Our Inner Garden...

Seeds, there are many kinds of seeds, they mostly come from plant life, seeds that are good for food, medicine and beauty. There are also bad seeds, honestly in nature there are no "bad plants", only the ones we don't wish to reap, such as weeds, noxious plants, invasive plants, poisonous plants, thorny plants...

If you plant watermelon seeds, you expect to get a watermelon vine, hopefully with watermelon fruit, if you plant corn seeds, you expect to get corn stalks with corn growing on them... how silly would it be to plant okra and expect to see peas growing??? What if we plant weed seeds, or if we don't cultivate our little piece of ground to remove the weed seeds that blow in from neighboring fields?  Then the good seeds we plant may be choked out by the weeds. The good seeds and plants can be delicate, they need tender loving care to sprout, grow and produce fruit. The weeds are hearty, they don't require care, in fact many thrive on stony, uncultivated, dry, hardened, ignored ground, they will steal the sun, moisture and nutrients that should be going toward your good crops.

There are other kinds of seeds, the ones we sow with our minds, our thoughts, our intentions and words. Make no mistake, what you sow you WILL reap. What kinds of thoughts go through your mind on a daily basis? Are they negative in nature? Even if you don't speak the words or perform an action, negative thoughts are just like weed seeds, and if you allow it free run of your mind, then this is what you will reap. Negative thoughts breed negativity in life, what do you think when you see yourself in a mirror? Are you thinking "I'm fat", "I'm too skinny", "I'm ugly", "I'm stupid", "My nose is too big", you get the idea... these are seeds that you are planting in your mind, seeds that will grow and choke out the good that you have inside.

How about changing those thoughts to positive ones, good seeds, things that will nourish you and make you smile? You can start out easy if you wish, find something you like about yourself and concentrate on that, no one is ugly, God created you and His creations are beautiful, there are many ways you can focus on the positive things, and saying them, even in the privacy of your own mind, it WILL create a beautiful garden inside of you, once you have that going on, that beauty will show to the world.

You can plant seeds in other people as well, how to you talk to other people? Especially those who are the closest to you? Sometimes our words are painful to the ones we love, it's not that we intend to cause pain, but words can hurt or words can build someone up, which are you doing? Do your words make your mate (or child or friend) smile or shrink away?

One of the best things I learned from PB was how to be kind, being in a relationship isn't a competition, we are on the same team, on the same side, it's us against the world. He goes out of his way to compliment me on a daily basis, if the kitchen is a wreck and I clean the stove, when he comes in, he doesn't point out the dishes in the sink or the dirty towels on the floor, he points to the stove and tells me what a good job I did on cleaning that. Guess what that makes me want to do??? It makes me feel good about myself and makes me want to please him even more.

Meals are the same way, he ALWAYS compliments me on the meals I make, even the ones that flop, he finds SOMETHING good to say about it. This taught me the value of words, he taught me the power of words. It took me a little time, but I consciously began to compliment PB more and more, at first it felt funny, forced, I meant what I was saying but I wasn't used to saying it that often, but as time went by it became easier and more natural, seeing how it makes him feel is my reward, that in turn makes him want to please me more.

It becomes a cycle, he makes me feel good, I make him feel good, we both feel good, it makes both of us want to be on the same team together, us against the world. Don't wait for your mate (or child, or friend) to start either, YOU start it and continue doing it, planting one seed will not a garden make, especially if you are also spreading noxious weed seeds, you need to plant lots and lots of positive seeds by saying nice, gentle things, compliments and stop spreading the weed seeds in there, even if you think your mate is throwing weeds toward you, if you are persistent, the good seeds will kill out the negative ones, don't forget that after you plant these seeds of good, you need to nurture them, planting them then ignoring them doesn't work very well, you must give them TLC and love.

So look at your inner garden, what is planted, what is growing? Is it weedy? Do you need to plant some positive seeds? Do you need to cultivate the soil? Do you need to remove some weeds?

Contentment

Where am I now?

contentment  
con·tent·ment [kuhn-tent-muhnt]
noun
1. the state of being contented; satisfaction; ease of mind.
2. Archaic. the act of making contentedly satisfied.
Origin: 1400–50; late Middle English contentment; Middle French.
Synonyms 1. See happiness.

World English Dictionary content 2 (kənˈtɛnt)  adj
1. mentally or emotionally satisfied with things as they are 
2. assenting to or willing to accept circumstances, a proposed course of action, etc — vb
3. ( tr ) to make (oneself or another person) content or satisfied: to content oneself with property — n
4. peace of mind; mental or emotional satisfaction

This is something I generally am, I know not the best grammar, but it's true, while we can't always control what is going on around us, we do have absolute control over HOW we react to things. Oh sure I can get angry, but my set point is contented, happy, calm... I can even get excited about things, being excited isn't necessarily a positive or negative thing, you can get excited and cause yourself damage (emotionally and physically) if you all it to rule your life. 

I am not into zen stuff, but if I were, I think I'd make a great zen person, instead I'm zen for God. :) I know things happen, sometimes good, sometimes not so good, but it's all for the betterment of ourselves. Yes, even the seemingly negatives that pop up in our lives, these tests, these roadblocks, I feel like everything happens for a reason, and even that seemingly negative experience is a growing and learning experience for me.

For example, you are on your way to work, you are running late, everything is slowing you down, you are working on your "excuse" you will give your boss, it's starting to rain, oh great... then you have a flat tire, ughhhhhh! You have to stop, hopefully you know how to change a tire, have all the necessary tools or you might have to call for help, either way, now you are really late for work... you could be thinking to yourself, wondering why it ALWAYS happens to you? 

So, now you are back on the road, you've called in to work to let them know why you aren't there yet, then as you come around the corner on the freeway, there is a huge backup of traffic, there has been a major wreck... soooo if you hadn't had that flat tire, you would have been speeding through there in a tizzy right at the time of the wreck. So all of those things that were blocking you from getting to work on time, probably just saved your life, or at the very least saved you from a wrecked car and possibly a wrecked life.

I can tell you that sort of thing has happened to me more than once, there was a time when I was looking at getting a pretty huge financial settlement, for 3 years this went back and forth with lawyers, meetings and such... eventually it all came down to one thing and that wasn't in my favor, it wasn't right, it should have been in my favor, but God did me a favor by not allowing me to "win" that settlement... I guarantee you that if I had won that settlement and gotten even a percentage of what I was expecting, I wouldn't be where I am now, I would be living quite a different life and I don't think it would have been nearly as good as I have it now.  

I enjoy my life, I am happy, more importantly I am content, what about you? If not, what would it take to get you into that state?

The Good, The Bad and The Overrated

I watched an interesting documentary a few hours ago, it's called

Angels, Aliens & UFOs

This is basically a show about seeing things through video cameras that the naked eye cannot see, things such as lights, orbs, shapes, shadows and such. At first I wasn't very impressed, the images and videos tended to be blurry and quite frankly I couldn't see what they said they were seeing, but it did get better as it went on.

Here is a preview of the show

Some of the things I saw in the video were pretty close to the things I see, the shadow on the building, some of the lights going across the sky, I also liked that the host of the show referred to scripture, it wasn't all "new age" or full of "let's meet our alien brothers"...

I watched this on NetFlix, I am enjoying a free month of use then I'll most likely cancel my membership, or I might keep it for a while like I did before, at least until I run out of shows I want to watch, this is my second free month they have offered to me.

I'd say if you aren't a NetFlix subscriber, it would be worth getting the free month just to watch this show.

I noticed it didn't have good reviews, I gave it a 5 star rating, for what it was it was pretty good, much better than the ghost hunting shows on TV nowdays. 

I have pretty much stopped watching the ghost hunting shows, I used to enjoy watching Ghost Hunters, especially the first few seasons, they seemed to be pretty genuine back then, they actually had shows where they found nothing, or they found normal explanations for what was thought to be paranormal activity.

Then, slowly over time, they would find something paranormal in each and every show, maybe their target audience didn't like seeing them find nothing, maybe they quit showing the investigations where they found nothing or found normal answers... I don't know what happened but it got to be very predictable and quite frankly boring... I still catch the show every now and again, but I make no special effort to watch it.

I couldn't stand all the other ghost hunting shows that cropped up after Ghost Hunters, I would watch then a time or two, most of them were a joke, filled with bad night vision distorted face cams of screaming investigators running away when anything so called "paranormal" happened... 

I had all but given up on those kinds of shows, I didn't bother even looking at the more strange ones, there's one out now about southern hicks hunting ghosts, and yet another about swampland rednecks hunting ghosts, another that combines ghost hunting with gold mining... I am glad there is enough interest in this subject to warrant people trying to make these really bad shows... I just can't watch them though...

Until a couple of weeks ago, I was at my neighbor's house doing some laundry, I turned on the TV and on one of the channels was a show called Haunted Collector, I had heard about it but really thought it would be just too far out for me, I watched one segment and part of another, I couldn't believe it, but I found myself wanting to see the rest of the show, so I found it online and watched it. Today I was doing laundry there again and they were having a marathon of this show, I watched a couple of the episodes and so far I like it, they don't run screaming every time something happens, they seem to do quite a bit of research on the location they are working, and they seem to be pretty normal people with real feelings, they don't come across as fake, they also don't jump to conclusions.

I'll be investigating this show more closely.

Where Have I Been?

All righty, here I am again, it's been way too long and I've been way too busy to write here, that is just not right, I know there are a few of you who check here on a semi-regular basis waiting for me to come back and get busy writing here... well here I am, sorry for the absence.

Soooo, you might wonder what I've been up to lately, since my dad passed away, I haven't really had any sort of visitation from him, please understand I'm not LOOKING for it either, my prayer to God about this is "if it's Your Will, then let it happen, if not then so be it"... I prayed it once and let it go, I don't feel like asking for it over and over, even saying "if it's Your Will" is a good thing to do, if it happens then it happens, if not, then it doesn't.

That was the attitude I had about my mother, and it was 4-5 years after her death before I had any sort of encounter with her, it happened in a dream, we had a discussion and she told me how I could contact her again if I ever wanted to, the funny thing is I haven't wanted to, I haven't felt the need, I am not going to seek it, but if it happens again, then so be it, the visit was very spontaneous and that's how I prefer it to be, not me seeking it.

I sometimes feel what I think is my dad's presence, or at least I wonder if he's around, it happens most often when I am singing alone, I wish he could have been able to see me now, leading our music services in church, singing out loud and playing the piano. I would like to think that he is getting to experience it a little now. He knew I was doing this before he passed away, but he never got to hear me singing or leading in the church.

I have to tell you that I come from a very musical as well as artistic family, we have very creative and talented people in my family, and quite frankly that intimidated me quite a bit growing up. I had no idea if I could sing or not, I liked singing OK, I just wouldn't do it if I thought anyone could hear me. I also do some art, drawing and painting, that's not as intimidating, I can show an art piece without having to "perform", I've already done all the hard work, all I have to do is stand next to it.

Fortunately I've found my inner crooner and I'm not as afraid to sing out loud. There are a couple of songs my dad wrote, I remember him singing them in church when I was a little girl, he also played the guitar. I have been working on learning these two songs and hope to have the nerve to perform them in front of the church, soon! I have been practicing singing these songs before church starts, I purposely wait for a few people to be around, I need to learn to sing solo no matter how many people can hear me. It's also hard to sing these songs because of the emotional connection I have to them, it's hard to get through the song without crying, and I don't know about you, but I can't sing if I'm crying.

OK, so a few months ago I had a dream with my dad in it, I don't believe it was really him though, but if it was him, I hope he was OK with my reaction and understands why I had the reaction I did. I dreamed I was in his house, in his bedroom, there were 2 twin beds in there, on the one farthest from me I could detect someone laying in the bed covered up, then he uncovered, it looked like my dad, but he looked so old and frail, he turned over to look at me, almost pleading with me to come over to him... in the dream I knew he was supposed to be dead and my reaction was to rebuke whatever that was, I yelled at it to go away, I yelled that you are supposed to be dead. His face was so pitiful, I turned away and began praying to God asking Him why I was seeing this, why was I being subjected to this... then I awoke.

The reason I don't believe it was really my dad, I don't think he would retain the look of a dying person, he would have no reason to continue looking sick, old and frail, I imagine he would take on the form of a much younger man, healthy and vital, he wouldn't be begging for help, I fully believe this was a trick of the devil, trying to fool me into feeling sorry for whatever "it" was and trying to help it, causing me to become entangled in whatever that thing was.

I haven't had anything like that happen again. I am still waiting, but not seeking a visit or connection.

Another dream I had a few nights ago, I dreamed about my grandfather (from  my mother's side), I wouldn't say I forgot what he looked like, but considering the last time I saw him in living color was when I was a teenager, I don't know if this was really anything or not, but it was certainly good to see his face, to hug his neck and tell him I love him.

This last month has been a month for dreams, usually my dreams are nonsense, sometimes just fun, but I rarely dream about the people I know, when I do there is usually a reason behind it. I did have one more dream that was significant, but I'll save it for another post.

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The Flash

Here's something interesting that happened a few days ago, I am a caretaker for a friend, it's a real paying job, yeah I get paid to visit, clean, cook and shop with my friend... I was at her place, it was evening, the sun was going down, it was just dark enough to begin turning on your headlights, but it was still plenty light enough to see everything pretty clearly. We were standing by my truck, she was talking, I was looking around and suddenly I saw a bright BRIGHT flash, it was bright enough to wash everything out, there were no shadows, no nothing but light, it lasted a microsecond and was gone. I looked at my friend who continued talking as if nothing had just happened, so I waited until she finished her sentence and I asked her if she had just seen something strange, she looked at me so funny and said yes, she had just seen a flash but thought it was just her eyes playing tricks, she has had cataract surgery this last year and it's not uncommon to have the occasional visual blip, she didn't say anything because she thought it was just her and I didn't seem to react.

We stood there for the next 15 minutes describing the same thing to each other. We live in a very VERY rural area, there is no traffic, we are miles and miles from the main road and it's not in line of sight, there are mountains and trees all around us, the sky was clear, we have practically no airplanes or helicopters during the day, and all but none in the evening going into night. I don't know what it was, there was no sound associated with it, it was just a very bright flash, I just realized that there was not an after image like you would see if someone used a flashbulb in your face, it wasn't centralized, it was as if the air flashed but it wasn't in any particular place. The sky was clear, there was the tiniest bit of breeze, we typically have pretty low humidity, there are no other neighbors around that could have caused it (car headlights or porch lights...), oh and it wasn't my vehicle or hers.

Who knows what it was, I do see flashes like this on a semi-regular basis, both inside and outside, this is the first time someone else was with me and saw it too, I might see it once a month or less often. I can't help but to think of that movie "The Matrix", perhaps it's a glitch in the program and we just happened to be in the right/wrong place at the right/wrong time...

Good Bye Daddy

Here I am, back and feeling better than ever. The last post I posted was about my dad, for those of you who read my other blog, you know that my dad passed away on July 30th, it was good, well as good as a death can be. Let me tell you about it.

Two days after writing my last post here that I had gotten back home, Sunday right after church, I received a phone call from my sister telling me that her hubby and their daughter were on their way to pick me up, I had 7 hours to get ready to go back to Fort Worth. I had been home for a week and one day.

I packed a bag, made some phone calls to let people out here know I would be gone for another little bit, and I waited for my brother in law and niece to arrive. They got here about midnight, I met them at the entrance to my neighborhood, kissed my hubby goodbye and started out on an overnight drive. We arrived in Fort Worth about 8ish in the morning, we went directly to the hospital. I went straight to my dad's room but was only able to stay less than a minute, the hospice people were there and wanted to talk to the family. Those few seconds I was in dad's room, I don't believe he even knew I was there, he had on a full face mask bi-pap machine, it assists in breathing. I couldn't see his face very clearly, and I was sure he couldn't see me, at least not enough to recognize me. He didn't respond at all to me walking in the room.

The hospice nurse told us that it would be next to impossible for us to take him home to die, something my dad wanted to do but had rejected the idea when we brought it up to him before, when he would have been healthy enough to make the trip back to his house. He balked at the idea of having hospice, I suppose it's not easy to accept the idea that one is about to die, he felt like he had more things to do.

We agreed that he would stay at the hospital and began calling family members and friends to come in and say goodbye. We knew he wouldn't see the end of the day. Within an hour or so, that room at the hospital, it was a cardiac ICU, was filled with people, friends, family, neighbors, it was amazing the number of people who showed up. Once the whole family was there (with the exception of 2 family members who were out of town), I told everyone to go outside into the hallway, I had each family member go into the room by themselves to say their final goodbyes. I am so thankful that we had the time and opportunity to do that. I didn't go in and talk to him alone, I had spent days and nights with him before and had already said everything that needed to be said in private.

As the day wore on, more and more people showed up, I am so thankful for the hospital, North Hills Hospital for allowing us to have so many people there, the room was full, we were spilling out into the hallway, and they never once said anything about having too many people there. I suppose they see a lot of people pass with no family or friends there. In fact, during the time I was there before, spending nights up there with dad, I had gone out into the hallway, it was dark and quiet. There had been a door to a room down the hall, there was a sign on the door that said "no visitors, see the nurse's desk", the room door was shut and no one went in or came out. Later that night, I saw the staff going into the room and quietly removing the patient, an older lady, they had her in a body bag, they had placed a hand made crocheted (granny squares) blanket over her, they quietly took her to an elevator that is for hospital staff only. I don't remember seeing anyone coming or going from that room, I wonder if she died alone...

Spending so much time in the hospital, I became very familiar with the routines and sounds of the hospital, and the spirit life there, and believe me, there is a lot of activity. A few hours before my dad passed, I was looking toward the door in the room. I saw a shadow figure go by very quickly, too quickly for a living person to have gone by, and less than a second later, another one, just like the first one flew by, I don't believe they had anything to do with my dad or that room, I believe I just happened to look up at the right time.

Being in the room while my dad was dying was quite an experience, I felt quite honored to be part of it, I talked to my dad nearly the whole time, we played gospel music, we sang, we prayed, we cried, we laughed, we told stories. Dad would respond from time to time, one thing he did was he hit his fist on the bed and said "I'm not ready!", even when you believe in an afterlife, it can be hard to face it, that final step can be a scary one.  I am convinced that he did pass on into Heaven though, about an hour before he breathed his last breath, he looked up toward the end of the bed and said "Hello Anita.", she was his oldest child, I had the honor of being by her side when she passed away some 5-6 years ago, we knew she was a saved Christian, I had been waiting for something like that to happen, I just didn't know who it would be, so when Dad acknowledged her, I felt comfortable that he was going to be OK.

Dad passed away later in the afternoon, he had been there long enough for the nurses, doctors and staff to get to know him, there were tears from them all, the nurses, the lady who cleaned his room, even his doctor there. That is part of the job, but it still doesn't make it any easier.

One of the things my dad and I discussed in the weeks before his death was if it was possible, he would come visit me, I do not actively seek it because I don't want to attract something else that might try to pretend to be my dad. I haven't had a visit from him, there was one dream I had where I thought it might have been him, but I feel quite certain by my response that it wasn't him, I'll talk about that in another post.