11 things that made me feel alive

Very often, I am struck by the unique importance and beauty of each day. I try to savour every minute, each mundane task or challenging moment, and not only do it well, but with fervour and grace. I work hard not to let frustration, worry, anger, fear, or petty criticism steal any of these moments away from me. I don't always succeed, but I am getting better at it.

Here are some of my richest experiences in the past 24 hours. This list may not look especially momentous or impressive to anyone else, but even in the grand scheme of things, I can't think of anything else I would rather have been doing at these very moments.

1. Last night on my way to the theatre, I managed to miss two buses in the space of 20 minutes. I ran for at least a kilometre in the cold night air of Montreal between 3 different bus stops, and finally caught a bus at the third one. I tried to text the person I was meeting to let them know I would be late, but the texts refused to send for some unknown reason. Instead of getting frustrated with the horrible way everything was going wrong, I stayed focused, enjoyed the adventure, and arrived only 15 minutes later than agreed, still in plenty of time to catch the show. I felt like I had just won The Amazing Race!

2. A colleague from university invited me to the live theatre production mentioned above, and it was a most pleasant evening. The writing was witty, the acting sincere (though sometimes uneven), the conversation before and after, amiable and engaging, and the wine and cheese excellent! We were the last to leave the party! I love the combination of art, food, and meaningful conversation with genuine, interesting people. I am blessed to be surrounded by good quantities of all of the aforementioned.

3. I had a cleaning lady come and clean my floors today. I have never had a stranger come into my home and do this and had been quite hesitant to call someone, but it was a very positive experience. I was impressed by Martha's focus (yes, we have the same name!), her diligent work, and her constant smile. We joked about our struggles in learning French and about the abundance of fur that one cat could produce. I realised that paying someone to do a task that I don't enjoy and don't have the time or energy for is a smart move. I like sitting here in my clean house, working on the things I do love!

4. Dean called me from Los Angeles around noon (9 am his time) as he was walking to the trade show where he would be working all day. We didn't really talk about anything important (warm weather in LA, of course, and how everything was going at home), but I smiled the whole time I was talking to him. I love it when my best friend calls me for no particular reason!

5. Today, I spent some time reworking an assignment. I had handed it in a few weeks ago and knew that it might need some tweaking. Yesterday, my professor gave me some comments, a few points of critique, and some suggestions to improve it. To my amazement, I was not at all discouraged by any of it. I saw what he was saying as soon as he pointed it out. Yes, I can definitely make it better! I am so thankful for kind and knowledgeable people who are helping me to do better work by not only demanding more from me, but helping me through the process.

Some other random 'feeling alive' moments:

6. A good boxing workout.

7. Eating yummy yogurt with fruit and granola.

8. Running up and down the stairs countless times and feeling light on my feet.

9. Cutting Jazz's nails and for the first time, having her purr while I did it!

10. Striking 4 things off my TO DO list.

11. Taking the garbage outside (I love not having any garbage in my house!).

May your day be filled with life-giving moments and may nothing steal the joy of them away from you.

This is a picture of my clean floors and a gift from a friend.

Names of God

The Hebrew word "YHWH" (read from right to left) This past Sunday I gave a talk on the Names of God, the beginning of a series on this topic. This first talk was to be a gentle introduction so I thought it wouldn't take too many hours of preparation. Well, I quickly discovered that the research is almost bottomless; every time I thought I had a somewhat definitive list of names, I found another source which added a few more or gave a different twist on some of the names I had already come across. After several hours I was getting overwhelmed by the sheer amount of data (and that was only looking at the Hebrew Bible). I wondered how I could present this to people in an orderly and accessible fashion and within a reasonable time frame. Not everyone is up for a 3-hour lecture crammed full of detail on a Sunday morning. So I took a break and spent a bit of time meditating on this problem and asking the Spirit for guidance. And then I thought that being overwhelmed by Go

it's a mad mad mad world (of theology)

The mad dash for the end of term has begun. I have finished all my required readings and have jumped into research reading. One of my papers is on the madness of theology (the correlation seems more obvious to some of us than to others). Truly inspiring stuff, I am finding. Let me share a few quotes here: There is a certain madness in Christianity – in a desert God who is jealous and passionate, in a saviour who speaks in apocalyptic terms, in a life of sacrificial love, in the scandal of particularity. In principle, a confessional theology should bear the mark of this madness, but the mark or wound must constantly be renewed. - Walter Lowe, "Postmodern Theology" in The Oxford Handbook of Systematic Theology , 2007. “In the Scriptures the odd phenomena constituting the ‘Kingdom of God’ are the offspring of the shock that is delivered by the name of God to what is there called the ‘world,’ resulting in what I call a ‘sacred anarchy.’ Consider but a sampling o

comedic timing

Comic by Joel Micah Harris at xkcd.com One of my favourite jokes goes like this: Knock, knock. Who's there? Interrupting cow Interrupting cow w--- Moooooooo!! Timing is important in both drama and comedy. A well-paced story draws the audience in and helps it invest in the characters, while a tale too hastily told or too long drawn out will fail to engage anyone. Surprise - something which interrupts the expected - is a creative use of timing and integral to any good story. If someone is reading a novel and everything unfolds in a predictable manner, they will probably wonder why they bothered reading the book. And so it is in life. Having life be predictable all of the time is not as calming as it sounds. We love surprises, especially good surprises like birthday parties, gifts, marriage proposals, and finding something that we thought was lost. Surprises are an important part of humour. A good joke is funny because it goes to a place you didn't expect it to go. Sim

Shelley said…

like! I love lists...maybe when I am too knotted up to write I should do something like this.
And it sounds like a good thing to put on the whiteboard in the staffroom at work: "what is the best thing that has happened to you in the last 24 hours?"

cool. glad I had time to catch this one. :)

4:32 PM

outWORD by Matte Downey

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