In the last two weeks, I have had to ask myself this very question. Trust is an important part of being human, as is faith. But there are things we can not anticipate that come our way that can shake our world. My daughter’s fiance’s flight was cancelled two hours before he was due to board and I have had several of my support team fall ill. This comes after I had been ill for over two weeks, following a spell of burnout, and then my bank rejected all my incoming Amazon royalty payments because of some change in code. The list is longer than I care to mention in this message, but one could say that I have had a spell of bad luck and I was certainly feeling fragile.
If we want to move forward in life, making plans and setting goals is important and misfortunate has a way of challenging the viability of those goals. While we may have to delay some of our plans, we should never be tempted to give up or give in to despair or harden our hearts towards others.
In the last year, I adopted a ritual of writing my wins every morning. I make sure I write a minimum of ten wins that I had the preceding day – even if it the tinniest of wins. It is my reset time. While I can not control some of the surrounding chaos, I can control how I claim those first few moments of the day. There are days where I stare at my notebook while all the troubles of the previous day pollute my thoughts, taunting my ability to even find one win.
I have taken to standing at the kitchen counter while I write down my wins, because I know that as soon as I sit at my desk; I will get distracted and won’t take the time to reset my mind. TI learned about writing my wins from the Uncovering Greatness team and it is a daily ritual that I defend because it is one of the few tools I have to reclaim my power when the odds are stacked against me. Because we know that at some point the things that we rely on may whither or perish, but nothing can claim the human spirit unless we allow it.
Whatever you are going through, I pray you will find the courage to reclaim your personal power.
What am I writing ? Extract of Book 4
The Masked Man closed his eyes. He felt the surge of the hatchling’s every growth spurt. Another Silver Wing. With their council, Nadine could be unstoppable. But a Silver Wing, that would be King Radolf’s prize. With a Silver Wing, King Radolf’s cruelty would spread beyond his borders in a way that none of the other warlords could have imagined. Warlords respected brute force. Powerful warriors that would win by determination and power. No warlord had ever harnessed the power of a Silver Wing. They were too proud, too strategic. A Silver Wing would rather sacrifice themselves than let evil prevail. Nadine was the key. The Masked Man knew that King Radolf had a carved egg. Inside it lay the secrets of turning a Silver Wing Whisperer, and if he could do that, if he could capture Nadine, he could control the Silver Wings. The hatchling was female. Her life force burned inside him, fueling his envy and rage. When Muquin reunited with Nadine, the young Whisperer’s power would grow. She would sense that she had a place in history and her fear would diminish. Without fear, he could no longer hold Nadine back. She would step into her destiny and his cause would be lost.
He had not accounted for the Emerald Forest Dragon Whisperer; he did not even know that there was one still alive. A twitch replaced Nabal, his great nephew’s rhythmic breathing and soon grew to an anxious thrashing. It pulled Amat-ul’s thoughts away from the dragons. He extinguished one candle to dim the room, hoping Nabal would settle. But the young man’s arms flayed, and he knocked over the ceramic bowl from the table next to him. The leftover milk that the Masked Man had warmed to settle Nabal splashed over the stones that surrounded the bed. Amat-ul did not have straw on the floor as many of the villagers did. Food residue in those homes filled their homes with the sickening stench of decay. He had lived for too long with decay around him. He could not stomach it in his dwellings.
“Nabal, be at peace. I am here.” The Masked Man called to the younger man’s mind as he picked up the broken pottery. Another broken vessel.
“Curse my brother for not preparing you.” It was one thing to not deem the Nabal not worthy, because that he certainly was not. But it was another matter to leave him utterly defenceless against predators like King Radolf and the warlords that had taken their mother Helena.
For all his brother’s principles, he had no honour. He had not even come to rescue the woman that he loved. Arpachshad had claimed the victory. How typical. The Whisperers had called him the “lover”, he always knew the right things to say to women. Emerald Forest Dragon Whisperers were like that. Women flocked to them. They understood the balance of life more than any of the other kind, and they seemed to sense the ebb and flow of women’s moods, unlike the brutish Copper Fire Dragon Whisperers. They had lithe bodies and seemed much like the acrobats in the groups of jesters that worked the festival scenes.
