Tag Archives: Blessed

Blogroll, Creativity, Friendship, Gratitude, Growing, mindfulness, Personal, Suffering, Uncategorized

Movin’ On Up!

When I was younger, there was a show called “The Jefferson’s”. It was about George and Wheezie Jefferson and their dry cleaning business which after a lot of sacrifice and hard work finally took off and provided them a life that allowed them to “Move On Up,” The theme song was a catchy tune with the following lyrics:

“Fish don’t fry in the kitchen;
Beans don’t burn on the grill.
Took a whole lotta tryin’
Just to get up that hill.
Now we’re up in the big leagues
Gettin’ our turn at bat.
As long as we live, it’s you and me baby
There ain’t nothin wrong with that.

Well we’re movin on up,
To the east side.
To a deluxe apartment in the sky.
Movin on up
To the east side.
We finally got a piece of the pie.”

Movin’ On Up is what we were all created for!

Who are you? What are you going to be when you grow up? Where do you see yourself in the future? All variations of the same question and all almost impossible to truly answer, because we are continually becoming. Life tends to build to moments and moments to renewal and renewal to becoming something totally different.

At this moment, you are a reflection of what you’ve done or not done, where you’ve been or not been and everything experienced and missed has contributed to who, what and where you are right now in this moment. The truly beautiful thing is that in this moment you are ready to head into your next moment and you can be, do and experience whatever you want, if you will just make the decision.

Someone said that we are always one decision away from a totally different life. What I can pretty much assure you is that you were created for so much more than what you are allowing yourself to experience and while life has been building to this moment, this moment is not the end, but the beginning.

This moment is your opportunity to advance, to level up to grow into all that you have been created for. Everything you have been through good and bad, every feeling of up and dow, all the mountain tops and valley experiences have worked together to bring you to this time and place, so that you might go to the next great place of your creating.

God allows us to go low, so that He might take us high. God allows us to wander in the valley, so we might appreciate the breathtaking views from the mountaintops. God allows us to struggle, battle and fight, so that we might develop the strength, wisdom and stamina to go somewhere we’ve never been before.

It’s time to realize and believe once and for all: “What didn’t kill me, has made me stronger!” And the purpose of it all is to help get me to a new, better and more amazing place of living. Enjoy this new day, this new place and all the new blessings that come with it. You are amazing, you are blessed and you are movin’ on up…

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Created For So Much More!

Why are you the way you are? If we are honest with ourselves, we all have things we want to be better in our lives, but wanting is not enough. Some where a long the way, we learned that if things are not working the way we want them to, then it must be someone else’s fault. I call this the “BLAME GAME” and we are great at playing it. We’ve gotten so used to doing it, that we don’t even realize we are doing it and this is what so often gets us caught up in a life that is never ever getting any better in the sense that we were created for so much more.

We were created to bless and be blessed. We were created for success, happiness and fulfillment which comes from having a purpose and chasing after it. When we fail to see these things materialize in our own life, then we often shift to our “bad” training and rather than taking responsibility for ourselves, we begin to play the blame game.

The problem with blaming others is that it keeps us from achieving our created purpose and fulfilling the destiny or our soul through this human experience. The fact is: Everyone that is living this human experience is doing what they know how to do, what they’ve been trained to do by their surroundings and upbringing.

I never knew my biological father. My Mom was living in a very unhealthy and dangerous situation, which she eventually found the strength to get out of. Not long after that, my biological father discovered he had leukemia, which in short order took his life. My Mom eventually got back on her feet through hard work and supportive family and friends. She started to do whatever she had to do to make a life for the two of us to survive. It would have been very easy for her to give up, blame others and not take any responsibility, but she had more than herself to take care of, she had a baby boy, so she did what Mom’s do. She got rid of the excuses, didn’t get distracted by blame and did what she had to do to begin building a life and a future for us.

Eventually she would remarry a very kind, humble and decent man. A man who would adopt me as his very own son and raise me as such. They would eventually bless me with a little sister who was ten years younger than me and we would all grow up to be one big happy and often dysfunctional family.

Now what you don’t see, read or understand in that story is that interwoven all through it was a lot of ups and downs. We have had our fair share of mountain tops, but also walked through more valleys than we care to share. Life has been a challenge, but a good challenge as far as any of us are concerned and what hasn’t killed us, most definitely has made us stronger. We have struggled, faced heartache, experienced loss and gone through things that we would rather not talk about, but at the end of the day, it hasn’t been anyone else’s fault, just our experience and we are better, closer and stronger for it.

Life isn’t fair. Sometimes it sucks and many times along the way, it just isn’t any fun at all, but if we choose, we can learn from it all. If we will make sure to not get distracted by playing the blame game and just accept what happens as it happens, then we can learn from it, grow because of it and embrace the challenge that it brings our way, because it’s true – you really were created for so much more…

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Positive Social Media!

“If You Can’t Say Something Nice…”

Social Media is a place for me to share my life with family and friends. I enjoy letting folks know about my everyday human challenges and what they are teaching me.

I am grateful for my blessings, especially getting to cook, feed and share fellowship with those that I love. I love our great big crazy family that is all over the place, but always right at home whenever we are together.

I do my best to stay out of politics, although I can assure you that I most definitely have an opinion, but I learned a long time ago that it’s not worth arguing over.

I don’t air my dirty laundry, frustrations or disappointments in others, because let’s face it – there is already enough negativity in the world and if I’ve got a problem with you, that’s worth my time, then it’s worth a face to face conversation and it really isn’t anyone else’s business.

I love taking pictures and letting others get a glimpse of some of the things that intrigue, excite and challenge me. My new wrinkles, an adventure with one of our dogs, another nature discovery, what I am getting ready to eat or just something that caught my eye are all fair game to be captured in a photograph.

I’m not anything special, just a middle aged guy, who is learning that I still have so much to learn and my best learning, seems to have occurred through my shared experiences with others. I decided a number of years ago that if I can’t keep it positive on social media, then it would be time to get off, which is why through the years, there has been a break here or there, but I usually find my way back and have managed for the most part to keep it fun, encouraging and hopefully challenging.

Thank you to each of you that are a part of my social media tribe. I love seeing your life and learning from your posts. I hope that 2020 will be an amazing year of blessing and growth for all of us and that social media will do her part to help us along the way…