Mindful walk

Yep, I have definitely gone mad. Running has come to a standstill as I got shin splints and doing nothing isn't in my dictionary. My mind is playing tricks on me, cannot run otherwise I would risk of getting a bone fracture. So I had no choice either to let my mind control me or I control my mind.

See it makes perfect sense, really? Walking in a purpose of being mindful doesn't come very easily. I'm used to getting A to B very quickly. Sort of auto robert, getting to a place to buy things and back home. Or walking to my college at a brisk pace because I have a lesson. I never have time where I really walk just because it's a fun thing to do. Look over there, is a lovely flower. Or look over there, what a gorgeous bird is flying in the sky?

I like doing mindfulness as it brings you back to reality. Your mind cannot control you. You are only in control! I find it really helpful when I leave my phone at home and just bring myself and a camera. When my mind is taking over taking a photo brings me back to reality.

I might else well show you what I captured with my digital camera!

You also tell, I very much like flowers! Can't you?

Please excuse me while I do knitting for the rest of the evening.

Monthly musings: April

All you need is love. But a little chocolate now and then doesn’t hurt.” - Charles M. Schulz

I'm writing this by being blinded by the sun, window open. I think the summer is here. I don't want to rejoice that much in case the sun goes away. 

My Mum did some calculations at the beginning of the Month, it been a year since we knew about Dad redundancy and a whole six months of living in Westerhope. (And still no house tour.) Where has that time gone? 

April has been weird month for me with my well being. I have been so overwhelmed thank goodness I had the Easter holidays when I did. To recover, by going off the grid. Though I did respond to messages that were deemed to be important. You know where everything gets to you and you cannot seem to run away and hide. Then sort things out.

Running progress

I can now run 8K, with a bit of walking-only because I have to the cross over the road. One day I even managed to run 14K. I ran 6K in the morning that I was intending to do before college just for my sanity. I then had a such a bad day at college, I ran another 8K in the evening  Even got a runner high as they call it. You can see i'm into this runner business, can't you? I had to run though one major problem 'hitting the wall.' I'm sure hitting an actual wall is less painful than hitting the wall while exercising. I only managed 5.5K in an hour run, where I could normal run 8K in an hour with a face pace but a 6k where I am comfortable.

April meant one thing for my running. I got PB (personal best) for the parkrun where you run 5km for run on Saturday morning. Just you and the stopwatch.  Not just once but twice in one month. That meant I could eat twice in 'Creames'. Believe it or not, I haven't. My first time I got a PB my Mum got me some yarn and I'm knitting myself a cardigan. The second time I got a PB, is a token to go to 'Creames' as my Dad wants to go. I will have to wait much longer.

I also got my Blaydon race number through the post. About a month to go and still have no idea about the song. It's all on in Geordie even the information booklet is. My Mum had to translate it for me!

College

I am now getting there with my work load. My well being plummet right down and college work left to the backseat where my emotions were everywhere it was even driving the vehicle. Though now my mind is and things are getting done, slowly but surely. That's for certain. I now have two projects on the go though they link to each other very well. So hopefully I can get them done before the marking is over. 

I have made a firm decision where my career is going. It's not photography. Computers and I don't get along and I much prefer working with young children and I think I am more academic than generating ideas. Especially creative ones. I'm not good at coming up with idea on my feet, I much prefer solitude time to myself analyze the idea. Maybe I over analyze things. Is that even a thing?

Personal life

The weather even allows me to put the washing outside to dry!

I didn't do things out of the ordinary, this Month. It could be summarized as knitting and running. Though my lovely calendar said, that I met up with two of my friends One on a bank holiday Monday where I met Clementine in Durham for a quick coffee and went for a short walk in the city. I didn't want to spend a lot of  time with my friend because she was visiting her relatives. I met another friend in  Newcastle town for a cup of a tea. Thanks for a lovey afternoons, Clementine and Alice! 

Mum and I had some 'Mum and Daughter time' One of them was to see 'beauty and the beast' which was so lovely. I just had 'be our guest' song in my head for the entire month. The other time was having a walk in town seeing all the historic buildings.Which meant one thing, after the walk we could get a well earned drink. Though my Mum don't ask me which pub to go to as I just go to the expensive ones. I don't mean to.

Speaking about drinks, I had my first alcoholic drink that I enjoyed though took me three hours to drink 'Kopparberg' even then it was half the bottle. I will just stick to appletiser!

Knitting progress with pictures

My left knitted sipper. Can you tell I like purple! There should be button where my finger is.

A bit of my knitted cardigan!

The Shack

My church that I attend has their own library so after having a cup of coffee, I was admiring the lovely books that was out. A lot of people told me that the shack was a good read. So I took that book out. I have just finished it this morning, I started it on the bank holiday Monday. As I got an exam today I had to leave my book downstairs otherwise I would not get my nine hours sleep otherwise I would finished it yesterday evening!

I enjoyed reading it, that's for sure. It brought me to tears. Though reading the shack for theology point of perspective I don't like it. It's very poor. From what I understand from the book, that bad things happens because God created a freewill. So it is our own fault things happen? Or is just life being chaotic and random? I notice in my life when bad things happen, I get closer to God than ever not by praying and resent it to God. having bad things happen in life make you stronger. Cliched as it sounds, I believe that.

If this book wasn't recommended by my church congregation, the chances are I would give up reading. The entire beginning of the book bored me. I had to make endless cups of tea just so I could read it. Though after I got through the beginning it changing from being boring very thrilling because there were interesting things going on, When it came together at the end, I did have a greater appreciation of the way plot elements came together, but most of the time thought certain components of the story weren't very well done.

I re-read one paragraph where the author uses nine similes! Two of them concern tears and are in the same sentence. Someone please sit this author down and explain that similes and metaphors are to open windows. We don't need an entire glass factory delivered to us every page. (You can tell I have an English exam, can't you?

Please hear me out with these three paragraphs.

Aside from the cursing, I couldn’t believe it when members of the Trinity began to appear to the main character as black women.  Don’t get me wrong, this isn’t about race, it is about gender and the representation of God.

Representing God the Father as any image or human is a serious error even in fiction. We are not to build an image in our minds of God--we cannot "reduce" Him to our level of comprehension as He is so far above us in all things. Jesus had to die a painful death to reconcile us as sinful humans to God the Father due to His holiness. Jesus is the bridge and mediator, we cannot approach God apart from Him, let alone misrepresent Him in this careless way.

Why represent God as a woman? The Bible makes it clear that the authority structure is for a man to be at the head. The Shack is more dangerous because it feeds society's attempts to undermine the biblical gender roles and provides direct support for the feminist agenda. Christians should be standing against cultural trends where they conflict with the Bible, not promoting and supporting them.

I was very annoyed and frustrated by the profanity and don’t think it's ever okay for a Christian to swear or use blasphemy in their books whether fiction or non-fiction

We need to remember that it is the broad way that leads to destruction and the narrow way to life. In the latter times, people will gather teachers that say what their itching ears want to hear and we are warned that many will be deceived. The popular way is not God's way. Simply put in this modification of a quotation from G. K. Chesterton,

Wrong is wrong even if everyone else is doing it. Right is right even if no one else is doing it