Thursday, May 1, 2008

Soul Cravings Part II - Destiny

A couple posts back I shared some lines that moved me from a book called Soul Cravings. Here are some lines, quotes, passages (whatever you would like to call it) from the chapter 2 that really spoke to me.

We humans are most alive when we passionately pursue our dreams, live with purpose, and have a sense of destiny.

Bottom line: we cannot live the life of our dreams without an irrational sense of destily.
And all of us have dreams.
More than that all of us need dreams.
Some of us sadly are just sleeping through them.

All of us long to become something more than we are. We are driven to achieve, moved to accomplish, fueled by ambition.

I was born to run.

All of us long for our lives to count in some way. We all have an internal need to achieve some kind of success or to somehow find significance. Pursuing the future we desire energizes and inspires us.

Every one of us longs to create even when we don't know exactly what. All of us, at the very least, want to create a better life, a better future, a better us.

A part of growing up seems to be acquiescing to mediocrity. It's death to our souls. When we stop dreaming, we start dying.

It is amazing how much we can endure when we are convinced there is a purpose to our struggle.

There is a destiny that awaits us all. It calls us, and if we ignore it, we are soon haunted by it.

The butterfly effect proposes that small and apparently insignificant incidents can set in motion a chain of events with far-reaching consequences. The bumblebee effect describes how great and apparently impossible dreams can set in motion a chain of events resulting in a seemingly insignificant person living an extraordinary life. We are more capable than we think.

Bumblebees are a great reminder that we should never underestimate potential.

Without dreams we have nothing to pull us forward.

Not only is ambition a good thing; it's a God thing.

*God calls us out of the life we have known and calls us to a life we have never imagined.*

When there is no future there is no HOPE.

The maddening reality is that each and every one of us has been created with a soul craving to become-- to become something-- something better, something different, something special, something unique, something admired, something valued, something more than we are.

Dream as if you will live forever. Live as if you'll die today.

As soon as we become fully aware of life, we become fully aware of death.

"It's All About the Dash."
You will see different dates of birth and times of death, but they all have one thing in common -- the dash in between the two.
The dash represents the totality of our lives. We are all born with a terminal condition.
It's called being human.

What is fascinating about the human spirit is that we can live with a conscious awareness of death and not be paralyzed. In fact, it can actually inspire us to live a life of passionate urgency.

Is it possible the reason we find God in our deepest despair is that this is when we are most listening?

It is in the worst situations that we are able to discover the best in us. It is also in these moments that we able to see more clearly what is true and what is real and what it means most fully to be human.

The Hebrew imagery is that we were created out of the breath of God. We are the product of a divine kiss.

When we live genuinely human live, we become translucent reflections of divinity.

Strength is unleashed within us when we are convinced our lives have a purpose yet to be fulfilled.

Only God can take you where you were born to go. There are a lot of roads you can choose, but one path chooses you.

The more proactive you become in pursuing your destiny, the more responsibility you will take for your life. When you choose to become, you become an enemy of the status quo. To become is to change and to bring change.

When we connect to God, we begin to care more deeply about the world around us.

... your soul is never satisfied with the life you have.

If Jesus was nothing else, he was an activist for change.

No one must remain a prisoner of fate.

Why have we come to value a sea turtle's egg more than a human fetus?

You are given one life, and it translates into eternity.

Jesus - he was a nonconformist; He was anti-institutional; He surrounded himself with outcasts; We was everything except what they expected. Jesus life was a model of uniqueness, and his movement was nothing less than that.

God, his value would not be uniformity, but uniqueness. Imprinted on your soul is the fingerprint of God.

You were made to GROW, to dream, to achieve. Your soul is letting you know you come from God and your life is intended to be God-sized and God-inspired.

Let him change you at your core, then let your passions fuel your life.
...genuine spirituality results in the passionate pursuit of life.

Metamorphosis- A change that literally moves us from crawling to flying.
...the process strengthens our wings and prepares us for flight.

It's in the struggle, in the process, even in the search for God, that he is making you strong enough to take flight.

Fear can hold you prisoner and hope can set you free.

Our ability to endure, to persevere, to overcome is fueled by this one seemingly innocuous ingredient called hope.

Everything that drives us,
every effort to succeed,
every attempt to be significant,
every moment we pursue a dream,
advance a cause,
or work to make the world better in any way
is an act of HOPE.

Where There is Hope, There is Life.

Soul Cravings by Erwin Raphael McManus

~

Lord this is my prayer. Oh my heavenly father God-size me! God-inspire me! Thank you for giving me this thought provoking book. Help me not underestimate my potential. I know I have a purpose. Never let me stop dreaming. Fill my life with hope. Thank you for the inspiration you have put in my life. I do not want to be stagnant any longer. Don't let fear and self doubt hold me prisoner any longer. Amen

Monday, April 28, 2008

1 day and 22 hrs!

Nolan is coming home Wednesday evening! The end of 3 months apart. This last week has been going so slow. Luckily I have a busy day tomorrow. I have my Asl class in the morning. Then work in the afternoon. Following that I am going to a show of the Sisters of the Holy Rock. The main sister I know from work, it should be a good time. Supposedly it is hilarious :P Then work Wednesday. At the Pch were I work I have some 80 year old friends. This one lady her name is Nancy, she is such a good friend of mine we talk every day. She knows that Nolan is in New Zealand and we would often talk about what he was up to. She traveled with her husband there years ago and loved it. Shes is like you don't know if your on the north end of the south island or the south end of the north island. Then she would just chuckle. When ever she sees me she asks me is he home yet? Is he home yet? So tomorrow ill tell her only one more day!

Friday, April 4, 2008

How much can one person take

I just got off the phone with my step mom Thelma. We had a great talk that was long over due. She truly inspires me. She told me God healed her broken heart. Life has been getting better. But she misses my Dad something fierce. Recently she got some very bad news that her sister has breast cancer. Thelma has lost my father and two of her brothers to cancer. How much can one person take? I worry about Thelma allot. I cannot imagine what she is going through. I'm working on changing my worrying to praying for her.

Thursday, April 3, 2008

Sun to the sleeping earth, love to the soul!

Man was it ever a beautiful day today. I love the change of the seasons. Spring means a number of things to me.
1. 26 days till Nolan is home!
2. Asl 102 starts
3. I plan to work less (only 40-45 hrs a week)
4. Bike riding
5. Capris and shorts
6. Gelati is in season (so there for I have to eat allot of it often)
7. Green grass and Flowers begin to appear
8. Sheila and I are finally going to go on our night on the town
9. Vee's work Gala

I was reading some poetry written by Whittier to a resident at work. I especially love the ending of this poem.

April

By John Greenleaf Whittier

’T IS the noon of the spring-time, yet never a bird
In the wind-shaken elm or the maple is heard;
For green meadow-grasses wide levels of snow,
And blowing of drifts where the crocus should blow;
Where wind-flower and violet, amber and white,
On south-sloping brooksides should smile in the light,
O’er the cold winter-beds of their late-waking roots
The frosty flake eddies, the ice-crystal shoots;
And, longing for light, under wind-driven heaps,
Round the boles of the pine-wood the ground-laurel creeps,
Unkissed of the sunshine, unbaptized of showers,
With buds scarcely swelled, which should burst into flowers
We wait for thy coming, sweet wind of the south!
For the touch of thy light wings, the kiss of thy mouth;
For the yearly evangel thou bearest from God,
Resurrection and life to the graves of the sod!
Up our long river-valley, for days, have not ceased
The wail and the shriek of the bitter northeast,
Raw and chill, as if winnowed through ices and snow,
All the way from the land of the wild Esquimau,
Until all our dreams of the land of the blest,
Like that red hunter’s, turn to the sunny southwest.
O soul of the spring-time, its light and its breath,
Bring warmth to this coldness, bring life to this death;
Renew the great miracle; let us behold
The stone from the mouth of the sepulchre rolled,
And Nature, like Lazarus, rise, as of old!
Let our faith, which in darkness and coldness has lain,
Revive with the warmth and the brightness again,
And in blooming of flower and budding of tree
The symbols and types of our destiny see;
The life of the spring-time, the life of the whole,
And, as sun to the sleeping earth, love to the soul!

Tuesday, April 1, 2008

Soul Cravings

On Saturday I went to the University of Manitoba Campus for Christ fellowship dessert evening. Really I did not know exactly what CFC was about our what they stood for till attended that evening. These university students goal is to change the world. Many from the group are running bible studies and are going on summer projects. The video presentation really moved me. The point of the evening was a fundraiser.

I was given a book called Soul Cravings written by Erwin Raphael McManus. If you can get your hands on a copy please do. I'm really enjoying it. Here is some tid bits that stood out to me from the first chapter called Intimacy.

Your retina may be necessary for sight but your soul shapes what you see.

We cannot live unaffected by love. We are most alive when we find it, most devastated when we lose it, most empty when we give up on it, most inhumane when we betray it, and most passionate when we pursue it.

It's a wonderful thing when your heart guides you to the very One you need the most. The strange thing about God is that the One we deserve the least is the One who desires us the most.

Home is ultimately not about a place to live but about the people with whom you are most fully alive.

It is insanity to run from God and search for love.

You are unique and irreplaceable. You are the object of God's love.

Why is it that so many who represent him are ever so quick to condemn?

That may be the most powerful thing about love. Love gives us a fresh start. Love gives us a reason to live.

Three more chapters to go. Destiny, Meaning and Seek.




Thursday, March 27, 2008

Signing over supper

This evening my Asl 101 class went to Apple bee's. We had such a great time visiting and eating. You know how hearing people talk with a mouth full and it is seen as rude. It doesn't happen with deaf people. There is nothing wrong with signing with a while your chewing. I really can't wait till I can communicate more fluently. Some of the ladies from my class are taking Asl 102. I hope that we all get together soon for another evening like tonight.

Wednesday, March 26, 2008

my first post

Sounds like an appropriate title. You know for it being my first one and all. For some reason I have felt to start blogging. Get my thoughts down and s-t-u-u-f-f. So yeah here we go.

Ok so right now Vee is standing over my shoulder reading what I have down. We're just laughing at it b/c it sounds real lame. Another reason this is so amusing for us is because were a little over tired. She was up at like 3:30 to drive a friend to the airport. But hey we get to keep his car for 2 weeks when he is gone. Snaps for us! Vee should have standard down pat by then. Maybe she will even teach me. As for me my excuse for being tired is that I woke up at 5:30 and then worked 11 hrs.

All and all today was a good day. I worked with a great hca and nurse today. The day went very fast for a Wednesday. Vee and i just got back from the mall. We went to pick up a mother daughter ring that we ordered for my mom's birthday. April, October and January birth stones look really good together. My emerald birthstone sticks out a bit. Oh well. So we got the ring and Driving home Vee got allot of practice starting and stopping due to our little scenic route on the way home. (note to self Dakota does not lead to the Perimeter)

God thankyou for the bright sun and memories that put a smile on my face.