Work-Life Balance

No, I no longer work at a paid job. When I eventually leave this place, perhaps I will begin working again. Who knows? Well, first of all, SHOW ME HOME didn't work out. It's confusing trying to explain the reasons, so I'm not even going to try.

My goal now is to get into St. Patrick's Senior Apartments in Florissant, Missouri where a friend from church lives. My current medications will go with me, but I'll need to find a very good new doctor. I'll probably have to enlist the help of Catholic services for furniture or whatever else I need to furnish a new place. That was the true beauty of the other program. It did all that for you.

But I was raised on the belief that "Where there is a will there is a way." So I'm awaiting the statement of income from Social Security and an application from St. Patrick's Apartments. Then I return those to St. Patrick's and wait to actually move in; that could be between three and six months. but that's a lot better than the wait list for the other program. And in that program, you had to do all of it within a year. At the end of that year I do not believe I could have re-enlisted because the very vague reasoning would still exist.

However, today's "lesson", if you will, is my own version of work-life balance. I get so caught up in trying to take care of so many others here, that it has completely worn me down to a frazzle. I now realize more clearly that some of my physical problems are aggravated, by not getting much sleep, but also because I look out more for others than I do for myself. That is not a good thing. God wants us to care for one another, but not at the expense of our own needs not being met.

So as is often the case I sat down to watch a movie on YouTube. The setting was in 2008 economically depressed central Florida. The first scene was of a young black man whose cocaine habit was so out of control, he tried getting run  by a car, which swerved and missed him. It was at that point that he finally realized he needed to do something to help himself.

He found a grocery store and hunkered down on the ground outside with no money to buy anything to eat. A man came up and sat down beside him, listened to his story and went in and came out with a hearty breakfast ... the first meal the young man had eaten in days. Later, it turned out that no one knew of that man or had ever seen him. He only appeared long enough to buy the young man a meal. The belief is that he turned out to be an "angel". We've all heard of "living with angels among us unawares."

Concurrently, in the movie, a woman who was a well-respected news reporter was about to lose her job in the depressed economy. On top of that, she had a brother with the same cocaine addiction. He wanted no part of her help, only to keep the habit, sleep it off only to repeat the cycle over and over again. She desperately wanted to get him clean and sober.

Meanwhile, a young pastor in the same town was trying to raise $600,000 to buy a church and turn it into a rehab center for drug addicts. By the end of the movie, not only did the young pastor get the original amount needed to buy the church to make it into a shelter, he was also gifted the 10 million dollar estate of a woman who had died and bequeathed the money to the church for whatever purpose it saw fit.

Now exist in this same formerly depressed part of central Florida many churches, homeless shelters for families, medical facilities, rehab programs and more. All due to the POWER OF FAITH. This is a story I really needed to hear right now.

I believe there are always "angels" operating beyond our awareness, working with God to bring about the large and small everyday miracles we need to live our best and happiest lives. We do not have to do it all on our own. That is not the way our Creator intended for us to live. First of all He sent His only-begotten son into the world to cleanse us of our sins, and then to be a our way shower for selfless love, for sharing, caring, and for creating a world that could be heaven on earth, if only we followed God's loving plan for our lives.