An Emotional Healing

Jer. 30:13 “There is none to plead thy cause, that thou mayest be bound up: thou hast no healing medicines.”

Emotional Healing

I am so grateful that I’m a writer. I sit and wonder now if this wasn’t Gods plan all along; writing being my emotional healing tool during this phase of my life. I don’t even think I can put into words the elation I feel writing to you all and expressing my inner emotions. Some people have a hard time verbally communicating let alone penning their thoughts.

I find writing to be a part of my emotional healing. Healing that isn’t going to take place unless I heal emotionally as well. I can physically see and feel different aspects of my healing taking place. I believe I’ve penned everything there is to emotionally heal from unless there is some dark sinister revelation inside me churning that will spring up in time and devastate all the progress I’m making. 

I don’t see anything unknown popping up because, throughout my life, I’ve always been an open book where anyone who meets me whether online or face to face sees the real me, not a mask-wearing woman with hidden closets waiting to be cleaned out. 

Since I found out that stress and anxiety are partly to blame for this diagnosis, I had to dig really deep because I wasn’t even aware of the anxiety eating at me on a very cellular level. Dig and dig again finding the minutest of reasons for any anxiety I might be harboring. 

I have prayed and meditated for years but what I do now is an added meditation where I clean out my entire system from the inside out. You know how when Spring comes you’re inclined to clean out the closets and throw away old clothes and junk that has accumulated over the years? Well, our bodies need this same cleaning out and on a daily basis if we are ever to be healthy, non-toxic, non-drug induced creations. 

Anxiety stems from fear and God is not of fear. There is an enemy just waiting to pounce on the smallest inclination of any fear that hides in you. You might be of the chest pumping variety that says, I’m not afraid of anything, but let me ask, would you toss out those hundreds of dollars worth of meds? Why? Because you fear what might happen if you do? Fear is fear and yes that is a fear! Oh I can hear some saying that tossing meds is just plain stupid, but I’m saying, you wouldn’t even NEED those meds if you cleaned the TOXINS from your life.

Stress and worry are debilitating. Something as small as, will I be able to pay the bills this month, or will I have money to feed my family? They are worries and stress on levels you don’t even realize that eat at your immune system and as soon as your immune system is weakened, a disease strikes like a snake lashing out to bite its victim.

The root cause of much of my anxiety was my previous marriage. I’m not even joking a little bit here. I know many people who will say when there’s a problem within the marriage it is Godly to work it out and stay. I say whatever works for you does not work for all. And there IS a reason people divorce because they did try to work it out, they stayed until they suffocated trying to hold pieces of the marriage together. 

I was married at the tender age of seventeen and stayed in a toxic filled, anxiety-laden marriage for TWENTY YEARS! I can guarantee ninety percent of what I have attacking my body is because of my previous marriage. I could feel healing taking place the moment I left home but the damage had already been done, the cells were falling apart, the immune system had become unraveled and an illness slapped me upside the chest, quite literally.

After I left home, so many aspects of my past haunted me for years. I was out here with my Savior by my side the entire time and the enemy was back home sending out the whipping tool trying to rein me in via guilt and shame. I didn’t succumb and even after discussing divorce with my ex, he still thought he owned me and could wait years upon years before ever filing for divorce. 

My ex would never be a man and face the damages he caused, and not taking care of his son was taking its toll on my son and me. This was a layer of the onion exposed. It was bitter, it hurt peeling the reality away, it scarred me and I’m now paying for that weakened part of me. 

I filed for divorce and stood on the solid ground knowing this is what I had to do if I was ever going to heal completely. The marriage wouldn’t evaporate all by itself. The years of pain and contamination festered inside of me until it bubbled over into a deathly disease. I believed I was healing all of those years away from home and I was but like I said, the mutilation had scarred me and had detrimental results.

I am now on a path of emotional cleansing from my past. It wasn’t just the marriage but the family also. It is kind of hard throwing all of those skeleton bones out of the closet when they had been such a big part of my life for such a long time. I need to let go to heal. I’m freeing myself of the ties that had me bound. I am standing on the solid Rock of my Lord who has blessed me unconditionally all of these years and it’s the only emotional cleanser I can use.

I have people whom I thought were my friends abandon me and I have to release them too from any obligation of caring for me. I need real friends to surround me and lift me up and not abandon me when I NEED them the most. I’m not in this alone, if you say you’re my true friend, you are with me on this journey, like it or not, God has called you to CARE!

From the link above: “Take the time NOW to do an inventory of individuals you can count on. Who can you truly rely on to be there in your darkest hour? Who may have a listening ear? Stay away from those who leave you burnt out and stressed.”

I need to release some people to feel the full crux of the healing aspect. This realization of a traumatic marriage is a good part of my cleansing taking place. I have to release guilt, shame, and blame to free myself to accept the mending of my immune system. Emotional healing is never fun but it is an exhilarating portion of the patchwork quilt that will cover me, comfort me and HEAL me for the rest of my life.

All praise and Glory to God!

Acts 10:38 “How God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Ghost and with power: who went about doing good, and healing all that were oppressed of the devil; for God was with him.”

Time...

Isa. 58:8 “Then shall thy light break forth as the morning, and thine health shall spring forth speedily: and thy righteousness shall go before thee; the glory of the LORD shall be thy reward.”

Time...

Do you remember the days where you took a test in school; you were sitting there sweating and looking at the clock, tapping your pencil on the desk, tripping over questions and answers as if your shoelaces were tied together? Do you remember the anxiety as the clock ticked and tocked and you were still sitting there with questions unanswered?

That’s what it’s like when you’re diagnosed with cancer or any other life altering illness I imagine, you keep looking at the time. Time, seconds turn into minutes, minute’s turn into hours and before you know it…the day is over, time has run out. 

Every second becomes more precious in each day and you wonder did you study hard enough to pass the test or did you just ‘wing it’? While the test in school was to see if you remembered everything you read, the test of life is going to be about you and all the knowledge you’ve gained and what exactly did you do with that knowledge up to those last minutes of your life. 

This is why it is important to make every minute count because you never know if this is your last one on the clock and you don’t get a redo of the test, once the day is over on your biological clock and your called home, is home going to be the place you had tried to attain while your breath sustained you while alive? 

I strive for eternity, not a place where seconds and minutes become days and years, I want time to be erased and live as if eternity is within my grasp. The good news is, eternity IS within my grasp with the saving grace of Jesus. I try to tell everyone else about the eternity we have as part of our biological plan but many are too busy making up for the menial minutes in a physical day to see the picture that’s right before their eyes playing out in front of them. 

My husband’s aunt is in the hospital as I write, hooked up to feeding tubes to keep her alive battling her last days with cancer and chemotherapy. When I asked hubby’s mom if auntie was in hospice, she said no, she’s on the ‘transition’ floor. The transition floor? Out of respect, I didn’t want to ask what a transition floor is but I have a pretty good idea.

A year ago we were sitting with this same aunt as the family was gathered to celebrate Christmas. As we piled bite after unhealthy bite of food on our plates from mashed potatoes to salads, meat and desserts, I watched his aunt speak about battling cancer and listened to her say how it was sucking the life out of her. I asked her if she had heard about turmeric and she said yeah, and that she was taking it, in between globs of potatoes and gravy crossing her lips.

Here’s the thing, chemo is not going to take cancer away, it will give cancer a resting place and that is it until it’s time to wake up again. A pill is not going to take cancer away either. There has to be a life-altering plan of your intake of food that got you to this point of unhealthy living that fed the cancer cells all along. From everything that goes past the lips to everything that comes out the other end, there HAS TO BE a life-altering change! 

I understand that when you hear the word cancer, you automatically think you’re going to die. So, many people go the chemo route trying to add a little more time to clock. It doesn’t add to the clock it takes time away. Time spent hooked up feeding radiation to your system, time spent vomiting, time of worry and stress, time spent going to the doctor, time spent looking for a parking spot! Precious time that is consumed by an illness and a treatment without a cure.

Maybe adding time to the clock should have been your first priority, to begin with. Why did the alarm clock need to go off for me to say hey, wake up, you’re not going to eat the chemical filled processed food? If you think that the processing of the food you eat was brought to you in the cleanliest of fashions, you are sadly mistaken. 

From the steroid injection of the farm animals to bring you a meatier slab of pork, beef, or chicken, to the handling, to the added chemicals of giving food a longer shelf life, to the people who all breathed and touched that pork chop before you purchased it and put it in your mouth! You are what you eat takes on new meaning to me now that I’m battling these nasty little demonic cancer cells!

Cleansing; that is what the soul needs to bide time and nothing else; a mind, body and soul synchronicity cleansing. You can see the detoxifying of the chemical laden body as torture because you’d rather choose to permit the very thing killing you to own you. Or you can take the all important life test without studying for the exam. It’s up to YOU and no one else what you choose to do to pass the exam of eternity. 

I have chosen to do my homework and look forward to exam day, no tapping of the pencil, no tripping over shoelaces, no ticking of the clock. It’s not about taking a vitamin to beat this. Beating cancer is about CHANGE; a swift major shake-up to your everyday living and eating habits. People can’t be bothered by drastic change because it takes up too much time? Well, I’ve got all the time in the world to make a change; time to LIVE! Holistically going to win this battle! 

Jer. 17:14 “Heal me, O LORD, and I shall be healed; save me, and I shall be saved: for thou art my praise.”

My Testimony of Christ

1 Cor. 15:51 “Behold, I shew you a mystery; We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed,”

I am being called to give a Testimony of Christ; MY testimony of Christ. This might very well turn into a week-long series so you’ve been warned. If you are reading me for the first time, I welcome you. Please don’t be discouraged by the word Christ, read on because you want to hear my story. 

Yesterday’s sermon was pretty good when Pastor called up a young woman to give her testimony of why she turned to Christ. That’s when truth slapped me upside the head. I hear so many people who give testimony of Christ, being raised with Christ all of their lives. Their parents and grandparents all had a hand in Christ and relayed Him to their children. This woman’s testimony was no different.

Amazing. People actually grew up with Christ in their lives? Surrounded by a loving family, their testimony is usually how they turned away, usually during the pubescent years and found Christ again.

Someone had told me recently that kids who are raised with Christ and turn away usually have a hard time returning to Him and accepting all that he has to offer. I have a tendency to disagree with that because if a child is raised with Christ and is turned away upon maturity, the soul search is just something that we need to do to find our grounding. 

I was not raised with Christ. My parents were not grounded in Christ nor were my grandparents a part of Christ. My family lineage is of alcohol right down to my great grandparents, all alcoholics, so it is no wonder I took my first drink at a younger than ‘normal’ age. Yeah, I would say eight and nine is younger than normal to take your first drink, puff your first cigarette, and smoke your first joint.

The pastor said something today. Pastor said, “You know how when you’re not of sober mind, you’ll say and do things that you normally wouldn’t do? People see you as a drunkard and no amount of bible spewing is going to have them seeing you differently.” He went on, “Well,” he said, “That’s what people see when you’re under the influence of God. They see Christ in you. You’ll say and do things you wouldn’t normally do!” 

He’s right. First, let me define Christian in MY eyes. For one, the term was not around in the Old Testament so when I hear people say that the men who wrote some book and call themselves Christians, I’ll assume have not read ‘the book’ in its entirety or even tried to understand what the message is that we’re supposed to receive.

Second of all, I was not raised in a Christian household. I didn’t have a mother and father that sat around reading Bible stories to their kids and I didn’t have a religious upbringing. I had what is deemed a politically correct term, dysfunctional family. I had a family who saw beer as a dinner meal, drugs as ‘cool thing’, whoopings when you were disobedient, and punishments were belted out, vocally and branded on your butt. 

My dad (God rest his soul) never dished out the beatings, he was too busy sitting on a bar stool exercising his elbow. I will not say anything bad about my mother and father because they did the best they could raising six kids and staying married for 60 years. That’s it, we were raised. We fended for ourselves and grew. Me? I chose to find God. You see, all six of us were sent to a Catholic school but not all of us sought out God. Many strayed but it wasn’t because we were raised on God and turned, we never accepted the teachings of the nuns and priests to begin with.

Was I a perfect kid? By no means whatsoever. The thing is, the people who know me now would not have ever recognized me back then with skinned knees, bruised legs, a cigarette hanging out of my mouth and beer hidden in a paper bag, you know so no one knew what I was drinking? I was bad in every sense of the word! I was a liar, cheater, stealer, and a scummy sleazeball! If you think the girls today dress slutty, that is me only ten times worse. Imagine a size zero fifteen-year-old, long blond flowing hair, wearing a see-through white halter-top and cheek bearing hot pants. Yup, that was me.

So how is it that people who see me now see a beautiful woman? They don’t see beauty physically, I don’t think, they see innocence, purity, God’s light shining through me. They see the changed me. They met the changed me and liked who I was as a person whereas the people back home in Baltimore never had a chance to even get to KNOW the changed me. They just thought I was the battered kid from back in the day and that is who I am now. Boy, are they ever so wrong. Change bit me hard and now I just have the scars to prove where I’ve been

So what changed me? I’ll tell you, God changed me. I stumbled upon Him as a beaten battered sinner and He took me in and raised me. If you go to a church, don’t assume the people there are these perfect people living sinless lives. They’re all standing in front of God as a sinner, we are all sinners, we turn to God for him to cleanse us; wash us of our sin and to heal us where no man is capable of healing. The term Christian is for Christ Followers. It is not a religion, it is not to be thrown around like a basketball dribbled and put in the hoop when the timing is right. Christianity is a state of mind, a spiritual cleansing making what was old new again.

I’ll have to finish this up in a later post. I told you it would take me a week. Hang in there folks. My sister told my mother this weekend in a disagreement that she [my sister] died when I was born. She was no longer a princess…..

Spring Cleaning My Soul

Job 37:21 “And now men see not the bright light which is in the clouds: but the wind passeth, and cleanseth them.”

The tiny seed knew that in order to grow it had to be set in the dirt, covered in darkness, and struggle to see the light! I myself have plunged through the darkness as it tried to envelope my soul, I stretched out toward the light and that is the time I burst forth with growth. The dirt (darkness) enriched me and cleansed my soul.

I know it is early for Spring-cleaning but it is never too early for cleaning of the soul of all the leftover fragments scattered behind from the previous year. With the doozy of a year behind me, the dismantling of the Christmas season, I’m faced with a liberating feeling of cleanliness. That is what happens when you clean up and put away the old and make way for the new. 

Only five days into the New Year and already I’m feeling the presence of change, so much so that it is moving along in a smooth flow: of words, of actions, of deeds and of promise. This year is setting itself up to be a rapid succession of energy that spills out into my writing, my cleaning and my meditating. I’m in awe of the visible transition.

Some people would rather wait until spring to clean out closets, toss away old clothing, get rid of unused stuff and junk, but me, I do my spring-cleaning when my soul calls me to make some semblance of this clutter that has filled these four walls. I didn’t start off the new year wanting to clean and shake this house up and get rid of the excess baggage tagging along collecting cobwebs. It just came upon me as I slept, hugged me when I woke, and moved me into action.

Granted my back is in no better shape than it was last year but this year I’m not letting my disability alter my active lifestyle I had before this thing called arthritis gripped my NOT-OLD back! I have not even reached the half a century mark and my back thinks it is moving into the seventies. Since my mind is still back there in time, where the thirty-year mark saw the seedling spurt with growing pains, now my nearly half a century old mind is giving a speeding ticket to my body and telling it to ‘hold on now’! But hi ho silver and away I go growing like a newly planted seed.

I’m not one to hoard because I learned quite a few years ago that they are all materials and can be gone in the blink of an eye and all you have to hold onto is memories of the physical hindrances, sometimes called artifacts of your past. This ‘stuff’ that I’m soul-cleaning is newly acquired stuff lodged in my mind as new experiences, new thoughts, and brighter comfort zones. 

I have a tendency to hold onto my old ways, my own pattern of thinking, not allowing the new age of things to play games in the basketball court of my mind. My soul-cleaning is going to consist of closing the doors on the negative thoughts that sometime ensnare me in their web and cloud my God thoughts as satan has set out to do on this earth. 

If I seem to be living my life out there on a cloud, distanced from what some call reality, it is my way of clinging to the new growth that is before me awaiting the springtime air, the season of MY New Year, and the bringing forth the solidarity of strength in my eternity. If I dip into the pool of confusion, like so many cling to this day and age, I will lose sight of my self worth and become stagnant in a clouded puddle. 

Pss. 91:1 “He that dwelleth in the secret place of the most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty.”

I will continue on the path of soul-cleaning, bouncing back refreshed and renewed with a new perspective on life. Some will enjoy the change, some will hide because they fear change, some will embrace my soul-cleansing and come along for the ride.

John 15:3 “Now ye are clean through the word which I have spoken unto you.”

May God bless YOU on whatever journey YOU are embarking on this year. 

Poetry Sunday ~ Never Fear the End

Pss. 30:12  To the end that my glory may sing praise to thee, and not be silent. O LORD my God, I will give thanks unto thee for ever.

Never Fear the End

I walk the place I fear to go

Where all men one day travel.

The breath of me hangs on to life

While the other threads unravel.

I press my toes in the snow

No fear for the taste of cold

I tiptoe with the brush of frost

My tongue is tipped with gold.

Rays have reached the horizon

Stretched out in welcome prayer.

I slowly walk to greet them

For the end is hidden there.

I’m bathed in a bastion of beauty

Unveiled is the Light within.

I raise my hands in mercy

Washed away is clinging sin.

I remember all the moments

As they pass before my eyes

Warmth and love surround me

I hear it in their cries.

Every tear becomes a puddle

Of this new life I must swim

Sorrow is then converted

Into a glorious hymn.

My body dripped in sunshine

Not yet for you my friend.

I softly whisper for all to hear

The righteous don’t fear the end.

Pss. 37: 37 Mark the perfect man, and behold the upright: for the end of that man is peace.

Poetry Sunday ~ Spiritual Cleansing

John 7:38 (NIV) "Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, streams of living water will flow from within him."

Spiritual Growth

Now has come the season

Where my soul tends to grow.

Like living waters inside me

My spiritual growth will flow.

The buds begin to surface,

The flower not yet seen

Until the sun has nurtured

From sleep what they can glean.

The trees will slowly waken

Arise from seasonal cold;

The buds will peak in numbers

Bringing forth the springtime gold.

My soul will drink in measure

The still waters from within.

My spirit churning back to life

The new season I now begin.

Take from me the darkness,

As my slumber is called to rise

Fill me with living water

For to shed my winter cries.

Behold, a new me emerges,

As a bud turns into a flower.

Washed over by the hand of God

I’m renewed by a spiritual shower.

Pss. 51: 10 Create in me a clean heart, O God; and renew a right spirit within me.

Lent: Day Forty: Poetry Sunday ~ Cleansing

Mark 1:44And saith unto him, See thou say nothing to any man: but go thy way, shew thyself to the priest, and offer for thy cleansing those things which Moses commanded, for a testimony unto them.

Cleansing

I feel a peace wash over me

as snow falls from the sky.

Each flake falls down all around

like my God beginning to cry.

One by one His sorrow mounts

the drifts are formed by wind

Cleansing all my spirit

for that which I have sinned.

He blankets my soul as the fields

in warmth His arms surround.

A little wayward shepherd

who was lost and now is found.

I gather all the wandering sheep

mere shadows in the dark.

A shower of unconditional love,

igniting their inner spark.

A soul absolved of impurities

the snow now turns to rain

Restoring you to innocence

now freed from all your pain.

 

 

Poetry Sunday ~ Cleansing

 

Cleansing

I feel a peace wash over me

as snow falls from the sky.

Each flake falls down all around

like my God beginning to cry.

One by one His sorrow mounts

the drifts are formed by wind

Cleansing all my spirit

for that which I have sinned.

He blankets my soul as the fields

in warmth His arms surround.

A little wayward shepherd

who was lost and now is found.

I gather all the wandering sheep

mere shadows in the dark.

A shower of unconditional love,

igniting their inner spark.

A soul absolved of impurities

the snow now turns to rain

Restoring you to innocence

now freed from all your pain.

A World of Words

World of Words

In this world we fight between good and evil. In this universe we have light and dark. In writing we relish the world of words.

Have you ever tried de-cluttering your writing world? I mean, taking words out of a piece of work to make it a tighter paragraph? I’m often called a drama queen and don’t worry, I don’t get offended because I know it means that I drive home a point. Whether in words verbally or written words, I drive a stake in the heart of the reader so they get the emotional gut wrenching point I’m trying to make.

I’m often telling writers to ‘tighten their work’ but by that I mean take out all the unnecessary words that I, and other writers call, fillers. I remember reading a friends work, and I told her, you have too many ‘ands’ in a single paragraph. She removed them, then showed her ‘editor’ the work and the editor told her the ‘ands’ worked.

To ME, the filler words bogged the story down, had me skipping through it like stones on water where I basically skimmed the story never really finding interest. She eventually went on to get the story published. I’ve never read the finished work, and I hope she is doing well in selling the book.

This is where I found myself less and less interested in writing. I was being asked my honest opinion, but no one really wanted it and didn’t like what I had to say. So why ask an opinion to begin with? Sure that extra set of eyes gives light to what you need to fix and work on, but if you’re going to shrug it off and think the person is wrong, then don’t ask. Find someone more trusting and stroking then I because I’m not going to stroke your ego, I’m going to be truthful and honest.

People read my work and are truthful and honest, sometimes even harsh but a lot of the times they were doing the butterfly stroke (easy) when I needed them to do a harder backstroke.

This is a world of words out here. I/we write. Let’s keep in mind that extra baggage in your writing is no different than a clutter-filled closet! It and your writing needs to be cleaned up and de-cluttered. This week’s posts was all about cleansing your spirit, cleaning up your environment and now de-cluttering your work.

Here are some tips in freeing your work so the sun can shine through the filtered words.

1. Take out a lot of the adverbs. I’m sure there is a more solid word for all those –ly words and such. If you absolutely need the word, then keep it, it might mean that it is a needed word.

2. AND makes a sentence run on and on. Use the comma, periods and semi-colons. They are there for a reason. If the word ‘and’ is a necessity, then keep the word, but don’t make run on sentences what your work is all about.

3. BUT is another overused word. I find myself using it a bit too much and am working on eliminating it from many sentences. Again, see words that are over used and eliminate them.

4. Use a thesaurus regularly! This is a must have in your writing arsenal. Most of the time an overused word can be repeated with a similar word found in the thesaurus. There is no need to repeat the same exact word over and over as long as you have a thesaurus.

5. De-clutter your writing. I can’t say it enough that cleaning up your work, tightening the paragraphs, cleaning up your workspace, cleansing your spirit all go hand in hand in the World of Words, remember that.

Encouraging Words for the Writer's Soul

Well folks, it’s time for some encouragement and you came to the right place. I’ll dish it out and you adhere and help yourself and honestly, you’ll be all the better for it.

Have you looked at the calendar? Did you know spring - the first day - is less than twenty days away! Can you believe it? And have we done any spring-cleaning? Well, with aches and pains, some may find it hard so I’m here to encourage you to get it started!

We’re closing in on Easter and we need to be ready for the rush of warm weather, possible rain showers, and more days OUTSIDE the home. So during these next few weeks as we embrace the chill that is keeping us inside, get to de-cluttering before the warm sunny days keep you from spending time inside.

I know how I am, once Spring arrives, I’m out in the garden raking old leaves, ridding the lawn of what winter has left behind, then my days are spent out there in succession, pain and all. This year, I might set me up a little place for my laptop out there, so all of you can be kept up to date with my activities. Oh you know you’d like it, admit it.

But first, before we can spend endless days outside, we need to get the place inside ready. You can do it, just take small steps each day and in less than twenty days, besides it being my birthday on the 23rd, we’ll be ready to face spring with a bounce in our step.

Our 1st baby step is realizing that the work needs to be done. So we’ll start small, say, with the desk drawers, and move onto the kitchen drawers. Rid yourself of all those saved pens and pencils that probably don’t even work! The kitchen drawers are probably filled with old papers and receipts from Christmas shopping. How about old utensils? Toss them if you see any rust, wood splinters, or worse, anything you haven’t used in a years time.

2nd – Clean out those drawers with some spic and span or your soap of choice. After scrubbing them out, return only the things you NEED and USE!

3rd – We’re going to get a broom, or a wooly-monster (that is what I call my furry TV electricity charged duster) I turn on my TV, run the wooly-monster over it and it charges the thing so it collects, you guessed it, DUST! Take your time! You’re in no marathon here to get it all done in a day.

Are you feeling ready now? These are small tasks (unless you’re a hoarder) and may even be done sitting in your desk chair or kitchen chair. The broom and wooly monster are for standing only; you’ll need to walk around the house, poking in corners at the ceiling to get any remnant cobwebs that linger.

By cleaning just these small things for starters will motivate you for the bigger chores done during spring-cleaning like ridding all closets of clothes not worn for five or ten years.

By this time you should now feel like a cup of coffee, and a nice seat at your desk to do some writing. Why not tell your tale of how glad you are spring-cleaning only comes once a year, and what motivates and drives you in getting it done.

Sure you’d rather be shopping, spending money you really can’t spare at the moment and sure you’d like to be lying on the sofa watching TV accomplishing nothing but remember by not getting these things cleaned up and organized, you’re really not helping yourself finding a cleansing spot to heal your soul.

I always took the saying “Cleanliness is next to Godliness” literally. You see, when you clean up your soul, you’ll feel the need to clean up your house, desk, computer, etc. so your cleansing feels complete.

I’m with you on the back aches, knees hurting and such but we must push our aching bodies to move through the smaller steps and hopefully we’ll be up to the bigger steps.

GET TO IT!

A Writer's Cleansing

As writers we always need to be aware of our cleansing. We need to get rid of stuff that isn’t working, toss out old writings that went nowhere, or organize what we do have.


What I’m saying is, it’s spring-cleaning time, writers!

I took time off for my spiritual cleansing, to right my soul where I felt it was off kilter a little. In these two weeks I’ve done no writing on my blog, but I signed up for a class and have begun a short non-fiction story.

I’ve reconnected with an old friend and hopefully made some new ones and as far as my spiritual cleansing goes, I feel I’ve accomplished what I set out to do. Every year at this time I feel a cleansing is necessary, as the year that has passed has left me with a lot of lingering clouded rubble. It needed to be addressed in order for me to write again. I now come back to you as a newly bathed and scrubbed writer, my soul is ready.

Quite a few of my friends and friends of friends are suffering with health issues, marital issues, and other issues. During these two weeks, I’ve prayed for them and their healing as well as my own physical and mental health issues.

I can tell you that before I left for my ‘spiritual cleansing’, I was barely walking around the house due to the lumbar arthritis in my back and some kind of nerve damage issues. I focused on healing, I focused on my pain, and I come to you now, walking again and reclaiming myself. I actually vacuumed my floor and mopped it, and didn’t wake the next day in pain. That to me, is progress.

Now onto my writing cleansing. This is where I go through my old files, re-read my old stories, use or lose some old junk that’s clogging up my folders that I no longer need. And also, the desk needs to be cleaned of clutter and unnecessary remnants of things that also will clog the mind.

In order for your cleansing to be complete, you must clear the clouding of your mind, body, and spirit, then attack the physical things that are bogging your life down. Are you obsessed with buying things? Do you feel you have to shop to be happy? Are you buying things out of WANT or NECESSITY? All material possessions are CLUTTER that keeps you from moving forward and achieving your goal, whatever that goal may be.

To complete your cleansing, you must give up a few things in order to gain new things. If you’re unwilling to sacrifice, then your spring-cleaning is for naught.

1. Try cleaning up your PC by getting rid of the clutter. Put it on a disc if you must; just get it out of the way for new stuff to be written.

2. Clean off your desk. If it is too bogged down with objects, get rid of them! Place a few candles on the desk instead to get your mind geared up for some serious writing.

3. Refrain from purchasing unnecessary things. Do you really need that bottle of glue? Extra paper? Tickets to the movie? A manicure? When you want to buy something (or do something) always wait a day before deciding if it is a need or a WANT. You’ll find yourself some peace in these thoughts as well as extra money in your pocket.

4. Write what flows freely from your heart. Did you ever try writing a forced piece of work? Sounds stilted doesn’t it? Your heart will never let you down.

5. Last but not least, find peace in each and every day with no CLUTTER!