i write to believe.

One of the things I'm trying to get myself to do is to have a consistent prayer life.  It's a must have.  Over the years I've realized that compared to night caps, vice, and impulsive shopping, there is no better way to find peace of mind than a good hour of silence and prayer.   I've often likened my writing life to my prayer life.  It comes and goes.  Like the ebb and flow of tides.  I lose the anchor and I drift like a log floating aimlessly at sea.  When this happens I know I've either not written enough or not prayed enough.   This afternoon I come across someone who has known the importance of prayer.  His name is Joey Cumagun and he was my highschool professor.  He is known as the Praying Runner and his blog is a tribute to the sport of running in memory of his wife who passed away early this year after battling 11 years of breast cancer.  I am moved by his honesty and his transparency to share the grief he goes thr...

Today I was much enlightened by Paul's letter to the Romans. Brothers and sisters: If you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.  For one believes with the heart and so is justified, and one confesses with the mouth and so is saved. The Scripture says, No one who believes in him will be put to shame. There is no distinction between Jew and Greek; the same Lord is Lord of all, enriching all who call upon him. For everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved. The moments I call on God's name are few.  The conscious effort to remember that these words are alive and are a testament from believers of ancient days are not enough.  But this morning's Eucharist helped me realize that I am grateful for so very little.  Gratitude isn't something I practice regularly.  At most I often think that I should be receiving gratitude for all the difficult things I put...

Dear Saint Rita, I watched a movie that told the story of your life yesterday and I felt moved by your immense capacity to love.   Your love manifested like God's with different faces.  Your love for your husband who was a difficult man.  You endured the jagged edges of his character and did not give up until his soul was saved.  You preferred that your sons be taken away at such a young age than have them grow up in a society that loomed with so much vendetta.  You loved by letting go.  You loved by embracing people's thorns.  You loved like Christ. With this love you were enflamed with such an ardent longing to be one with the Savior of the world.  The Incarnate Word who remained faithful to you until the end of your life.  Today I reflect upon the story of your life and long for the same love to overwhelm me and captivate me.  So much of my misery in this world is caused by a lack of love and therefore a lack of understand...

I have been reading Heather King's latest book entitled Shirt of Flame this weekend.  I've felt it finally calling me and found myself hungrily absorbing all the words.  I somehow hit a low spot after a busy week and found myself asking those questions again that led me to wondering what am I really supposed to do in this life?   The awful feeling of being locked in on a circumstance that is beyond my control puts me in a situation greatly in need of contemplation.  So I find myself wading in her words that allow me to feel what I'm feeling and learn how to be comfortable with the tensions that normally come with growing up.  Here are a few of my favorites so far. ...Yes, I'm deeply grateful to be sober and to have been supported by a job as a lawyer for a time, but it's not for me.  I can't and won't do such work anymore, and if I have to be thought of as a quitter, disappoint my parents, bewilder my [now ex-] husband, and possibly beco...

I find myself searching for words this morning.  Unable to quite define what I'm feeling after such an overflow of literary thought last weekend.  I dived into this week in a different rhythm.  There is so much to do and I'm still trying to learn how to be graceful about everything.   Delayed schedules on newsletter printing.  Delayed artwork for laid out pages.  Last minute changes on photos and editing.  I'm missing a half-beat.  I'm losing the rhythm.  But I suppose this is how it really is.  Printing publication materials isn't an easy.  Creating content to describe life at work in a busy organization is complicated.  But for someone who wants to see life chronicled in pages and words it shouldn't be a problem.   I'm realizing that a writer's world is more than just scratching words on paper or reading carefully crafted prose from another's thoughts.  It's more than the act of writing itself.  It's...

It took me a week to finally choose a poem I resonated with among the six poems I was assigned to reflect on through the ancient practice of sacred reading called  lectio divina .  The experience of being in a writing course (albeit online) has given me the liberation to explore the power of words and unearth the gift I know I've long locked within.  The gift of realizing I have the same power as well. My writing process was a painful unraveling.  I could not write immediately.  I could not catch the thought and pin it down on paper.  I tried reading other books that would get the flow of creativity going and to no avail the anxiety caught on and forced me to take a break.  So I did.  And went back on it again this weekend.  I had to recalibrate my mind for 2 hours.  Removing the residue of the business mind that forces me to constrict my definitions of life in a less human sounding voice.  I began my  meditatio  o...

Sometimes I forget that I've actually seen beautiful places.  When I forget, my world suddenly feels too small.  I immediately feel limited.  What becomes magnified are the stressful situations that eat up the peace I try to pursue everyday.  This morning, I was thinking to myself that I need to learn how to be more decisive about my choices.  I ran into the Happiness Project Blog by Gretchen Rubin from a feed in Facebook linking me to an article about writing tips from Flannery O'Connor .  It would be a good project to do for this coming year.   On my way to work I was telling myself that I needed to know how to respond to situations without being overpowered by the circumstance.  The past few months have extremely been busy and getting myself anchored back to my center has been a big challenge.  I noticed that some people have it easier and it's because they're able to choose the way they respond to situations .   This mor...