today's dose

I'm still on a campaign to 'fall in love' three times each day, but it is kind of hard to do when I'm sitting in front of a computer for most of the day or doing my readings for school. I do go on walks a couple of times a week though, and that's when I mostly have these moments. I usually walk to a hill in my local area - it's hard to explain what it is exactly. It's a man-made hill that I think has been constructed specially for people to walk/bike up. I think it's called a 'marker' (whatever that means!). 2 of my 3 fall-in-love moments are pretty much guaranteed whenever I go on this walk:

1. The view: when I get to the top of the hill, I take in the view of the surrounding area. Now, I wouldn't place it in the top 5 best views that I've seen (or top 10 for that matter), but there is something peaceful about being able to watch the world go by from up high somewhere. It also looks out over a creek and I love watching the sun glisten and dance on top of the water.
2. Lavendar: on the way back from my walk I usually walk past a lavendar bush and I'll pick off a leaf and sniff on it till I get home. I LOVE the smell of lavendar! It's so therapeutic.

Today's third moment was while I was walking up the hill and watching the sun start to set in the west. I'll have to bring my camera along one day.

I'm learning to enjoy the little things in life and to take in their beauty on an everyday basis. In my small group, we've been looking at the book of Genesis. I'm understanding more and more why our Creator looked at what he had made and said that it was good. And this is a fallen world too. I can't wait to see 'the real thing'. In the meantime, I'm going to just enjoy little bits of heaven here on earth.

three times a day

In my class on 'Spirituality' we've been learning about a brand of spirituality that was a pre-cursor to New Age, called 'Creation Spirituality'. While I don't agree with most of what its founder Matthew Fox has to say, he has at least one point that I like and agree with. He says that we should 'fall in love' at least three times a day. He doesn't mean falling in love in a 'romantic' way but in a more general way. Here are my three things from yesterday:

1. The 4 year old girl I was minding yesterday wanted me to have the sticker off her mandarin, and the little 3 year old boy offered me a piece of mandarin. (it's easy to have these 'fall in love' moments when you work with kids!) That sticker stayed on my hand all day.
2. Listening to the drum pattern of one of my favourite songs (Molly Johnson's 'Ooh Child/Redemption's Song')
3. Watching a waiter at the Chinese-Vietnamese restaurant I was dining at last night, reading the paper in Vietnamese to his aging mother.

On a day like today when I've been in front of the computer all day, I haven't had three moments yet. Have you had three fall-in-love moments today?

By the way, I'm sure it's a different Matthew Fox from Charlie of Party of Five a.k.a. Jack of Lost.