Embracing Autumn

This is the account of a girl waiting for a bus. She’d had quite possibly one of the worst days and weeks of her life and absolutely the hardest 6 months of her existence. It’s funny though, in a strange sort of way, how one often stares off into the distance when deep in contemplation sorting through a thousand different thoughts and feelings, and yet in the subconscious staring you begin to see things you’d never noticed before. After all, one only knows where they’re sore when they start to stretch, one only finds where they’re weak when trying to be strong. I know this girl quite well, so I’m sure she could be wrong, but I’m also sure she could be right. Let me take you to the street where this soul once sat.  

As she sits waiting for the bus, time isn’t the only thing to pass her by - cars whoosh past, sending the dry auburn and pale lemony-orange leaves flying in a papery, scratchy whirl across the bitumen road. Her gaze lifts from the leaves peppering the road and up a little higher.

Beautiful burnt-orange bricks surround the enormous arched windows that are perched above her on the opposite side of the street. A man takes in the street view from inside the building, sipping from a mug as oversized as the windows and deep in contemplation of some kind - at least she thinks his thoughts must be kind; although his face is a calm guise, she’s sure this Autumnal street could surely make a man smile. 

Up higher still - the moon hangs softly above the brick building, only half of its luminous face visible this fine sunny Monday morning. She cranes her neck again, looking for something higher than the delicate and diaphanous moon, not a cloud or bird in sight. She shivers then, pulling her sweater sleeves halfway down her hands as she lazily lets her eyes float back down past the bright blue sky, the half moon, the man halfway between sipping, the street half covered in leaves, and the surrounding people waiting for a bus halfway up a hill. The air is crisp for a clear day, although her numb hands tell her it’s colder than crisp and closer to quite chilly. Then she sees it coming. 

The girl now pulls out her phone, after avoiding it for her brains sake, now she uses it also for her brains sake - to write. Her words start simply, it’s all she could handle as she lifts the lid off of her thoughts, but as her fingers fly across the letters on the screen, quotes and questions spill out, as they often do when emptying the cerebral can. She writes.

The bus arrives late.

The poetry arrives on time. 

The joy - the joy doesn’t arrive, rather is found. Not by happenstance or by accident - the joy is in the choosing to look around rather than down at a phone. The joy unravels from one question, what’s higher and what’s greater? They say if you truly seek you’ll find, but in order to seek there needs to be intention; a question has to be asked in order to be answered. Like a man wanting a warm drink would seek water, a kettle, a mug and a flavour.Sometimes joy finds you, and other times, you have to seek her out. C.S Lewis once said if you want warmth you get close to the flame. So I guess if you want joy, get close to the source, because joy is a source, a deep well that is overflowing for those who would thirst and seek. Besides, can joy truly last if it's based on a seen circumstance if the source itself is unseen? 

The girl shoves her phone back inside her pockets, her hands now starting to warm. Looking through the smudged windows of the bustling bus with way too many body odours, she thinks about the greatest sources of joy in her life. The greatest measure of joy she’d known was always in the presence of One in particular, she smiles knowing it’s true and looks at squirrels sprinting, perfect pine trees and auburn Autumn leaves. As she nears her home, gazing upon creation a thought pops in her mind, “if joy was created then joy must belong to the Creator.” I’m sure she could be wrong, but I’m also sure she could be right. 

Coat Hangers & Hanging Coats

I sold my designer clothes for a dream.

I know what you might be thinking, she did what now? 

Okay, let me give you some context here. 

Not that long ago, I worked for a high-end brand called Zimmermann, while I worked other jobs freelance at the same time, it was still my primary income for a really long time. So, as you can imagine, after around 5 years there as a casual; getting free uniforms, discounts and commission in vouchers meant a lot of Zimmermann clothes.

After I left that job, I was working full time writing from home and realised I’d had clothes sitting in my cupboard for 6 months to 3 years I’d never worn, and honestly, might wear once more in 5 - 10 years. Now, I live in a little run-down beach shack, the pros being the beach and the cons being broken and run-down everything. The closet doors don’t close, which means one day as I lay pondering on my bed, I zoned out staring into my closet and drifted off to Narnia, kidding, but I did drift off. I started thinking my clothes looked like they’d been put to sleep, dreaming, and then, as thoughts often do, they lead into another connected string of thoughts. Dreams… the dreams you have when you sleep and the ones you have wide awake, which ones did I value more, which ones would help others - turn into something beautiful and lasting?

Right then and there, I decided I’d sell all my designer clothes, the ones I didn’t wear and even some I did, (I kept a few staple pieces I wasn’t ready to part with) putting the money I made from them into an account, an account called “Dreams”. So this poetry book, which is now a physical thing you can see, feel and read, isn’t just sitting hung up, hooked in the closet of my mind and a cupboard of ‘one day's and ‘what if's. 

This book you hold is not only a journal, letters, stories, poetry and prose, although that might be all you see. Not only do I see the ups and downs of life that was had in the making of this book, the poems of dark and bright moments, but I also see empty coathangers. I see the things I was holding onto, although beautiful, they were the result of someone else’s dream.

When we have a dream or a goal, sometimes we focus so much on the end result, which is still an important aspect, but we forget about the other side of the coin when it comes to achieving something we set out to do. There’s a whole heap of discipline, long hours, cleaning out space so you can work on what it is you really want to do, and for me, tonnes of prayer and journaling, making sure I still have time to play, cutting back work hours and goodness so many more things. So take a look around, what can you trade off for something better? Everything at the end of the day is a trade-off, you trade time watching Netflix for time learning a program for your book, you trade those things you don't use to fund something that will be useful, you get the picture…

Grab the scales, weigh it up, and make sure you plonk some perspective, hindsight and larger picture things on there too with all those dreams and desires on your heart. Lastly, remember your ‘why’ hold onto the purpose of the project, whenever I thought about doing a book and publishing it, I honestly lost motivation. “I don’t really care about those things,” I would say, “I just super enjoy writing poetry and stories.” Yet when I was editing the poems and remembering times that really sucked, I was encouraged and felt far lighter and brighter, and this was something I didn’t feel I’d found in poetry I’d read. So the thought of another person feeling what I had felt and gaining comfort from these words kept me trading off my comfort and ease to sail out of the sea(sons) of holding on to pretty comforts that never really served me. Although there are many many stories that belong to the poems in this book, which I’d be more than happy to share in person, this one is foundational and one that deserved space online. 

Big Love

O.J.S

After The Credits Role

Well hey their Marvel fans, I see you sitting there waiting for the credits to role so you can watch that minute clip that gives away the secrets for the sequel. Yeah look, I’m a huge superhero movies fan too, actually just a movies and stories fan in general. A little time ago, I sat watching a movie and was vibing out to the song playing while the credits rolled, I just let it play without turning it off because the song was THAT good! Then after the credits had nearly finished, a little clip started playing, and although I’d just watched a two-hour story unfold, that little one minute clip changed so much, someone was alive, the ending, was in fact not the ending, even after every credit had rolled on through.

Endings, are not our endings… in fact they are often a prequel to a sequel. I love writing stories, novels and scripts, I’ve been in love with it since I was a child making stories up with my siblings, making family plays we’d act out. The highlight of our school holidays sometimes was renting 7 weekly videos for $7, the more kids that left home, the more video choices I got to make on my own ( oh ya, I have 11 siblings haha just FYI).  While there’s so much in our lives we can’t control, in writing my own stories, I can control what the characters do, who they choose to love, the boldness and skills they have, the arc of their development and growth, who dies and who lives, and most importantly what I’m saying and telling through the story. But I realised something, although I believe there is divine timing and providence, we actually choose so much of what we step into, we choose how we react to certain situations or people, we still choose what we say and how we say it!

What if our spare time, was actually where we created our future? What if those little things most people miss are actually making way and setting you up for what’s to come?  What is the one-minute spiel (the secrets to the sequel) you’d tell yourself going into the next chapter and season of life after learning all you could from the last one? If people are stories like movies and books, we are all series with more episodes and seasons than Grey’s Anatomy. Don’t skip the credits, don’t skip the “boring bits”, because the movie wouldn’t have happened without those faceless names rolling through the screen. Words like discipline, reflecting, learning, understanding, developing, play and creativity come to mind when thinking about things we can do when no one is watching, after all, this is what integrity is all about, the unseen, faceless yet necessary things that make the seen (like a movie) so great, genuine and powerful! 

Those things aren’t always so fun to do right? You know what makes everything a lot more fun, joy, no not your neighbours grandma Joy down the road, merry and jolly joy! It’s in joy’s nature to bring vision and hope. Hope and vision are gifts that keep on giving, ‘want’ lives in the future, but hope and vision, they pave the road to the future from the here and now, and if hope and vision are a pathway, joy is a railing of light that keeps you from fear of falling, it allows you the freedom to dance along the path, rather than walking with trepidation of ‘what if’s’ and what’s below. Eyes on the steps in front of you, not too far ahead. It’s like baking bread - you put it in the oven knowing it will rise, you set the timer and you walk away, it will tell you when it’s ready, trust the timer, we don’t sit in front of the oven hoping and praying it will rise and thinking of all that could go wrong, if you’ve put the right ingredients in, there’s no worry needed. If you’ve put purpose, kindness and life and light giving love in, (even when it’s hot) you’ll get the bread, it always produces sustenance in time.

You may not be a marvel movie, but you are a marvel, and you and I are always learning, always growing, always figuring out what works and what doesn’t serve us. So before you walk into the next chapter and flip the page, wait for the credits to role, it doesn’t matter how small, 20 seconds can change the whole movie that just happened before it and lead the way into the next, you decide what you let live and die in your heart and mind, these are the secrets to the sequel.

Big love, 

O.J.S X  

Twenty Twenty - A line in the sand

Wave after wave, unrelenting and unceasing they came. Forced under by the weight, breathless and beaten, flipped and frazzled.

In our worldwide wrestle, we stopped. A great pause sweeping over the land, a shouting ‘shalom’. 

And in that place, something glorious happens… we see! The light beaming through the waves forever pointing which way is onwards and upwards. We MUST follow the light, it is our best and only option, it is our breath, our sight, our life.

Surrounded and saturated… stripped back and refined. We slow, we breathe…  just as the ocean does from low tide until high. That’s the thing when high tides swamp the land… a new line is drawn in the sand, will we rise to meet it? New ways, new standards, new perspectives…

What if the year from hell… was changed by the people into something heavenly? What if all we have… is all we ever need? Because what do we really control? What do we really have? What. Really. Matters? 

Forced inside and away from life and nature…is it not the simple things we truly enjoy most? 

Connection, community, family. Earth beneath our feet and art filled skies over head. Like those skies, we too must create, we tell the stories of imperfect humans striving for the only perfect way. A way that will never be rid with disease, judgement, shut off, closed down or voiceless. In every tribe and tongue it is simply paramount, there is not one single living thing that can thrive without it – Love! 

For our people, our planet, our bodies, our hearts, our minds, our communities, our nations – Love – Its. All. We have. 

Have a blessed 2021

Big Love

O.J.S X

Words on Pages

I found some notes in my phone from a trip to LA earlier this year… I’m still baffled at how I actually fit a semi-normal holiday in 2020 too! I was so taken back by how timely it was for me that I decided to turn it into a blog for ya’ll!

Los Angeles is crazy, nuts, bonkers! Flying into LAX airport we saw non-stop blocks of houses and concrete stretched out for miles and miles, literally farther than my eye could see. Coming from Australia and growing up in a small coastal town, my mind was well and truly blown! Spending some time in the actual city and of course traffic jams, it really made a lot of sense why cities make people feel so stressed out and even depressed.

All around us is non-stop marketing, music, adds… all vying for our attention, all seeking our time. Yet what happens when we give our time away? we lose our own, for everything in life is a trade off… we give hours to the TV, to our screens; sometimes we don’t even realise we didn’t get to do what we want to do because we get used to the patterns of it all, we get used to it because it’s what everyone else is doing too… so it’s okay right?

Yet how often to we make our own creativity a priority? Do you know what your creativity gives you? Your own mind, thoughts, desires, joys, wanderings, words, art… it's your own uniqueness that says more about you than a screen could ever tell you who you are.

So there in an Uber, driving through down town LA, the car so covered in shade from all the buildings, I found myself craving the sunshine. It sparked something in me… what am I doing with my time? what do I love doing? like I loved and wanted the sunshine - I needed to be rid of the tall, grey, dark buildings looming over me.

So this is just a little ‘post it’ note if you will, a reminder to find out what is of value and worth, what is worth the value of your time? For me, I needed to write, to find joy in journalling, in poetry and story-telling, and this is where the below poem came from, in an Uber in downtown LA, I hope it brings a smile to your precious, beautiful dial!

Write words on pages,

for every one of life’s seasons and stages.

Stories, poetry, prose and rhymes, 

it’s these I’ll jott down, every single time.

To know you are not alone,

gives us strength to our very bones.

Days get tough, nights seem long.

Even if it be so faint, let hope be a resounding song.

You were made with love,

from the heavens above.

Your life has meaning,

just as the sun is made for light beaming.

You may not feel it or see it yet, 

but take the path of life and love – you will feel peace I absolutely bet!

And on that road,

let go of that heavy load.

Time is a gift,

use it wisely as you uplift.

Take the time to sit and reflect,

On all the grounds of growth and seasons you’ve trekked.

Write words on pages,

at every one of life’s seasons and stages.

BIGGEST LOVE

O.J.S xx

Awakening wonder

I wrote this day after a really rainy night at home, I’d gotten my wisdom teeth out 6 days prior and hadn’t been outside or even in a state o up to doing anything for days. My husband returned home after a boys night dinner at 10.30 just as my movie finished (I watched a musical, because he hates them so its my only chance to watch them haha) I had so much energy and he handed me permission in a raincoat and a trusting smile even though he add to work early the next day and needed to go to bed, his lost sleep awakened my wonder.

——————————————

Of all the things and shade he could have thrown at me at 10.30pm at night, he threw me his rain jacket and umbrella. It was as though my heart were a ball that was once flat, now it had air in it and it simply couldn’t help but bounce off the walls of our tiny little apartment. He knew the ball needed to be let out, and demanded I put my snow boots on and do a lap around the block. 

His rain jacket smelt of lived in adventure, which I gladly placed over my silky pyjama dress. I placed my boots on as though they were my dad’s size 14 gum boots and I were 10 years old; my excitement had been wound back 16 years and saw this rainy night as though it were the most magical wonderland. 

Taking the longest route around two blocks I danced off the sidewalk, I tapped down the streets and spun in the air. I was Dorothy of Oz, then Mary Poppins, then Luke Skywalker then Harry Potter; an umbrella and some rain makes for the most transformative playground. 

We need to play, we must play! It’s essential to our bodies and minds, we lose so much of our childish ways when we grow up, but childlike play and imaginaition was never one we were designed to lose, if anything it can only grow stronger the more we use that muscle. As a kid the raindrops turned into laser beams and the umbrella a magical forcefield, my gumboots were springs that bounced sky high and in that moment the world really was magical.

So begs the question, what happens as we grow older? What’s takes our joy and wonder away? 

I danced down the dark, dead streets with not a soul in sight, until a man on a bike road past that I hadn’t seen in my flurry of flouncing limbs. He said “I saw that”, and those three words were as though three years were smacked onto my 10 year old dancing delight. A now 13 year old teenager, aware of what I looked like, constantly wondering if others were looking too (I’m sure you remember the feeling) 

So was it fear or worry? What I lost in the “watching” for others who could be watching was the dance, the magic, the imagination, the wonder. For what I lost what did I gain from my constant worrying of peoples thoughts? Nothing! No single thing!

Would I rather die with my worries and live a “society normal” life? Or die with my wonder and dreams and have lived a life full and free - complete freedom of creative expression? What kind of life and attitude am I myself inspired by?

So I took the umbrella off that I had placed below my head to hide me from the world, and I ran and skipped with no shields, I was soaked in the best way! Soaked and drenched in delight – always a choice I’d take over being safe and dry in dismay and displeasure. 

What deadens desire?

What kills dreams?

Is it fear like loud streams?

Is it judgement like burning fire?

In streams they drown, in fire they burn and brown.

So I’ll walk over streams and build a bridge called faith,

I’ll fill my buckets from dancing in the rain and spread it all over the fire,

I’ll tell fear and judgement they are liars.

Mind and heart awake with childlike dreams and desire I tossed and turned in bed.  2 am felt like 9.30 in the morning after an ocean swim and a green smoothie. Wonder has a way of doing that, turning what seems like tired dark sleepy nights, into bright and cheery fresh mornings; it truly flips worlds, especially those that we create in our minds first. 

I took a good look in the mirror and said to the sparkle in my eye, “I’ll do whatever it takes to keep you alive”. I barely slept a wink that night, but boy did I dream. 

The Timing Of Rhyming

I lay in bed and said; not out loud but in my head,

“I feel tired and uninspired”.

Unintentionally rhyming made for perfect timing…

So I pulled out some paper and penned this poem. 

Writing and rhyming my way out of feeling jaded,

sparked a colour in my clouded mind, just a moment ago a shade of grey so dull and faded.

Creating may be the best thing to do, when you don’t have the energy to even put on your shoes.

Inspiration and sparks of colourful hope are hidden in the most mundane of things,

Even mindless monotony can be turned around to flourish like spring.

Like after the storm, a rainbow with the sky has a flamboyant fling and

like a vibrant flower is fed from the colourless dirt it’s planted in.

Yet all flowers and poems must be watered, and creativity in that sense is one and the same. 

Verse by verse a poem is made from an otherwise one line sitting alone and lame. 

What’s a poem without a beginning, a middle and an end?

The drafts you write and the seeds you plant are like a framework, of this process; relish not rend.

Each day is not perfect, each day is not a finished product, each day is not grand,

Yet each day you choose where your heart, mind and feet land…

Is it on soils of growth and goodness? do they dwell upon stormy clouds or rainbows? or swim in the sea of rest?

If life were a staircase, each day is a step, not a racing fitness test.

You see if you rush up the stairs you miss the view,

That each step had waiting just for you!

Next time I feel tired and uninspired, even if I have to close my eyes,

I’ll let my mind wander and create - I’m certain and sure it’s how we’re wired!

BIG LOVE!!! O.J.S X

Dream catcher

Does the dreamer catch the wild thoughts? Or do the thoughts catch a hold of the dreamer? Either way, the dreamer decides…

Thoughts in their nature are like seeds; each small seed already containing the entire DNA to germinate and blossom into a full fledged tree. Yet a seed doesn’t look wild at first, it’s small and fragile in fact, but plant it in good soil (right motives) and water something you cannot see – that is WILD, that is faith in action.

Like a seed buried in the dark, so are our dreams, literally and metaphorically. We close our eyes and all we see is black, yet we dream in colour, a reminder to add colour to the black and white outlined drawings and plans of our dreams.

Dreams come not just when we lay our head to rest. Have you ever caught yourself in a quiet moment or sat to watch a sunset and your thoughts drift away as you start to dream about something else; what you want for dinner, what you want to do the next day… we imagine it as we dream it.

Our imagination and our dreams a lot of the time are one and the same. Our imaginations are so ridiculously incredible, we are born with this invisible gift like a child’s toy. The power to dream and imagine is given to every single human, past, present and future. The problem I think, is that we grow up and we think we are now too adult to dream or to let our imaginations run wild, so like our childhood toys, they get stored away in boxes and collect dust and the wheels and cogs start to rust.

The most part of society is addicted to the hustle, to bettering technology, to bettering our bodies and to living longer, for the most part it’s conformity that ruins creativity and individuality. Maybe, just maybe as our childish imaginations and big dreams start to wrinkle, so does our body. How often do you just sit and really let your mind just think. Not impacted or influenced by music, a podcast, eating, or being distracted by going for a walk or other people there, just you and your imagination, you and your dreams.

The irony of dreams and our imagination, is that we do it best when we close our eyes and block out all the noise and distraction. There in the darkness, just like the seed, is the germination of growth, of colourful dreams and possibilities. Imagination is like a bottomless treasure chest of golden ornaments. Open the lid, unlock the chest - you hold the key. Dive head first into the Gold that is your individual thoughts, your quirky humour, all the beautiful, the bold and the bizarre that isn’t uninfluenced by anything other than what is held in the seed of your DNA.

It is good for humans to be alone, we really, truly and scarily don’t do it often enough. So enjoy the company of your thoughts and make them full of life, colour, dreams and wonder. What if we chose to see the things around us like it were the first time, like a child in awe of the beach, or seeing a kangaroo for the first time, or smelling a frangipani, or dancing to no song in-particular just because you have the ability to. Do the dreams catch a hold of the dreamer, or does the dreamer catch a hold of the wild thoughts? Either way, the dreamer decides… dream on dreamer!

Big Love

O.J.S X

Honeyed Seas

A ship’s contents and waters to which it sails is of it’s masters choice. Where waters and currents are fast, the pace is as rapid as rough raging seas. When your pace is too quick there is no time for rest, constantly on guard, behind the wheel to navigate the waves and adjusting the sails to the winds…

Yet there is a sea, like honey from a bee

Thick, smooth, and sweet, a ship through honeyed seas cannot rush or hurry,

In those golden seas so slow, there is no need or chance to put on a show.

So I’ll sail through restful waters, I’ll leave my post, I’ll leave the wheel,

For time away I long to steal.

I’ll waltz onto the deck and simply lay out in the sun, I’ll watch the clouds float on by and slow my mind to their ponderous pace,

I’ll fill my ship with light clouds of peace and grace.

I’ll clear my ship of the heavy things – a free heart with liberating songs to sing.

Such songs are not carried off by the winds of haste, but heard and caught in the thick presence of sweet honey; a fulfilling taste.

Lay aside your maps and your compass; quell your telescope you get lost behind

Stuck behind such a future seeking scope with only one eye open - honey seas allow no such work or grind.

Both eyes open you can see what is right in front of you, no chasing horizons, but simply enjoying the view.

Sweet golden seas sparkle with gentle invitation. So satisfyingly sweet, I am need of nothing else but healing honey waters to eat.

From Grandeurs, glorious, golden seas, I can sail on into the great voyage with ease. 

Sailing on and sparkling from stern to bow, if ever I need rest I know exactly where I’ll go!

Depth

Standing over the cold rails of the bridge, the girl gazed at the dark glassy waters below, would it be cold? Would it hurt when she hit the water? The clouds covering the sun gave her skin a shiver of bumps; she looked at the reflection of herself in the water, her reflection moved with the waters as it said “Dive In! What you lose, is far less than what you win”, then the wind carried her fearful thoughts away and she jumped into the reflection of wisdom to play.

I watched the above scene (creatively written obviously, just in case y'all think I’m loopy) play out one day, one of those days where you just observe…I couldn’t stop thinking about the girl who was so scared and the complete swap of fear and joy she had on her face before she jumped. Then it occurred to me, to be able to jump in and have that moment, things need to be deep and scary… So I asked myself these two questions, Why does it have to be deep? Why depth?

At the core of everything lies embedded the code, the DNA, the life, the how, the why, these things often small and mostly unseen. Like the depths of the ocean, the core of an apple, the roots of a tree and the structure of a house; get the foundations/roots right and the tree will stand strong! Depth is something you carry with you, it is seen in the health of the tree and the taste of the fruit. If the core is rotten, the fruit will taste bad, even if it looks good on the outside.

To go “deep” with someone and even with your self (sometimes far harder) is to know them beyond what they look like and what they “show”. I think that that is why all that is deep is often hidden, like a treasure in someone or yourself, so that you get to find it along the journey if you’re willing to search it out. Would you read only the cover of a book? would you appreciate the beauty of a flower yet never learn what it needs at its core and depths to stay alive?

Our thoughts, cares, true desires and loves go so far beyond the surface, embedded deep into our hearts and minds. Married couples know this so well, a single tap or shoulder pat could mean an entire page of unspoken words, or silence, or a look means something only depth of understanding could fathom.

If we are not deep we risk being the opposite, shallow. When waters are shallow, you cannot dive in and explore the depths. Have you ever noticed how the shallow waters that are clear are often just sand? Yet the deep blue farther from the shore holds so much coral and sea life, or even how there are warning signs at pools warning of the shallow ends. It hurts when we dive into shallow water, shallow people, friendships and lives will do the same. 

It’s okay to dip your toes in before you dive in! Depth is a slow waltz, and depth and discernment hold hands as they dance like old lovers that know each curve and dimple in each other’s spine. Sometimes the water will smell sharky or the waters are icy cold… or will it suffocate me? If you can swim, these waters just take a little longer to be able to be in fully. But waters melt and sharks flee where there is a light as bright as the sun and there is a bigger fish in the water called LOVE. Depth doesn’t happen over night – but it does happen (Maybelline jokes haha) 

I know so many people who have fallen in love with others hearts and minds, after knowing them a while, or those that weren’t initially drawn to the other. What a beautiful thing to say to a special someone “I’ve fallen in love with the very depths of you”. Depth scares some people, but the depth is WHO WE ARE!!! Not what we look like, what we wear, the job we have, the place we live…

Depth is not fleeting, depth is strong, depth is substance and grounding, depth is understanding, in depth is wisdom and discernment, depth is treasure; a treasure to be searched and loved despite what we think of the value of said treasure found; small coins or trunks full… Do people not go snorkelling or diving if they aren’t sure what they will find? Or there is a fish they cant “name”, describe or understand. Would you rather go your whole life staring at the waters below, always wondering but never knowing? 

“ May your love abound more and more in knowledge and depth of insight, that you may be able to discern what is best..” - Phillipians 1:9