not yet punditik

image from https://redletterwords.com/ I recently had a session with Florence Achama Ukpabi , a courage and confidence coach on visibility.  It wasn’t a long session – just under an hour, as we got our times mixed up [time zone things], and she had been waiting for me for probably close to an hour. After a questionnaire – that I should have filled up before and sent to her [which then took up more off the hour long session], she asked me what I wanted to talk about.   The issues I brought out were linked already – I do not do things because I fear the inevitable outcome of being visible, and with that comes a strange fear of success, because people – because visibility is made alive in being seen, and people are the ones seeing, and they will have opinions and thoughts.   About me.   Horror me timbers and shake them up. I had told her before, within her group when she run a procrastination personality quiz [ Transformed over Conformed: Courageously & Confidently YOU

Those life moments when you are wondering what’s up with me, what’s going on right now, coz you have that niggling somethingy feeling in a sensing part of you, which tells you, all is not quite right.  And then you kinda, just kinda, see the thought coming from outfield the right side of your brain, curving round the back, coz it knows if it comes in through the front, you might just slam the door shut, and it gusts through the inner-side quarter glass of your mind, that you’d left open just for a little idle wondering.  BAAAAM. Like that that hot afternoon when you are driving down your dusty road, windows down, keeping just a spin ahead of the dust trail, and then that flank wind comes from the side exactly as you ease of the accelerator to slow down a mite, to glide smoothly along the edges of the familiar rut cut in the road that you’ve learned how to take without using the breaks, and BAAAAM, your next breath is dust!   And you step on the break, which allows your dust t

image from www.premierchristianity.com I’m reading my old journals.  And I am looking at my notes for Restless [a study guide by Jenny Allen], precisely the session on suffering.  Coincidentally I am also listening to Jeff Cavins, “When you suffer – Biblical keys to hope and understanding”.  Cavins gives a verse - Colossians 1; I rejoice in my suffering for you sake, and I fill up in my body, that which is lacking in the suffering of Christ.  And also quotes from Pope John Paul II’s February 11,1984 Salvifici Doloris [salvific meaning of suffering], paraphrasing paragraph 27 – What is lacking in the suffering of Christ.  Nothing, but that you can come to know the love of God.  He has made room in His suffering for you to participate.  The springs of divine power gush forth precisely in the midst of human weakness.  Those who share in the sufferings of Christ preserve in their own sufferings a very special particle of the infinite treasure of the world’s redemption and can share

image from Pinterest Recently as I was reflecting on where I am going, and what I am doing, I started wondering about the link between me, my purpose, the process, the path and God’s will. I think of God as Love. And me being His creation, made in His image and likeness must mean I am made for Love, to be Love.   I think of His Will, His Purpose for me, as the actualisation of that Love, and thus as I pray, may Your Will be done on earth - on me - as it is in heaven, it means that I am asking that I actualise that Love.   To reach up into His Will, to live Love, to be Love. This is my purpose. To get there I am on a path. This path is many things.     It is people and relationships, places and spaces, happenings and occurrences, sorrows and struggles, joys and hopes, within me – who is laden with personality, abilities, talents and gifts.   All done my time – which is my life.   It is individual components, coming together almost magically, working together systematically.  

Anthony deMello, Walking on Water – Lord give me the grace to know what to change and to change it, to accept what can't be changed, and the wisdom to know the difference. Acceptance that there are things that cannot be changed is painful.   To realise within the heart, that no matter what one wants, no matter what one does, nothing is going to change.   Of the situation/person/relationship/place/yourself even.   That there are some things one just has to accept as is, let go, resign to them.   Irregardless of how deep one’s longing is, how great one’s hope is, how great one’s faith is, how anguished one’s praying is.   It just will not change.   The pain at that realisation.   The pain.   The anguish to come to that acceptance. And that one’s time, thoughts and actions, efforts and energies would be better used in wise acceptance, or elsewhere all together. And yet elsewhere is not an option. Psalm 136 – 1 [NKJV] Oh, give thanks to the Lord, for He is good! For

image from youtube Many times I have been asked, “how are you”, and the real answer would have been too big for the moment, or the person.  There are moments and people you give platitudes to.   And there are moments and those you do not disrespect thus, and give the honest answer.   Which varies; ·           -  The short truth, ·           -  the long truth [when time allows], ·           -  or the third truth, which is  - my truth right now, is too hard to say, so let it bide a while. First published on my Facebook page

Mother Theresa – God has not called me to be successful; He has called me to be faithful. Faith to me is letting go off me.  My fearful, lazy, self centered, selfish, capricious, disobedient, proud, arrogant, disgraced me.  Letting go of all inadequacies, ignorance, conceit, routine, business as usual, comfort zones.  Embracing my enoughness for what I am made for, and taking one step out of myself.  Asking in the assurance that He will meet me in the second step – where love peace and joy await. Faith for me is selfless love, blind obedience and awe of God.  For His glory and my honour. Lord increase my faith.   To grow to the size of that of a mustard seed.   And my soul shall be healed. Initially published on my FaceBook page. 

image from www.furniturebank.org In the recent past, I've moved a lot, sometimes reluctantly, sometimes eagerly.  Spiritually, soulically and physically.  I have let go of a lot of what I want.  Acquired more, of what I need.  And I hope that it continues.   I pray it dose.  Because, within these actions I have become lighter, bolder, and hardier.  Able to dig into my depths, and similarly reach to new heights.  And in that, still able to leave more of the inconsequential and gather more of the essential.  It never stops.  Off with the old, on to the new, deeper and higher.  And then again.  Replaying on different planes of my life. A result has been the loss of many relationships, or the change in existing ones.   Leaving me lonesome.   Resulting in an initially subconscious search for a “home” for myself.   A place with like minded, like equipped, like purposed people.   That are like me.   To be silent, listen, share and encourage with.   To be with, in this searchin

image from http://tidbitsandtinkerings.com Indulge me - please sing with me…. Father Abraham had many fears, Many fears had Father Abraham, I know some of them.   And so do you.   So let’s just talk them out. One lie…..   Two lies….. Father Abraham had many fears….. Yup it is true.   That man, our father of faith, was still beset with fears.   So how could a man, so graced with faith, have fear? Here is a man, who has talked to God one on one.   Here is a man, who has promises from God.   Here is a man, who has translated this faith in his God, packed up his family, chattels and possessions, and walked out of his known home, the land of his fathers, started a journey into the great big bad world, into where God will show him, to take it into possession, for himself and his descendants - as numerous as the stars - with a barren, but beautiful wife to boot.   Total obedience.   Faith in action.   Trust.   Abraham believed in God.   He believed in God

My desktop for the last two years has been A return to love by Marianne Williamson .  From the time I read it, the start line resonated with me, has resonated with me for a long time.  I have examined fear multiple times; here and here and here , and that is just the tip of the iceberg.  A lot of my fear exams are undocumented.  A return to love starts with, ‘Our deepest fears, is not that we are inadequate.  It is that we are powerful beyond measure.  It is our light and not our darkness that most frightens us’.  The darkness has offered me security in its familiarity.  In fact, I have often reveled in the darkness.  In the darkness, no examination of anything can occur.  And though this has not been comfortable, again there has been an assurance in its familiarity.  Stepping out into the light for me, has happened and has been threefold.  One, it has been an admission and a facing of the latent fears that have held me back.  Stepping into my light has been a journey

About God - why am I stubborn?  Why do I not obey?  Comply? I keep on asking myself this.  And keep on not finding the answer. Not the commandments.  Those are clear.  Thou shall, thou shalt not.  And yes – I flounder even in those – but I am not talking about the commandments now. I’m talking about the other things, the clear nudgings, the loud messages that come to me from God.  In all manner of ways. Why do I not obey?  What is obedience?  Submission, “the action of accepting or yielding to a superior force or to the will or authority of another person”.  Will or authority of God.  Accepting that His wisdom for me is sufficient, His provision for action is sufficient?  That His grace is sufficient? Trusting God?  Easy words to say.  But how to action them?  Consciously and consistently? I know submission to Gods way leads to experiences God’s will in my life.  To the living of His planned purpose for me.  His thoughts are not my thoughts, nor his ways my ways,