Live courageously from your heart!
What values do you want to pass on to your children? How well does your life reflect your core values?
Websters dictionary defines integrity as:
1. firm adherence to a code of especially moral or artistic values : incorruptibility
2. an unimpaired condition : soundness
3. the quality or state of being complete or undivided : completeness
Back in February I posted a blog post titled, “Who is your Samwise?”. During that time a group of seniors participating in a speech/creative writing class spent some time answering this question. I share those unedited responses with permission from their instructor.
“I don’t really have a Samwise. I have multiple friends that help me with different things. Some are very close; but some, not so much. I love my friends and need them to get through life, either to just have fun or to figure things out that I do not understand. I need people in my life, but friends make things so much better. We like being with each other. As the Beatles once said, ‘I get by with a little help from my friends.’” -Matt
Looking for my value, my self-worth, and my identity with position and success, I would always choose a safe retreat into my hiding place of counterfeit affirmation — selling my soul to my work. Receiving the glory of man through the recognition of another successful project; earning more money; advancing to that next, higher title on the corporate ladder, I continued to retreat from the pain and insecurities of my fractured life, protecting my empire as I chased my American dream with a blind devotion. The dream of this empire was something I wanted so badly that I failed to listen to that little voice inside trying to warn me that I was walking down a bad path. I would continue to perform on the world stage desperately trying to gain my identity. Ignoring the inner sadness slowly tightening around me, I didn’t realize that underneath this drive was a deep desire to just be accepted. I became a slave to my own empire, running without a purpose, and I didn’t even know it.
Wanted to share a story with you. Walk with me…
Image that a loving God created you and placed you in His sandbox, a beautiful pristine beach with a shoreline that only has boundaries in your own mind. We are given the tools we need to live out life, and like most of us we quickly go right to work building our sandcastles.
What is Easter to you? What are you doing for Easter?
Could you imagine Jesus wandering onto the scene of an Easter egg hunt or seeing excitement around Easter baskets? Easter is not about coloring eggs, kids hunting for them, Easter baskets or even enjoying a big meal with friends and family. It can include these things, but Easter is about the death and resurrection of Jesus!
