The Time is Now

There's a Kid President video that talks about how now is the time to be awesome. Now is the time to show kindness, to do something good, to be your best self.

In light of recent events around the world this weekend, I'm going to reiterate that statement.

The time is now, friends.

It's time to let go of our pettiness and anger.

It's time to love.

We have been watching this world fall apart for months, even years. Lives are threatened and ended every single day because of race or religion or simply being in the wrong place at the wrong time. People are dying because they left their homes and went about their normal day.

It isn't fair that these things happen and, more than that, it isn't right. We see these events on our news every day and we ignore them or argue about them. We fight about who is right or wrong, argue about race and religion, but do we help anything by doing that?

The answer is no, people.

By posting those arguments and by choosing sides we don't do anything but continue to harm. To me, there is only one side we need to choose:

Life.

I'm on the side of life, what about you?

Not only am I on the side of life, I'm on the side of love.

I have been in the position where I wanted to hate in my own personal life and it got me nowhere. Okay, that's a lie. It got me depressed and angry. That's what hate does. Hate solves nothing and it only brings a person down. If we continue to show hatred then nothing will ever change.

My pastor shared an amazing message about this today. We, as humans, carry so many emotions and when we hear of terrible things there are many, many reactions we can have. We can hate and want revenge, but in the end that isn't going to help anything. The only way we are going to change anything, including ourselves is to love. We can spread that love, share the light, be the light with the world. Be there for those who are sad and suffering. We can pray for peace for all of those and hope. We can hope for things to be better one day.

Choosing love isn't always easy, though. One of my favorite quotes actually comes from the Harry Potter series (that should not surprise anyone). It's this:

"We must all face the choice between what is right, and what is easy." 

That's pretty heavy stuff. Choosing love isn't easy, but it's right. Hoping for something better in trying times isn't easy, but it helps. Forgiveness...man, that's a tough one...but it's right.

Maybe we aren't ready to forgive, but in the meantime there are other things we can do. There are other things to focus on than hatred against others.

As a Christian, I know I am called to love and I know I know I know it's something that I struggle with sometimes. But now, today, I feel that calling so very strongly.

Even if you aren't a Christian, as a human, we should be ready to lift others up no matter what the color of their skin, how they worship, or what they believe.

I'm going to try to do that this week. I hope you will too.

Use Your Words (Wisely)

I really love words. That might not come as a surprise to anyone, but I’ve been thinking about my relationship with words for a few days now. We’re pretty committed to each other, you see. Words and I get along really well. I love to read them, write them, speak them, sing them, and listen to them. Words do their part for me, too. They can heal, encourage, entertain, and comfort.

Words are powerful.

I think sometimes we forget how powerful they are, because sometimes words do other things like: hurt, embarrass, and discourage others.

In my classroom one of our rules is Use kind words. It sounds pretty simple but often times it’s the hardest rule to follow. For example, this week (three days of school, mind you) I heard a lot of:

“He said I was mean!”

“He doesn’t want to be my partner.”

“They aren’t being fair!”

Yeah, that sound you hear is me banging my head against the wall whilst comforting small children. I love my job.

It’s just crazy that we can choose to use words so flippantly and think that they don’t matter. That because they’re just words, they don’t hurt as much. Words are our most powerful weapons if you ask me. I always think about when students might hit or cause physical harm to another because they’ve gotten their feelings hurt or something didn’t go their way. The automatic response is: “Use your words!” But, man…those can hurt, too.

As a teacher one of my biggest challenges is finding the “right” words to discipline, encourage, teach, and all those other things I do that escape me at the moment. And sometimes it’s really, really tough. It’s tough to have to think about things before they come flying out of your mouth. Personally that’s always been a probably for me. When I was younger I’d just spit out useless facts or stupid stories that would only embarrass me because people look at you like you’ve got five heads. I can’t help it, though. I already told you: I love words. 

Okay, scratch that. I love good words. I love words that encourage and tell stories, which share feelings and give hope. Those are the kind of words I love. Those are the kinds of words I’m going to focus on this year. I don’t want to focus on words that hurt or break down friendships, relationships (personal and professional), or other people. I hope you don’t want to either…*hinthint*.

My life group leaders were recently telling our group about a self-help guru on some morning show who had decided to choose a word and live by it for 2014. It’s an interesting idea. Pick a word and focus on it. Put it in every aspect of your life. To me, that’s one way that words can be powerful in a good way.

I chose the word peace. I want peace in every aspect of my life. Peace in all my relationships, in my job, in my classroom, and in my heart.

Peace out,

Ash