“That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong.“(2 Corinthians 12:10)
Sometimes you need to go to the book itself when you’re given a verse to read for the day. So I did, and read what led up to this statement by Paul to the Corinthians.
I like Paul because he’s not afraid to talk about his own failings, although he keeps his main failing, the ‘thorn’ in his flesh a secret, he still admits he has one. So what does the verse mean?
I look at myself as an example. I have Fibromyalgia which is also known as Chronic Pain. I have Chronic Fatigue, migraines that are always present, with variance in intensity, light and sound sensitivity, a sleep disorder, as well as spinal problems and other health issues. Why do I even look at those weaknesses in delight? Or perhaps the insults I’ve received at times?
Because with the help of God, those weaknesses, insults, and persecutions didn’t stop me from doing something I’ve dreamed of for decades. In fact, because of those weaknesses I may have accomplished my goal of becoming a published author.
I took what life gave me and worked with it. I didn’t say that because my life isn’t the norm, that I couldn’t accomplish something. Even today I don’t know when I will sleep, when I will be awake. Sometimes I sleep three hours out of 48 and I will turn that into something useful in writing. What better way to describe sleep deprivation than being in it?
Anyone can brag about something they’ve done. But boasting about a weakness is something else. Overcoming hardships to be normal or even being extraordinary is something to talk about, but it’s mainly something to look to and realize help was given along the way. God directed me to write a book, or a few really. Within three months of an accident that changed my life forever, I’d written a book that I am about to shop to agents. I shouldn’t have been writing anything, but I had this need inside of me to challenge myself to accomplish something I’d never done before, write a romance novel. So it turned out to be a coming of age novel more than a romance. I still did it.
Having that helping hand to guide me, to support me, to lift me up when I fall backwards, is something that I know I can rely on and makes me more fearless in what I do. I am not afraid of weaknesses or failures. I use them.
Time for a change, don’t you think? As some of you may have noticed, I don’t really blog much these days, months, or however long it’s been. I guess I just haven’t really known what I’ve wanted to do, among other reasons. Sometimes you have to make choices between things, and blogging comes up second or last.
That being said, I’ve decided to focus, or continue to focus on positive things. What you’ll see from me are articles about how to make your life more positive and hopefully more satisfying. No one has all the answers but with more answers given, we can at least have something to choose from.
At the same time, I’ll be helping myself focus on things I need to. Also I tend not to post about my writing here as a courtesy, but you know, it is my blog, so if I want to share a chapter of something, I’ll share it.
It’s funny how we as bloggers trend away from what makes us happy about blogging and instead do things to please others. Eventually that causes burnout or a malaise about the whole thing. That happens in a great may parts of our lives.
I’ll be speaking about that this week, so see you on Monday, and start today enjoying your week ahead by saying no to something instead of always saying yes.
If you wonder what I’ve been doing with all my time lately, check out LitWorldInterviews.com, my book review and interview site. I’ve been reading a lot and interviewing a lot, all while getting my coming of age/romance ready to shop around to agents.
First this week is Florence T of Meanings and Musings with Free Your Mind. @FTThum Remember to click through and support her post by clicking LIKE on the original.
Today I had planned to have a couple of posts. Then life happened, but I still felt this sense of responsibility to have them done. I was falling into a trap that I recently talked about in another article. The traps for me are a bit different because this is my world, my place of friendship and connection.
“To be yourself in a world that is constantly trying to make you something else is the greatest accomplishment.” - Ralph Waldo Emerson
I am not a huge stress-out person. I am pretty “chill” about things. But I live in an environment of stress and stress-magnifiers. I seriously wonder if those lives would be happy if there wasn’t some type of drama existing.
Sometimes that spills over and the riptide grabs me by the ankle and pulls me, while I bob along like a beach ball on the waves, and throws me on the shores of stress beach. I’m only a visitor and I always remember to step back and think of where and why I am in this stress situation. I know it’s not me. Not my problem, and I then decide how to calm it down. That’s me. I am the calmer-downer in Stressville. I am not exaggerating.
With the SMs, meaning stress-magnifiers so some of you need to get your minds out of 50 Shades of Grey at some point, doing their thing I got concerned I would not be able to have anything for today. I mean I had decided to reduce my blogging schedule to Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, and then they happen. The reduced schedule is to work on my Romance novel.
To me, not communicating through my writing is more a let down to myself than to others. I almost let the SMs suck me into their world and change my mental outlook on life and how I handle things. But stressing would have made my reality moments worse and I realized trying to do too much or trying to create something entertaining or even thoughtful/inspiring wasn’t necessary. I just needed to write. Nothing fancy. Not really for anyone to read, but for me to talk, to let things out. And so I did. And here we are at the end.
“What lies behind us and what lies before us are tiny matters compared to what lies within us.“ -Ralph Waldo Emerson
Ronovan is an author, and blogger who shares his life as an amnesiac and Chronic Pain sufferer though his blogRonovanWrites.WordPress.com. His love of poetry, authors and community through his online world has lead to a growing Weekly Haiku Challenge and the creation of a site dedicated to book reviews, interviews and author resources known asLitWorldInterviews.WordPress.com.
Time for you all to meet Florence T over on Hugh’s blog. She’s his Blog Recommendation of the Month. He has a great introduction and she gives you a great account of what she does. A bit modest but good enough. Please go and read and click like on the article. She deserves it for putting together the fund raising for my new laptop.
Much Respect
Ronovan
Last night before falling asleep, I felt a Haiku welling up inside. My tablet was in my hands. I wrote down the verse, and with some minor edits the Haiku appeared: “History Repeats.” It is the PING presently above. It seems my reaction to Ronovan’s words Rise and Save had an extremely visceral reaction within me. All three Haiku I wrote in this Challenge came from dreams and a necessity to record what came to me. TY Ronovan for your majorly creative and inspirational choices of words. It seems they inspire all of us. jk 😎
In the Quiet Hours. Last week I discussed Creating a Positive Environment and how you needed to be serious about it and how there would be difficult decisions to be made. Something unusual happens when you enter a quiet place. That place being the newly formed room in your chaotic mind.
Do you really want to be rid of negative relatives? I pretty much no longer speak to one of mine. I have reflected on that and came to realize something. I came to realize how that break actually came about.
Over the past weekend I lost my peaceful world for a time. I was angry with the citizens of my nation and their ugliness in exchanges over various issues. I was angry at myself and my situation in which parts of I have no actual control at the moment, but I am working on it. I was angry at the drop of a hat.
I tell you this to show you that there are times you slip out of that Positive Environment. Why? Because we are human and our brains are truly chaotic. AND our brains are connected to our hearts. Those hearts do so much good and so much damage.
Am I angry now? I have turned anger into disappointment. Disappointment is something I can handle. I can eventually turn disappointment into a moment in time in a string of events to a better time. I can examine and grow myself by learning what I felt and thought during those anger moments.
To learn I need a quiet room in my mind. I need those Quiet Hours. Quiet Hours lead to quiet times, quiet environments. By being the person you want to be, others see it. They will either like it, accept it or they will reject it. If they reject it and you are someone they cannot push around with their words and antagonizing, they slowly leave your environment, or quickly do so.
In other words, you don’t need to tell a negative person to leave your life, they will do it on their own when they can no longer handle the shining light of positivity and happiness you exude all the time.
Now you can actually confront and remove someone from your life but that’s a decision for you to make. It also depends on how bad that person is in your life. No situation is the same. There is silence of the mind and silence in wisdom and there is also the silence in cowardice. This is not the later. That is a discussion for another time.
I found the below after I wrote the article and came up with my title. I don’t believe in coincidences. I and Find Positivity to the title after I had completed putting this article together.
This may not load in all regions. You can also find it on Spotify and Rhapsody. It is also the name of the album, track two I believe.
My theme this week so far has been silence. Keeping one’s silence is golden. You appear wise when not engaging a fool, even if you are a fool yourself, which in some way or other we all are.
Living in the moment for me means I don’t ALLOW those old moments to flare up my emotions to interfere with my dealings with the moments of today.
If we all ALLOWED them to happen, we would never love as we all most likely have had broken hearts.
By living in the moment we ALLOW ourselves to experience things we would have missed out on otherwise. We don’t ALLOW fears to get in the way of adventures. By this I mean foolish fears, not wise fears that bring us caution.
Living in the moment is a difficult thing to do at first. With practice it can be done.
ALLOW yourself to enjoy life. ALLOW yourself to be more than you ever imagined.
As pain is the past,
The future’s in the present,
With great hopes and dreams.
Here are some free Kindle books pertaining to living in the moment. I haven’t read them yet, but they have good reviews and I thought I would bring them to your attention. Quotes are from Amazon Book Descriptions. Click images for Amazon book page.
“After reading Remove Negative Thinking, you will be able to: – Recognize and remove your negative thinking patterns throughout the day – Reframe how you see the world – Connect to your passion and purpose – Focus on abundance and live in the now – Move outside your comfort zone – Stay motivated and surround yourself with positive people”
“This inspirational guide reminds you that life can be good, no matter what challenges you may be facing right now. Be present, see the divine at work in all circumstances, and experience ordinary life as sacred. Learn to practice the art of abundance as a form of spiritual awareness based in gratitude. “
Mira forgive and forget | They, You and Me
Elizabeth Haiku: Rise and Save | teandpaper
Al Haiku Challenge – “Rise” & “Save” | Al The Author’s blog
Prakash Rise and Save – Haiku | Its PH
Janice Wisdom’s Gems & Conserving Daylight | Ontheland
Sue Vincent (Author & Dog Posession) Grace | Daily Echo Edit
Clarence Loons Song| PrairieChat
Denis1950 Save a Sunrise – haikuhound.wordpress.com
Judy Two Thoughts | Edwina’s Episodes
Nato One Day at a Time | Chasing Life and Finding Dreams
Jen Optimistic & Haunted | the secret keeper Also be sure to check out her About page. Amazing quotes.
AC Elliott Death’s Snare | The Salt & The Light
Meredith & Martha (The Literary Angels): Rise and Save | Meredith’s Musings
R. Todd Rise and Save… | A Flash of Fiction…
Al https://altheauthor.wordpress.com/2015/08/19/haiku-challenge-save-rise-and-zombies/ My boy “B” liked the picture.
Greg Starting the Day: a #haiku #haibun | Potholes in the Road of Life
Elusive Trope Middle Ages Reconnaissance | Elusive Trope
Ruth Cake, Do Not Dessert Me... madmeanderingme.wordpress.com
Jen History Repeats | the secret keeper
Last night before falling asleep, I felt a Haiku welling up inside. My tablet was in my hands. I wrote down the verse, and with some minor edits the Haiku appeared: “History Repeats.” It is the PING presently above. It seems my reaction to Ronovan’s words Rise and Save had an extremely visceral reaction within me. All three Haiku I wrote in this Challenge came from dreams and a necessity to record what came to me. TY Ronovan for your majorly creative and inspirational choices of words. It seems they inspire all of us. jk 😎
Vashti Quiroz-Vega (Author) Blue Planet| The Writer Next Door
Serins Weekly #Haiku #poetry prompt challenge 58 | Serins Sphere
Florence Embrace | MEANINGS AND MUSINGS
Kathy Happy Days – kathymburke.wordpress.com
Steven (Author) A Simplicity Lane Truism Haiku (bills never sleep) | Simplicity Lane
Shailzaa From the Ashes – fewunsaidwords.wordpress.com
Juliette Heaven or Hell | Battered Wife Seeking Better Life
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