Good Tuesday Morning!!
One of my best friends, (Jenny's and my other sister), Anna Frances shared someone with me years ago, Barbara Crafton. All us girls are Episcopalian, and grew up at Grace Church together, so it is a little unlike us to give our "testimonials" if you will. Please don't misunderstand, we are blessed with other people who are more vocal in their Faith than traditional Episcopalians...and for you we are thankful too.
Anyway, Anna Frances has an amazing faith that keeps her honest, humble, thankful and the most real a person can be. So when she told me about Barbara I knew she was worthy of my listening. Barbara is an Episcopalian minister who lives and preaches in New York CIty and she is super cool.
She sends a (almost) daily lesson, which always makes me stop and slow down (not my strong point). As I sit here this morning checking ALL of mine and Willow's emails accounts, blogging, returning calls, texts, making lists like crazy....I read this...and breath!!
SLOW DOWN....be thankful for what you have and what you don't!
Anyway, here is today's lesson/thought:
You need some skills in order to live well in this world. You need to know how to cook and sew on a button -- if you can't hem something, you need to know that scotch tape will hold a hemline through one wearing, until you can get the garment to someone who can. You need to be able to add and multiply and subtract and divide -- and you need to be able to read a traditional clockface, not just a digital readout of the time, so that later you will understand fractions more easily. You need to know a few simple knots -- a square and a bowline are enough for most of us, though more are better. You need to know how to light a fire and keep it going. You need to know how to perform CPR and the Heimlich Maneuver; also, how and when to apply a tourniquet. You need to know how to read.
You can see that this list is not in either ascending or descending order of importance -- if it were, reading would probably be first.
You also need to know how to delay gratification of your desires, or even to set them aside altogether, if it becomes necessary for the survival of something more important. And so you need to be able to distinguish between what is truly important and what is merely urgent -- they are not the same.
You need to know the direction of your delight -- that activity that will satisfy and interest you for a lifetime. If you are very fortunate, this will also be the way you earn your living, If not, you need to know how to find the time to feed your devotion.
You need to know how to ask for help.
And you need to know how to admit error. Maybe that should have been first.
You can go here to subscribe to her emails. You will love her!! Oh, and the book pictured above is fantastic...and a great gift. Back to fashion tomorrow :)
