What is a home?

A home can be many things to many people.

A home can be a place where our precious family abides. A home can be a place of refuge, safety and protection from the world and the elements. A home can be a large debt that weighs us down. A home can be a place filled with love, peace, happiness, and God. A home can be a place where we store all the accumulated “stuff”, or items, we have collected all our life. A home can be a fancy showplace with expensive furnishings and such. A home can be a place of learning and growth. A home can be a haven for a friend in need. A home can be a “heaven on earth” for all who dwell therein.

Grieving

We have all lost someone we love through the process of death. And we all know how hard and difficult that time is for us.

Yesterday I attended the funeral of a family member. It was a very special, uplifting service. One of the speakers made the following comment, that I would like to share. I am not sure I have the wording exact. He said, “The only way to get rid of the pain of grieving, is to get rid of the love in life”. Pretty profound, I thought.

What is a legacy?

Webster says it is “something left by will; a bequest; something handed down or derived from an ancestor or earlier time”.

Do we have any legacies left by any of our ancestors? Their journal, diary, or life story? If we do, we know the great value and treasure these things are to us. These legacies left, help us to know about that ancestor.

What if we did not have anything left by any ancestor? What if they never wrote anything about themselves? What a tragedy. How would we be able to know them?...To know the kind of person they were, their feelings, thoughts, the kind of life they lived, what they did and accomplished. Honestly....how would we feel?

Would we want OUR posterity, in time, to feel that way about us? Would we want to be a great big question mark in the mind of our descendants? Think about it. Down through the generations of our family...no one would have a clue about US...because we did not take the time to write about our self and leave it as a legacy (a gift of ourself) for our posterity. Our life story...what we are all about...will have been buried with us. What a tragedy that CAN be. But it doesn’t HAVE to be.

Let’s begin today. Let’s start writing our life story for our future generations of family. We do not want to be forgotten or unknown to them, do we?

So what do we do....how do we begin to write our life story?

Near the top of this blog home page, on the right hand side is a section titled “visit my 4 other blogs”. Click on my blog titled “Writing Your Life Story...one memory jog at a time”. Here I give you step by step instructions for getting started, some tips, and a multitude of questions that will help to jog your memory of happenings and incidents in YOUR life. These are the things you write about. These are the things your family would want to know about you.

So begin right now. It will be fun and extremely rewarding to you....AND a priceless possession in the hands of your family. It will be your gift of love to them.

Christmas

Dove of peace




Christmas is a special time. But it can also be a hard time for some people. It shouldn’t be, but it seems to be that way in many cases. During this time of year there can be more depression, more sadness, more debt, more stress, more loneliness, and way too much busy-ness. This type of Christmas is not what it was meant to be like. Sometimes there is not enough love, peace, contentment, happiness, simplicity, and spirituality!! Think about how you could make it this kind of Christmas.

One word stands out for me….SIMPLICITY.