Monthly Archives: March 2026

To that, I will not object.

Posted on by
Reply
Daily writing prompt
What are three objects you couldn’t live without?
View all responses

Well, on the material side of things, coffee? Maybe having blue tooth so I can listen to my radio station from when I was growing up. Kind of tough to answer that one. I could go to tea, or water if needed. Have before. Sometimes a local radio station will suffice. That is still only two. Not sure.

But that is one definition of object. A material thing that can be seen and touched. Huh. Maybe that disqualifies the blue tooth. Unless the holding the phone and pushing the site on the screen counts. But blue tooth really cannot be seen or touched. So perhaps that statement needs to be amended to “having a phone with blue tooth so I can listen to my radio station from when I was growing up.” There. Is my OCD an object? But I digress….

The other is ” a person or thing to which a specified action or feeling is directed.” If you look at it in this fashion, three things immediately come to mind.

Trust.

Intention.

Faith.

Trust can generate some very specific actions and feelings. What you come to allow in others as well as in yourself. It has been my experience of late that I find it way easier to do so with othose around me than it has ever been with myself. That is changing. Still some things yet to prove on my end. It is an object I cannot live without.

Add to that, intention. Something deeper than “want to”, commitment or goal. Intention reflects a direct investment of self into another object that has no guaranteed outcome. Just that in many ways and means needs to be employed and embraced. Not as a thing to be touched or seen. But a depth of giving of onself that is sensed, felt and fully woven into one’s being.

The intention may be to have a positive impact on another. And then again, it may be to have one on yourself. No guarantees. Just a way of being that goes beyond once incorporated, spreading inward and outwards.

Lastly, faith.

Not really lastly. Really firstly. Because it is only through faith that you are able to actively engage in patience with perseverance. There is a knowing component that provides the salve for the waiting. The continuous deployment of trust in the direction and intentional thoughts, words and deeds through the acts of perseverance.

Objects are of little importance to me.

Objects to which a trusted, intentional action, guided by faith is directed, are.

To that, I will not object.

Sincerity.

Posted on by
Reply

“But the man who is not afraid to admit everything that he sees to be wrong with himself, and yet recognizes that he may be the object of God’s love precisely because of his shortcomings, can begin to be sincere. His sincerity is based on confidence, not in his own illusions about himself, but in the endless, unfailing mercy of God.”
― Thomas Merton

He was right there all along.

Posted on by
Reply
Daily writing prompt
What experiences in life helped you grow the most?
View all responses

Those that demanded the absolute most of me, to the extent that I didn’t know I even had it in me, grew me the most.

I am sort of at a loss for any humorous analogies for this one. Not because the hardship endured or the honesty demanded left me sullen and bleak. Heck, that is what a great time looks like on this old stoic’s kisser.

Well that lasted about one sentence.

I am fortunate to have undergone tests such as those. I am filled with gratitude for being given the opportunity to experience life in some very painful ways and days. Months. Years, Decades.

Ultimately, it helped reveal to me who I can be and should be. Because in the end, that is who I am. It is how I came to be.

And you know what?

The tests are far from over. Nothing you can study or prepare for. They are simply on standby to take their turn when the time comes.

And me?

Not gonna be on standby. On call. Or on edge.

Just gonna live. In the here. And now.

One thing I know for sure.

It wasn’t just me before.

He was right there all along.

Fate chose my destiny.

Posted on by
Reply
Daily writing prompt
Do you believe in fate/destiny?
View all responses

I do not believe in them per se.

So much of life just comes down to the choices we make.

Free will if you like.

How you choose to exercise that gift tends to produce those overtly or covertly calculated results. Things which are done with intention, whether honestly acknowledged and accepted or dishonestly ignored and hidden, tend to yield precisely what was fated to be. It might be things that lead you to an outcome that may have been expected. On the other hand, it might be a response to an outcome that takes things down an altogether different path.

Like I said yesterday at the onset of my prior post, I am speaking of me. This comes out of my dented noggin from the singular “I” perspective. And when “you” gets added into my word salad, that is meant to be from the Mark perspective. Not you. I have no desire to return to that pulpit. Over stayed my welcome and singlehandedly created more alienation in my life than O’Bannon and Shusett combined. I chose my fate in many areas of life.

“Uncle”.

There, that is some of the fate of my design in a nutshell.

Then, there is destiny.

Not gonna call it fate’s sibling. More so a very distant cousin. Part of the family, but going back to quite some time ago. Unlike fate, which can largely be your design, destiny is something born of another one. By design, meant to bring good, purpose, fulfillment, joy, connection, love, and life. Among other things.

I think in the former, I created the design, created the plan and pretty much brought things down around me. Choices I made determined my fate. And if I made similar choices on how to respond to those circumstances, the self-destruction escalated.

But because the latter – destiny – is provided by a much older and wiser pillar of the family, it will encourage a more patient, foundational and divine journey to what you were meant to be. That is, if you can listen, accept and trust in it.

Yet in both instances, that one wrench remains as the constant. Dating all the way back to that garden.

Free will.

I cannot say it is mine, but dispatching the tendency to call it how I saw it and wanted it sure as heck changed the tenor of my life. Perhaps it was my fate to finally acknowledge that I did not know it all and needed someone else to show me the best way possible. It was destiny that called me to just let go.

Fate chose my destiny.