11 Helpings of Inspirations In an Integrated Day

1.) Spend time with God however He presents Himself/Herself that day.
2.) An outstanding beverage? Coffee. Drink it! Full of antioxidants, helping you continue in productivity, health and wealth.
3.) Slept in at least twice this week.
4.) Didn't make it to church on Sunday. Stayed home, and didn't beat myself up over it! Instead, do something with God alone without that fear of what people “think” of your absence. Legalism = Death
5.) Find space in a cozy chair, to sit. Then, run a while and laugh lots.
6.) Journal a bit. Never to catch up... only Present, here and now.
7.) Light a vanilla scented candle.
8.) Hopped a fence with my best friend Julie.
9.) Holding a baby a bit.
10.) Smoking almonds, currently eating them like water.
11.) Hit the gym, followed by a rock concert.

Not Real

I sit in my semi - comfy, brown, normal rocking chair. I look at my grandfather watching a program on TV as a man from the music video sings with passion to the audience, “this is what people want... to dance and sing and be merry! This is reality guys, and if you don’t change your marketing procedures, no one will listen to you!!” Rolling my eyes I think… “What if this life is not reality? What if true reality is that which I cannot see? What if my life were different than what I perceive to be reality? What if the daily reality I see -- with my little raccoon eyes, is not a valid picture of reality at all? Reality is something I cannot comprehend. Reality comprehends me.

Reality comprehends me because reality is nothing I can obtain or grasp. It has understood my plight long before I came into existence. Reality in it’s purest form is by definition… the after life; a circumstance that lives and breaths -- a place, a word that isn’t a word at all… it’s a place full of life! It’s a spiritual area… a moment of eternity. Call it heaven? Call it truth for a moment. Call reality a sparkle in a child’s eye. Call it a belief in love or the fulfillment of a medium rare steak. Reality was there before I was born… I promise you… It understands us more than we understand ourselves. It’s an incredible creature we cannot see.

What if reality is not what I see, and only what I believe from hearing and trusting? What if reality and the truth of reality is something I cannot understand or see? What if? What if there is a God I cannot control? To not control something? Oh, God forbid! What if reality had nothing to do with temporal morality? What if morality though, has everything to do with ONLY eternity? Am I over spiritualizing? Would I matter, if the reality we see in this life from material things is, in its very nature—only the taste of spiritual heavens in the next life? If so, then reality is truth we choose to block out on a daily basis, through covering up feelings by temporal enjoyments or merely what we perceive to be truth in our daily lives.

What if the woman next to me is more a part of me than I realize? She is me. She is me? She has the same worries, same struggles, fears and likes. She enjoys the comfort of good food, same standard of music likings, loves to read and write, likes chex mix, desires to eat healthy yet busts it with a burger sometimes, really enjoys eclectic middle names, latte’s with no sugar, dry salads, dark red wines, working out, hates sitting down, and loves for the poor deeply.

“The very thing that I once thought made me unique makes me like everyone else. We are all the same in reality with skin to cover this reality. ”

What a paradox? To feel unique as a human, yet know we are similar and in reality all the same...destined to go to true reality. To covet similarity and common ground, yet desiring independence and want to “feel unique and special” depending how our passions guide us.

We assume that those who have ‘made it,’ in life have it all together. Reality cries out from the street and says…. No one knows. The truth is crying out yet we choose to run from it desiring uniqueness in our own nature -- which is pride.

I look up; my grandpa stretches out his toes. He is tired and getting older. He might think ‘what an interesting program on TV!’ Is he watching this to drown out his sorrow and pain he feels from his late wife’s death? Does he truly enjoy watching this tiring and annoying television show? Really, reality?

“Truth and reality are connected in almost a marriage relationship. Reality is not what I see, but what I know will come. Truth is what I do not see. Truth is what I cannot understand. Truth is a life after I am dead. Truth is the next life. So, what is important? Seeking others in the truth of who they will be, not how they see themselves right now. If we see truth in others as the finished work, then we will see them as a beautiful, incredible individuals with potential to always grow and thrive. We will see others not as objects, but as true loving friends who always tell the truth. To desire to walk in constant surrender of those who are in our face daily.

So, what is truth and reality in the temporal? Allowing God to posses you with the reality of a next life. Allowing your neighbor the love and respect you will one day show them in a life after this. Loving the truth of the person you do not know in the car next to you. Loving the truth about the loneliness of this life as well. Loving, that we are all in this thing we entitle with such a simple and extremely under-appreciated word… “life.” We all have felt the pain and sting of hardship in one way or another, whether it be growing pangs or physical ailments. Mental philosophical hardships or monthly gym fees! From the struggle of spending too much money on trivial enjoyments... while really wanting to save it. These things we worry about don’t really matter because in reality -- we are all in heaven already. This earthly life is only a dot in the string of dots to come.

An interesting thought, considering we cannot ‘see’ eternity… only know it is truthful reality based upon belief.

I get up; I stumble softly over the shoe in front of me, as I walk out of my scene of ambiguous thought to physical reality. “Ouch, that toe again! I always stub the same toe…” I pause, laugh in my heart a bit and think, “how wonderful it is that we all have stubbed our toes at different moments in time—yet all we see and think at that moment is how we feel.” In eternal reality we all enjoy the same things, love the same foods in different forms, hate the pain of toe-stubbing and recognize the uniqueness of each person and the potential he or she offers. What a beautiful confusion, what joyous bewilderment, what an illusion of certainty!!

Laughing, I consider how I love the similarity of humans, all of us living on the same ground. Building houses for ourselves on the top of it yet segregating ourselves...for no reason at all. Believing that ‘my life,’ is to have a house of my own, a cute dog and a cup of ice cream every once in a while. However, in truth… these things are what we all desire, yet ultimately to help others… the issue is that we cannot do it on our own.

We are all the same, and its time to recognize our similarities. We all struggle with the same things in different forms. What we choose to do with these differences is up to us. How we choose to act the next time we stub our toes, get pulled over and have coffee with a friend is up to us? Will we enjoy it, knowing that in a few short years this 'dot' we call life will be a 'string of dots,' in the next? Will we live in right reality or only think about ourselves? Reality is something I cannot understand. Reality is something that understands me.

peace, Davy Nicole

Lovey Love... Believe in love.

Love is all around you. Is is consistently apparent in the rustling wind, the frothy beverage, the simple smile, the colorful faces. It is never silent. It screams at us; every moment, every minute ever meeting. It forges its light into every dark pathway.

It is our fault for failing to recognize it, grasp onto it and never let it go. To recognize love in your life is the first key to unlocking a number of successes in our lives. It is screaming at us behind closed doors, in a restaurant, and in your community. To believe and accept it, is where we MUST act. To capture it and believe it is our duty.

To believe in love. To live in it married to truth is even more enlightening.

The truth is a mighty and intense opportunity that we must not fear. However if we can grasp the understanding for of true optimism, and love life in and out of every situation will bring true joy.

Live in Love,
Davy Desmond

I like Steak... How About You?

In her interview with Time magazine in 1989, Mother Teresa said

"It's a big sadness; it's always the children who suffer most when there is no love in the family. That's a terrible suffering. Very difficult because you can do nothing. That is the great poverty. You feel helpless. But if you pick up a person dying of hunger, you give him food and it is finished."

There is a great reality that sweeps throughout the earth; It is the reality that millions of children DO NOT have enough food, clothes, and medical treatment. When I say the word 'enough', naturally everyone has a different opinion on what 'enough' is. Often in America, many have 'more that enough.' The ability to have a lunch break, the beauty of enjoying a meal with a family, and the ability to go to the movies at any time. These things are all wonderful things, and also a wonderful blessing.

However, once one sees the reality of a person not having anywhere NEAR 'enough', the understanding of this concept changes. The word enough changes to necessity and the human's desperation for survival. It is not a selfish thing to be blessed, but rather to recognize that to who much has been given, much much more will be demanded; and from the one who has been entrusted with much, much more will be asked.

We know it is the duty of those who have much to give much. We know it is also the duty to enable others in the world to receive this beautiful blessing as well. No matter what you have been given, no matter what you know, may you not grow weary in giving this blessing to those who are in front of you, behind you, right next to you and across the ocean.

I hope that the next time you are enjoying a steak... ENJOY it! However, may your enjoyment of it make you EVEN more grateful, more loving and more content knowing you can serve others. Do not take the options, choices and the blessings we have been given go to waste. Eat, be fed, and feed.

always, davy

September

September

Brierly Ashour

When the goldenrod is yellow,
And leaves are turning brown -
Reluctantly the summer goes
In a cloud of thistledown.

When squirrels are harvesting
And birds in flight appear -
By these autumn signs we know
September days are here.