Skip to main content

inspire (breathe in)

I am doing an online course in spiritual formation. We studied inspiration last week: what breathes life into us? The following is based on an assignment I wrote on that topic.

I love standing outside and watching planes fly overhead (did that 5 minutes ago – YES!!); It makes me think of adventure and being an explorer.
I love walking, running, jumping, and skipping.
I love breathing, stretching, and the feel of clean water on my body.
I especially love mountains and oceans; they make my heart burst with their immensity and raw, unstoppable beauty. I love being small next to them.
I love watching little bugs. Their wee, tiny legs move so fast and they cover so much ground.
I love touching soft fur and rough elephant skin.
I love drinking chai tea and sitting close to Dean. Comfort.
I love moments of silence when I am just a part of the universe without trying to impress anyone.
I love time and the splashes of flavour that squirt from it as it passes.
I love being able to hear and see and smell and taste.
I love the touch of another person’s hands in healing care, so I love going to the dentist and the doctor.
I love going to the bathroom because it is cleansing, like confession.
I love not having to worry and just going with the flow of letting Jesus be in charge.
I love creative, quirky, misunderstood people.
I love the authenticity of someone singing words they believe and live.
I love thinking and reading in the quiet. I also love shouting and dancing.
I love the unexpected. Boo!
I love moving from one house to another. It helps me clear out all the old stuff I don't need anymore and gives me a blank canvas on which to paint, "HOME!"
I love walking on the beach. Ocean is endlessness I can hear.
I love sitting in front of the fireplace.
I love phone calls from people I don’t know.
I love learning. A present in every day.
I love helping people in transition. Not everyone loves change as much as I do, so I try to lighten their load.
I love having conversations with God. He is very interesting and smart. Funny on occasion, too.
I love Church; she is beautiful. So much potential.
I love the me that Jesus made.
I love Life. He breathes into me every second of the day, whether I am aware of it or not.
Inhale!
This is a picture of insubstantial me running around on the beach in Hawaii while the camera does a slow exposure night shot. Probably not the best composition with a crooked palm tree, fire torch, and a garbage can all vying for the centre of the attention, but I like it. Makes me smile!
Labels:

Comments

Shelley said…
I love matte downey's authenticity in her writing. she inpires me.

and matte I love bird by bird...it is hitting me in so many important and healing and challenging ways, i can't even tell you.
most of the time I want to laugh and cry.
thanks for the recommendation or i might not have done it.
12:15 PM
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

comedic timing

Comic by Joel Micah Harris at xkcd.com One of my favourite jokes goes like this: Knock, knock. Who's there? Interrupting cow Interrupting cow w--- Moooooooo!! Timing is important in both drama and comedy. A well-paced story draws the audience in and helps it invest in the characters, while a tale too hastily told or too long drawn out will fail to engage anyone. Surprise - something which interrupts the expected - is a creative use of timing and integral to any good story. If someone is reading a novel and everything unfolds in a predictable manner, they will probably wonder why they bothered reading the book. And so it is in life. Having life be predictable all of the time is not as calming as it sounds. We love surprises, especially good surprises like birthday parties, gifts, marriage proposals, and finding something that we thought was lost. Surprises are an important part of humour. A good joke is funny because it goes to a place you didn't expect it to go. Sim
Post a Comment
Read more

Names of God

The Hebrew word "YHWH" (read from right to left) This past Sunday I gave a talk on the Names of God, the beginning of a series on this topic. This first talk was to be a gentle introduction so I thought it wouldn't take too many hours of preparation. Well, I quickly discovered that the research is almost bottomless; every time I thought I had a somewhat definitive list of names, I found another source which added a few more or gave a different twist on some of the names I had already come across. After several hours I was getting overwhelmed by the sheer amount of data (and that was only looking at the Hebrew Bible). I wondered how I could present this to people in an orderly and accessible fashion and within a reasonable time frame. Not everyone is up for a 3-hour lecture crammed full of detail on a Sunday morning. So I took a break and spent a bit of time meditating on this problem and asking the Spirit for guidance. And then I thought that being overwhelmed by Go
3 comments
Read more

soul refrigerator

I went grocery shopping yesterday and came home with three bags of food. After I unpacked them all, this is what my fridge looked like: really empty. How does that happen? How can I feel so full and ready for any food emergency one moment, and after one quick glance, realise that I have nothing, really? Today is one of those days in my soul as well. I woke up with gratitude and fullness in my heart, ready to take on this day and all the wonderful opportunities that it presented. Then I caught a brief glance of some emptiness in my life and bam - my buoyancy was compromised. For the past few hours I have been treading water, trying to keep my head in a positive space, bobbing in and out of disappointment, and catching myself whining with pathetic indignity at the cement blocks of other people's stupidity that are tangled around my ankles. When I am staring at the empty refrigerator of my soul, these are my thoughts. Where do I go from here? Perhaps I should slam that refrigerator
1 comment
Read more