Have you ever been completely tired of hearing/reading words of encouragement? Encouragement that's given/shared by others when you are in an unwanted predicament...encouragement that's meant to be caring...encouragement that's obviously sincere...encouragement that's so repetitive that you are wondering why in the hell you are still in the unwanted place of emotional, financial and employment discomfort? It makes you question what you are doing wrong...have done wrong considering your life has been in a rumble for more than a year. For some it makes them question if God's test or plan is really real - and for others they don't believe that God is in the testing business (I definitely don't believe the latter). The waiting on a change or a different result is the hardest part especially when all your efforts have been unsuccessful...or not enough. All of this turmoil weighs on you. It forces some to complete destruction: drug abuse, spousal emotional and physical abuse, complacency, thoughts of fleeing, over/under eating, unusual mood swings, indiscriminate sex, uncontrollable anxiety, harmful behavior that's not apart of your daily activity...there is so much many of us think when we continue to receive Words of Encouragement. Nothing changes for the individual - but the encouragement remains. I guess that's human nature...to care...people actually caring. The funny thing about caring...it is useless to the person who has been beaten...defeated by life's changes. Useless, in the sense that caring is not what the defeated person possesses anymore.

So tired of the caption in the attached photo...so tired!!!!!!!!!!

Trading Places with Love

It is so hard -actually it is traumatic- to watch someone that you love waste away especially when you know without a doubt that you would be wasting away too if you would have responded to that shared pain with an inch of weakness. Which means that you are a viable candidate for the suffering that the love one is trying to fight off...which means you are in a position to help! Back to that Love: The love is so strong that you are willing to trade places with the love one...thinking/believing that you can endure the pain that they are suffering from - and when you are better...when you are recovered Trading Places will be in order again...you will pass on the baton hoping that your renewed strength will be everlasting for the special Love One. Please remember that many of us are a foot step away from addiction, insanity, suicide, homelessness, financial loss, foreclosure, eviction, disease. Thus, we are Candidates for Trading Places!

Documentation of Life

 

When you give a person what they have been wanting for The Longest Time you become an agent of change in the life of that person who probably has attempted to satisfy that 'want' for The Longest Time.

Time in fact is a change agent. All it takes for change to occur is the ticking of a watch...the ticking symbolizes waiting....Waiting for The Change to Come. For me within one aspect of my life I have been successful at aiding in a life change for a friend...a true friend…I am extremely thankful for the opportunity.

She has no idea how much her approval of me has benefited my life. She has no idea what she has given me. Like most life events and attempts, the road has been filled with stress, disappointment and finally now, Joy.

There are numerous gifts that we can give someone. What I have noticed over the past two years is how simple it is to give a gift. A smile, a hug, a touch, a word of support. All are necessary for humans. We need this type of attention so that we will be complete…Whole. We also need this devotion to survive…to live within the context of a Good Life. We need it so we can repeat over and over again, ‘Life is Good’.

It definitely has the potential to be Good when we take the time to Give to one another. Not solely during the Christmas, Kwanza, and including Birthday Seasons – but each day that we awake to face another opportunity to get it Right. These are the opportunities that mold and define us. We need satisfying existence and we certainly need adversity…we need tough times.

We are enhanced people when we ‘go through the storm’ especially when the storm is lengthy. Anyone of you reading can make it through a brief, not so challenging period of hardship. We are human beings that claim to be God’s creations. We say we are Believers, and Faith Walkers…

If we are of God we should be prepared for lasting (some refer to it as long-suffering) circumstances that promote personality change and psyche adjustment. We must endure so that we will continue to Live after we Die. Death is a guarantee…no one can defy it. Death is our final journal entry…it is our Documentation of Life.

I want to believe that my life has been a journey of smooth and rocky roads that have defined me for not only myself – but for the world…for anyone who has taken Time to engage me in friendship and in intimate relationship. So many of you have been in my corner. You have not given up on me when I repeatedly claimed that I have had enough…Enough with my present reality which is completely different from what I molded over the years. You have encouraged me. You have challenged me. You have supported me e.g. emotionally, spiritually, and financially. I am the beneficiary of a dynamic group of remarkable friends and a loving family.

So…I will not quit. I will push on. I will be what my mother proclaimed that I would NOT be, a quitter. I will be what I was created to be, a man that has no room in his life for ‘Long-suffering’. A man who loves life so much that he is always in the graceful and humble mode of Giving Life.

I prefer not to die…but like all of us I will. In my moment of death, I will be praying that I have been a Change Agent for at least one individual.

Enjoy 2013!!!