High Anxiety

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Saturday Catch-Up - 26th January 2019

January has seen the family get to grips with a heck of a lot of baggage. Physical and emotional!

Spring might well be the season of cleaning, but we've started early, well into Winter. Every week this year our family has tackled a different room in the house, and ruthlessly culled things. Recycling, re-evaluating, re-ordering or binning. It's making a difference.

I've blogged before about the emotional baggage that we unearth as we go. I think I'm actually in a better place than I used to be, as this time around I've found 'letting go' to be a much easier exercise than previous sessions. Far less painful. Mementos trigger memories which trigger emotions. But the memories this time around seem to be predominantly happier ones. I've smiled and laughed more. And thanks to my family, kept on going.

Still a whole bunch of rooms to go.

Saturday Catch-Up - 19th January 2019

“Never give in. Never give in. Never, never, never, never—in nothing, great or small, large or petty—never give in, except to convictions of honour and good sense. Never yield to force. Never yield to the apparently overwhelming might of the enemy.” ― Winston Churchill

Well, that was a week to remember! Feeling so much better health-wise, feeling so much worse when I start looking at the news headlines ... oh well ... I've made it to the end of yet another week!

And so, it's onward and upward. As I look back over the last seven days, I revel in those many little victories at work, when so many things have combined to conspire against me. I rejoice in those precious incidents when I feel I have bonded with a kindred spirit, each of us battling to do the best job we can in our own small corner. I pat myself on the back when I continue to take a stand to help my fellow man - when so many others want to sweep them under the carpet, to boot them out.

It's the small things that have made a difference to my life this week. Because most of the big things have been, to tell the truth, a bit... meh!

Yeah, I know, it's more how I have felt about this week, and not what I have actually experienced. And I know, feelings can be deceptive.

Feelings come and feelings go,
And feelings are deceiving;
My warrant is the Word of God -
Naught else is worth believing. 
― Martin Luther

Saturday Catch-Up - 12th January 2019

Do I truly believe that 'My God is a God of Miracles'?

I'm writing this whilst I am actually feeling pretty low. I'm full of cold, and am therefore taking cough and cold remedies on a regular basis - well, as best I can so that it doesn't interact adversely from the other medications that I am on. I'm finding it a bit of a struggle to keep on going, at a time of the year when the workload is just starting to ramp up for me. And yet, I can't give in and rest up. And, I've got an overnight session at the Cold Weather Shelter tonight to look forward to. Oh, the joys!

In fact, I gave in to the cold on Thursday night, I simply couldn't fight it any more. I retreated into bed for the rest of the evening, weak as a kitten and racked with pain. And twelve hours later I woke and struggled to my feet on Friday morning for yet another round. As Captain America might say "I can do this all day..."

And yet - I still believe whole-heartedly that this is only a passing time of struggle. If I don't weaken, and don't give in, I can win through. I can make a difference. I truly believe we are 'more than conquerors' here (see below). Things will change, there will be a miracle just around the corner... Just keep on the right lines, keep faithful, keep believing...

So I keep going. I pick myself up, and struggle on for the extra mile. Pushing the boundaries as far as I can stretch them.

Fall Down Seven Times, Get Up Eight: old Japanese proverb

Romans 8:31-39 (NIV)
What, then, shall we say in response to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all—how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things? Who will bring any charge against those whom God has chosen? It is God who justifies. Who then is the one who condemns? No one. Christ Jesus who died—more than that, who was raised to life—is at the right hand of God and is also interceding for us. Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? As it is written:
   “For your sake we face death all day long; we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered.”
No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

I keep going. I look for the miracle just around the corner. Maybe tomorrow...

Saturday Catch-Up - 5th January 2019

Yes, I'm trying something just a bit different this year. Because I want to get back to blogging. I am sorry to say this has taken a bit of a back seat to other things lately. So I'm trying to commit to a catch-up post at least once every week...

I'm blogging less, because I am spending more and more time in the car, driving. I used to do quite a bit of blog writing on the train. But at least I've got away from commuter train delays!

I'm blogging less, because I've not been in the best of health, and to be honest my heart just hasn't been in it. But I'm now told that I'm responding well to treatment.

I'm blogging less, because quite frankly I've been a bit disheartened by a good many things that have happened during 2018. Some of these are obvious, they've been splashed over the newspaper headlines...  Some of these have been a little, shall we say, closer to home. The way certain things have turned out, the way certain people have reacted to me and mine. But I still remember the words of  Proverbs 3:5-6 - "Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways submit to him, and he will make your paths straight."

Lean not on your understanding. Mmmm. I don't understand a whole host of things that happened during 2018. I didn't like them, either.

This is a New Year. Let's start again. And do things a little differently....