Making Good Choices

If everyone in this world spent their life making good choices about what they did in their lifetime – Wow, I guess you could say that would make this world a Paradise.  There was only one person that ever made every choice perfect – Jesus.

At times we all fall short on making good choices about our life.  I often made the wrong choice in choosing friends as I was growing up.  Then again, I made the right choice in who I married.  My marriage has lasted for decades.  My youngest brother James is on marriage #5.  James selected several of the wrong women and made some unbeneficial choices.

If you are older, look back on your life and ask yourself this question – “If I had the last 20 or 30 years to do over, would my choices change?”  If you ended up in the wrong job, the wrong marriage, alone, divorced, homeless, in jail, with health problems, did your choices cause these outcomes to happen in your life!

Making things occur in your life, causing your life to become what it now is, were all caused by choices.  To succeed or improve your life simply comes down to making the right choices.  Everyone has the freedom to choose what they want to do with their life. You are guided by your own judgments, selections, or the choices you make.

I have seen people my entire life that blame the disappointments, heartaches, and outcomes of their actions on other people.  You could blame your wife saying she caused you to drink, or steal money, or beat her, or abuse the children.  Your wife did not make the choices, you did.  Or your spouse, child, friend, boss, did not make your choices for you, you made bad choices yourself.  I have a nephew who has been in  jail, who has chosen the wrong friends, who has yet to make one right choice in his entire life.  To me, my nephew’s unsavory life is strictly his fault, totally caused by his bad choices.

To succeed, be happy, experience joy and fulfillment in your life, make those good choices for yourself.  I look back on decision I made when my Mother was ill with dementia, when I became caregiver for my brother J.R. during his journey into dementia and I often beat myself up for some choices I made.  Yet I know in my heart I did the best I could.  We all regret so many choices we made in this journey called Life, but we can’t go back, we can’t change those choices.  So, giving extra time and thought to our decisions – could cause us to, “Make Good Choices,” in the years we have left on this earth.  I guess Paradise on this earth is not realistic, but MAKING GOOD CHOICES might get us somewhat closer to a more perfect world.

Gazing At The Image In The Mirror

I was looking out my kitchen window when I saw this butterfly on the window.  I went outside and took this picture – it looked as if he were gazing at his own image in a mirror.

I began to psychoanalyze what goes through a person’s mind as they gaze in the mirror each early morning.   I read a quote once about gazing in the mirror – “Be glad when you gaze into the mirror and only see the outer appearance.”  Most of us never look deep within our inner selves as we gaze in the mirror. We might examine ourselves, tell ourselves we need to change our perspective on how our day will begin and end. Perhaps putting a smile on our face, and thinking how to live this day to the fullest, would change our outlook on life.

Gorgeous Sunday Sunrise

I could not believe the beautiful sunrise God provided this morning.  My camera captured it just exactly as my eyes saw these wonderful colors.

This sunrise is for my friend Ronnie, who I wrote a post about not long ago.  Ronnie was taken to Hospice this week and it broke my heart.  Such a dear man, suffering so much for so long.  I know his wife is having such a hard time dealing with Ronnie’s illness.  God bless this family.

It amazes me just how much a sunrise can change in color as the sun makes its appearance.  The sunlight was shining around the edges of the clouds in this picture.  All of these pictures are from this morning.

Sorrow (Dementia)

There are so many fellow bloggers out there who are caregivers for loved ones with dementia.  My heart goes out to all of you, I have been there.  These cows are in the field next to my house.  I think of my brother J.R. when he was living here, how much he loved the cows, the rabbits, the birds, the flowers and everything to do with nature.  All of those feelings he once had for nature are lost in the fog of dementia.

When you deal with a loved one with dementia, there is oppressive pain and unbearable suffering, because your loved one does not know who you are anymore.  That vital, close, intimate relationship has disappeared.  It’s so unbearable it is beyond comprehension.  You are miserable when you dwell on what once was and can never be again.

Dementia is a terrible, painful disease to watch a loved one endure.  Dementia is actually harder on the caregiver than the one with the disease.

Is there an answer to how to deal with the dilemma of Dementia?  What is distressing or painful about this dilemma is you have to make choices you do not want to make.  There is no clear answer on how to deal with our emotions.  What have I done personally? Back in May of this year I wrote a post, “An Early Goodbye to Someone You Love.”  I realized the person my brother once was had disappeared.  I decided at that point to make sure J.R. had a safe place to dwell and receive proper care.  I placed him in a nursing home for many personal reasons.  Do you feel guilty when you place someone in a nursing home?  Yes, you definitely do feel guilt.  For all those out there that judge you for the nursing home decision, I say, “Have you been a caregiver, have you walked in their shoes?”  Not everyone is strong enough to endure to the end of the Dementia Journey. Each caregiver has different abilities on how well they handle the tremendous stress involved with caring for someone with dementia.  Each dementia patient has different problems and actions involved with the disease.  Some people with dementia are extremely hard to handle due to insomnia, anger, wandering, attitude, and the list continues.  So Caregivers, who totally give up their own lives and their own health issues, my heart goes out to you.  God bless all caregivers, and never let others judge you when you have done your very best.

 

Birds and Flowers

I was out in the yard, camera in hand, saw these 12 geese coming at me.  I had about 10 seconds to point the camera that direction and snap this picture. What a surprise, I  got a fair looking photo.  This group of geese stay in this area and fly from pond to pond.

Looked out the kitchen window and there sat this little baby mocking-bird on my husband’s garden tiller. Now and then he gave a yell for mom and dad to come by and feed him.

This white (MayPop) Passion Flower is native to the eastern U.S.  It grows wild all over Arkansas and the fruit is eatable.

This rose moss in my yard re-seeds itself every year and has so many beautiful colors.

Glorious Sunrise

“Wake! For the Sun, who scatter’d into flight, the Stars before him from the Field of Night. Drives Night along with them from Heav’n and strikes, the Sultan’s Turret with a Shaft of Light.”  Omar Khayyam

“Whether I retire to bed early or late, I rise with the sun.”  Thomas Jefferson.  (For 50 years Jefferson rose every morning as the sky came alive with its beautiful colors and the sun showed its brightness.)

U.S. Founding Fathers

A friend sent me this email which is being passed from person to person in the U.S.:

As you read this, think about why the United States of America, as a Constitutional Republic, became in a historically short time period, an “Overnight” success where it’s people as a whole and at all levels are the most wealthy in the world, and the most powerful nation on earth.

DID YOU KNOW:  As you walk up the steps to the building which houses the U.S. Supreme Court you can see near the top of the building a row of the world’s law givers and each one is facing one in the middle.  Who is facing forward with a full frontal view?  It is Moses and he is holding the Ten Commandments!

DID YOU KNOW:  As you enter the Supreme Court courtroom, the two huge oak doors have the Ten Commandments engraved on each lower portion of each door.

DID YOU KNOW:  As you sit inside the courtroom, you can see the wall, right above where the Supreme Court judges sit a display of the Ten Commandments.

DID YOU KNOW:  There are Bible verses etched in stone all over the Federal Buildings and Monuments in Washington, D.C.

DID YOU KNOW:  James Madison, the 4th president, known as “The Father of Our Constitution” made the Following statement:  “We have staked the whole of all our mankind for self-government, upon the capacity of each and all of us to govern ourselves, to control ourselves, to sustain ourselves according to the Ten Commandments of GOD.”

DID YOU KNOW:  Every session of Congress begins with a prayer by a paid preacher, whose salary has been paid by the Taxpayers since 1777.

DID YOU KNOW:  Fifty-two of the 55 founders of the Constitution were members of the established Orthodox churches in the colonies.

DID YOU KNOW:  Thomas Jefferson worried that the courts would overstep their authority and instead of Interpreting the law would begin making law an oligarchy: the rule of few over many.

How then, have we gotten to the point that everything we have done for 220 years in this Country is now suddenly wrong and unconstitutional?

Also, why is it that the Democrat Political Party tells us the U.S. was not founded on
Christian and moral values.

WAKE UP PEOPLE !!!!!!

Let’s put it around the world and let the world see and remember what this great country was Built on – The Holy Bible and belief in GOD!

(Congress can say a prayer to begin each of their sessions, but children in American schools can no longer say a prayer to begin their day, as they did several decades ago.)

Hay Season in Arkansas

This is one of the female long horn cows who looks like she ate too much hay.  They often cut their horns so they will not injure another cow or calf.  She looks so wide because she is pregnant.  She was quite interested in what I was doing when I took her picture.

It is Hay season in Arkansas and you see these hard working farmers out in their fields cutting, raking, and bailing hay several times during the Summer.

I thought this picture of the sky, barn, and bails of hay in the field was a nice scene.