40 days – Here we go!

#1 – Lenten Reflections

When Lent arrives I come out of the box sprinting. Typically loaded with big plans to give up sugar or gluten, maybe stop being so judgy and lead with kindness, or remember to pack extra mercy and grace with me wherever I go.

I settled on sugar, but by 4:40 pm today as I popped a Werther’s candy in my mouth (fail), I told myself it was time to go back to my 40 days of blogging.

40 days of raw reflections I like to call them. Little snippets of life – the messy, funny, daunting, and unpredictable moments I experience or observe. We all bundle up so much in our hearts and heads, that sometimes it may be worth it to take a risk and share…to release our emotions and remember we’re not alone in this world. So I’ll share a view from my chair in life.

To get started before I begin, I turn to Pope Francis to guide me toward moments of solace. He has said, that to give hope to others, it is sometimes enough simply to be kind, to be “willing to set everything else aside in order to show interest, to give the gift of a smile, to speak a word of encouragement, to listen amid general indifference”.

So whether you listen to Taylor Swift or Taichowsky, follow NPR or Fox News, or believe in God or Ganesh, let these 40 days be yours to grow in faith and love for yourselves and one another.

So I’ll end with a quote from my 88-year-old Dad – something he says as he pours himself a little scotch,

“Join me!”

~Lucretia

On Ash Wednesday…

“This evening, in a spirit of prayer and humility, we receive ashes on our heads. This gesture is meant to remind us of the ultimate reality of our lives: that we are dust and our life passes away like a breath (cf. Ps 39:6; 144:4),” Pope Francis