Happy New Year! I hope this finds you happy and healthy and ready for new challenges.
Each year the members of the Thursday Spiritual Journey group choose one word to offer focus to their year. I must admit that I have been fairly lame at this practice. Maybe it's my age? Gasp!!! If the past is any prediction, by June I will have to look back to see what word I chose for that year. So I have been asking myself if this One Little Word idea, often referred to as OLW, works for me at all. Maybe I should stop kidding myself. Or maybe I haven't found the right word. So, I've been considering... what word could inspire me and also bring focus to 2022?
Finally, I decided on a word, and my word is STORY. This year I feel more invested in my decision, more motivated. I hope to look and work through the lens of story this year, and I hope to find some clues to my journey there.
I sometimes feel that my childhood was spent in a fog. Of course I remember certain things, but also I now recognize many issues and situations I had no clue about then. And the thing about fog is, you might come out of it to a beautiful vista, or you might come out to find embarrassment, shock, fear, intensity, etc. Each clearing offers an opportunity to learn, each one offers a challenge.
Here's a story that I don't exactly remember, but has been told to me. When I was about 3, my mother washed the floor, but when she next walked on it she slipped on a wet spot, her feet flew out from under her and she landed on her back. I reportedly said, "Do it again, Mama! Do it again!" Of course I was just a child, and I didn't recognize the possibility of pain or injury. It must have looked like a pratfall to me. And since it certainly didn't happen every day, there must have been an element of novelty to it. My mother did a trick! Do it again, Mama!!!
Sometimes, even at my grandmotherly age, I still feel in a fog and I still misinterpret things. Perhaps we all do under our current conditions. But I'm praying that the fog lifts a little this year, and that stories both past and present will help me discern my path forward in the process.
When I was a child, I spoke and thought and reasoned as a child, but when I grew up I put away childish things. Corinthians 13:11
Margaret Simon wrote: We are gathering again for the first Thursday of each month. This is an open invitation to any blogger who would like to join us. We post on the first Thursday of the month. Each month is hosted by a different blogger. We do not adhere to any specific religious affiliation. We are here to express our thoughts about how our spiritual lives are going.
Join us if you can... read us if you wish... share!
