peace – Page 3 – ramblrWrites.com

Meekness And Weakness

A fool mistakes meekness for weakness and a quiet tongue for an idle mind.

Have seen and read a lot of articles that affirm that being meek does not mean weakness, but tell that to those who use it to their advantage to the detriment of that meek soul.

There are some who believe in meekness as being submissive and easily imposed on. They ignore the merits of a personality that is gentle or quiet. Most immediately think of a meek person being a door mat, not as a strong and confident person who is wise enough to know when to move and when to be still. Someone who uses humility as a way of supporting progress instead of strive. It is someone who has really gained the knowledge of true contentment, not phased by trends and popular opinion – not fake meekness.

I know persons who have lived a long and what should have been fulfilling lives, yet they feel compelled to remind others that they are not their equal. Why you may ask? They are not her equal to her because they make lack the things they possess or may not have gone to the places they have been. While you have those who have more but never feel the need to make others feel small because of what they have been able to achieve while here on earth. Being being does not mean that you are perpetually poor or lacking, it’s a mindset that has nothing to do with what you have or think you lack.

There are also those who try to be everything to everyone and think that they are being meek, humble and are pleasing the creator. However, I think it’s more important to know what you are capable of and living that truth; operate based on what you have been designed to do and don’t be a chameleon. Being one never works out for long, as one day you will be exposed; just be your imperfect self. Being humble also, does not mean “bowing down”, but it is an awareness to your own flaws and limitations.

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When persons are meek, they do not keep quiet and accept whatever they are told. I have come to realize that that is someone who is weak in character and may have been damaged by a series of unfortunate events in their live. Instead, the meek will speak when it is necessary and will act when it is necessary to do so. They will fight injustice and speak in defense of those who cannot or will not and they will tell the truth because, for them, there is no other option. And if you think that such persons sound perfect; no, it is hard to do and that is why it should be seen as power under control ( Better a patient person than a warrior, one with self-control than one who takes a city: Proverbs 16:22 ). It is something for us to strive towards.

Don’t Worry When You Mess Up!

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Can you relate to the above statement? It can really be frustrating when your sole purpose in doing something, is to do it right -what ever right is – and then have everything just crash and burn, beautifully.

I am not a patient person and I have resigned myself to this flaw being with me forever. So, currently I am learning the art of being patient. Sometimes it is a lesson I do not want to learn and try to cut corners. When this happens, I make a lot of mistakes – and I do mean a lot. This leads to more work and more time wasted doing: THE SAME THING. So you see why this can be frustrating.

When I started my current degree I gave myself half the time to finish, since then that overconfidence has crashed and burned and I am still looking for some of the pieces. Suffice it to say, I have learned that bumps, cracks and even craters, on the road to achieving anything meaningful is inevitable. Messing up so much was new to me and so for a good time I was terrified by how much I was messing up. Also, what made it worse, was that each time I tried to correct something I made it worse which added to an everlasting list of mess; my list outgrew me and tried to devour me! I was in denial about the mess I was making and became a mess.

But if you make a big enough mess, there is nowhere you can turn to avoid it. Like a monstrous avalanche it can sweep you and your dreams aside, when you do not acknowledge the mess and clean it up. And so until I acknowledged that I did not know how to clean it up on my own, I was sinking in quick sand.

I am beginning to accept that it is okay to mess up and each day it becomes a little easier to live with making them. But, there is a danger in ignoring the mess you create, because there may come a point when the mess consumes and destroy its creator. So while we all struggle with our individual mess, we need to remember that we may be the creator of the mess but there is no reason we have to stay in it. Pay attention to your life and stop creating the mess you threw out yesterday.

Just remember that mess does not define you.

Mountains Behind Mountains.

Deye mon, gen mon
Haitian Proverb

The righteous cry out, and the Lord hears them; he delivers them from all their troubles
Psalm 34:17

When I first came across this Haitian proverb I didn’t know what it meant. So I decided to find out.

So this is my finding: when you overcome an obstacle or difficult situation, don’t get too comfortable, there is another one waiting for you to conquer. Now this could be a disappointment because we all love happy endings. However, as we all should know by now, real life is not that fantastical. You get rich, okay – more money, more problems. You finally get that dream job after burning the mid-night lamp. Okay, now you gonna have to burn two! The point is, once we get what we want, it doesn’t mean that it’s smooth sailing all the way.

We can think of it as the mountain being a measure stick of how much we can tolerate. Imagine, the highest mountain in the world, Mount Everest, is 29,029 feet tall or 8,848 metre. So far eleven persons have died trying to reach its summit. While this is terrible, there are many eager climbers, professional and non-professionals alike, waiting to take their chance. For those who make it, it is not necessarily a daredevil feat nor the status and prestige that comes with success. For some it is a confidence in the abilities that they can overcome any obstacles waiting for them. It is this confidence that will get them up there and down. It is a confidence that will later see them tackling many more mountains.

So now that we know that our mountain top experience is not the end, can we be confident in tackling those other mountains waiting for us to scale? Reaching the top of a mountain should not be driven by hubris -well i don’t think so. It should bring into focus, what’s important, it should not only be a chapter you can now close, but an awakening to the limitless potential still waiting to be realized by tackling yet another mountain. In passing the “death zone” of any mountain you conquer should make you realize that nothing is impossible. You stood on top of that mountain you faced yesterday and then mountain yet to be climbed tomorrow, will also be conquered.

Just remember, those mountains will give you a good workout. They’ll make you stronger!

Your Turn!

Do you ever feels its your turn?

What happened? Did things change? Did you work hard for it or did you just hope and pray?

We may have felt from time to time that it’s our turn to do what we were destined to do!

But somehow things just never worked out.

Maybe it’s because we need to click on the link that gets us to the place we need to be (there’s a thought).

Is it your turn?

Only you can decide that.

No one can make your dreams come true, only you can, by putting the work needed. And even though we know this, we always could use a reminder. We are bombarded by all the things we have to do to get by. However, this state of affairs cannot be our end game. We need to do what we have to do, in order to do what you want to do. And sometimes when it’s our turn we may think we are not ready, but that’s because we do not know how strong we have become. All we need is the right timing to prove this to ourselves. Sometimes your turn is when you feel like you’re not ready!

What do you do when it’s your turn? Will you be ready to take advantage of all the opportunities waiting for you? We are good at dreaming about the things we want to do but we can defeat ourselves if we do not believe that we deserve our turn when it comes.

So what ever it may be, believe that it is your turn and everything will always work out the way it is suppose to. All you need to do is remember that when your turn comes, it’s not just about you, it’s not just about what you can get and how much you can get; it’s about being true to you. Also, make sure that when your turn comes, you make the most of it!

Your Thinking is Poor.

When you focus on what you think you can’t do or be, then you will never be who you could have been. No matter what you do, you will remain poor.

Many of us have an escapist mindset. Every time something looks like it could be kinda hard, we say we can’t, we chip away at enriching our lives; we become poor in spirit and we clip our wings before we learn how to fly. We accept that we can’t and never try. We become the thing we most fear when we are eager to believe that we have limits.

Maybe your frustration and unhappiness has nothing to do with anyone but your mindset about what you can do and where you can go. The limits we place on ourselves are the ones that stick because we are doing a better joy at chaining ourselves to our circumstances, than anyone else could.

It’s easy to tell yourself that there many things you can’t do but remember that when we do this, we become uninspired to dream big and reach for all the possibilities available to us.

I too have to learn this lesson and so it is important to take some time to remind yourself of all the things you have done that say you could, can and will. It may be safer to remain in one place but we make ourselves easy targets for regrets and the very real crime of limiting ourselves. We need to put in the work to be more than a can’t. We need to allow ourselves to be limitless and free ourselves from our self-imposed prison.

No one ever got where they wanted to go by making their home at the bus stop. Maybe we need to get some words out of our vocabulary, and maybe, can’t is one of them. It’s never too late to start!

Goodbye Stress!

You must learn to let go. Release the stress. You were never in control anyway.
― Steve Maraboli

If you’ve recently looked in the mirror after one hard day and wondered when you got so old – but you’re not, you my friend may be stressed.

Today, we use stress as if it is a badge of honor. We talk about being stressed day and night, as if it were a prize that we have to brag about.

This leads to little things happening that add up to becoming BIG problems:

We remember nothing from moment to moment
It feels like your bodies are attacking itself – literally, every patch of skin bones and organs are at war with each other.
you can’t eat or you eat too much.
You can’t sleep or you sleep too much.
You nightly dreams become hellish – a monster you can’t escape.
You can’t decide whether to sit or stand, go or stay. It’s all a mystery!
A small bitter little monster is knocking away all day at your head. Trying to tear it off your shoulders.
You get angry and then don’t know why and frankly you just don’t care at this point.
Absolutely nothing is worth smiling or laughing about!
You have a constant river of sweat pouring down your body. Even when you know the temperature should not allow this!
And nothing you do ever turns out right!

There are so many things that can go wrong because you are stressed. The greatest of them all is that it can kill you.

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So what are you going to do about it?

What you are not going to do is continue this way. Because if you do it could be that you really have developed a tolerance for being stressed, which is not good.

The road that seems the easiest is often the most dangerous and the familiar can be so deceptive that your demise creeps up before you can fight it off. To combat stress maybe we need to stop leaning on the wrong people (yes frenemies, they may seems a strange breed but they are a dangerous one!) Also, we need to go to bed and get some sleep (even though I should have been at mine an hour ago, we will get it right). Next, stop overthinking things and just go with the flow. Stop giving people your time, and don’t stretch yourself – who cares what they think. Only you know what you are going through. And finally, stop overlooking great opportunities that may seems difficult but which will bring the desired results. Give back the title and trophy that is stress and live your best life. Shalom!

Remembrance Day

According to the data in World War 1 an estimated 10 million military and 7 million civilians died with 21 million wounded and 7.7 million missing or imprisoned. During World War 2 over 60-80 million people died. Not only were there millions of death but for each war, but there are records of genocide being committed on particular groups of people. For the first world war it was the genocide of the Armenians and for world war 2 it was the Jews and other minority groups by the Germans. In all of that data is the question; was it worth it in the end?

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On Sunday I sat and listened to the sermon and one concept stood out to me:

Freedom is not free, someone must pay the price in order for us to enjoy it!

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Armistice Day a.k.a Remembrance Day, commemorates the armistice signed to end the first world war at 11 a.m. on the 11th day of the 11th month in 1918. On this day a two minutes silence is held to remember those who have died in wars. Two minutes to remember what is now easily billions of people all over the world, killed for political and ideological beliefs.

Many of us cannot imagine being in the situation of being constantly facing death and uncertainty for a prolonged period of time, much less years at a time and live to tell the tale. I recently read an article by David Lammy [How Britain Dishonoured its African World War Dead] that sought to put closer to the forefront of W.W.1 narratives, African soldiers who served Britain in the first world war but who had been “written out of the story”. What is heartbreaking is the reality that the records never tell the true death tolls; they never allow many who died to be remembered. Many of those soldiers were never buried with the dignity that their service demanded and in his article, Lammy relates how dead soldiers had been left without the dignity of a grave, much less their names on a tombstone. However, such is the nature of war, along with the bolstering of pride is the reality of many many more left behind, their stories never finding itself on the pages of history, their names are now like them, dust blown away by the winds of time.

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There have been many wars in the history of the world. There have been the need to defend, protect and take possession or repossession. However, what we sometimes forget are the real sacrifices that many made so that from war we could enjoy peace today. Many will argue that war eventually leads to a more peaceful and productive society -depends on who you ask, surely not those who have to live through it. But consider that the wars fought in ancient time cannot compare to the devastation of wars that have weapons that can cause mass destruction around the world in a short amount of time today. Peace is dangerous to those who do not benefit from it and we need to consider who do not.

Guernica by Pablo Picasso 1937 shows the tragedies of war and the suffering it inflicts upon individuals, particularly innocent civilians. This work has gained a monumental status, becoming a perpetual reminder of the tragedies of war, an anti-war symbol, and an embodiment of peace.

And so we return to the simple case of wars.They continue today, and many of us are removed from them and therefore cannot imagine the devastation of such events.What is a fact is that war is something ever present and therefore we will always have the need to remember those who die because of them. As we remember, let us acknowledge that some will never have their stories told and their final resting place marked. Let us remember all the nameless and faceless who got no credit and who have died to make the dreams of others a possibility. Let us also remember that violence and misery are present companions for many around the world in 2019, where desolation never left and where war is still a reality and peace a dream. But most of all let us never forget the pity of war [Wilfred Owen] not just for some but all who have experienced wars, especially those in far flung places.

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