Lifted, By My Girls! — The Archives — Formerly Vented Uplift

Are there days in which you sit in the calm ealry hours enjoying the peace and stillness sipping a cup of coffee? Do you talk to God in that time? Do you hear the words that pop into your mind or heart? Do you put those words from pen to paper? Or do you let the words be forgotten and fly away with another thought? Do you hear those words as a message, a thought, a purpose, your mission, a whisper from God? Or do you simply ignore them and not give those words another thought? I myself, hear them, write them, feel them and seek then when I get these little "divine downloads". Last month, in the still of the morning, while taking in the sunrise doing my daily readings and pondering LENT, a few words were whispered to me. "Find the CALM in CALAMITY." So I grabbed a pencil and my journal and sribbled the words down. What do these words mean? I started to ask "Well, how does one find CALM in CALAMITY?". I decided to literally take CALM out and looked ...

Violent. Disruptive. Tumultuous. These are words used to describe storms. Both actual and metaphorical. When you hear the word STORM, what do you think? By definition, it ensues chaos. I bet you've never thought of JOY, though. Having the clarity of mind to choose joy during a storm brings freedom. Perhaps even purpose. Most will tell you to push through to the other side of the storm. What happens when you have to sit in it? Recently I walked out to my car to run errands. As I looked up, dark clouds were moving in. I thought to myself, oh wow, a storm is coming. I got in the car, and I saw a raindrop, and soon I was consumed. The rain poured droplets that reminded me of the size of rain in the movie "A Bug's Life." I sat in my car as it rocked and felt like it would be swept away. I watched garbage cans fall over and spill trash in the streets. The rain was heavy, and the wind was strong. There I sat in the car, watching the storm move and change the scenery. The rai...