Okay it is Friday and you know what that means!
QUESTIONS!!! QUESTIONS! QUESTIONS! Come get your weekly fix.

1. Do you like reading poetry?

2. How do you like your coffee?

3. Favorite flowering annual?

4. Do you have a favorite type of tree?

5. Do you feed the birds?

6. Last piece of fruit you ate?

7. What is your favorite vegetable?

8. How many candles do you have displayed in your home?

9. How often do you eat red meat?

10. Will you be going to any weddings this year?

11. What is the high temperature supposed to be today?

12. Do you like to go camping?

13. When is the last time you rode a rollercoaster?

14. When is the last time you had a picnic in the park?

15. Do you feel you have enough time?

16. Would you ever go on a silent retreat for a week?

17. What is one trait you find difficult to tolerate in others?

18. What is your favorite kind of cake?

19. What consist of a perfect day if you have the whole day and it is yours alone?

20. Got any good plans this weekend?

That's it! Enjoy and have a great weekend my cyber-friends.

Bear Hugs!
PolarB ;)

If you could choose

If you could choose what kind of world to live in, what kind of world would you choose? If you could determine how the upcoming day will be, with what kinds of things would you fill it?

If you had the power to decide what types of opportunities would come your way, what opportunities would you select? If you knew that your experiences would equal your expectations, what would your expectations be?

In fact, you do have the power to choose the way that much of your world will be. You do have the ability to decide what kinds of events, experiences, opportunities and circumstances come your way.

For the world you experience is the world with which your dreams, your thoughts, your expectations and your actions most closely resonate. The world you see and live in, is the world you most sincerely expect to see.

The universe is filled with endless possibilities, and those possibilities keep growing more numerous with each minute. The way you live determines which of those possibilities come into contact with your life.

With your thoughts, with your actions, with your values, dreams and expectations, you do indeed choose what kind of world you live in. The way you are, is closely mirrored in the world you see.

-- Ralph Marston

For a wonderful refreshing moment to experince peace, please click on the link below.

POSITIVE~PAUSE

Have a wonderful day,
PolarB ;)

Hey Peeps,

I've been wanting to write and finding the time is the issue. Things have been busy here and about to get a lot more busy with the changing of the seasons. I am so thrilled about that and am really itching to get out there in the yard and start digging in with all of our plans for the season.

Work is hectic however it is starting to settle down a bit as I get into a comfort zone of how to handle my new additional tasks. I've been with the same company for over 18 years and last week we had a restructuring in the leadership and in the way we will do business going forward. We've been told that there are going to be cutbacks and they are looking at all positions to see where they need to lean it up and trim the excess in order to be more efficiently run with less cost. This is happening over the next 60 days or so. I don't think anybody really feels secure in their job right now. I know I most certainly don't. In the most recent cutbacks there was no rhyme or reason to whose positions were cut. Some had over 20 years seniority, some had less than a year.

To make matters worse, there was a consultant that came in to review my tasks that I do currently on a daily basis. That makes me even more nervous. To tell you the truth I am praying as hard as I can right now. It is very scary and I am feeling very vulnerable and insecure in that we just refinanced our house this past summer. To put it mildly, I have to continue to make the same salary range I currently make or it could be a situation where we could lose our house. I am terrified of that. I have worked hard all of my life to have the things I have. I am the first one in my family of origin to graduate high school and to buy my own home and hold down a decent job. I am proud of that fact. Most people have family to fall back on or a husband or spouse who is usually the bread winner or is able to help them out. I don't. I'm it. If I don't do it for myself... then that's all there is. Lovie is retired and she gets a small monthly check from Social Security. She is also working full time right now so we can make it. We don't have extras in our life like cable and high speed and going out to eat on a weekly basis. We pay our basic essential bills and gas and groceries.

The sad thing is that I make a good salary, more than most, and I am proud of that. For just being a high school kid I have managed to do very well for myself. I am intelligent and have strong leadership skills. I get very high reviews at work and am a hard dedicated worker. I am an extremely positive person and I am able to motivate myself and others on our team and in general. I don't want to lose everything I have gained in my life. It took a lot for us to be able to finally buy our home and we have done an amazing amount of work on it to make it our very own comfortable home. I don't want to lose it. I am praying and trying my best to have faith and to hand it over to God and know that he will handle this. I am praying very hard that I get to keep my job and our home. Whatever happens will happen, I am not in control of it and God is leading the way so I have to just trust in that.

In times like this it allows me to see how far I have come. I've been thinking a lot about that over the past few weeks. I am very grateful for all the things that I have been able to handle and to heal from. I have had a lot thrown at me in my lifetime and yet I am still standing strong.
I think of my beginnings in life and I am proud of who I am today. I was a throw away kid that nobody really wanted, abandoned by my mother at 6 months old, abused sexually by my father for the next 18 years of my life, was sexually and ritually abused in a church for more than two years as a young child, and I was passed around to over 22 different homes in and out of the foster care system until I was able to be on my own at age 17. My therapist tells me I don't know how a child can overcome so much repeated abuse and abandonment and come out as strong as you have. I know why... It is because I have a strong spirit and God has a specific purpose for me. I am working towards that purpose right now in my life. It is part of my legacy of who I have always been meant to become. When my life is done and over with many years from now and my physical body is just dust in the wind, I know I will have made a difference in this world. It is my destiny and I accept that.

Does that mean that I don't falter from time to time? No. I am human. I have fears but I also have a tremendous amount of courage and strength too. I remember about 15 to 20 years ago how frightened I was and how much fear ruled my life. I was a scared little girl. I had a hard time looking at people because I was afraid they would notice me and either reject me, hurt me or deceive me in some way. I didn't have trust in anyone. I was afraid to sit outside on my third floor patio for fear that the people who abused me would find me somehow and hurt me again. I had extreme night terrors and would lay awake all night watching the doorway afraid a dark shadow would appear. When I did sleep I had horrid nightmares from the abuse I suffered as a child. I would wake up drenched in sweat and trying to scream. It wasn't pleasant and I lived in a constant state of fear. When I finally got the courage to make a change in my life and to try to heal the damage that was done, I went to a women's support group for abuse survivors. I couldn't even speak out loud and talk to anyone. I just sat and listened as my body was physically shaking and trembling with intense fears.

The effects of what I lived through impacted me in so many different ways. It was gut wrenching working through the issues and seeing how the abuse impacted my life. I used a ton of unhealthy coping skills growing up. I drank, I drugged, I cut and self mutilated in order to try to block out the pain. None of those things worked and it harmed me further. I raged and my anger was expressed in unhealthy unproductive ways, mostly towards myself. As I started the healing process I was able to recognize the things I did and I was able to change those things from negatives to positives. I replaced old coping skills with new positive life affirming ones that allowed me to have and outlet for my feelings and my creativity and my expressiveness. I learned to embrace who I am as a person and to love myself and nurture myself in ways that I needed and did not get as a child. I am worth it. I deserve to be loved and respected and honored for who I am as a human being. As they say God don't make any junk and I am not the throw away kid that I thought I once was.

I have been on an upward journey and sailing a heck of lot smoother for the last 8 years of my life. Life is so good and I am so glad to have made the changes in my life for the better. I am very fortunate to have survived because so many don't. Alot of children who go through abuse like that die with broken spirits. I didn't and my spirit is alive and strong and full of life. I am honored to have people in my life who love me and treat me the way I should be treated...with dignity and respect, with love and caring, with compassion and honor. I have learn acceptance and I know that my life has meaning. I wasn't born to be used and rejected and harmed by the people who were supposed to love and protect me. It took a really long time to realize that. However through my own experiences and in all the healing I have done over the last 20 years of my life, I have been able to help countless others who are walking the same path. There has been such a transformation within me that I feel it is all part of God's divine plan for me. It always was.

If you looked at the person I was 20 years ago compared to who I am today, you would see a very different person. I was once a scared hurt child who was in survival mode 24/7. Now I am a strong self assured woman who lives her life with a positive uplifting outlook on life. I am proud of the woman I have become. I am intelligent, caring, compassionate, humorous, thoughtful, respectful, honest, passionate, creative, dependable, affectionate and loving. I am able to trust and share my life and my love with others. I am open and willing to open my heart to other people and trust and believe in them. Often I am the one who people come to for advise and when they need someone to listen and support them. I am honored that they have trust in me. I have a deep level of integrity and I try to bring out the positive and be a light to others in everything I do. In my work, in my play, in my personal relationships, and within my own self in how I relate to life in general.

Again do I have moments where I feel insecure and doubt creeps in? Yes. I am human. We all experience that. It is natural. Have people let me down and hurt me in other ways? Yes, of course they have, it is a natural cycle of life, but it doesn't devastate me. Life goes on. There are lessons in the journey and God knows exactly what he is doing. Things and situations don't happen by chance. Sometimes the lessons are for me and sometimes they are for the others in our life. I thank God for my journey and the ability to make a difference in the life of others. I know I have a positive impact on many people. I have validation and confirmation of that and the Great Spirit above has told me I am exactly where I am supposed to be.

So when I feel doubts and I get worried that things might not happen or go the way I want them to go... I have to trust that it will happen just the way it was meant to happen. Sometimes life is a test of our faith. I just have to let it go and let God. Really letting go is what faith is all about isn't it?

If you happen to be a praying individual, say a little added prayer for me that God will work it all out just as it is supposed to about my work situation.

Take care of yourself and each other!

Love, PolarB ;)

Happy Saturday evening Peeps and Happy Easter as well!

The most recent CD I bought was Justine Timberlake and I have to say I really love the music. I was never much interested in him before yet the music on his latest CD is really great. There are a few that I simply love so I wanted to share them with you.

The first one is one that makes me wanna take Lovie in my arms and hold her close to me and sway under the moonlight. I can never hear it enough.

Losing my Way is such an uplifting song and I love the sound and the words of it. The church choir coming in to join the melody is beautiful. It makes me want to sing.

What Goes Around is another song I love and for whatever reason I always get the image of Brittney Spears..YIKES!! LOL! Wonder who he wrote that one for?

Summer Love is a song that makes me wanna get up and dance and move my body to the groove.

Well there ya have it. These are my top 4 JT songs and I hope you enjoy them too.

Have a wonderful Easter Weekend and never forget that the Great Spirit has blessed you in ways that you don't even realize yet. Give him the praise and the glory. Thank him for the blessings in your life, seen and unseen. He works in mysterious ways. Thank you my Lord for all things you have done for me, will do for me and for the countless ways that you help me to fullfill my purpose here on Earth.

Enjoy the tunes and as the Easter bunny says BOCK BOCK! Thank you Easter Bunny!

Bear Hugs!
PolarB ;)

(Music removed)