2 January 2015

Seeking Inspiration

I must admit that I wasn't feeling particularly good on New Year's Day. I was still tired, recovering from a busy New Year's Eve where I strived to be as pleasant as I could be while feeling totally like a fish out of water. Social gatherings are always so draining. I had got out of one party successfully earlier that day on some pretext but there was no way I could avoid this second... By 1am on New Year's Day I was running on empty, so we made our excuses and left...

It was now New Year's Day morning, 8am. I crawled out of bed and made tea for my wife and a large coffee for myself. I was looking for something awesome to lift me up and set me off on the right path for the New Year. I had another party to go to that night (this was a family do, couldn't cry off this one either!) so I desperately needed some meaningful input!

The most inspiring thing on the telly at the time was "Bee Movie", an animated tale about bees, work ethics and the dangers of litigation - a distraction, but only for a short while. Mostly spotting which character actors were doing the voices...

I took time to read my emails. Topics were as you might expect - primarily related to goal setting for 2015, or what was on offer in the January sales. There were a large number of people on Facebook wishing everyone well for the New Year. Then the computer rebelled, kept falling over, and I ended up shutting it down. A new PC for the New Year looks like it's becoming an essential.

In the end I started out on the kitchen cleaning and buried myself deeply in the task. I ended up spending the best of the morning on it.

A blog post that I found during the course of my afternoon's sit down revealed (at last!) a little nugget of wisdom from J.R.R. Tolkien:

"Still 'round the corner there may wait, a new road or secret gate."

This comes from a poem by Tolkien, I've now found the whole thing here. At last, something a bit more inspirational!

Finally, I found myself going back to dwell on the Serenity Prayer, written by Reinhold Niebuhr (1892-1971):

God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change;
courage to change the things I can;
and wisdom to know the difference.


I'm still seeking. There's a whole bunch of things I need to change, it's just that some things seem impossible to change, no matter how I try. But perhaps I haven't found the 'secret gate' yet...

I know that nothing is impossible for God, and He knows the things that I struggle with. I bend His ear with them often enough.

The good stuff - it is still out there, however somethimes it takes quite a while to find it. I'll keep searching. :)

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