GRACE OF GOD AND GRATITUDE

Here's me today, bordering on fear and trepidation...fear that dementia is on my plate and ready...ah, for what? There's the dreaded border.

I am a tish surprised that I wrote "bordering on"...it is true, I am not full-out panic stricken, but I do have a sense of dread in my belly.

Being in the crosshairs of dementia and not feeling dread is akin to being on the tracks of an oncoming train and feeling fairly calm about it. Say what?!

However, I am not full-out panicked. I attribute that to God, grace and the willingness to grow spiritually, as in: Give over, give up, give in while praying thank You for the good, the bad and the ugly.

I achieve that today the majority of the time...some days that is 51 percent, some days I get way up in the 70s. bordering 80s. There: Shout hallelujah and feel the grace of God.

I am remembering the song, Whatever Will Be Will Be. This I know from my own experience, whatever will be, will be for my benefit.

Thank you.

WITH GRACE AND GRATITUDE

Say we make a decision to turn our will and our life over to the care of God as we understand Him...the hard lesson we learn is that leaves all to God. Every jot and tittle, every breath we take is left to the care of God. [From my post of May 29, 2019.]

That is my hard lesson to accept today. Recently, I've written about my suspicion (fear) that I am coming into dementia...or that I have dementia.

That is a scary fact, the fact of dementia. 

This is where lessons learned rush to our aid. The pearl beyond price in my life is that I have learned to welcome my fear, specifically my fear of whatever unwanted that I see coming to me.

I suspect that dementia is an unwanted to any one of us. I do have anxiety disorder which causes panic-forgetfulness so I'm letting my self-diagnosed dementia hover in the land of maybe/maybe not.  

This I know from personal and priceless experience...whatever I am fearing that looks less-than yet is heading to me is for my benefit by grace and by God. Ergo, I pray thank You.

The thought occurs that I can think of dementia as an untrained puppy...it rules until I learn how to...with grace and gratitude. 

And God is back on the field.

Thank you.

GOD-GUIDED IS FREEDOM

 We must try with a will or fall by the wayside. -- Anonymous (to me)

Let go and let God. -- Anonymous (to me)

At many different times in my life, I have lived by both of those adages. Both are right on target if and when we know when to apply them in our life.

To try with a will in an obviously negative-result situation qualifies for self-will run riot. 

Pretty much the same goes for let go and let God only in the opposite direction...as in, too afraid to try, or to trust God to walk us through our dilemma. We tend to describe that as being "chicken" which says more than we want to hear.

As life flies by, I am becoming more aware of the truth we quote so blithely, i.e., that living in the now, the here and now, is God's home...for Him and for me, for you, for us.

The wonder of that flash of insight is it came when I felt fear of dementia...of my possibly/probably having dementia. I gut-bucket knew that if I do, I will live there by God and by grace. 

With God as our Guide, we are free. 

Thank you.

FREED FROM RESENTMENT, 1

[The following is a reprint of my post of May 25, 2016.]

We must be willing to hurt our own feelings for the benefit of another. This is a major, but just another, lesson in learning to detach from our dependence on our own reasoning mind.

Since it is our own thoughts that engineer our hurt, we must feel that hurt and know it for the nothingness that it is. Otherwise, we will put someone else's name on it and feel a compulsive want (that we mistake for need) to "set him straight" or hurt her in kind, i.e., the way we perceive they have hurt us.

In fact, our hurt feelings begin when our own thinking grows horns and gores us. I suspect that is the journey of psychic hurt...it begins with our resistance to it, really.

This explains the how and why of the Sermon's "turn the other cheek." It frees us from our guilty desire to feel resentful.

Peace, be still.

Thank you.

REGRET NAUGHT, LOVE ALL, I

[The following is a reprint of my post of May 29, 2016.]

Regrets are just resentments in fancy dress. - Blinding flash of the obvious

Thank you.

LOVE...GIVE OVER, GIVE UP, GIVE IN

Love and love alone is the substance of reality. -- James Finley 

It seems that it has been fairly recently (last ten years or so) that I fully realized that I know naught about love...specifically, how to love. Love not as written about in the Song of Songs but love of the un...the unlovable, the unpretty, the un. 

I know family love, I know friend and pet love, I know love of country...but none of those move me inwardly. I know fear of not loving God...or of thinking that I love God.

I wonder...have I ever thought what love would feel like...impersonal love, that is. Not a crush on a guy, nor a best friend to talk with about the guy, etc. 

Impersonal love seems like the ultimate contradiction in terms. How can love be impersonal? But it seems to me that personal love is all about me...where's God in that? For that matter, where's God in impersonal love?

Maybe God is love, personal, impersonal and all feelings in between Maybe there's no maybe in that.

It appears that I have my new study...what love means to/for me. I'm guessing kill self now is the starting point...ah, but not by self-will, but by grace and by God...which right now I know primarily from my eyebrows up. 

My study most likely is about giving over, giving up and giving in to God to do whatever inner moving happens.

Let it be...more will be revealed from within.

Thank you.

ON LIVING A TURNED-OVER LIFE, 1

[The following is a reprint of my post of December 29, 2018.]

Except the Lord build the house, they labor in vain that build it. -- Psalm 127

So the difference between 'the boys and the men' is the difference between striving for a self-determined objective and for the perfect objective which is of God. -- Anonymous

So the difference between relying on the reasoning mind and relying on spiritual consciousness is the difference between striving to build our inner house by our own devices and not striving but trusting our Father within to perfectly lead us through the building and then our living therein.

According to me.

Thank you.