Truth or Consequences

The air is cool and crisp as it blows across my face. I can't seem to inhale enough of it. It must be my eagerness this early morning to take in all of God's creation....I've always been this way when I feel blessed just to be on this planet and to know what I have come to know as truth. All truth, if practiced, has its consequences. It will either minister to you or against you.
What is your truth and do you take time to contemplate its affect on you and others in your environment? Are you still searching for that truth that some have definitely found and others wish they had? An age old question: How can a black and white cow eat green grass and give us white milk and yellow butter?
The truth is that some things may never get answered to our satisfaction and may jade us to other truths.
I say all these things because I had a friend die recently and the question on his lips was..."Why me?" "What have I done to deserve dying like this?" He had never found the truth of life nor its author.
He was jealous of my truth because of the calm, peace and hope it gives me daily over the decades. But I tried to share my truth with him and he just couldn't receive it as his truth. Life issues can be so illusive and demanding....WHY? you might ask. Because the truth lives in the infinite and we are trying to capture its essence with a finite mind. We must search out and take time to practice a truth and in its proof to us, it is truth, we can decide to willfully submit to it for our benefit or not submit. Consequences either way. But don't wait, like my friend, until time has run its course. Think about it..

LOL
Soli Deo Gloria
Ricky

Sept 8th, 2009

Well what a day so far! I've been to the Chemo doctor and this was the day he has started me on some chemo pills called Xeloda.
Now the best thing about this is no needle for three days straight. The pills will last 14 days straight (8 each day) and 7 days off and start them again. I really don't know the side effects of this regimen yet but I will keep you updated.
Doc had another tough thing to say and that was....If this doesn't work I don't have anything else for you. Now that's a statement!
I've always believed this to be GOD healed or it would never be and number 2, there comes a time to 'cut bait or fish'. So this is no surprise and my prayers have been to be healed and to be taken off this chemo. My prayer is being answered one way or another. GOD IS GOOD TO ME.
To me this is an exciting time and I get to participate in it. Many of you have similar or worse circumstances. Faith in God is what I rest my day in. My prayers go out to you and please send some up for me. Get out those journals and write or doodle.

"You are faking it..."

I was accused the other day of faking it. The accusation was..."Every time we ask how you are you say, I'm doing well." Then they went on to inform me I had to be fibbing.
This made me think back to when I was a kid and my Grandma would call me into the house from playing. Grandma would say..."Now get on in there boy and wash everything that shows." hahha I can hear her now. Anyway this statement made me think of faking a bath or anything we do in life and putting on a show for all to see. BUT, let's examine this for a minute.
We all have our beliefs we live with and die with and some may not understand mine or yours. You all know that I am a christian and in the book of James it states, "A double minded person is unstable in all his ways". So instead of just washing what shows, or faking it by telling people I am doing well and lying to them.....I really confess and believe in my mind I am doing well. My body just hasn't caught up with my beliefs/mind.
Everyone knows that the body is led by the mind/head. If I were to say I am well one time and then change 5 minutes later I would appear unstable or double-minded as in the book of James. This does not mean I am in denial of pain etc. BUT I speak more of what's well with me than what isn't. The more my mind hears my positive speech/belief the more it will inform my body of how it should be. A type of reprogramming.
Now I know some of you are going WOW, he is out there today. Trust me when I say that I have practiced this for decades and know for a fact that this works in my behalf more than the alternative of wishy washy language. Wanting to be well but moaning and restating to everyone all your aches and pains does nothing but produces more aches and pains. You talk yourself into miserableness...the mind is leading the body in how it should be. This takes some learning and time to practice and become who you are. So washing what only shows is ok some of the times but we really need that 100% bath, all over, to be totally clean and feeling good. This bath is the quality of thoughts and the renewing of how you think. Call it self talk or selling yourself on how you want to be.
Take your thoughts and drive a standard in the ground and don't waver for nothing. In 2 Corinthians 5:7, it tells the christian to walk by faith and not by sight. My faith is in God and what HE has done and is doing for me. This is by belief and I get my thoughts renewed to this along with my speech. Mys speech is such as, how well I look and getting stronger day by day etc.. If others are going to talk about you let them repeat the positive things that you locked and loaded their lips with. I don't see myself sick even though I have pain etc.. I have a healthy of picture of myself in my head and the thinking/thoughts that go with it. Dwell on these things and not the negative. YOU are making a choice. THINK ABOUT IT! God bless..LOL

Who is Looking over YOU ?

WOW! I was just sitting there, around midnight, on my easy chair. BOOM! , the whole house shook....I thought we had been bombed. My dog, Bandit, came running from his bed in a scurry and the wife was hollering from the bedroom as to 'what happened?'.
Well we all sat quietly waiting for the next sound but nothing came. So our scouting around the house, trying to figure out the shaking of our house and windows, started in great earnest. But nothing to be found but unrest for us all night... thinking we all imagined this great BOOM.
Daylight came and out the door Bandit and I went so he could do his duty. Across the street is the monument for our subdivision. To my surprise it was all busted up as if a car had hit it. Upon investigation there were no tire marks, umphf. Scratching my bald palate my eyes started wondering and behold! At a 45 degree angle and across the other street set a pair of big wheels off of an eighteen wheeler.......WHOA!
I got the neighbor up and the only thing we can figure is they came from quite a distance.....off the interstate above us. Can you believe it? Upon inspection we could see the brakes, bearings, and apparatus were still attached to the drums. This was unbelievable because these double wheels are so heavy and coming at a high rate of speed and force to bust down a solid concrete and brick monument sign and then get back across the road to the location we found them....well it was too much to try and comprehend.
Thinking of how these could have come through a wooden wall of a home and killed any one of us was disturbing to say the least. The neighbors never felt or heard anything due to being asleep. But with the jolt that we and the house received made us even more thankful.
So Who is Looking over YOU? LIFE is so short! Well we took a few minutes and thanked God for our saving experience. I pray someone is always looking over all of us, even for the small stuff. LOL
Now go journal about something important to you this day....addios' me amigo.

After the Party

There's always the time 'After the Party'. My party of chemo is over again, I think, because with lingering side effects it's just one of those things that just keeps on giving.
Anyway I feel so much better today than I have since last Tuesday...thank you Jesus.
This treatment seemed a little rougher than most.....don't know why. The diarrhea and constipation have been worse but if that's all I have to deal with bring it on........amen.
A buddy of mine was told this week that he may have prostate cancer and it has already moved to his lymph nodes and possibly his bones. God forbid! but can you believe the doctors laying that on you, sending you home for the weekend, and they haven't even finished the tests or gotten any definite answers back. So I spent some time trying to talk him back from the brink of total depression. Sometimes these doctors must get so jaded and speak to you like you're just another case. While all the time I am waiting for them to say NEXT! This isn't all the doctors but quite a few because I have fired a couple because of no HOPE in their speech toward me, so I said NEXT DOCTOR PLEASE!
The world is difficult enough with the diagnosis without having people who treat you almost indifferent.
Thank you for letting me get that out of my system but maybe you and others are going through this. IF you are I pray for all the positive things in the world to come your way and hope this community helps you somehow.
Let us all know!
Happy trails until I see you again.......now go journal or art. Thanks to all of you for your comments to the blogs.......YOU"RE GREAT!!!!!!!!!!
LOL!

Journaling Affirmations

Hey gang,
It's Sunday and we just got home from church....what a glorious day on my side of the planet.
The message was on saying things, rather positive or negative, that will affect us and our situations. In Proverbs 18:20 scripture says that Life and Death are in the tongue........wow! So think about that and meditate on what comes out of our mouths and what do we write in our journals is important. We must capture our thoughts to our benefit.
Dr Dwayne Dyer says we can change anything with our thinking correctly if we put belief behind it....faith some would say. As a christian I believe the scriptures to be truth so I have to agree with Dr Dyer. Many of our art therapy professionals say the same thing but maybe in different words, staying away from the religious aspects of this. But however we word it, the truth of it is not negated.
With that said let us pick up our journals and write what needs to get out of us, but then make sure we end with affirmations for ourselves about those conditions. For example I write about my treatments and may have had a rough week but end with the affirmation that I am getting stronger daily and try to describe myself healthy......then visualing seeing myself healthy, as described and going about my business. Dr Dyer saids this is most important the last 5 minutes prior to falling off to sleep. This allows the subconscious to dwell on the positive all night and not the problems. Our subconscious doesn't know truth except has we relate it to our minds. So our thoughts and affirmations should be on the positive and not the negative because soon the body follows the mind.
Don't ask me how this all works........all I know is it does and there's lots of years of proof of it even in the bible.
Hoped this was informative and not preachy.....God bless and let us hear from you.
See a picture of the little watercolor palette and brush I use for my doodling and painting.

Faith?

How many of you trust this journaling thing? Well let me talk about this for a minute. When you walk into a room and proceed to sit in a chair, you don't give it a second thought that it will hold you up.....WHY? Because of experience of sitting in chairs and they have worked for you. Now there may have been that rare instance that a chair leg has broken off or you tipped over, but other than that you trust them.
This trust did not come except for your experience in this area. The same is with journaling and art.....You must get started and build the frequency of doing it before you can take notice that there is a change starting to happen inside of you that will finally come out and change your very environment. WOW that was a mouth full.
You must motivate yourself in the beginning with EXPECTANCY that journaling is going to perform for you and others and has and is right now. Let me say it this way. Expectancy of change or hope thru journaling is the gasoline that motivation is propelled by. Out of the doing comes the experience or trust in journaling [like the chair]. After a short while the whole thing will increase you Faith in what we are trying to promote on this site....journaling for healing. Your faith then takes over and actually increases the outcome of the process.
In other words....YOU have to start pushing the car to go and the inertia you have to overcome at the beginning will be strenous...BUT...once that car is moving it doesn't take much effort to keep it rolling.
I hope all of this makes sense and I am writing on the process of journaling because of some comments that came up on another site.
While mentioning comments be sure and post yours.........what you think about the above...your experience....how is your journaling going.....any questions about the art side...??
Remember you don't have to have had cancer to comment on this site....all are welcomed....cancer is just what is in the title of this site and is my ailment at this time. There are many ailments just as bad...so weigh in with your thoughts for day or questions. Tell your story right below this blog if you want.
Now get out there and get some healing going. Next we may chat on stress and how journaling helps in this area.
God bless and I leave with a line from one of my heroes..ROY ROGERS'...."Happy Trails To YOU Until We Meet Again".