The brisk Autumn air is awakening my senses once again although this time feels incredibly unique to me.
So many Autumn's in my life have been faced with dread and a sense of sadness. I believe they have a term for it, it is referred to as "Seasonal Affective Disorder" I have it or so I've been told.
What I had was actually a lack of Faith. There is in fact a name for that as well, though it is far less acceptable to use and also neglected to be written about in any Medical journals..."Spiritual Bankruptcy". I think I'm safe in saying it is past it's "flu" stage and now it is most likely a "Pandemic" in the world. A word that can send millions of intelligent people into a frenzy of buying vast amounts of surgical masks, rubber gloves and bottles of sanitizer in bulk. Yet when was the last time you heard of a rush on Bibles?
For me Autumns turning leaves signify a crisp, colorful and magnificent call from nature that is saying look at me, take a last glance before I go to rest for a season. It has already started and is being framed for me as a time of Spiritual renewal. A time to nourish and yet slowly release this process here openly, my passion for The Lord and everything that emanates from there, for that is my home and my very soul.
I have allowed myself enough of a laziness over the middle of Summer to be pulled away from my process a bit more than I had anticipated. Discipline comes hard to me as I have mentioned a few times before, it is something that i am being taught because it is a necessity to see this dream become a reality one day. I can talk my passion here but I can not live it on these pages unless I am summing up a day for you a day spent doing my life's work. Oh how I pray and wait for that day. The waiting has become less difficult because I am learning to move at my God directed speed. I have also achieved a patience I never had for patience is possible when you walk in true faith...On a wing and a prayer has always struck me as a beautiful term even before I consciously understood the meaning of the phrase.
I had hoped to be in Africa by now. I have spent countless hours looking in to how that might happen with the many, many issues facing me as a single Mother of a six year old child.
Much to my chagrin and at times what can only be described as a deep disappointment, the blues would settle in as if to stay. There have been weeks where I put little into what had become my well formed dream and complete commitment to the work of my heart, the journey that would lead me home one day. I have been sidestepping the work I had started here. I found myself for financial reasons without a telephone for nearly three weeks this past month...not too far into this period I realized it was truly God's will. I know now to call upon that newly shaped discipline to step in and keep me patient, to envelope me in the certainty of HIS love. It is he that has full knowledge of my purpose. I am simply trying to live within that beautiful Peace he has created for my soul.
As of now it looks like we are a few years from Africa, I have absorbed the pain this brings and it is in fact a big part of what has kept me away.
I have through prayer and many insightful and enriching conversations with Maji, my "Anam Cara" in Gaelic {I'm Irish and it's a beautiful term besides!} talked non-stop about Africa and possibilities. Maji is a scientist and an all around radiant Christian that loves everyone and in turn she is greatly loved and respected. Maji also happens to be my soul's sister...together we have grown in our Faith in leaps and bounds and had days of laughter that would make anyone's ribs ache.
When we meet the person in our life that comes accompanied by a mirror from which to view your most authentic self, hold on and don't let go...it is one of the keys to the Kingdom. I thank the Lord I had those "eyes to see".
So we will go forward from here and I will resume blogging and discussing the tragedies, the sufferings and the joys of the people of Africa. They, just like us have all of these moments...The joy of a birth still exists in the human heart even if there is no food eventually to keep that child alive. Africa is at the absolute heart of so many matters and we can all be at once a part of the sadness and a part of the joy. It is still and with even more fire in my heart, where I long to bring my unique gifts. Every time I drink water from my faucet I am reminded what a privilege it is.
I missed these pages deeply, I missed sharing and I missed calling out from what at times feels "the wilderness" for deep human contact within the honesty of who you are...
Mimi Nakupenda,
In great Love,
Malaika~
*With great thanks to Maji, when I write you come through my fingers as well~
