The power of real postage stamps

I have a beautiful friend Ms. Library.  She is an absolute ray of sunshine. This was never more evident to me than a few months ago.  In the cold, dreary, Pacific Northwest winter months that follow the ringing in of a New Year, the gray skies can elicit a gray mood and a chill in the soul.

I do not like being cold. It makes me grumpy and tired and downright unfit to be around.  When I get chilled it is really hard for me to get warm again. I battle the gray days with garage gym workouts and chocolate. I yearn for the warmth of summer, outdoor rides and sunny days that last past my normal bedtime.

So when I walked to the mailbox that day, in the drizzle that had been falling for weeks, I bundled up, walked quickly.  Expecting the typical junk mail, mail for past residents and a bill, I could only wish for the valpak coupons to break up the monotony. As I pulled open the rickety mailbox door, I noticed an envelope that warmed me and made me smile.  The small envelope had a real stamp on it. My name and address were hand written. The local return address made my heart soar.

Quickly walking back to my house, mail in hand, I was anxious to open this mail anomaly.  It was simple, but so incredibly meaningful.  Ms. Library had taken a moment to write me a card, just to say she was thinking of me.  It was a quick note with powerful words that climbed in my heart and made it feel as though it would burst.  She expressed the joy of our friendship and then signed off.  A simple card, but a powerful gesture.

Her intentionality was such an meaningful expression. She was thinking about me and our friendship. In the dark drizzly gray, that real stamp and hand written note meant the world to me.  It is often that the small simple gestures hold great power for me.  To be seen, to be thought of, to be remembered can be transformative.

What if we all reached out to someone with a simple handwritten note and real stamp just because we think of them?  What if we each texted people that crossed our mind, just to say that…”I was thinking about you!”?  What if you knew you were seen, thought of and on someone’s mind…. That you matter even just to one person? How would that change your day?

I have another friend whose daughter was struggling through social isolation, like so many of us have for the past many months. They found themselves seeking help and in the end it was decided she just needed to be connected.  She needed her friends to reach out to her.  Our lives have been disrupted and many are left wondering if life will ever feel normal or if anyone even remembers or cares about them.  The darkness of loneliness and being unseen can have such a simple remedy, yet how often do words go unsaid, cards not written, texts not sent, people not noticed. We often do not know the battles in one another’s hearts. We all battle, so we all need to be seen and thought of.  I often lack follow through of even the best intentions to reach out by allowing myself to be busied by the mundane of each day.  I know it does not take but a couple minutes to reach out, but I often still don’t do it.  The practice of seeing people and reaching out, I want to cultivate more.

Ms. Library has inspired me and I hope you too!  Send a text today to someone you are thinking of.  Or better yet, make your grandma proud, buy some real stamps, hand write a note and send it in the actual mail. You could be just the medicine a lonely, unseen soul needs right now.

When have you felt seen lately? Who has been on your mind most recently?

An ordinary mason jar

Each week we add to the jar. Then it sits on our dining room table waiting for the next week. It is not ornate or beautiful, as a matter of fact it is cluttered and ordinary. The standard copy paper cut up into small rectangles in a basic mason jar is not marvel of home decor. And yet it had become one of the most beautiful objects in our home.

Sitting akwardly at the dinner table has become commonplace with an introverted teen boy. Mr. Wonderful jr. endures my perky questions about his day and probing about the video games he is enamored with. He tolerates me as I try to connect to his world and discover more of who he is becoming. In those simple akward conversations, I am becoming as well. So when I suggested a weekly practice of sharing gratitudes, I was met with reluctant tolerance from both Mr. Wonderful and his jr. Once each week as we sit together over meals both simple and elaborate, I set out a slips of paper and random ball point pens fished from the junk drawer in the kitchen. As the meal begins in typical fashion, I ask question after question, met with small gestures, grunts and monosylabic answers. Pushing further into the teen venacular I probe for any connection or little glimmer of response. The paper and pen waiting patiently. At some point in the meal, ususally at the end, we each grab our pen and quickly scribe a kindness or gratitude from our week so far. Most of the time it is a quick action with just a few words, sometimes it takes thought to recall a gratitude and other times the words flow easily. We each fold our response and place it in the jar.

We began this practice in January of 2020. Little did we know what was about to insue. Each week faithfully through a dumpster fire year, we added to the jar. We had agreed to not read the sentiments until New Year’s Day 2021. And so we did!

New Year’s Day 2021 as we sat to dinner, we read each paper round robin style. In our distinct voices, we poured out the words we had saved from our journey through a crazy year together. The gratitudes were grand and mundane. Pondering each sentiment, I was so filled with joy and of course gratitude. But maybe the most significant for me, was I got to know Mr. Wonderful jr’s heart just a little bit more. I got a small peek into a shy teenage boy that tolerates his father’s partner. It was a connection for me to treasure! As we remembered the year through a lens of gratitude, I was overwhelmed by the beginnings of a connection I had been so hopeful for. It was a special dinner, not for the crunch wraps that Mr Wonderful had made, but for the tiny step in becoming a bonus mom.

Gratitude shifts our minds to new and unexpected places. It requires vulnerability. It seeks connection. Gratitude has been highlighted in the past several years as a healing balm. It has been capitalized on by writers and talk show hosts. Gratitude floods social media in the holidays. Any gratitude moves us into becoming more gracious. But the transformative gratitude that becomes a lifestyle is small, steady and repetitive. This gratitude undoes us and leaves a vulnerable place in us that calls to action a connectedness and reaction to the world around us. It calls upon us to transform, be better and do better. With all that is happening in our world in the wake of crazy times, I think we all need a gratitude jar on our table. What would New Years 2022 look like if we all did that? What would we be called to do and become?

How does gratitude play out in your life? Do you have a regular practice? Has it shifted your thinking or actions?

Hugging a Porcupine

The world around me swirls with anxiety in the wake of a year that can be only described as a dumpster fire. The slow burn of this dumpster fire continues on and if I am honest, I have become somewhat jaded to the sensationalism surrounding me. Overwhelmed, I did not write at all last year. I have been disappointed again and again, but yet hope does not end. For those who adhere to the teachings of the Bible, It has been a year to keep 1 Corinthians 13: 13 in mind. “And now these three remain: Faith Hope and Love….”

Our quarantine poster that hung in our front window in March 2020

In so many ways I have still hoped this past year. I firmly believed that maybe some good could come from extended time together in our households. I cheered as the earth took a deep breath from the lessened commuters clogging our atmosphere with carbon emissions. I continue to hope for a systemic change in pace as we start to reemerge from unbearable isolation. As difficult truth comes to the surface, the pain will hopefully give way to understanding and kindness as we open our eyes to the beauty of a life lived in respect and joy for races and creeds. Hope abounded as I watched my colleagues make home visits, reinvent their classrooms and creatively support cherubs from afar.

Intentionally loving the people around me has taken on new complexity. Who will I allow to be in my space? How do I convey compassion and friendliness without the benefit of smiling? When do I speak and when do I stay silent and listen? Who do I allow to influence me in making decisions about safety? How do I love friends plagued with cyber bravery that spout off offensive, hysterical or disagreeable streams of rhetoric on social media? Intentionally loving people in the tension of all that has sought to divide is like hugging a porcupine.

I recently checked out from Libby (online library app) the book “Digital Minimalism”. This book is shifting my thinking about connections. Humans need connection, we need to be understood and to have people to socially interact with. This book unpacks how disconnected digital interaction actually is. It is challenging me to rethink the value of even using social media. I am internally debating whether social media is actually contributing to my desire to live life intentionally. Minimalism is intentionality. Minimalism requires meaning for each decision, item, app, service or relationship. The more I ponder these ideas, the more I long for real connection. Dr. John Delony, asserts that anxiety, depression, bipolar, among other often diagnosed disfunctions are really, at their core, a lack of connection. On his podcast, he often advises people struggling and suffering with these issues to connect. He advises looking in the face of the people you love, touching their face with your hands- skin on skin. He urges parents to hold their children’s hands as they watch tv. He tells husbands to not solve their wives problems with words, but to listen, to touch her face and look in her eyes twice a day. He urges wives to stop the flurry of activity and to hug their husbands tight for long minutes twice a day.

While the pandemic surges on, new strains threatening to prolong this crazy disconnection, we are desperate to connect with each other. I see it everyday with my cherubs online. Hope continues as I put my intention into the world of loving people well. I have not figured out how to do this well in our current situation by any stretch of the imagination. As each day blends to the next in this “Groundhogs Day” like existence, my goal is to increase my intentionality and connect where I can with the people that enter my day.

What from 2020 are you keeping? How are you connecting to those who mean the most to you? How are you safely connecting to people in your community?

Mr Wonderful jr.

For my birthday I have a tradition I have decided to uphold . I run a half marathon on the weekend closest to my birthday. I invite my friends to come run or walk or just hang out at the finish line, then we go and eat!

As I run I think about the previous year, all the people and things I am so thankful for. It is a great practice that I want to include more in my daily life of living beautifully exhausted. Each year I have unique events that form my memories and people that play recurring parts, exit the stage or make their debut. Each person plays such an important role.

In the past few years, I have had significant cast change in my life. Not the least was two years ago on my birthday. Mr. Wonderful and I had been dating for nearly 6 months. Our lives were increasingly intertwining, So it seemed the right time for me to meet Mr. Wonderful Jr. Following a sunny day with my cherubs at school, I commuted home to my lovely roommates. We chatted and celebrated my birthday with a simple dinner. Mr. Wonderful and I had arranged for me to meet he and junior at a local bohemian ice cream shop in our downtown area after dinner.

I was incredibly nervous. Mr. Wonderful Jr. is the pride and joy of Mr. Wonderful. This young man had been the center of his universe and we were moving toward blending our lives together. My beautiful boy (who is now an incredible man) had been my pride and joy, so I had a deep understanding of the gravity of this meeting. I love kids and I knew the minute I meet Mr Wonderful Jr., it would be a metaphorical point of no return. It was so important to me that we hit it off or at least he didn’t hate me.

I walked across the parking lot to the ice cream shop as Mr. Wonderful and Mr. Wonderful Jr. walked along the sidewalk. It was a moment I will never forget. A handsome, shy, blonde boy meekly looked up at me and I could feel the gravity of the moment. We ordered our uniquely flavored ice creams, then awkwardly sat at a nearby table. in my usually form I asked a lot of questions and attempted to engage this quiet child in conversation about school, sports, and other activities. He was painfully shy and seemed to be challenged by every question. It was quickly evident to me how different Mr. Wonderful’s sweet boy was from my boisterous Beautiful Boy. I left feeling so cherished and valued, that Mr. Wonderful would share with me his most important relationship.

In the years since that birthday meeting, I have grown to really love Mr Wonderful Jr. as I continue to fall deeply in love with his dad. I am constantly asking myself how I can love them both well everyday.

Lately, with the Beautiful Boy off adulting across the state and Mr. Wonderful Jr. navigating the middle school world, I daydream about how they will hopefully meet someday. I wonder what tales they would tell each other as they get to know one another. Maybe someday I will get to watch that unfold.

This is all very tricky business! There is so much love to go around in this house and yet I am so sensitive to sharing these amazing young men together. I want to love big and enjoy them both for the uniqueness they bring to our evolving family. It is an endeavor of great love that takes all of our focus. A true act of beautiful exhaustion!

What tricky relationships do you have in your family? What can you do to blend them well? How do you love each other well in your family, even when it is awkward?

great expectations

Today is the last day of summer break for me.  I can remember as a kid the last day of summer break meant chores and a reinstated early bedtime.  The clothes we had purchased weeks before from JC  Penney had been sequestered into a separate location in the closet preparing for their debut would finally make their way into my dresser.  Sorting through the bags, carefully choosing a first day outfit and laying it out before bed was a ritual of sorts that just increased my excitement for the impending school year.  In the late summer heat, I can remember not sleeping with anticipation of all that would come in the next nine months. I had a longing for the return to routine while equally lamenting the loss of lazy summer days and being outside.  Not much has changed.  I sit this morning on my porch sipping coffee and thinking about all the things I still wanted to accomplish this summer and distracted by the long list of tasks I need to complete before the cherubs return to the halls of our fine school.

A new school year provides a new beginning, a fresh start.  New school clothes, shiny shoes, and fresh lunchboxes usher in a hopefulness that this year can be the best yet. It is a time to set the stage for reaching new goals and measuring growth.  It feels as though anything is possible.  Hope is abundant at times like these and we all need more hope.  It seems that hope is a commodity of great value that gets swallowed up by the pace of our lives.  The overwhelming stream of information that surrounds us is like drinking from a firehose. This leaves us with no mental space to process it all, let alone to pause and take notice of transitions. The endings and beginnings seems to blend together, if we do not take a moment to block out the noise of the continuous flow of communications.

Rituals can help us to push pause on the noise.  Most people have rituals around holidays, birthdays or even sports event. Rituals can enrich our time spent with friends and family.  Creating rituals or traditions creates margin for connection with each other if done properly.  Rituals can get out of hand or become empty and obligatory.  That is not what I am advocating.  The first day of school ritual of a pancake breakfast or a pizza dinner with the family can be a rich time to connect and mark time.  It is the way we can block out the noise of our culture and love one another intentionally.  We can reminisce and dream together. I had these kinds of rituals with my son as he grew up and now as I forge an encore life with Mr. Wonderful and Mr Wonderful Jr. I am searching to create a new blend of rituals.

So today, I search for a new outfit for the first day, set my alarm and pack my lunch for tomorrow. Happy school year everyone!

When are the natural pauses or transitions in your calendar?  What rituals keep you connected in your family? 

*I am still collecting your ideas to live beautifully exhausted for an upcoming post.  Email them to me at beautifulexhaustionblog@gmail.com

 

margin- get some!

Photo by Chevanon Photography on Pexels.com

Sitting in the school auditorium on a Sunday morning, coffee in hand, I was exhausted.  Not beautifully exhausted.  The kind of exhaustion that comes from accepting busyness as a kind of badge of honor in our culture.  I worked full time in the non-profit sector, taught as an adjunct professor at a small college, a mom of a preteen, wife, friend, sister, daughter, and active community member.  I was committed to being all things to all people and to physical fitness.  I was married to a man with a less than strong work ethic, that had big dreams and no drive. I did the lion’s share of the household management, yardwork and daily chores.  I was a hands on mom, involved in music boosters and any other activity my kiddo found fanciful that week. I worked 60-80 hours a week and was desperately trying to hold on to any relationships with my girlfriends to keep what little sanity I had left.  As a good Christian woman, I even quoted scripture trying to make it all ok. (“I have come that you may have abundant life” John 10:10) This was my life, sound familiar?

It was that morning that I began to question whether all of the activity was really worth it. As my pastor got up to share his weekly message, my brain was already moving to the list in my purse containing the all the tasks necessary in the next 24 hours to just make it through to tomorrow.  He began as usual, but quickly I realized this message was

different. As he shared about his life, the busyness our culture values and the toll it took on his life, marriage and even health, my heart sank.  I was achieving all the culture valued, and was killing myself in the process. He spoke of the need for margin.  We tend to live our lives right up to the boundaries with no space left. Many books are written on how to do this well, the be “more effective” with our time, how to fit more into your day, to focus for more success. I had read them all, practiced them and what I came up with was a life with no margin.

Margin is the space on the edges. It is our room to breathe, a resting spot.  It is not the place to reorganize and launch back in, it is the space for nothing.  When we write in the margins, our life flows off the page. We need the space of nothing to be healthy.

A lot has happened since that day so many years ago and I still find myself learning how to practice margin.  My life is shrinking to a reasonable place with margin all around. With more margin, I have more opportunity to love deeply, to exhaustion;  to love with depth not more activity.  Beautiful exhaustion does not come from a life of increased activity, it may actually be quite the opposite.  It is a life with less in it, with deeper roots.  Physical and mental exhaustion are not the measures of a life well lived, it is in the beauty of exhausting ourselves in pouring into others, but not into everyone. With our world so vastly connected it seems counter-intuitive to intentionally shrink my life, but it is the only way to create more margin in our finite time and space. I have to say no often, to say yes when it matters.

How much margin have you created? How can you create more margin?  What do you need to shrink in your life to have more margin?

****In a future post I will be listing the top ten ways to live beautifully exhausted.  Do you have a great idea or example?  Email it to me at beautifulexhaustionblog@gmail.com it just might make the list!

Anniversary Day

Today marks the one year anniversary of my arrival home to Anacortes, WA  after pedaling across country. While epic and life changing, it was just the beginning. I have said to people that the journey on my bike was not to prove anything, but it really ended a book (not a chapter) for me.  Like most people I have had many chapters, but this was different.  My life has so dramatically changed in the last couple of years, that I have put that old book to rest and have begun an entirely new book.

As I rode across the Northern Tier,  I experienced amazing generosity and kindness.  People are genuinely thoughtful and kind, quite the opposite of what we are led to believe on social media and traditional media.  People love their communities!  I am no different.  As people poured out pride about their community, the little voices in my head were saying, “Well, you’ve never been to the Pacific Northwest, it’s the best place to live!”.

At the finish line last year, I was given a very special honor of a day named after me in Anacortes, WA. As the mayor declared the day mine, I couldn’t help but think that I needed to really make it special.  So, I will!  This year, I am simply asking people to give to CHOW or your local food program for school children.  You can usually find one through your local United Way, a food bank or even a school.  Give so that children can be fed and ready to learn!  I have plans in the works to organize a short day ride in the coming years to benefit CHOW.  I encourage you to remember August 12 as the day to support feeding programs for kids in your community!  If you are in Skagit County please make a donation to Skagit United Way- CHOW today!  click here to give to CHOW

get out of my own way

He works nights, so most days this summer I get up and busily work on my to do list until he wakes in the mid afternoon. Teacher summers are great! Yesterday was no exception. I try to be focused on

dropping everything and sitting with him while he wakes up, eats and gets ready to head off for another 12 hour shift. I make him some breakfast and pack a lunch so he can ease into his long day. I happily send him out the door imploring him to be safe and keep the bad guys locked up.

Except yesterday I didn’t. I was working on an important email to my brother about some pressing family business. Then, I got side tracked searching for gear on the facebook marketplace for our upcoming backpacking trip and our every evolving garage gym. I shuffled through my to do list and set my plans in motion. All the while he was searching the cupboards groggily for some breakfast. A swarm of locust, I mean four preteen boys, had ravenously consumed all the food at a sleepover the previous couple of days and I had not yet finished compiling our click list for groceries (warning tangent… I hate the grocery store, so online groceries with curbside pick has changed my life. I have not been in side a grocery store to grocery shop in months…) So he was left in his sleepy state

to make breakfast and pack a lunch with little more than rice cakes, frozen brats and tortillas.And I didn’t move an inch off the couch. My focus was on myself, on my list. Those who know me well, know that I am a list maker. My friends and I joke that we make lists of the lists me need to make. I have been known to complete a task not on the list, just to write it on the list and immediately cross it off. It is so satisfying! Going to bed with a completed list is a little victory for me. Yet my focus is in the wrong place. Lists just for the satisfaction of completion is selfish and that is exactly what happened yesterday. I was so focused on my list, that I did not take one hour of my day to love Mr. Wonderful well. He deserves to be loved well. He loves me so well, I should at least make him a sandwich.

So, today I woke to a piece of paper ready for a list and refocus. My list still has tasks, but I am asking myself what needs to go on this list that leads me to love well, to love deeply; to pause from pragmatism and pour out generosity of spirit, love for another and gratitude for those in my life. I want to get out of my own way to embody love.The lists will be increasing as we renovate our home to prepare for sale and embark on building our own home as owner-builders. There are a million little details, but I want each day to be filled with intention to love well. So my lists will be a practice to love well. It is an opportunity to build a new home founded on intentional acts of love.

When do you find that you are the biggest barrier to loving well? How do you overcome it? What practices do you use to be intentional about loving those around you?

What you focus on

I have not spent much time writing in the last few months. I found that my journal has been empty and my desire to record my thoughts, feelings and ideas has been absent. It has bothered me that my blog has sat idle, looming out in cyberspace. Yet, I have felt I have nothing to say. Perhaps I have used all my important words and exhausted all of my ideas last summer on my epic journey. The mundane life has been ambling along and I am focused on tasks and dreams that are seemingly far less important to the world at large, but are really meaningful to me.

I knew that the journey last summer was in so many ways a culmination of so may chapters in my life. So much has happened in the past five years, that it is as though I am not just writing a new chapter, but a whole new book. All that I have known and staked my life to has been shaken and shifted. It sounds ominous, but really it had been more of a rebirth. I have let go of so much. I am beginning to find the things that are anchoring my new life.

Living beautifully exhausted, looks very different these days. My world and influence seems to be shrinking. Not shriveling or dying, but far more focused. I have taken on new roles that are keeping my world small, and focused. I have become more intentional in many ways and I am learning daily what it means to live an abundant life free of mindless selfishness.

This year I have been listening to podcasts. This new world of information and inspiration is intriguing to me. My podcast subscriptions range from Dave Ramsey, Build Your Own House University, Spartan Up, the Liturgists, the Blue Wife Life, The Stepmom Club and the Cult of Pedagogy. Every part of my crazy life has a podcast. It keeps my long commutes from being mundane for sure. As I have listened to this vast menu of topics one theme continues to emerge in every context – Be intentional!

Intentionality requires focus. It seems everyone agrees that the things you give your time, money and thoughts to grow and flourish. If you want to make changes and improve your finances, create a budget focus every dollar that you have. If you want to be successful, persevere, get up early, decide to follow the plan that leads to the finish line. If you want to build a house, create a strong foundation, use the right tools, focus your time and energy on being an expert on your house designs. To be a supportive law enforcement spouse, understand the law enforcement community, be flexible and create community among other law enforcement families. To be a good stepmom, focus on being patient, learn when to stand in the gap and when to be in the background. For success in teaching, really understand students, culture, psychology and brain development. Every podcast when boiled down is screaming to me ; what you focus on is what will be true, successful and robust. How do I focus when all of the above is my life?

Think about your car. I drive a Nissan Versa Note. It is not a glamorous car by any stretch of the imagination. However, everyday I see a handful of these cars on my commute. I bet you see your make and model as you motor about too. I see Versa Notes, because it is the focus of my car life.

This year I have been focusing on not being able to write, having nothing to say and not having a strong purpose to convey to the world. It was the wrong focus. My real focus is what I started this blog all about. So you could say, I am refocusing. How can I live each day beautifully exhausted? What does that mean in my much smaller life these days? How do I love so deeply the people in my constricted circles that those relationships thrive and significantly deepen? What does it mean to love myself well? How will that spill over into a focus of living life with intention?

What do you need to focus on? Where do you need to renew your intentionality?

Sacred spaces

I entered the room with an anxious spirit. I haven’t played guitar in years. By play guitar, I don’t really mean creating beautiful music like my very talented friends Mark Clawson, Beth Bishop, or the members of Old Town Tonic. It is not meant that I can actually play music at all. I really just play enough chords to sing along and to lead children in simple tunes. While the mere presence of my guitar awes most every first grader, real musicians know that I am not one of them. My chord sheet downloaded from the internet, I enter the room hoping my hands are recovered enough to hold the neck of the guitar and pick, that my fingers have regain enough dexterity to press the strings to create sounds of the G, D and A chords.

Singing is foriegn to so many children at my school. They seem to have the idea that somehow singing skills are given to some people at birth while others are skipped over of this skill. It seems having red hair or being tall is just like singing to them. It seems they have not had a lullaby sung to them, sat at the dinner table to sing grace or celebrated life events with song. They have missed the sacred space that song creates. Yet, here I come inviting them in with a simple tune and gusto as I strum in mediocrity. I invite them to consider that singing can be learned and developed.

I get to enter sacred spaces with children everyday. I roll my cart of wonder into classrooms all over my school. I get to sit and watch as the lightbulbs go on, as kids explore the world for the first time in new ways considering all the wonder the world has for the first time. I get to carry simple instruments into spaces and march with children as they discover that making sound can be a glorious adventure as we create a marching band transforming a bland blacktop into a grand parade. I get to work in the classrooms of educators that do seemingly impossible things everyday, all in a day’s work. The sacred space of learning is a mystery and precious joy. My colleagues create this space each day!

My sunmer bicycle adventures were filled with a sacredness that I carry through my days. It has helped me view the seemingly mundane and routine with new light. I cherish in my heart the people I met along my way and the joy of having my world opened up in much the same way my colleagues and I open the world for our littlest students.

To be sacred, is to be set apart, but it does not have to be extraordinary. Sacred can be plain, but given the space and authority to be sacred. Can all of life be sacred? Can I live a sacred life that embraces gratitude, mercy, and grace?

My cousin Joseph gave me a great gift a few weeks ago. He sets his alarm for a certain time each evening. As the alarm sounds, he pauses and he invites whoever he is with to share three gratitudes. Dinner was over and my cousins, boyfriend and I were having dessert when the alarm sounded. Each in turn we entered the sacred space of sharing gratitude. This moment shifted each of us to refocus as we contemplated our gifts, shared our thankfulness and embraced gratitude.

Sacredness is not reserved for the religious. Sacredness is a pause to recognize the fragile nature of life and relationships, the wonder of innocence, the joy of intentional living and the embracing of suffering.

Do you have sacred spaces in your day? Where can you pause to create a sacred space? Who can you invite into sacred space with you?