Life, like the contents in a worn oil skin, seeps out daily. Each second mounting to minutes, hours, days, weeks, months and years, the leaking oil running out till the end of time. Life once spent on earth cannot be regained! Every day drawing nearer to the end, wherever that exit be on the earthly journey….
Time is life!
Who is spending your life? Life is precious, as can be seen when someone is bleeding away and fears escalate of imminent death. Life quantified in time, therefore implies ineffective use of time is ineffective use of life!
If my life is quantified as oil in a jar, what would I use the oil for?
Every life matters, guard your moments, guard your time, guard your life from being misspent! You only live once! True freedom includes freedom from life wasters!
What activities, interactions or relationship is using up your life purposelessly?
Waves of panic swept in, washing out thoughts of an exciting journey. We had planned this trip for years, with the assurance of our tour guides making our adventure safe and thrilling.
The middle aged man feeding us details of the historic city with its iconic buildings, suddenly began to stutter as beads of sweat broke out on his face, his eyes darting back and forth, frantic to find an exit from the old ruins. His partner responded breathless and hurriedly, in the local dialect, what seemed to be suggestions. An uneasy quiet chilled the excited chatting in the group to silence. An elderly lady paled and began trembling with beads of sweat pouring from her face, mirroring our guide. We feared she would pass out!
Recognising anxiety as a cue to implement action for ensuring safety measures, avert danger and promote healthy living, is important for the holistic well being of each person and those around. Children are on a life journey, a place they’ve never been, looking up to parents and adults around them for assurance and safety, through the twisty unknown paths.
Anxiety inevitably sets in for the young ones, when carers are unable to give clarity in uncertain seasons. Fear becomes overwhelming and sometimes paralyzing for tourists when the tour guides are obviously anxious and scared. Tour guides need help too.
There are seasons in life when answers are not clear cut. Leaders still need to lead at these times. Assurance for followers may be provided with truth and leaders clarifying with not having the answers yet but working on solutions, encouraging followers to focus on what may be controlled as focusing on uncontrollable factors tend to make anxiety take charge.
Changes in seasons of life are easier navigated by vulnerable persons, especially children, when adults, parents, carers and leaders in various capacities are able to guide whilst containing their own emotions.
Yes, adults and leaders too are prone to emotional distress. Engaging appropriate strategies, reaching out for help, embracing support will limit the risk of anxiety and fear spilling to others looking to them for needed support. Let’s focus on the things within our control and keep anxiety within healthy limits by not focusing on things we cannot change
Gifts and talents all around us, are asking for help to bloom and grow. Like diamond chunks disregarded as coal, children’s best may lie unseen for years or never show.
Screams and yells may be cries for help to be set free. “I need to run, but there’s no room” or skillful artists without “tools” may resort to “defacing” surfaces. Unrecognized actors and actresses have not infrequently been described as melodramatic.
KYC, please know your child. It does take time, listening and more. Engaging in activities besides old school, mingling with mates and families too, helps to give room to see their talents manifest. Seeing the seeds then helps to know the best conditions to uniquely bloom and grow.
No one would give food to a child, with a known risk of an allergic reaction. So please avoid undue triggers that rouse emotional diarrhoea or make them groan from tummy stones. Of course children do try it on! Discernment is key when it is real or just a ‘deal’.
Embracing support from healthy sources, helps the journey of parenting and parent-teens. A healthy diet from healthy support groups, will strengthen carers toward a fulfilling role, in spite of inevitable challenges. Professional help may sometimes be needed, please don’t refrain to ask for help – A stitch in time save nine!
Everyone kept cheering “you can do it, you can do it”. The words floated over my head, above my thoughts of desperation for a break from this race and a longing to quit! Yes, quit. I wished I would pass out, get injured, desperate for anything to justify ending this breath draining challenge.
Suddenly, the cheering went deeper in my mind and a new thought floated: every step draws you closer to you goal, focus on just one next step. I did. The race became easier, the weight was less of so much left to accomplish. One step a time with all my might, as best I could and I found myself at the finish line.
What thought is holding you back from attaining your desired goal(s)? What thought(s) would set you free from limiting beliefs?
I had been looking forward to sunshine, the weather forecast had also reassured me. Suddenly it began to pour. It didn’t even start with a drizzle, it seemed to be a flood! My heart dropped as I pictured my plans crashing!
I reminded myself that I couldn’t do anything about the weather outside, as I watched the fierce downpour drowning my dreams. I knew I had the freedom to choose my response, I could give in to gloomy thoughts or make room for brighter ones, noting what I could not change.
I determined to reset my inner thermostat to a setting that would do me good. I cancelled my plans, got comfy in my zone and did some writing that kept me smiling as I poured my heart on paper. I had no way of changing the weather outside, but I had the freedom to accept the things I couldn’t change and change what I could for my good. What thoughts are you dwelling on? Are the thoughts helpful or harmful? What thoughts would be healthier to embrace?
Fear had become a constant companion, this was deadly fear! Treading land mines daily in a petrified state was paralyzing. Initially it had felt like walking on egg shells, and within months progressed to fears of an explosion, doubtless that any eruption could escalate to fatality!
There were good things at times, it seemed, but were they worth the price of living terrified? “The little foxes spoil the vine”, a phrase she had heard from childhood years, often came to mind.
The vine seemed to have become increasingly worthless. She had grown to know the foxes by name: intimidation, threats, and manipulation coming in regularly and lies and deceit were the most frequent ones. Anger had taken permanent residence for the past few years, with short lived respite only when it slept.
An exit strategy was required, hopes of a fruitful vine was clearly a delusion. The dilemma was how? how? how? without rousing anger and killing dreams for life and freedom. It was time to make a plan, a careful plan with safety prioritized, best done with help, for time was fast running out and anything could happen any minute or second. She recalled someone had once mentioned a “net” that could help. One minute more could be too late. https://www.hotpeachpages.net
It’s your car, a birthday gift. You are to drive it as often as you choose, wherever you will. At times, there is a need for another to be at that wheel, to help the car perform better or the owner to get required rest.
Life has a purpose.
You may find a helper, at times of need, steering your gift not as you will or heading a different way than you desire. The gift being misused, may be termed abnormal use or better shortened to the word “abuse“.
It’s function is unique for every one, no two people are exactly same. The gift wears out with every breath and if it’s spent not as designed, would have been used, for anything but its purpose.
Like good car care, it’s always worth checking the gift is used as should. Fear and doubt are known to have been allowed in taking over a driver‘s seat, aborting dreams and purposeful living. Taking care of the precious gift of life, is taking charge of how it is spent. A daily check may be to ask, “who is in the driver’s seat of my life?” Then also ask “Who should be there?“
There were no scars seen by the eyes, so it was hard to describe. The intense pain and scars too deep, had no rating, as none with eyes could see. The wounds failed to heal for repeated trauma and got reinforced too, with verbal abuse that knocked self worth and resilience failed to thrive. It was hard to get help from hospitals or any source for these invisible scars, so most victims keep quiet till the end whatever that may be?
Like an occult bleed from hidden cancer, many are losing blood daily. Their lives ebbing, suffering and smiling, in fear they wake and sleep. The smiles may be terse for pain restricts the fulness of life in them. Sometimes the exuberance is used to veil the wounds they fear be seen. The world uhs and ahs when suddenly they flee from unspoken agony, to realms unseen, having bled to death from injuries deep within.
Emotional trauma is real! The abuser not being ‘aware’ does not reduce the detrimental impact of the assault. Coercive control kills and is still killing, in homes, at work and various settings. Abuse in any form is dangerous and unjustifiable in any way, else it would be justifying early deaths and children orphaned too.
There’s hope while there is life, it just has to be right. So please never give up as long as you have breath. Reasons that hold many captive have answers to help out. Bone and skin doctors don’t treat hearts and friends can’t treat cancer, so it’s best to contact specialist help so life is not made worse. Click here for your local help agency.
It’s so much fun to clap, clap, clap, the more the bobbin gets wound up. My clinical supervisor’s inspiring, care filled words, have stayed with me through the years. Her words of wisdom helping me see through dark seasons in children’s lives. The words have also been a refreshing reminder for me to always mind the gap and to help others do the same.
I have reflected frequently on those golden nuggets, one of many she dropped for me, which have helped me on life’s journey. These particular nuggets have been a great help, especially when engaging with children with various challenges and trying to get to the roots of problems causing distress to families, carers and professionals.
I had been taking about resilience in children, to which she softly responded, “even an elastic band has its limit”. Profound. That comment has been a great help for me in supporting children who have been stretched to “snap, snap, snap” changing the joyful tune of the song. thankfully, we have been able to clap again in most cases. I reflected that everything has its capacity or limitation, beyond which healthy functioning or beneficial purpose begins to decline or cease. Economists describe this principle as the law of diminishing returns.
Every child is unique and no matter how resilient a child is, there is a limit beyond which stretching becomes detrimental. Encouraging a child to aspire for high goals, is therefore best done acknowledging the child’s strengths, weaknesses and capacity. A healthy process also requires ensuring the weaknesses don’t impede the strengths and the strengths are not stretched to snapping point.
It brings to mind louder applause for athletes, as their stamina and skills gleam. The noisy joyful clapping stops abruptly, when unfortunately something snaps, a tendon, a muscle or even the mind. Please let’s support children and indeed everyone, in clapping and not snapping. Let’s be encouraged to help support children in healthily attaining their unique potential in every way. #Parentsbeware #childrensnaptoo #thebest4children
What does your child do that makes you clap? What could make your child snap?
Omolola saw all the warning signs. Attempts at resuscitation seemed futile. She knew she needed to accept this was final, except something supernatural happened, like cases in the mortuary that unexpectedly stirred with life. She braced her mind with determination to accept the truth. Letting out a huge breath, she thought, “when it’s dead it’s dead, hard though it may be to accept”.
The living dead
Acknowledging the truth did not stop her going back to the sepulchre, at times when she felt pain from decades of her life dead and gone, “hmm..just like that” and hopes of her beautiful dreams shattered. How had she not known it would end like this? Visiting the sepulchre was like going to a dead end job and making no plan to break away.
Encouragement from friends and family to move on was hard for her to embrace. She smiled to herself, thinking her feeling stuck was sadly like romancing the dead. She knew she had to cut off this unhealthy emotional tie, that tormented her mind. The time for change had come else it would be more time wasted. She decided to take the next step to move on and leave the sepulchre.
#Livingfree #Befreeindeed
What dead situation or false hopes are you holding on to?
It may often feel there’s so much more needed, for life to be a brighter place. A solitary star can only give so much light, compared to many stars shining bright. The world would be brighter with more light whilst helping others to shine brighter too. “It only takes a spark to get the fire glowing…”
The moon and sun give light in different ways at different times so shine as ‘you’. Be happy to be ‘you’.
Let your light shine!
Start where you are, with what you have, as best you can. The best step towards your dream goal is the first step at every step. The journey of a thousand miles is made of steps, take the first and at every point take the first.
Help others too. “You Can Have Everything In Life You Want, If You Will Just Help Enough Other People Get What They Want.” – Zig Ziglar Helping others shine may be the extra light you need on your path
Invest in relevant resources towards your desired goal(s). The right food for the body keeps if growing healthy, feeding the mind with relevant resources makes the dream a reality. There is always a price to pay and risks to take.
Network with people who have attained your goal(s) and people going where you desire. It helps to avoid time wasting mistakes. “He that walketh with wise men shall be wise: but a companion of fools shall be destroyed”. Proverbs 13:20 KJV
Enjoy each phase of the journey, to keep you persevering. So, find joy in every stage. Celebate the victories, even if they be small wins. Embrace the lessons from failure with joy, knowing they are lessons for improvement. Infuse activities with fun, like calm soothing background when engaging in a difficult task. Enjoyment fuels endurance, helps to stay focused and keep moving closer to that desired goal.
