photo: martha grimm Brady
Lately, I have found myself wanting my life to be more like it once was…at least at certain stages.
I want to feel vibrant and energetic; cheerful and alive; optimistic and hopeful.
Instead, I keep finding myself spiraling downward quickly into gloomy thinking, or feeling very sluggish and foggy in my thinking, and having to struggle to come up with an optimistic thought or hopeful idea.
Finding the energy to get through the day just doesn’t seem to be there. I can think of 15 things I would have told someone who told me this even 5 years ago, but lately, nothing even sounds hopeful when such suggestions come up. All I can hear are more things to do that I already don’t have energy to do.
I want to feel vibrant and energetic; cheerful and alive; optimistic and hopeful. Share on XI know this isn’t just simply a physical, emotional or spiritual problem. It is probably a combination of all of the above! stop
I read about and listen to all the things I need to do or change. I look around my house and see all that needs to be done and I feel overwhelmed. I want a fairy godmother to come and whisk away all my troubles and clutter. But despite my maiden name, I don’t live in a Grimm’s fairy tale. I live in real life. I am getting old and feeling every inch of my age!
We’ll be heading out of town soon for a couple of weeks of vacation to places we once lived in south Florida many years ago. The early years of our marriage and ministry together in Ft. Lauderdale, FL (in the late 1960’s and early 1970’s) and then later in the Miami area where we lived with our daughters in the 1980’s.
I’m sure both areas will be nearly unrecognizable this many years later! But we want to get down there for a last visit while we can both travel easily. On the way, we plan to stop and see a few friends as well.
Getting out of town may be what we need to feel refreshed when we return…or at least change some of the ruts we have gotten into!
It may be enough to realize that we just need to get back to the simple basics like meditate on the following:
The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want.
He makes me lie down in green pastures.
He leads me beside still waters.
He restores my soul.
He leads me in paths of righteousness
for his name’s sake.Psalm 23:1-3
Don’t we all want a fairy godmother?!?! :)Hope you have some refreshing time soon. I’m over in the #8 spot this week.
at some point, i think so tara:) instead, we have a wonderful Shepherd who is much better! no glitter:)
Ah, I can relate to your overwhelmed feelings! I get to feeling like that quite often (it takes me years to ‘move in to’ a new house 😉 and my daughter can unpack and hang things on the walls and make it look like home in two days). I think a vacation is a wonderful idea for gaining new perspective! May God be with you as you travel and recreate!
thanks anita:) part of our trip will be to our general assembly in mobile, AL where i always find encouragement and hope for the present and future in worship and seminars. i’m looking forward to it:)
Interesting that we’re tracking on wanting to be who we once were…though I suspect that the hearts’ desires are quite different!
My choice would be convoy escort in, say Helmand, and the chance of instant apotheosis. At least I’d get to meet God with a bunch of good mates.
#1 at FMF this week.
http://blessed-are-the-pure-of-heart.blogspot.com/2016/06/your-dying-spouse-166-all-i-want-fmf.html
i must confess andrew, i usually don’t read before i write, but i glance at a couple of posts including yours and realized you were putting words into how i felt with a slightly different twist. can’t say i have any desire to be in a war zone:) but i do understand the camaraderie! we have never quite experienced anything like what we had in Jamaica. i don’t know if it was our age, the culture, or what it was, but it was great…hard at times, but great.
when it was time to go make comments to everyone, i was falling asleep. so i’ll be doing that today.