June 13, 2023

Posted on by Johanna Garcia
My reflection:
“There is no need to give up your serenity for the sake of getting something accomplished. In fact, accomplishment comes more surely when your efforts are calm and your spirit is peaceful.
Consider how very much more you can get done when your energy is not being sapped away by a frenzied mind. True serenity is not the absence of action, but rather action with integrity, confidence, and a steadfastness of purpose.
The world may very well be swirling around you in a constant turmoil. But you don’t have to adapt that turmoil as your own.
 The more frenzied and hurried life becomes, the more serene and unperturbed you have the opportunity to be. Whatever you can accomplish in a hectic and chaotic state, you can accomplish much more powerfully with peaceful calm determination.
When you’re confronted with turmoil, respond with serenity. It will lift you to a higher level of experience and accomplishment.”  Ralph S. Marston, Jr.

June 11, 2023

Posted on by Johanna Garcia
My reflection:
“When you are disturbed by events and lose your serenity, quickly return to yourself and don’t stay upset longer than the experience lasts; or you’ll have more mastery over your inner harmony by continually returning to it.”
All reactions:

20

June 10, 2023

Posted on by Johanna Garcia
My reflection:
We cannot choose how many years we will live, but we can choose how much life those years will have. We cannot control the beauty of our face, but we can control the expression on it. We cannot control life’s difficult moments, but we can choose to make life less difficult. We cannot control the negative atmosphere of the world, but we can control the atmosphere of our minds. Too often we try to choose and control things we cannot. To sell them we choose to control what we can… Our attitude.” Author Unknown

June 9, 2023

Posted on by Johanna Garcia
My reflection is from Living Faith:
Before them all Tobit proclaimed how God had mercifully restored site to his eyes. Tobit 11:17
“Confession: The whole ‘God is good proclamation has never sat well with me, especially when it accompanies an answered prayer. Somehow it feels like a conditional statement. It’s good thing happened; therefore, God is good. Of course, God is good when cancer is cured or the blind cannot see, but what about when people die, where is ravish nations and children starve? I can see nonbelievers cringing asking, ‘How good is your God now?’
Very good. Now and always. He was good when he mercifully restored Tobit site, but it isn’t his ex that make him good. It is his very being. God is good because he loves and forgives. He’s good because he pursues us even in the darkness and stays with us through strife sickness and fear. He never leaves. He is all that is good and worthy even when everything else is not.”

June 8, 2023

Posted on by Johanna Garcia
My reflection:
“I remember when I was young and driving 30 miles in 60 minutes of rush hour traffic twice a day so I could work for eight hours two cities away from my children in an office that afforded a view of concrete ribbons screaming in every direction with people who knew my name but that’s all and climate control they kept everything uniform in every season.
Are used to think about my grandparents tucked away in a piney woods in their small, wooden house with a screened in porch for summer sleeping and their tiny kitchen with a green formica table top and a clear plastic cover over the floral sofa so you could see the bouquets underneath; with a vegetable garden and a chicken coop and a trout pond and an old pick up truck the oil company gave my grandfather to drive to check their wells, twice a day, his job.
I remember them waking up together and working alongside, him hoeing the garden while she did the laundry and sitting down for lunch together, every day, following their heads to say thanks for the sweet corn and the leftover fried chicken and the coupons for paper towels in the newspaper that day and how those vinyl chairs clung to your flesh and never wanted to let your legs go anywhere else.” Sally Clark

June 7, 2023

Posted on by Johanna Garcia
My reflection:
“Father, help me to be like a refreshing cup of cold water on a hot summer’s day to the friends you’ve given me. May I contribute encouragement, comfort, wisdom, accountability, and loyalty to our friendship. Help me to reserve judgment and faithfully pray for my friends as we walk together heart to heart and hand to hand . Amen” Stephen Weber
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35

June 6, 2023

Posted on by Johanna Garcia
My reflection:
“God gave us one another to teach us about love and guide us through the world, always available to help us forward toward a greater understanding and a greater sharing and giving of love. “Regina Riddle

June 5, 2023

Posted on by Johanna Garcia
My reflection:
“We should strive to keep our hearts open to the sufferings and wretchedness of other people, and pray continually that God may grant us that spirit of compassion, which is truly the Spirit of God.”St  Vincent de Paul

June 4, 2023

Posted on by Johanna Garcia

My reflection:
“I asked God for strength, that I might achieve-
I was made weak, that I might learn humbly to obey.
I asked for house, that I might do greater things –
I was given infirmity, that I might do better things.
I asked for riches, that I might be happy-
I was given poverty, that I might be wise.
I asked for power, that I might have the praise of men-
I was given weakness, that I might feel the need of God.
I asked for all things that I might enjoy life –
I was given life, that I might enjoy all things.
I got nothing that I asked for –
But everything I had hoped for.
Almost despite myself, my unspoken prayers were answered.
I am, among all people, most richly blessed ” Author Unknown