Spiritual Fitness

"Spiritual fitness seeks to answer important questions in life, the big questions like 'What's my purpose, what do I believe,'" said Chaplain (Capt.) Thomas Fussell, 354th Fighter Wing protestant chaplain. "Questions like those operate our daily lives and our beliefs; those beliefs in our heart of hearts will come out in our behaviors naturally.....Life happens and all that stuff tends to sit on us and we have to get it out somehow," said Fussell. "When we get the concerns and cares off of us, then we can be more focused, we can be more efficient and effective at what we do."

Welcome

Welcome to my blog. Yes this is all about me... and maybe about you and things in your life.I am new at this so I will teach you patience and endurance... hopefully a laugh along the way. I will try to make following me as easy as possible.

Wednesday, September 24, 2014

Bridges.. seeing from both sides

What can bridges have to do with mental health?  What do they even have to do with life in general?  I read this poem as I thought about bridges in life and I would like to share it.

The Bridge Builder

BY WILL ALLEN DROMGOOLE
An old man going a lone highway,
Came, at the evening cold and gray,
To a chasm vast and deep and wide.
Through which was flowing a sullen tide
The old man crossed in the twilight dim,
The sullen stream had no fear for him;
But he turned when safe on the other side
And built a bridge to span the tide.

“Old man,” said a fellow pilgrim near,
“You are wasting your strength with building here;
Your journey will end with the ending day,
You never again will pass this way;
You’ve crossed the chasm, deep and wide,
Why build this bridge at evening tide?”

The builder lifted his old gray head;
“Good friend, in the path I have come,” he said,
“There followed after me to-day
A youth whose feet must pass this way.
This chasm that has been as naught to me
To that fair-haired youth may a pitfall be;
He, too, must cross in the twilight dim;
Good friend, I am building this bridge for him!”

Why do I bother doing a blog that many people will not even read or share?  Again I am building a bridge.

There are many bridges in life.  And once you pass from one side to the other you are not the same person.  Marriage, children, and all the standard things we "graduate from" in life.  We are not the same person.  The same is true with struggles, loss, heartache, disease, mental health, loss of job and all the struggles we face daily. When we cross that bridge we are not the same.  How it affects us depends on us.  Once over that bridge we cannot spend our time looking back.  We can learn and the scars will be there, be they outside or inside.  They will never be gone.  But they are a reminder of strength.

These are not punishments but ways to prepare us and to strengthen us for what may lie ahead.   Trust God.  Be Grateful every single day for those struggles because you would not be who you are without them.  God is loving you and building these bridges for you and for me.  They are bridges of love.

I have mental illnesses, degenerative Disc disease, I need implants for teeth, I cannot keep food down or eat as I want.  Today I made steamed vegetables.  They were meshy and I ate them and it was like heaven.  I felt blessed and joyful because the food stayed down.  Something great happened and Praise God!!  My knees are bad, arthritic,  a hernia that needs removed but can't be until we have money that causes pain, insomnia, sores that I have to take care until surgery can be done so I do not have them.  I had 14 surgeries in a 2 year period of time.  All of these are bridges.  Pain lets me know I am alive and I am grateful that God thinks I am strong enough to handle this.

Yes I crossed many bridges to get to where I am now.  I had to leave people behind that were only bringing negative into my life.  People that judge and just are not of my "tribe".  People who accept me for who I am and when I have bad times my Tribe yells ME TOO!!

I have a long way to go.  I don't feel I deserve the family I have and it is a struggle to fight it.  "They would be so much better off without me and all my troubles.  What good am I?"  Those voices are a moment by moment fight.   Sometimes I win with my mental illness and sometimes I am not.  But I keep building bridges.  I look for positive and stay away from negative.  And I count the blessings that I have.  Because no matter what I know that I am rich in the ways that matter.  I know Heavenly Father and my Savior love me and are there for me.  As I ride the waves I remember even in the rain the sun is still shining.
Share this text ...?
            “That God may bless you on your journey and that you may successfully cross the ‘deep and wide’ chasms in your life is my prayer for you.” —President Thomas S. Monson
"Love can build a bridge...don't you think it's time?"

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