Tag: grow up

There but for the Grace of God – Go I

Jennifred Jones

Mom said this to me frequently in my growing up years, when I was tempted to be critical of someone else.

So easy to get out of focus in life and fault find, blame, criticize…really it probably stems from insecurity, fear, loss of control, feelings of inadequacies on our part (the last one was a big one for me as I grew up). ‘Am I gonna make it?’

If I could just rest in the good plan God had for me…although I didn’t know it fully then…still don’t – but staying confident in who I was made to be and looking out for others instead of myself all the time, life became easier. My mind had less to think/worry about, and I was gonna be OK.

So far it has worked and is still working decades later.

How about you?

Let You Out!

Jennifred Jones

Once upon a time most of us were carefree little kids. Mom and Dad, or Grandma and Grandpa would let us out to play. We’d make cups and bowls out of river-bottom clay, build bridges with sticks and stones, clothes-pin baseball cards to our bike spokes and listen to the clatter. We’d mix our food together different ways and eat it. We’d sew dresses for our troll dolls…

We started to grow up and somebody told us our striped shirt didn’t look good with our plaid shorts. The frosting on our homemade cake was an ugly color. Our glasses looked dumb. Our feet were too long, our hair was too curly…self-conscious, self-conscious, self-consciousness began to set in.

It’s too painful fighting off the thoughtless comments from others… I’m not going to do anything different, not going to be made fun of again…gonna blend in so no one sees me AT ALL!

Years pass, nothing changes, it’s day in-day, day-out…same ole, same ole. “Oh how I wish I could be more than a cog-in-the-wheel.”

That is the voice of our true calling…asking us:

Who are you? Where are you going? What do you really want to do? Are you tired of the rat -race?

Get back to the childhood freedom of mind. Begin to think, play, design, dream, plan, imagine, tinker.

It’s time to let ourselves out!

We do not need to ask permission…