Fueling the Flame

In pregnancy you don’t actually know what you’re having until you deliver and still you don’t know the exact nature of your gift until it matures. Each of us has the seed of greatness resident within us. Some intentionally watch over their gift to see it birthed into its greatest purpose. This requires faithfulness and consistency, just as parenting takes deliberate, consistent attention to raise a child.

What are you doing to nurture the gift within you and see it come to maturity? What do you do to keep the gift within you ablaze?

Every flame needs a good dose of wind to keep it fueled. Your gift is connected to your passion. Wind upon a flame will ignite passion and cause it to burn brighter.

The best way to keep a flame ablaze is to fan it. One way to fan a flame is to engage in delight-led activities, rather than duty-led obligations. Duty-led activities can be spotted where ever there is a "should." “Shoulds” quickly douse vision and passion like a cup of cold water on a fire.

What are two things this week you will do to fan your flame? Remember this doesn't involve things you think you “should” do, but rather activities that are sure to ignite your passion, vision and creativity.

This week I plan to fuel my flame by giving myself time to work on a writing project. When I write I loose myself in time. Even when I spend a whole day writing, my flame is fueled, not starved. What will you do this week to fuel your flame?

Abundance Is An Inside Job

Kim George the creator of Abundance Intelligence™ said, “Abundance is an inside job.” The Abundance Intelligence concept is built around the idea that abundance is measured by our ability to be who we truly are. In contrast the ultimate scarcity mentality is seen in resisting who we are, and being held back by the limitations surrounding who we THINK we are. This kind of scarcity in perceiving ourselves to be less than we truly are is shaped by life events that create our own story, or script about who we believe ourselves to be. The life we live is built around what we think and believe at the core, not just what we think we believe!

Many struggle to comprehend that we have the divine embedded within us, and instead choose to live from the place of past failures and insufficiency. Many times we choose to focus and give power to our own weaknesses and brokenness, rather than the greatness we posses, because of the divine signature resident within each of us.

In the famous words of Jesus we hear the exhortation given to the paralytic: “Rise and walk.” We can receive the same encouragement to rise into the greatness of who we were created to be, moving out of the places that have kept us stuck, and paralyzed and into our fullest capacity. If abundance is an inside job, what is holding you back in the way you think, and believe about yourself?

Misbehaving Hues

Most people would probably say they don’t care for loose ends, but would rather maintain a world that’s free from sharp edges and smooth like a frosted cake. I for one love it when my desk is clean and all clutter has gone out with the trash. However, life and people are not so easily rounded off, or contained!

Have you noticed that no matter how hard you try, your heart can’t be made to keep up? You’re head may be able to line life up like a battalion of tin soldiers, yet your heart is the straggler teetering on the edge of resolution, when your head says move-on. Your heart is willing to be wrong, while your head demands perfection.

Once I made my daughter the most spectacular, yet exasperating, heart shaped, rose covered birthday cake, and then retired forever from cake decorating! The effort it took to decorate that cake did not come easily for me. I was never able to get the pink icing perfectly consistent and smooth. Instead it revealed slight imperfections and variations of hue. Yet I poured my heart into that cake, and made it with every ounce of love within me.

Life is much like that cake and so I try to soothe by head when it wants perfection. Now I don’t work as hard to smooth out the bumps and sharp edges of life; instead I try to accept the variations that pop up in every bite of life, as exotic hues and flavors. I would like to be one who welcomes those sometimes misbehaving hues, as much as I do a flavorful piece of cake. What new hues are you redefining and learning to accept in your life?

Posing on the High Dive Only to Land a Belly Flop

Remember in school when we had to write papers entitled, "My Summer Vacation," or "My Greatest Achievement?" Well, today I rewrote a paper in my head entitled, "My Greatest Asset."

It occurred to me that my greatest asset might not be what Strength Finders totes as an activator. I realized that perhaps my greatest strength and possibly yours is being a fool!
Here is why: after recently feeling that I capsized an opportunity to impress, I found myself tickled by my over the top ability to strike a pose on the high dive and quickly descend into a belly flop.

You may think I’m being self deprecating, but really I am not. You see after a friend said she adored my childlike innocence, I decided to reframe my belly flop knack and call it a gift! Maybe her comment was really just a nice way of saying I’m a dingbat, I’m not sure? However, I do hold evidence of probably being one of the only waitresses who managed to break the cork off of wine bottles I was required to open table side at what was once Los Angeles’ trendy Mustache Café. Or ask my friends about the bowling party where I approached the lane, over stepped my landing and performed a perfect split!

You see, I am learning to use my blunders as opportunities! What better time is there to play it up big, laugh at myself and not take life so seriously? Really, I’m not competing for the Presidential office!

When recounting my assets, I’m definitely voting for my ability to perform ludicrous feats off the high dive at inappropriate times, but hey at least I’m diving! I see the mileage I can get out of this as I turn every faux pas, or awkward trip down the red carpet into an opportunity to mine for humor and fun.

A spoon full of humor makes like a heck of a lot easier to swallow! How is your humor threshold? Do you also display an unusual propensity for belly flops? How can you turn an uncanny knack for humiliation into an opportunity?

Living Like A Toddler

New seasons are not only a time of exciting exploration, but a time of grasping for new footing around unfamiliar turf. We all know that toddlers move from infancy to master rolling over; pulling oneself up; and standing; yet still strive toward the greater advancement of walking; running; and ultimately leaping over new heights.

As adults what makes one person willing to engage the risks of life, while another runs from it? I believe the willingness to face risks is coupled with a toddler-like sense of adventure.

Many of us avoid risks because we have no lexicon for situations, or surroundings that are unfamiliar to us. However, expanding into new territory and adventure is laden with discomfort and risks. Quite simply we would never step outside our own back yard if there was not the exponential value of new possibilities awaiting us. New discoveries and risk coexist.

I remember the angst my daughter experienced eating lunch alone for weeks in her new school cafeteria. She had no lexicon to process the transition from the old into the new, which included the awkward experience of having a boy and his posse hit on her during her first eighth grade lunch period. In toddler like fashion she grew and discovered new things about herself and her ability to take risks and adjust to new environments and situations.

My world is currently full of new toddler challenges, and although there may be days that I choose to stay in the shallow end of the crib, one thing is certain, if I want to walk, run and ultimately leap in my new environment, I will be forced to pull up like a toddler and collide with risk.

Long Live Play Dates!

When people gasp about our seemingly impractical move to Los Angeles, the following verses ring in my head.

“The spacious free life is from God, it is protected and safe.” Psalm 37:30 MSG

“An undisciplined, self-willed life is puny; an obedient God-willed life is spacious.” Proverbs 15:32 MSG

Reaching for a spacious life, rather than settling for status quo is what makes me come alive. This is the faith road that like Abraham, many have pioneered before me.

When we buy into an undisciplined, fear led life that has us scrambling for crumbs, we live anchored to the immediate, overlooking the possibilities that may be available beyond our sight. Faith absolutely requires discipline and intention to step out into the unknown, beyond what we can see. Fear does not.

Have you looked around and noticed that there is a whole lot of settling going on, producing puny life, not spacious life? Where have you settled for the familiarity, status quo, or comfortable living, rather than the spacious wide-opened-God-vamped life?

One ingredient that will keep us from stagnating into a comfy cul-de-sac mentality is the notion of living life as a play date! What better way to handle joy killers, naysayers, and even adversity than to find a sense of adventure hidden in the mix of every situation.

A person that looks for adventure in every circumstance is a person living a spacious life, and one who is enjoying the ride, no matter what the ride involves. Are you living life like a play date, or are you more comfortable with the puny life?

Where Is Your Hook Up?

Living for two weeks in a world without Internet has caused me to focus my attention on another powerful communication connection. While Internet providers have the ability to charge for their in-demand services, the hook-up I’m speaking about is absolutely free. However, it is only available to those who avail themselves to an inside hook-up.

Some call it intuition, some call it providence. I call it a God-connect. However, without awareness and faith this connection is powerless. Yet, it is necessary to apply a further crucial step when it comes to bringing the information you receive through this powerful line from the invisible world into the material.

Here’s an example of what I am talking about. After working to move into our new digs here in Los Angeles, the family became quite parched, so I walked to a near by restaurant to purchase thirst quenching drinks. As I walked away from our place and turned the corner I read a bold proclamation that says, “Safe and Secure” high above the street on the side of a building.

Only a few hours earlier as my son Sam and I waited to apprehend the keys to our new place I noticed scads of activity coming and going down our street. I blurted out to Sam that I believed what I saw was a drug house. I blurted out a quick proclamation/prayer about the safety of our street. Later that afternoon when our family walked by this particular house on our way to dinner, we noticed that a crowd of policemen had gathered during a drug bust. Interestingly LA’s finest are not the only ones concerned about the welfare of the city. Even higher forces care about the city’s warfare. And we have the ability to get connected with that force and speak God’s highest intention into our environments.

I am not taking credit for the drug bust; however I am offering the idea that we can get on board and align ourselves and circumstances with divine purposes by speaking into being what is not as though it were.

Here is an illustration of an earlier situation that transpired a few days before that challenged me to be mindful of the words I speak. While enjoying the refreshing breeze at a beach side restaurant in a Santa Monica, I retold the story of my husband and son Josh’s previous restaurant nightmare, during their trek to Cali. While stopping to spend the night with my Dad, the famished men enjoyed dinning out until the waitress approached their table and dropped their meals on the floor in front of them.

As soon as the disastrous story escaped my lips, to my chagrin our Santa Monica waiter reenacted my very word as I watched my sisters egg brunch slather across the floor! Immediately I recognized the warning and covered my mouth in horror.

You may not think yourself so powerful, but have you considered that maybe you are more than a passive passenger on this ride called life? What if you actually had the invitation to be partners and co-laborer with God? What if you had the choice to speak words of life, rather than words that tear down? I challenge you to watch for the signs. You might discover an invitation to your own God-connect where you too can get hooked-up?