30 Oct 2014

today, my children's names remind me of greater things

There is this conversation Jesus had with a woman of questionable repute. As the man, Jesus starts the conversation off (because if he didn't, it would not happen because women back then were basically second class or even property).


If I may, this is sorta how it went:

J (very tired): Will you give me a drink?
W: What? Are you crazy? You are a Jew, and I am a Samaritan*. We don't get along remember? How can you break the rules?  
J: If you can see past all that, you will know I can give you a drink that truly settles your life's thirst.
W (eyes J carefully): hey, how you plan to get water, you didn't bring a bucket. This well was dug centuries ago by Jacob. Our ancestors drank from it. Are you greater than them? 
J: this water relieves thirst but doesn't satisfy and overflow from your life.
W: sounds good, Give me some, coming here is really a lot of work. 
J: Go call your husband.
W: I have no husband! 
J (smiles gently): you are accurate here. You have had five husbands. The man you are with now is not a husband.
W: You can tell... some sort of prophet huh? Then answer me, who is right? Where is the right place to worship God? Did the Jews or the Samaritans get it right? 
J: The place is no longer the issue. Listen, salvation will come through the Jews as God planned; but it's for everyone. God the Father is Spirit so those who worship him must do so in spirit and in truth.

Fifteen years ago, we talked about having children. The hubs was not keen; but I was pretty set on the wonders of having children and very excited about being a mother. We agreed that he would take some time to pray about it. He came back with a rather nervous demeanour but conceded that children are accorded worth, purpose and glory in the Bible. Our baby girl was conceived the following month.

The point that Jesus made in that conversation captivated me. Many of us by then are pretty jaded about where the world is headed; and not a few friends have sworn off having children. But there is this: there is a group who seeks and responds to God - and they do so not depending on tradition but by being animated by spirit and truth.

I am a huge fan of tradition in many ways; and call people to return to a historic, tested faith. But there is also this: every generation will have challenges that must be confronted and it requires a move of the Spirit that emboldens and an anchorage in the Truth so they won't get swept off their feet.

My firstborn bears the middle name Spirit-of-God ~רוח אלוהים
Six years later, the son enters the world with theTruth enfolded in the middle of his name ~אמת
People name their children for many reasons:
popularity of the name
in honour of family members
expressing aspirations
a sense of the child's destiny

These middle names I felt inspired to include were more like a proclamation. I wanted to shout out: Spirit and Truth!

Interestingly, many days, these two Hebrew words shout back at me, holding me up against the Light~

are you guided by the Holy Spirit or relying on your own past experiences and success?
are you seriously seeking the truth or will you get lazy nd gloss over stuff?

I never get past these questions. Even now. I need to prepare talks and sermons. I mentor. I need to make decisions and respond to the decisions others make. Will it be in Spirit and Truth?

The thing about growing older is you lose confidence in the right places.

When I was younger, I said, "Lord, lead me in Spirit and Truth!" because I didn't know very much anyway, so I needed to be led; and honestly I did not see much of what was coming!

Now, I cry out, "Lord, blanket, build, bolster, barricade me..." for I know much more; and it's mostly about how easy it is to stray into Self and falsehood. 

I guess the real stuff becomes all the more precious when you see how frequently the counterfeits are traded around, when you have hurt and been hurt because the Spirit and the Truth were absent.

Perhaps lift a prayer for me please: I am feeling a great need to remain in, dig deeper, be defined - by Spirit and Truth.

You too? Share with me in the comments so I can pray for you too.



*the story is found in the Bible in John chapter 4. A Samaritan is part-Jew so rejcted by the pedigree Jews.

24 Oct 2014

What shape are you..and if there's a mould, how about a Cross?

{this is a post I shared over at The Brave Girl Community - an online group of gals loving Jesus and learning to live freely in His fierce freedom!}

We don't just have stereotypes (and these can be useful); but we also have stereo-shapes! That's right: aren't we being told all the time what shape things ought to be, whether it is the economy, the family..and of course, our bodies {and the men are not spared these days}. But who determines these shapes?

I remember thinking about the wondrous ideals of communism and mashing it with Acts 2 'they had all things in common' only to be challenged by my Theology professor about the good that capitialism has done. I see his point; but I am not fully convinced. After all, the principle behind captialism is this to capitalise -- which gets really out of hand quickly!

Who decides when something is maxmised or capitalised? Whose benefit are we thinking about? Who defines the shape of things?

What about our individual lives? Do they too have shapes?
Some people remind me of :
Arrows - always directed at something. I respect their missional sense and drive; but wow..it's does get rather one-dimensional at times just to speak of bottom lines.
Circles - they keep going around the same issues.
Loose shapes -these are ill-defined it seems and appear to go with the flow...

The Cross is a shape. If we could pout our lives into a mould; how about the shape of the Cross?

Loving God
Loving Others

This is a shape we should explore more. The Cross is the shape formed from the meeting of two lines.
A life in Cross-shaped seeks to live upward or Godward. It is a life that reaches, stretches, grows... and it happens not as the line goes up; but also as it goes downwards; plunging the depths and abyss:
where we dig deep into the why and wherefore of things, where we examine our motives, sense the movements within our bosoms and ask probing questions so that we don't go through life like a phantom or facade.

Then there is the other reaching where we aspire, dream, hope, work towards...that moves outwards. These are the horizontal lines that can stretch out a welcome, and reach around to embrace!


The cross-shaped life is a very dynamic life that cannot be fueled by seeking to capitalise, or asking 'what's in it for me?' because it will take us to places where those sorts of questions don't make sense at all.

The Cross is a symbol of ~

Love and Life
Forgiveness and Freedom
Grace and Goodness
Power and Peace

It is a shape we must in humility lie down and soften into.


23 Oct 2014

Suppose you're not such a great witness..but ..today . is . a ..gift!

This being a Christian thing can be unnerving
.

biting nails !


I remember my daughter struggling with it, and each time as we sorted through the debris of doubts and questions, this one piece will appear persistent, almost like it can crawl back after we toss it out: but I'm not good enough!

Somewhere deep within her (no thanks to our imperfect parenting) lurks the notion of 'measuring up'.

In my latest book Shed Those Leaves, I come right out and say it: Forget it! You and I - we won't measure up!

But how we hate to hear it. We want to measure up. We want to be good enough. What kind of wimp lets someone save them? That sounds so much like... failure!

But suppose we come to our senses and cry out for salvation. What do we do next? Go right on trying to measure up again! Habits, especially such ingrained ones, die hard! So commonly I hear -

I'm not a very good / strong Christian
I am sure that wasn't a very good testimony
There goes my Christian witness!

and it goes along with the expression of helplessness and a taint of defeat; sometimes complete with an audible sigh!

To their disappointment I don't hug them and say, "I am sure you are trying your best" - because sometimes, honestly, we don't! We don't care that much about God's reputation. But my quiet presence is not meant to be rebuke; it is meant to be company. I know. I am right there with you at notch four.

You see, I used to beat myself up.
Then I would get sick of feeling beat up.
Then I may beat myself up for not being firm enough on myself...you get the crazy routine.. until - one day, I realised I was having this conversation all by myself. I was deciding whether I was good enough, and whether I right about my estimation, my feelings about it and so on...

So I did a weird thing. I asked God.

Did I really mess up?
Was it that bad?
What could I have said / done differently?

God swooped right in on me then.

What is in your heart for this person / situation?

We are so bent on making an Impression when our witness is meant to be our Expression of Him!

Huge difference there.

Now I was feeling true, real, guilt that will make a difference. I saw the paucity of my love. I saw my priorities in clear light. I saw my attempts to feel good about being good.

It was a good, necessary seeing, the kind described as thus
For godly grief produces a repentance that leads to salvation and brings no regret...
~ 2 Corinthians7v10
I grieve often for my lack of love, a love that prays on knees, serves with hands, runs with feet, weeps with a broken heart and sacrifices that others may live better or stronger. This is a grief that empowers me. It doesn't in the end lead me to wallow in my lack; but to run to the Supply.



What about you? What helps you take the next step?

And one more thing God still says to me; which this video captures so well {you need a few minutes to enjoy this} -



Each day is a day for adventure, for receiving, for giving as we are being led to higher places or lower places -- and our witness happens in smile, speech or service as we express that bit of the Great God who mercifully works and weaves Grace and Truth, Life and Light into our days.

15 Oct 2014

A Happy song in a minor key called Joy

I love being happy.

I am not always happy. In fact, many days, my children and spouse consider me rather crabby {somehow that happens alot at home}. But they are wrong; even if I was crabby; I was really en route to being happy. Sounds insane, or perhaps, you agree!

We believe our actions and choices and words are aimed at making us, others and the world better, happier. Sacrifices must be made on the way to bliss right?

Just one major flaw in this premise. Happiness has this habit of being elusive. We should all know.

We all have our boxes of 'nearly perfect dates', 'supposedly relaxing vacations' & 'amazing imagined and engineered outcomes' where we have tossed the moments and memories which we wouldn't post on Instagram or facebook about.

I should know - I speak about the subject of happiness.

But can I share honestly here? I'd rather speak on the subject of JOY. Now that's a different moniker.

Joy we've been told is a deeper thing that runs much further beneath the surface. At times it bubbles forth with delightful gurgles; but mostly it is subterranean. Maybe a picture can save me the thousand words I cannot find right now:


Here is a sudden burst of joy erupting forth when the wonder of fireflies buzz around one's little head!

Joy often catches us off guard. 

We are rushing around and suddenly our eye catches sight of the beauty of a flower
We are engrossed in our work when we hear a giggle in the next room
We are walking our usual route when we bump into a dear friend
We are lost in our thoughts when a gentle breeze comes and a playful bird offers us a enlivening distraction

Yet- in each of these instances, we need to choose Joy or we can miss it. We can fail to splash around the refreshing spring of joy that can nourishes us. Rightly, Henri Nouwen reminds us




But choosing Joy can be hard as life comes with many sombre minor notes when what we hoped for, worked for, prayed for, does not happen {soon enough}. Choosing Joy can be hard when our lives are so busy we don't have space . to . notice ...

I find that I forget to choose joy many days and rummage around for some scrap of happiness instead. It is most unsatisfactory!

I forget there is Joy. I am too impatient to wait for it. Every day as I read the news, I am faced with the reality that with all of our advances as a race, humanity continues to confront massive challenges: from Ebola to ISIS. These large issues and our own daily difficulties can easily cause us to mope and lose touch with the gift of Joy.

What we settle for then is happiness of this stripe:



Which is really good and necessary {thanks to all my baking friends for the yummies!}.

But -- we now live in a world where more of us are chronically unhappy. Why is this so? Could it be that seeking to be happy doesn't work; that we were made for Joy and a lesser substitute is like taking an artificial sweetener?

Studies show that happiness and unhappiness are actually two different clines. In other words, doing stuff you think will make you happy will not make you as happy as if you also at the same time deal with what makes you unhappy. Your unhappiness which may be caused by a totally different set of things can leak your happiness.

This is where Joy comes in.

While we muddle about to find out why we are happy or not; there is this gift called Joy.

Joy is built on something larger and bigger; indeed Someone larger and bigger.

For joy is about wonder, awe, grandeur, surprise, reversals, redemption.

Ask the mother who has reconciled with her son
Talk to the man embroiled in  lawsuit who has just received news that the suit has been dismissed
Look at the child who has just been given an ice-cream instead of the cane when he just failed his paper
Listen to someone who just returned from the Grand Canyon or the Northern Lights


These are the big boxes of Joy.

But daily, there are smaller parcels waiting for us to notice and unwrap too.

One of the most surprising places to find Joy is in Scripture! Listening to God speak to us is life-giving and adds to the quotient of joy in the depths of our soul; even if we do not immediately feel it.
Like a filled up petrol tank, we don't immediately go faster; but we soon know we can go on longer.




My son has just walked in. He is moping because his Math homework is making him think so hard. I read this verse in John 15 with him and I ask him,

Who is saying this?
-God
Now, think, when you read your Bible or listened to God, did you hear something that put joy in you?
- Ya, when God tells me He loves me, I feel so full of joy inside. 

{his mood lifts! thank Goodness}

Perhaps you and I need to read and listen more consistently.

Indeed, this past week I found myself drawn to those familiar words Jesus spoke about becoming like children. At once I know why my joy quotient is dipping. I am acting all grown-up again trying to figure out life instead of leaning into Everlasting Arms... Yes it's a paradox friends: we need to grow, we need to solve, we need to wrestle and at the same time, we need to let go, rest, trust.

Just imagine if it were only life on one end of the paradox: all strife and self-dependence! Good grief, then happiness and joy will be all hard-won battle scars. Ouch. Thankfully, it doesn't have to be so.

It's a crazy world, and you and I need Joy to find our song in it. For we do so much want to be happy. So how about these pictures for a start:


9 Oct 2014

because the rants tire us all..and the Word calls us to mind our words

When I saw the tag on facebook, honestly, I went "O no...".  There is this one-up-man-ship these days especially on the social media platforms. We challenge notions, question actions, and accuse so readily, and easily.

I enjoy learning and as a student and then a cleric I would raise questions. But I was always tentative, somewhat unsure... and even then, I was labeled a firebrand ! One generation later with a more learned populace we are assured of more lively debates and challenges. But somehow, the online exchanges leave me wary and weary.

It is a strange place in a way to find myself sounding like my elders of past, with thoughts such as -

I have eaten more salt than you
How much have you really experienced to qualify you to make such a judgment?

Yes, as youths, we felt asphyxiated when our elders threw such quick retorts back at us. We roll our eyes and count them lesser mortals for not being as exposed to ideas as we are. Youthful zeal and pride are often bedfellows I guess.

But is it just a function of growing older? Am I destined to calcify in my position and become impatient with the young uns?

So I did an exercise.

I took an area where strident voices have been heard and I tried to cross over to the other side. I imagined myself belonging to a misunderstood minority. I imagined struggling about which public toilet to use, how my head may turn and heart stop when certain words are overheard, how going to school, church, street can be constant reminders that I don't quite fit in....

 It turns out it wasn't altogether that difficult. Upon reflection, I realised why.

Firstly, in one sense, we all have experienced being on the outside. Rejection is almost universal a human experience. Granted, some experiences of rejection, name-calling, and worse lie beyond my scope of imagination and empathy. To read of abductions for the purpose of correcting behaviour is bizzare to me. But then, that's salt I haven't tasted. Would I order the abduction of my child if I was convinced she was so wrong she would end in eternal damnation and be ruined for life?

There are many things about ourselves, what we truly feel, think or will do, that we cannot be certain of. A religious commitment and outlook may proscribe some things; but then again, when crunch time comes, can we be so sure?

Further, I have chosen to live on the outside in some ways. The religious or spiritual person doesn't exactly square in a material-secular world. I have been called 'unreal, out-of-touch, holier-than-thou'... My gender has added to the mix too as leadership roles are not easily accorded to a woman (yes even today). 

Finally, I have been a victim before.


Is this why I am tired of the calling-out, standing-up, setting-right?

Listen, most of us have no idea and no business doing any of the above; because we are just going to walk away after a while. We go right back to our little lives filled with self-centred ambition and greed. Including me. This isn't to say we don't get into the fray at times. But here's the Word:

"Let your speech always be with grace, seasoned with salt..' ~ Colossians 4v6

This Word here about seasoned speech is not one of my favourites. It cuts too close for an extrovert with a gift of the gab (so they said). But it's in the Word, so it applies. It means simply, I must apply it. I am not always sure how; especially when I am tagged and I feel like I am expected to say something. As an older person I feel immense pressure to be wise and responsible - especially today!

So this online fracas is going to test how we apply this Word. Can we be polite? Can we look for what's good and throw that in the mix when we want to point out a weakness? Can we pull back from polarising and demonising? Surely for all the education, we can move away from the grandstanding?
After all, the truly learned are humble no?

May our hearts grow large with our minds while our mouths and keyboard skills be put to truly good use.


8 Oct 2014

how to keep believing in rainbows when they disappear so fast..

I believe we all live under His eternal arc of Goodness {click to read about it}. But there are days when all I can muster is this: I want to believe.

After all, the amazing confluence of vapors and light quickly disappear and our pretty bow of colours is lost to us.


Last night, I was part of a large team that was praying for the sick. When we opened the doors, the church filled up quickly. I turned around and see a young girl, about eight, sitting strapped to a special wheelchair. The straps would keep her upright. She was fair, pretty, unsmiling. Her mother was holding her hand while her father sat behind to keep a watch that her skinny frame is not slipping out from those straps and she is leaning on the tiny pillow stuffed around the backrest to cushion her neck.

When the singing started, I noticed that I was struggling to join the rousing chorus of voices. I feel deeply and often find myself burdened by such gaping needs. The common cold to me is no life trial. But the sight of that little girl got to me. I don't ask 'why' the same way I used to - all angsty, self-righteous and impatient; but I am of the band that still hates to see such seeming senselessness.

Later, what I would hear from nearly every person who stepped up to me for prayer was more than my few words could carry.

a woman who has had five surgeries and is expecting another for her recurrent hernia problem
 my mother has dementia and now I am getting sick; her medical bills are too much for me.." 
the weary mom who prodded her epileptic son forward, "recently also he has eczema:..and afterwards, is telling us she has three maladies and her kidneys may be failing

It felt so inadequate, the few minutes of summarizing needs and pains into a few lines; and the prayer.

After the prayers, we sang our last song, God is Good, all the time.

What does it take to honestly sing God's goodness in the face of such crushing life difficulties? How do we remember that as long as it is day and the water cycle of life goes on; the rainbow is always there - because the water is always there - just that we only glimpse it sometimes.

Sometimes it is cruel to make God sound so close; not that He isn't, but we are not so easily in tuned with Him. And at times, He does seem to disappear behind the clouds and everything seems just.plain.dark.

But this precisely is the walk of f a i t h . This is the hard, true stuff of it. You and I, somehow, are drawn to this strange place where we notice rainbows and get pelted by rain, often within the same day.

This is the hard real stuff God promises His people if we refuse to split the Word into bits we like and bits we don't:

Then shall the maidens rejoice in the dance,
and the young men and the old shall be merry.

Sounds like a bright-below-a-rainbow picnic of wild abandon!

I will turn their mourning into joy,
I will comfort them, and give them gladness for sorrow.
I will fest the soul of the priests with abundance,
and my people shall be satisfied with my goodness, says the LORD ~
Jeremiah 31v13f

And I am up on my feet ready to twist to this news until my eyes glance down and I notice there is more:

a voice is heard in Ramah, lamentation and bitter weeping. Rachel is weeping for her children; she refuses to be comforted for her children, because they are not. ~ Jeremiah 31v15



This verse sits strangely among the many words of comfort and rainbow-promises.

I have gone back and read it, prayed, thought, and checked the commentaries. It's hard. Why such harrowing information right smack in the middle of the promises of return, vindication and joy?

We may not quite get it; this rainbow and thunder mix, this abundance and death deal all rolled in one.

But then I see it. Jeremiah is gaining traction here. The rainbow is glimpsed and for a closer look, one trudges and finds sometimes that a craggy large boulder is blocking our view; but the climb up that boulder, scraping hands and knees will reveal a vista  not yet seen.


Jeremiah is building up towards a crescendo: The New Covenant.


The terms of the New Covenant are ... new. If you were a Jew listening; it will sound strange, unfamiliar, preposterous. The exile was hard to stomach; the return is hard to conceive; the New Covenant is plain impossible.

A new king whose kingdom will not end.



W-O-W.

But listen. This verse of wailing mothers is later used by Matthew. It happened.

There were inconsolable tears nearly two thousand years ago when baby boys where slaughtered by a nervous king. These tears, incomprehensible to us, were the context of God's great salvation plan to rescue us from all tears forever.

I wish it didn't have to happen this way. But it did. God came right into our messes. Jesus was subject to it until it killed him.

So if there's sound advice on how to stay right under the rainbow even when you cannot see it; it's what God told Jeremiah to do: buy land! (I don't mean invest in property folks). I mean lay down your stakes. Live deep. Dig right in. Embrace your now, your weakest and darkest. For God is working something out. 

This by the way is sheer madness. Jeremiah is asked to trust when everything appears contrary. His title deed is an act of defiance against how-things-appear. It is a statement that says, 'the game isn't over, the score hasn't been tallied, the results are not out yet'. This too is God's instruction to us: to live not by sight, but by faith.

In our days, this living by faith will be really tough sometimes. We will see stuff that blocks out the Son and makes the rainbow vaporize. To keep believing in rainbows when that happens, we must look at the definite work that demonstrates God's Goodness once for all: the Cross and the empty tomb. We don't deserve, wouldn't ask, couldn't conjure it - but there it is, historical fact and faith revelation. God is good to us and has sent us His Son, tore up His heart - that we may know while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.


The rainbows appear to remind us they have always been there. 
They show up where there is light and where life continues.


13 



4 Oct 2014

an arc of Eternal Goodness ....{Jeremiah cont'd}

There is a arc of goodness that stretches and covers our days.



Every day then is about seeing and linking back to this arc so that the flood waters of daily life don't become a deluge and we get drowned in our moments and movements.


Today, I arrive at chapter 29 with the prophet Jeremiah. It is familiar; and so I must step back and read it all the more carefully if I want to truly listen.....

Twenty-eight chapters of anger, grief, judgment and appeals later, the clouds seem to part a little and we trace more clearly the arc.

So what You are saying is that -
my feeling removed, far away, cut off, abandoned and forgotten... that was good for me - because - I will cry out and I shall discover You again -

"For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, says the LORD, thoughts of peace and not of evil, to give you a future and a hope. Then you will call upon Me and go and pray to me, and i will listen to you. And you will seek me and find me, when you search for me with all your heart. I will be found by you...and I will bring you back from your captivity.." ~ Jeremiah 29v11-14
These famous words we love to quote are preceded by a clear statement of God's plan and timetable:


"after seventy years are completed..I will visit you and perform my good word toward you and cause you to return to this place".

Nothing random about it.





For the people of Judah, the exile was a necessary disciplinary act of God towards their persistent rebellious ways. Can I say this? We forget too quickly when we quote Jer 29v11 that it is spoken in the context of this discipline. The way we tell our kids,

"I want you to stay here in the naughty corner until you are ready to play properly."

Yes, we forget God sometimes will, must, and does, discipline us.

What is harder as I read is this: God expects us to accept the discipline; to trust Him through it. Jeremiah was constantly pitted against a bunch of other prophets who were telling the people good stuff they wanted to hear. God repeatedly says, "I did not send these prophets. They are prophesying lies." Ouch!

Perhaps we need to accept that a brother or sister has to bring us some tough news at times.

And then we come to verse 11-14. The discipline - an exile - being cut off from all that is familiar, feeling lost, being second-class citizens... going through what one simple cannot reconcile could happen to a child of God ---  stand firmly under the arc of God's goodness.

Jeremiah is churning my spirit up!

Being God's child is not a badge. Some Christians alas seem to flaunt it! I have seen smug Christians who talk like they've got everything figured out; and it borders on offence. {wait, I think I was the smug Christian before}.

No folks, God's Mercy and Grace are specific instances of His Goodness at work in our lives to draw us to a holy union with Him. But we are often unfaithful as Judah was. We have so many other gods we depend on and cling to.

So God uses an experience of immense dislocation - an exile - to break us free from our bondage.

The old spiritual fathers and mothers have this word 'detachment' to describe the process over our lives where we recognise our smaller gods and are set free from our dependence on them. May very few of us need a disciplinary encounter of being so shaken because only that will free us... Rather, may our maturity be more like a shedding of leaves {see my book Shed Those Leaves}; where a fake, insecure outfit that never anchors us is sloughed off to reveal a strong, solid soul being formed by God's hand.

Either way, we live under the arc - of Eternal Goodness.


1 Oct 2014

Time to live from the Inside-Out...and 3 keys towards that...

We live most of our lives for the outside. 
Appearances.
Actions.
Apparel.

People judge our clothes, our words, our decisions.
And so we think that's what matters. Yes, of course, their words, opinions, the way they narrow their eyes or look away just.bothers.us.

We lose sleep over that remark.
We scratch our scalps over that facebook comment.
We get all angst and angry over that email.

"Get over it!" - we try; but it isn't so easy. And it's not because we are weak; not in the sense of being a weakling.

Great leaders have moments of severe doubts and darkness. 

From preacher Charles Spurgeon to War-Time Prime Minister Winston Churchill to that great nun Mother Theresa; their stories shed vital light: there are no super-humans, not really. All of us humans are weak and insecure, yet when captivated by a Vision so beyond us, we can become capable of great good-will.


When that Vision confronts us though, most of us back away. 

Why rock the boat?
Why risk the loss?
Why take the path less traveled?
Why act so sure?

This is why probably the most important Q we need to ask as we mature is this:



We come to a time when we must realise that we are Inside Beings and will never be satisfied living for the Outside. We are made of deeper, stronger stuff. We want to believe in something, We want to stand for something, We want to make a difference. These are all Inside things. And we find them only when we dare to journey inwards to our hearts.

What does this take?

1. Devote time to understand yourself: what truly motivates you, what brings you joy. {this means less time on lesser stuff like TV or social media perhaps}

2. Have a way to dailogue with yourself and with God: a journal is really helpful here. Most of us will find ourselves rambling and haphazard until we start to make notes...and then things begin to take a form, a structure, a direction, Got to try it {or ask me when my next Journaling workshop/seminar is happening}

3. Get in touch with what is meaningful to you. Read, learn, make friends with the right tribe.

Go on, discover your Insides. It's never too early or late to begin. I'll see you around!

{feel free to raise Qs, share your experiences & thoughts in the comments!}

And remember, the Vision-Giver will give you a lift.