend. "I sought the Lord, and he heard me, and delivered me from all my fears......This poor man cried, and the Lord heard him, and saved him out of all his troubles." psalms 34: 4 & 6.
Living and Learning,
Marcey
Friday, September 22, 2006
Sunday, July 09, 2006
Cure for Fear?
Fear. What a tiny word for such a HUGE emotion. Fear is capable of so many things. It can drive a person or it can freeze them. Fear can aid a person in their quest for success or it can be the very thing that leads to their failure. A single four letter word. Wow!
Recently I experienced the stifling kind of fear. The fear that stops you dead in your tracks. I am a part of a group called "The Artist Way". We're just a group of ladies from all walks of life that have gotten together and are discovering things about ourselves or resurrecting life enhancing things that have been long buried. Our manual is a book by Julia Cameron called "The Artist's Way; A Spiritual Path to Higher Creativity". Awesome writing and instruction. I give it a huge thumbs up. Anyway, during one of our weekly meetings I sort of blurted out my desire to write. I received lots of affirmation from the group. No negativity sent my way at all. What happens though? You guessed it. I all of a sudden could not write. I would pick up my pen and nothing. I would sit down to type and nothing. It was so heart breaking for me because writing has always been my "outlet". You know those little voices we all have, well, they were talking non stop. "Look what you did. You said you wanted to write and you can't. You told them and now people are going to expect you to write." It was a lot more brutal than that but I am toning it down in case someone does actually read this. LOL! It was so bad that I swore off writing. I quit writing morning pages. I quit journaling and I didn't' work on any of my stuff. I found myself soon depressed. Just the other day I picked up my "Artist Way" book and thumbed through it. Julia speaks of synchronicity in her book and well, I think I may have experienced a bit of it that day. My thumbs landed on Week 9 "Recovering a Sense of Compassion". What's the first section labeled? "Fear". Julia says this, "Fear is what blocks an artist. The fear of not being good enough. The fear of not finishing. The fear of failure and of success. The fear of beginning at all. There is only one cure for fear. The cure is love...Stop yelling at yourself. Be nice..." She says a lot more than that about it but you'll have to get the book and check it out. Anyway, so, I'm afraid. That's why I'm not writing. I'm not stupid, incompetent, or dreaming. I'm just scared.
So, the cure is Love. Seems I've heard that message before. "Perfect Love Casts out Fear" I've wrote here before about my "theory" concerning "perfect love". What if to make love perfect you have to allow yourself to love yourself. You know, do what is good for you. Take care of yourself. Be nice to YOU. How many of us are nice to ourselves? I don't know about you but I often take a mental verbal beating on an almost daily basis. If I were to say to another person the things I say to myself I wouldn't have many friends and I'd probably lose my family. What gives us the right to berate ourselves like that? The Bible does mention loving your neighbor as yourself doesn't it? Well, I feel sorry for my neighbor if he's getting the kind of love I throw my way.
I want different. I'm not sure what the answer is. I don't know how you change your thinking where yourself is concerned. How do you take a lifetime of relating and reacting to yourself and change that? I'm going to try to find out though. And I'll probably write more about it on another day. Wish me luck.
God Bless!
Living and Learning,
Marcey
Recently I experienced the stifling kind of fear. The fear that stops you dead in your tracks. I am a part of a group called "The Artist Way". We're just a group of ladies from all walks of life that have gotten together and are discovering things about ourselves or resurrecting life enhancing things that have been long buried. Our manual is a book by Julia Cameron called "The Artist's Way; A Spiritual Path to Higher Creativity". Awesome writing and instruction. I give it a huge thumbs up. Anyway, during one of our weekly meetings I sort of blurted out my desire to write. I received lots of affirmation from the group. No negativity sent my way at all. What happens though? You guessed it. I all of a sudden could not write. I would pick up my pen and nothing. I would sit down to type and nothing. It was so heart breaking for me because writing has always been my "outlet". You know those little voices we all have, well, they were talking non stop. "Look what you did. You said you wanted to write and you can't. You told them and now people are going to expect you to write." It was a lot more brutal than that but I am toning it down in case someone does actually read this. LOL! It was so bad that I swore off writing. I quit writing morning pages. I quit journaling and I didn't' work on any of my stuff. I found myself soon depressed. Just the other day I picked up my "Artist Way" book and thumbed through it. Julia speaks of synchronicity in her book and well, I think I may have experienced a bit of it that day. My thumbs landed on Week 9 "Recovering a Sense of Compassion". What's the first section labeled? "Fear". Julia says this, "Fear is what blocks an artist. The fear of not being good enough. The fear of not finishing. The fear of failure and of success. The fear of beginning at all. There is only one cure for fear. The cure is love...Stop yelling at yourself. Be nice..." She says a lot more than that about it but you'll have to get the book and check it out. Anyway, so, I'm afraid. That's why I'm not writing. I'm not stupid, incompetent, or dreaming. I'm just scared.
So, the cure is Love. Seems I've heard that message before. "Perfect Love Casts out Fear" I've wrote here before about my "theory" concerning "perfect love". What if to make love perfect you have to allow yourself to love yourself. You know, do what is good for you. Take care of yourself. Be nice to YOU. How many of us are nice to ourselves? I don't know about you but I often take a mental verbal beating on an almost daily basis. If I were to say to another person the things I say to myself I wouldn't have many friends and I'd probably lose my family. What gives us the right to berate ourselves like that? The Bible does mention loving your neighbor as yourself doesn't it? Well, I feel sorry for my neighbor if he's getting the kind of love I throw my way.
I want different. I'm not sure what the answer is. I don't know how you change your thinking where yourself is concerned. How do you take a lifetime of relating and reacting to yourself and change that? I'm going to try to find out though. And I'll probably write more about it on another day. Wish me luck.
God Bless!
Living and Learning,
Marcey
Wednesday, May 24, 2006
Time Flies
Wow! Last night I attended Kyle's last middle school band concert. In August he'll be a 9th grader. It's so hard to believe. He's such a handsome young man and smart too. The high school girls were hitting on him back stage. Oh man! Let me get my hands on them. LOL! Not really. I am confident that Kyle has great morals and will be a joy to his teachers and peers in the next 4 years. It seems like only yesterday he was talking to the elderly neighbors over the fence. (sigh) How Time flies????
Zachary is leaving his elementary life behind and will be in junior high come August. He also is growing up to be quite the young man. He's excited about athletics. This will be his first year to participate. I have a feeling the next couple of years will be quite interesting. He's went through 3 sizes of clothing this year alone. Seems like just yesterday he was pouring sugar on my kitchen floor and running his match box cars through it proclaiming, "it's 'nowing momma, it's 'nowing".
Then there's Hannah. She turns 5 next week. She has grown like a weed this past year. The little fragile girl has beaten the odds and become strong and well. She's beautiful and a mess. LOL! I'm going to try my hand at schooling her this year and I'm really looking forward to it. There's nothing more exciting then seeing little minds at work. Especially hers. I can't believe 5 years have past since she was in NICU with only a 50% chance of survival. It's exciting when I look back and see the fight she put up for life. She's an amazing little girl and I can't wait to see the woman she becomes.
Last night as I was driving home from the concert I saw the most beautiful sunset. I've never really thought about sunsets. So many writers focus on the sunrise. But with every sunrise there is a sunset. As I thought of all the sunsets in my children's life I was very thankful that I was there to witness the sunset of each experience as well as the rise. That is a miraculous gift. One to savor and treasure. If we only had sunrises we'd never know the joy of accomplishments. Think about it.
Living and Learning,
Marcey
Zachary is leaving his elementary life behind and will be in junior high come August. He also is growing up to be quite the young man. He's excited about athletics. This will be his first year to participate. I have a feeling the next couple of years will be quite interesting. He's went through 3 sizes of clothing this year alone. Seems like just yesterday he was pouring sugar on my kitchen floor and running his match box cars through it proclaiming, "it's 'nowing momma, it's 'nowing".
Then there's Hannah. She turns 5 next week. She has grown like a weed this past year. The little fragile girl has beaten the odds and become strong and well. She's beautiful and a mess. LOL! I'm going to try my hand at schooling her this year and I'm really looking forward to it. There's nothing more exciting then seeing little minds at work. Especially hers. I can't believe 5 years have past since she was in NICU with only a 50% chance of survival. It's exciting when I look back and see the fight she put up for life. She's an amazing little girl and I can't wait to see the woman she becomes.
Last night as I was driving home from the concert I saw the most beautiful sunset. I've never really thought about sunsets. So many writers focus on the sunrise. But with every sunrise there is a sunset. As I thought of all the sunsets in my children's life I was very thankful that I was there to witness the sunset of each experience as well as the rise. That is a miraculous gift. One to savor and treasure. If we only had sunrises we'd never know the joy of accomplishments. Think about it.
Living and Learning,
Marcey
Monday, May 08, 2006
Love and Fear
Wow, It's been that long since I posted on my blog? Shame on me. I haven't shared my blog with anyone just yet. Maybe soon. We'll see.
Live and Learn is still the undercurrent running in my life right now. It's both scary and exciting. I've got more "ideas" than I have time. If I can only figure out how to implement some of those "ideas" without making a total mess of things I would be one happy person.
Recently I came to realize how much fear is a part of my life. As I'm sure it's a big part of most peoples lives. In the Christian ranks we talk a lot about love and how it cast out fear. So, if we love ourselves, does that love cast out fear? I believe it does. If that love comes from Christ and I believe he wants us to care and love ourselves then that love will also cast out fear. I wonder if the lack of love for ourselves is the key reason most of us still have fear. We have love all around us. Our family, friends, pastors, teachers, spouses, and God himself love us and we still have fear. What if we add the love for ourselves and that makes it the "perfect" love? I am no theologian. These are just my ponderings. Anyway, I'm going to work on the "loving self" thing and see if it helps with my fears. I'll let y'all know how it goes.
Well, I should get busy around here. My quote for the day is from Eleanor Roosevelt, "It takes as much energy to wish as it does to plan".
Living and Learning,
Marcey
Live and Learn is still the undercurrent running in my life right now. It's both scary and exciting. I've got more "ideas" than I have time. If I can only figure out how to implement some of those "ideas" without making a total mess of things I would be one happy person.
Recently I came to realize how much fear is a part of my life. As I'm sure it's a big part of most peoples lives. In the Christian ranks we talk a lot about love and how it cast out fear. So, if we love ourselves, does that love cast out fear? I believe it does. If that love comes from Christ and I believe he wants us to care and love ourselves then that love will also cast out fear. I wonder if the lack of love for ourselves is the key reason most of us still have fear. We have love all around us. Our family, friends, pastors, teachers, spouses, and God himself love us and we still have fear. What if we add the love for ourselves and that makes it the "perfect" love? I am no theologian. These are just my ponderings. Anyway, I'm going to work on the "loving self" thing and see if it helps with my fears. I'll let y'all know how it goes.
Well, I should get busy around here. My quote for the day is from Eleanor Roosevelt, "It takes as much energy to wish as it does to plan".
Living and Learning,
Marcey
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