How gracious God is; how gentle with His earth-bound children! Despite my reluctance to follow, little by little He led me deeper into His truth. How could I know that in committing myself to God’s sovereignty I was embracing the richest love, the purest joys, the truest source of fulfillment the human heart can know?
— Margaret Clarkson, So You’re Single, p. 35
What does faith see? For that, we must return, I think, to the moment when we saw by faith for the very first time. In that moment, we saw differently than we had ever seen before. We had x-ray vision then. We were able to see through the things of this world and recognize in them God’s invisible qualities — love, order, patience, enthusiasm — revealed in the world he created for our benefit. Faith, after all, merely confirms what creation shows us in that first lightning bolt of believing. We looked at apples, grass, shade and saw provision. We looked at algebra and saw order. We looked at our pain and struggles, even our terror, and recognized God’s patience and his amazing gift of free will.
— Patty Kirk, Confessions of an Amateur Believer, p. 55
When your tribal beliefs conflict with your soul, your vibration drops, your inner light dims, and you open yourself to physical, emotional, and spiritual maladies.
This doesn’t mean you have to give up your tribal heritage and throw away everything you own, but simply the items that cause a conflict or that do not raise your vibration or allow you the life you want and deserve…. You need to consciously and happily — not forcefully — decide what to keep, what will raise your vibration.
— Christel Nani, Sacred Choices, p. 194-195
We need to make the choice to be happy in a particular situation, just as it is, and at a given moment. It might not be a perfect moment, but it is ours; we are breathing; we are alive. We choose our happiness incrementally, moment by moment, hour by hour. Now.
— Alexandra Stoddard, Choosing Happiness:Â Keys to a Joyful Life, p. 1
We learned an important lesson in our decade-long friendships. We learned that we had been fooled. We had convinced ourselves that if we could manage our schedules, break through the glass ceiling, spend quality time with our families, bring home the bacon (and fry it up in a pan) while bouncing children on our hips and creating warm and loving relationships with our husbands, in-laws, and colleagues, somehow, some way, we would be rewarded with the problem-free lives that had, up until then, eluded us. We were wrong….
We learned that the problem-free life we sought was more than an illusion. It had become a myth to which too many women had fallen victim. A woman’s life is much more than success, having it all, or the elusive balance we all seek. It is more than seeking perfection or conquering the world (although you might). It is more than gritting your teeth and making it through. It is about surviving and thriving.
For us, surviving and thriving meant reinventing, rebuilding, and realizing that success was never final and failure was never fatal. It meant putting our best foot forward (Nike for some, Nine West for others) no matter what, and walking. Walking forward looking like a pillar of success on the outside while that tiny voice inside reminded us that our teenagers were out of control, our job could end tomorrow, and our spouses, colleagues, and bosses had been untruthful, selfish, unfaithful, or just plain stupid.
Surviving and thriving meant taking what life offered up and looking for the opportunities, the joy, and the compassion in less-than-pleasant or less-than-perfect circumstances.
–Deborah Collins Stephens, Jackie Speier, Michealene Cristini Risley, and Jan Yanehiro, This Is Not the Life I Ordered, p. 18-19
Stop and celebrate each of those small successes, each of those little steps we take on our journey to success. Don’t skip over them, don’t rush through them, but take time to enjoy each as it comes. It will encourage you and, most important, it will motivate you to keep going.
— Debbie Macomber, Knit Together:Â Discover God’s Pattern for Your Life, p. 67
“Deliberately using our capacity to be amused is one of many ways we can cleanse the mind of pollutants. Laughter is letting go. Laughter — true laughter, laughter that makes us all feel closer as opposed to laughter that makes us feel uneasy and separate — is instantaneous release of anxiety, discouragement, and all other fragmented states….
“Children are predisposed to laugh. They are pre-amused. Because of this, children can often prevent disturbing thoughts from getting a foothold in their minds in the first place. Under most circumstances, they instinctively shift their preoccupation from a subject of disstress to a subject of delight.”
— Hugh Prather, The Little Book of Letting Go, p. 139
“My definition of guilt is quite simple: when you try to force yourself to do something you don’t really want to do…. Anytime you hear yourself say, ‘I should, I’m supposed to, I have to,’ you have ignored your spirit to please your tribe.
“Coming into harmony with your soul releases the tension in your body and eliminates the mental Ping-Pong. When you hear your spirit, there is a huge surge of energy with a wonderful feeling of relief. Suddenly you are awake, alert, and fully alive and ready to live.”
— Christel Nani, Sacred Choices, p. 49
“To continue to grow in love is a joyous and mystical journey, full of new insight, excitement and surprise. The eventual payoff, though it may not offer us all of the answers, is well worth the trip.”
— Leo Buscaglia, Born for Love, p. 118
“Simply put, listening to that [your spirit’s] voice means making a sacred choice to do and believe things because they make your heart sing!”
— Christel Nani, Sacred Choices:Â Thinking Outside the Tribe to Heal Your Spirit, p. 43