Words From Across The Pond

Today I'm starting a new series;  it’s only five weeks long so it will fit perfectly with the five Mondays that we have in November.

During a de-cluttering phase that I went through back in January, I got rid of everything that was on my refrigerator.  You know...pictures, various magnets, notes, etc.  I had never thought about it before, but it was actually stressing me out - the constant look of disarray was really starting to bug me.  It was such a simple thing, but I was so happy when I was able to look at the clean, white refrigerator.

Over the course of the year, I’ve collected five new magnets that now reside there.  Before you think I’ve gone and cluttered it all up again, let me assure you that it still looks wonderfully tidy.  All of the magnets are white with black lettering, and they’re all the same size!  (Uniformity makes so very happy.)  They align perfectly along the top and they serve as reminders to me whenever I need a kick in the pants or a little extra help getting through the day.  I thought that I’d share them with you (in the order that I purchased them); perhaps at some point they will encourage you as they have me.

The first one is a reasonably famous quote by Winston Churchill.  It reads:


“If you’re going through hell, keep going.”


So simple and yet so profound.

How often do we find ourselves in the middle of difficulty and we’re so paralyzed with fear, indecision, or pain that we do nothing?  We just remain there as if we're physically stuck.  I’ve been there lately more times than I care to count.  I love being able to read this simple quote and be jarred to movement.  It reminds me that I don’t need to have all of the answers, I don’t even necessarily need to have a coherent plan, but I do need to do something.  Sitting and wallowing in whatever hell I find myself in doesn’t help me; taking a step and looking for a solution, even if I change paths a million times before finding the right path, is a good thing.  It’s doing something.  It's being proactive.  It’s not giving up and allowing myself to be defined by or controlled by my circumstances.

So I'm trying, with a little help from Winston, to remember to keep going.