What are you passionate about?

permaculture garden

permaculture garden

I am thinking about what I want to write for my 500 word challenge today, and the only thing I can think of is what I want to do with my blog. What is my passion? I know we all have them, but sometimes it’s hard for some of us to see what they are. So what am I passionate about at this moment in time?

I love to talk about spirituality, but some days it’s one of those topics that people struggle to talk about in a civilized manner, maybe I’ll leave that for another time in the future. I like…no, I LOVE nature, I always have. I feel more at home out in nature than I do anywhere else, so maybe I will focus my attention on that for now. This is one of the wonderful things about life, you don’t have to focus on one area unless you ‘feel’ you need too. I can be passionate about nature now, but if something else catches my attention down the road, then I can focus on that as well or completely change my focus, it doesn’t matter.

One topic that I have been drawn to over the past few months is permaculture. Permaculture is hard to explain because it means something different to each person, but simply put, it is a set of tools for designing landscapes that are modeled after nature, yet include us humans.  I feel that nature has the answers to every question and yet is simple enough for everyone to understand and connect with. The harder something is, the harder it is to connect with it, but the moment you begin to understand and things become clearer, the more connected you feel to it.

I feel that the area around my home is wasteful, it has no purpose other than mowing it, but what if I could change that? What if I could use every part of my land for the production of something? Whether it be air, shade, food, or just creating my own ecosystem, all of these things are beneficial to me and my family, not to mention the ground and the animals. Yes, I do believe the soil we walk upon is a living being and not just dirt, I also see animals as living beings and not just food or pests.

This will be a big change for me, but one I am willing to make, one that I know will benefit future generations and the planet. I have already started by purchasing a few different plants and shrubs, and one thing I know I will add into my blog, is some free giveaways, trying to do the right thing is hard and expensive at times. I was so excited to be able to purchase a beautiful flowering tree that I wanted for a fraction of the original price because it was at the end of the season and they just wanted to get rid of it so they had a place for their winter items. The poor thing was very neglected and the leaves were pretty dried up, but I knew it wasn’t dead and I knew I could nurse it back to health. It is now growing beautiful new leaves.

This is not about manipulating nature to do what I want it to, but realizing that nature is perfect the way it is and if I follow its example, I can give life to everything around me.

Posted in permaculture | Tagged , , , , , , , , | 3 Comments

My all-time favorite movie

The Princess Bride

The Princess Bride

I am doing a challenge to write 500 words a day, so I’m going to use my blog for this and have a record of what I wrote for 27 days.This will also help me to get ready for November when I entered another challenge to write even more words per day.

I know this is kind of cliché, but I have to add in my favorite movie/book of all time. I remember watching this movie for the first time when I was around 13 years old. I was staying at a friend’s house and we watched it together, for some reason I don’t remember liking the movie then as much as I do now. I can’t even begin to tell you how many times I’ve watched it, and since my husband bought me the DVD for my birthday many years ago, I have watched it a lot more and it never gets old to me.

I am reading the book for the first time and it has me just as spell-bound as the movie does, although the book goes into more detail than the movie…as usual. The version of the book in the photo also cuts out a lot of the parts that are not as interesting, so that adds to my liking. Note to self, if I ever write a book, don’t get caught up in boring details that no one cares about just to make my book longer. I would rather have a really good short book, than a really boring long book.

As I sit here watching the movie on the tv,  I wonder why I like this book so much, and the one answer that comes to mind is the simplicity of the story. True love is simple, it is our human minds that complicate it; adventure is simple, unless our human minds complicate that as well.

I find that my life is simple when I don’t complicate it with my own expectations, expectations of what my husband should do, expectations of how my kids should act, expectations of how my life should go, and on and on. Expectations are defined as a strong belief that something will happen or be the case in the future. I have found that expectations only bring suffering when they don’t work out, so I am trying to live each day without any expectations of how I think it should be.

I can’t recommend this book enough, but I know it’s not everyone’s cup of tea. Not everyone likes simple and seek to live more simple lives, there are those people who enjoy complicated books, and that is fine. This book is a reminder to me of simple, the simple love between Buttercup and Westley, simple adventure with Westley and Buttercup putting one foot in front of the other and facing what each moment brings into their paths without expectations of how it should go. I don’t see simple as boring or a life without stuff, I see it as a life without expectations and just accepting what comes our way with gratitude.

Posted in Life lessons | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Bondage

images (3)

There is a story about a man who fell in a hole named Corban. When he finally realized that he could not get out he started to yell for the people he heard above. The first person who answered his call was a billionaire who threw down a check for $100,000. Corban thought, “Where am I going to spend this down here?”, so he threw it aside. The next person who answered the man’s call was a religious leader, “What can I do for you, my son?” said the cleric. When Corban presented his problem, the cleric said, “I must perform mass at the church in 5 minutes, so I can’t stop now, but we’ll pray for you.” As he was getting ready to leave he dropped a Bible into the hole. Corban picked up the Bible and tried to imagine any possible way he could use it to get out of the hole.

The next person was a woman who threw down some organic vegetables, vitamins, and herbal supplements. A doctor stopped and donated a few bottles of sample medications; a lawyer came by and talked about suing the city for not putting a fence around the hole. At this point Corban was giving up hope that anyone would help get him out, he felt lonely, and a little afraid. He desperately needed someone to guide him out of the hole. Corban couldn’t help the tears of desperation that fell from his eyes, eyes that were quickly losing hope in humanity.

Then a woman came by who told him that he had to let go of all his negative thinking, learn to visualize, and then use the law of attraction. “But that’s exactly what I’m doing, trying to attract someone to help me get out of this hole!” Corban yelled, anger beginning to rise within. “You must not be doing it right”, the woman responded, and she threw down a DVD about the law of attraction. A little while later, a Zen Buddhist sat down at the end of the hole, wanting to teach Corban how to meditate. “If nothing else,” the zen master said, “if you practice long enough, you’ll feel better about being in the hole. You might even be able to levitate your way out in a few lifetimes.”

Corban couldn’t believe it, were these people so blind that they couldn’t see that he needed real help, not food, money, a DVD, or anything else they tried to throw down at him. Couldn’t they hear the desperation in his voice? Couldn’t they see that his life was in danger and that he needed to get back to his family? Corban also thought that maybe the woman was right, maybe it was his fault that he was in here, and maybe it was his fault that he didn’t already know how to get out.
Then a man’s voice shouted “Can you move over a few feet, out of the way?” His eyes still moist with the tears of hopelessness, Corban reluctantly stood up and took a few steps back toward the side; he figured this person didn’t care about his problem either. After he moved, the man jumped into the hole, landing at Corban’s feet, “What did you do that for? Now we are both stuck in here!” Corban exclaimed. “Why couldn’t you throw down a rope or get a ladder?” The man looked at him gently, “Those won’t work. I’ve been here before, and I know the way out.”

I used this story because it is a model of what I have been through, and probably a model for a lot of people’s lives as well. You go to all these different “groups” looking for the answers to the questions that burn deep inside you. You think someone has to have the answers, so you search and search. Mostly what you end up finding is a lot of disappointment, unanswered questions, and no help from anyone. You actually begin to wonder if these people are actually keeping you in the state you are in.

A lot of places don’t want you to find inner peace, they don’t want you to find the answers you seek, because that means less money in their pockets, so they drag you along for years, revealing small bits of truth just to keep you coming back for more. Should the truth about reality really be peddled for money? The Light of the Creator is supposed to be freely given to people who truly desire it, so that they can live an abundant life, not used as bait to keep people tied down and under another’s control. I was blessed to find two mentors who deeply love and care for me and my husband. They don’t tell us what to think, they just walk beside us on our journey and share their experiences with us, allowing us to come up with our own conclusions and find our own way.

So I ask that all of you really look deeply at where you are learning from spiritually, are you really seeing a change in your life? Are there people there to “lean on” when times get rough and you need a little mentoring? Are they doing it for money? Always keep your spiritual eyes open, this new spiritual awakening ‘movement’ is big business now, making tons of money, and there are many wolves ready to devour our energy and potential, keeping us in their chains of bondage.

Posted in spiritual | Tagged , , , | 2 Comments

Welcome to my new home

You have reached the home of J.R. Richards (Author).

Stay tuned for stories that will touch your heart…

🙂

Posted in permaculture | 2 Comments

The Beauty of Balance

Share Your Light

Share Your Light

It’s hard to sit and watch the horror stories on the news about murder, violence, and total apathy of one another. The worst part of it is when this violence and apathy is premeditated by lies and materialistic gain, why would someone want to hurt another person over a pair of shoes, have human beings really fallen that far?

The upside to this is that in life, in the Universe, there is a balance so when I see all this violence  I know that there is the same amount of love and compassion somewhere else in the world.

Then many will take offense, betray one another and hate one another. Many people who claim divine inspiration and use it for personal gain will rise up and deceive many, because of all this the love of many will grow cold.

Let your love shine bright, especially in times of darkness and despair.

Posted in spiritual | Tagged , | Leave a comment