10 Life Lessons from Valley of Life

Posted on by Joanne Guidoccio

I’m happy to welcome Stella Chiu to the Power of 10 series.

Here’s Stella!

stellachiuThe life journey is composed of mountain tops and bottoms of valleys. During the last 12 years, I encountered some events that turned my world upside down. My husband wanted a divorce. I had made some financial mistakes in business and investments which caused huge financial problems. Being a Christian, I couldn’t make any sense out of it. Later, I was led by the Lord to the wilderness (Mesa, Arizona) in both physical and spiritual situations. This wilderness experience provided 10 important life lessons.

1. The hardships are mostly caused by us.

It may shock you to know that most trials and sufferings are created by you. You went into bankruptcy because you made the financial mistakes along the way. You have no need to blame God or other people. Only then can you can take responsibility and do something above your situation.

2. Get your identity firmly inside you.

All problems are temporary. The circumstances will improve. “Tough things won’t last, but tough people will.” You are the beloved child of God. You can trust the most powerful person in the universe (God as your Daddy), who loves you so much, will help you to get out of the mess. You will be able to overcome the fear with that faith.

3. Stay put.

It is not wise to rush His time table until all the training is complete. This training is called A Joseph Calling by Os Hillman.

God takes time to develop character. He could not afford to have a prideful 30-year-old Joseph managing the resources of an entire region of the world. God used 40 years to train Moses. God used 12 years to transform me from a so called Christian to a real Christ believer.

God has a storehouse of blessings that He has reserved for you and me. God has a specific timetable that He requires to accomplish His purposes in the life of the believer. Sometimes, that timetable seems excruciatingly cruel and painful; yet it is necessary.

The greater the mess, the bigger will be your promotions. Don’t look left, right, back, or front, but up.

When you are experiencing trials, you should not try to get secular counseling from people around you. Their suggestions cause more confusion than before. When you look backward, the only sure thing is regret. When you look ahead, there may not be promising views. The upward direction is where you can obtain the divine wisdom, revelation, or inspiration to get out of bondage.

4. Don’t ask the wrong question(s).

During your trials, you should not ask: “Why has this happened to me?” or “Where is my God?” These will lead nowhere. A better question: “Lord, I did make the mistakes. I am sorry. Show me your rescue plan for me.”

5. You are a spiritual being.

We are created in the image of God. In other words, we are spiritual beings. It is vital that you must have this notion in your hearts and thoughts.

God is spirit, whose communication tunnels are only open to spiritual beings. When you realize you area a spiritual beings, you can freely communicate with God, who is the ultimate rescuer for any situation.

6. A new way of meditation.

It is a good idea to commit the first hour of the day to meditation. The aim is not for calmness but to hear the very small voice of God inside you. In a locked room, you seat yourself in comfortable position without any music. You allow no distractions. Because you are spiritual beings, you can imagine your spirit flying out from your body to heaven. You can talk with Jesus, God, or the angels.

Revelation and inspiration may come in during this hour or later in the day. Bring pen and paper to jot down new ideas.

7. A new way of prayer.

What is prayer? Prayer is your conversation with God – just like your conversation with a friend. Prayer is not just for asking favors. You can tell God how you feel inside: your frustrations, adventures, happiness moments, as well as your appreciation. Prayer is also a two-way street. You need to learn to be silent in front of the mighty God so that He can pass on His ideas.

God wants you to connect with Him every minute of your daily life. Talk (pray) to Him every chance you get: standing in line, waiting for the bus, drinking your coffee, cooking, doing laundry, etc.

Many people believe prayer does not affect their lives because they don’t believe God will answer. Make the word “believe” as big as you can in your own life.

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8. The power of repentance and forgiveness.

To repent means you know your mistakes; you turn away from them and never repeat them. This ties in with the first point of this post. God’s hands can come down to help you.

Forgiveness is so important because un-forgiveness blocks anyone trying to access the blessings, revelation, and favor from the Lord. Thos point can be illustrated more clearly in Mark 11:25 – 26: “And whenever you stand praying, if you have anything against anyone, forgive him…If you do not forgive, neither will your father in heaven forgive your trespasses.”

The forgiveness process starts with forgiving yourself first. From that point, you can forgive others.

9. Power of your faith.

You must be careful about what you say daily. You frame your world by the words you speak. You can’t have what you want if you speak against what you want. “And I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven and whatever you bind (speak) on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.” Matt 16:19

If you want to come out of the pit, you must speak positively about what you want to happen.

10. Power of praise and worship

If you understand the significance of praise and worship, you will do well in your life.

Praise means you are thanking God for granting your requests ahead of time. Will He do it for you? I have no doubt in my mind He will do it for you.

God flows to and from the universe looking for worshippers. He already has all the angels worshiping Him 24/7. Why is He still looking for human worshippers? Angels are created to worship Him. Human worship is not an automatic action. Worship from someone who is suffering is more dear because it goes against human nature. You can definitely out of the pit with praise and worship.

My final thoughts…

The disappointments in life can open doors to new opportunities that God has for YOU! – @Ibloom

“On this journey called life, we wish we would not meet the thorns but have all bed of roses and everything smooth without so much as a worry. Our Creator has other plans. Out of each test, there is a testimony and for every mess there is a message. It is also not so much that we go through difficulties in life, but our attitude that makes all the difference.” – @EMBYvonne

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Bio

Stella Chiu runs http://www.stellachiu.com where she is passionate to use her experience to help people to achieve good life through the Kingdom within each of us. Her blog covers faith, health, prosperity, and life (parenting, family, relationship, empty nest, etc). If you want to have good life, sign up free updated, free gifts, and one-to-one consulting.

Connect with Stella via Facebook and Twitter.


The Secret to Serenity

Posted on by Joanne Guidoccio

When I received this Zen parable in an email attachment, I couldn’t resist a smile. And I knew I had to share it.

Enjoy!

A harried Type A businessman went to a yogi, high on the top of a hill.

“They say you have the secret to serenity,” the businessman puffed, mopping at his brow. “I have high blood pressure, I am stressed beyond belief, and I am at the end of my rope. Teach me the secret.”

The yogi smiled beatifically (as yogis tend to do.) He then rummaged around and presented the man with a large bottle. Inside the bottle was a live duck, swimming placidly in the water trapped inside.

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“This will teach you,” the yogi said. “Get the duck out of the bottle, without breaking the bottle, or killing the duck.”

The businessman was baffled, but he’d faced tough challenges before. Swearing to have it solved in two weeks, he took the bottle and went about solving the problem.

In two weeks, he returned, looking more frazzled than before. “There has to be some trick,” he groused. “This is impossible. There has to be a cheat or something.”

The yogi simply smiled, then told him to come back in two weeks.

In another two weeks, the man looked half insane. His eyes were bulging, his clothes were unkempt, and he was furious. “I am going to smash this bottle and wring the duck’s neck if you don’t tell me how to get it out!”

The yogi simply smiled, and told him again: Come back in two weeks.

Another two weeks, and the man returned. This time, he was the picture of calm.

“I figured it out,” he said. “The secret to serenity. I finally got it.”

He then handed the intact bottle to the yogi, with the duck still swimming inside.

He grinned. “It’s not my bottle. And it’s not my duck.”

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10 Mermaid Sightings Before 1800

Posted on by Joanne Guidoccio

mermaidhistoryBefore writing Between Land and Sea, I researched mermaid sightings. I expected to find only a handful of examples and was surprised by the lengthy list and vivid descriptions that emerged. So much so, that I’ve devoted several posts to this topic.

Today, I will focus on ten documented sightings before 1800.

1. First Century AD: Roman author, naturalist and philosopher Pliny the Elder wrote about the Nereids that were found dead on the seashore. He described their bodies as rough and scaly like fish and then went on to share other supporting evidence: “I have, too, some distinguished informants of equestrian rank, who state that they themselves once saw in the ocean of Gades a sea-man.”

2. Between 1040 and 1105: Rabbi Shlomo Yitzchaki wrote about mermaids in the Talmud: “There are fish in the sea with which half is in the form of man and half in the form of fish, called sereine in Old French.”

3. During the same period, Moshav Zekeinim provided the following details about mermaids (Sirens) in a commentary on the Torah: “This refers to the creature in the sea which is similar in part to a person, from the navel upwards, and it is similar to a woman in all aspects in that it has breasts and long hair like that of a woman, and from the navel downwards, it is a fish. And it sings beautifully, with a pleasant voice.”

4. 13th Century: The King’s Mirror, a Norwegian educational text originally intended to provide King Magnus Lagabote with advice on various subjects, included the following description of a creature found off the shores of Greenland: “Like a woman as far down as her waist, long hands, and soft hair, the neck and head in all respects like those of a human being. The hands seem to be long, and the fingers not to be pointed, but united into a web like that on the feet of water birds. From the waist downwards, this monster resembles a fish, with scales, tail, and fins…This monster has a very horrible face, with broad bow and piercing eyes, a wide mouth and double chin.”

5. 1389: In his book, Eastern Travels of John Hesse, the author described the perils encountered during his voyages. He wrote: “We came to a stony mountain, where we heard syrens singing, mermaids who draw ships into danger by their songs. We saw there many horrible monsters and were in great fear.”

6. 1403: During a heavy storm, a mermaid drifted inland through a broken dyke on the Dutch coast. At first afraid but later intrigued, several local women and their servants befriended the mermaid. They took the mermaid home and tried to domesticate her, clothing and feeding her dairy products and meats. After a number of thwarted escapes into the sea, the mermaid resigned herself to her new life and died fifteen years later. John Swan, an English minister, described her story in Speculum Mundi, a book released in 1635.

7. 1493: After spotting three mermaids rising from the sea, Christopher Columbus wrote in the ship’s journal: “They were not as beautiful as they are painted, although to to some extent they have a human appearance in the face.” He noted that he had seen similar creatures off the coast of West Africa.

8. 1608: After two of his company reported a mermaid sighting, explorer Henry Hudson wrote in the ship’s journal: “Two crew members–Thomas Hilles and Robert Rayner–sighted a mermaid at 75o7’N (Russia) and shouted at the rest of the crew to come and look…From the navel upward her back and breast were like a woman’s, as they say that saw her; her body as big as one of ours; her skin very white and long hair hanging down behind, of colour black. In her going down, they saw her tail, which was like the tail of a porpoise, and speckled like a mackerel.”

9. 1614: Captain John Smith, of Pocahontas fame, reported a mermaid off the cost of Massachusetts: “The upper part of her body perfectly resembled that of a woman, and she was swimming about with all possible grace near the shore. It had large eyes, rather too round, a finely shaped nose (a little too short), well-formed ears, rather too long, and her long green hair imparted to her an original character by no means unattractive.”

10. 1797: While walking on the shore of Sandside Bay (Scotland), schoolteacher William Munro spotted a mermaid sitting upon a rock. In his letter to Dr. Torrance in Glasgow, he wrote: “…my attention was arrested by the appearance of a figure resembling an unclothed human female, sitting upon a rock extending into the sea, and apparently in the action of combing its hair, which flowed around its shoulders, and of a light brown colour…The cheeks ruddy, the eyes blue, the mouth and lips of a natural form, resembling those of a man; the teeth I could not discover, as the mouth was shut; the breasts and abdomen, the arms and fingers of the size in which the hands were employed, did not appear to be webbed, but as to this I am not positive.” The complete letter appeared in The Times of London on September 8, 1809.

Writers Have to Write

Posted on by Joanne Guidoccio

Welcome to my Second Acts Series!

Today, we have author Susan Coryell sharing a lifelong passion for writing and the long, winding road to publication.

Here’s Susan!

susancoryellWe writers know who we are; writers have to write. That about sums up my “Second Act” in life.

What happens when a full-time career/working mom knows she is a writer and feels the need to write with simply no way of making time to do so? I believe it was the late Erma Bombeck, a writer of humorous columns, who laughed at her own solution to the problem: “There is a lot of untapped time between midnight and five a.m.”

Not only was I an active working mother—I fancied myself the busiest mom in the East. Full-time public school teacher, department chair, soccer mom, Sunday school teacher, night-student in grad school, mother of three and wife of a small business owner (who worked 80-hour weeks)—to name a few of my titles. Oh, did I mention I was trying to write a novel?

Miraculously, I somehow completed what I now call my “Disney Novel.” The young adult mystery involved twin boys, one a pitcher and one a catcher, who telepathized their signals on the ball diamond. Though probably not publishable, the work proved to me that I could write a story consisting of 50,000 or more words—with a beginning, middle and end. You’d think I would have been satisfied, happy to prove myself and move on with life on Muppet Manor with my family. Right?

eaglebaitAlas, Doubleheader only whetted my appetite to write more, more, more. So, I began working on another young adult novel—this one an anti-bully book with a 14-year-old male protagonist. I worked only on my summers “off” from teaching—posting daily notices on my closed office door that suggested my kids should not disturb me unless they were “bleeding profusely.” It took three years to complete Eaglebait.

While sponsoring a middle school literary magazine at Columbia Press Scholastic awards (yes, I also was in charge of the lit mag at my school), I said to myself, “Hey, you’re in New York. Let’s try to find a literary agent.” Luck prevailed and on the second day at Columbia, I met a guy who knew about a great agency in Chicago for YA books . They took on Eaglebait, secured a contract with Harcourt, and my writing journey began to take shape. Or, so I thought.

Even though Eaglebait won some impressive awards, Harcourt pulled it after 14 months, with no explanation. And, though I had plenty of other writing ideas, I threw in the literary towel until retirement years later. It was just too difficult what with the children merging into teenager-hood.

But then…my Second Act!

Retirement to a lakeside cottage was a godsend for this writer. I mucked around for several years doing free-lance for a pittance and writing a lot of local press for nothing. Not that I was wasting my “talent,” but I longed to plunge into novel writing again. That’s where I am at my creative best. And so, I picked up on a mystery/Gothic idea I had contemplated some years back—adjusted the setting to fit my retirement locale—and I have never turned back. The Wild Rose Press published A Red, Red Rose in 2013 and the sequel, Beneath the Stones this past April of 2015. I am currently writing the third novel in the series—as yet unnamed. In between writing these cozy mystery/Southern gothics, I was able to update Eaglebait with cyber-bullying and publish it through Amazon in e-book format.

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If there is a moral to my story, I believe it would be: Since writers know who we are and writers have to write, we must never lose faith; the window for writing will open somehow, some way, some time. I found my muse in the loft of a lake house 20+ years after my novel debut—a Second Act, for sure.

My heartfelt thanks to Joanne for inviting me to guest on her awesome blog!

Bio

A career educator, Susan has taught students from 7th grade through college-level. She earned a BA degree in English from Carson-Newman College and a Masters from George Mason University. She is listed in several different volumes of Who’s Who in Education and Who’s Who in Teaching. Susan belongs to Author’s Guild, Virginia Writers, and Lake Writers. She loves to talk with budding writers at schools, writers’ conferences and workshops. Her young adult anti-bully novel EAGLEBAIT is in its third edition for print and e-book, updated with cyber-bullying. EAGLEBAIT won the NY Public Library’s “Books for the Teen Age,” and the International Reading Association’s “Young Adult Choice.”

A RED, RED ROSE, first in a cozy mystery/Southern Gothic series, was nominated for a literary award with the Library of Virginia. BENEATH THE STONES, the sequel, was released in April of 2015.

The author has long been interested in concerns about culture and society in the South, where hard-felt, long-held feelings battle with modern ideas. The ghosts slipped in, to her surprise.

When not writing, Susan enjoys boating, kayaking, golf and yoga. She and her husband, Ned, love to travel, especially when any of their seven grandchildren are involved.

Where to find Susan…

Website | Blog | Facebook | Twitter | Amazon

Joanne here!

Susan, thanks for sharing your inspiring journey. Good luck with all your literary endeavors.

Clean Jokes for Toastmasters

Posted on by Joanne Guidoccio

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Use one of these jokes at your next meeting.

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On his deathbed, a miser asked to be alone with his lawyer, doctor, and priest. “I know I am going to die,” he said. “I would like to take my money with me, so I am going to give each of you $150,000. I want you to each make sure the money gets in the coffin.”

On the day after the funeral, the guilt-stricken priest confided he only put $100,000 in the coffin.

“I’m glad you brought it up” said the doctor, “because I’ve also been feeling guilty. I only put $80,000 back.”

“You people should be ashamed of yourselves,” stormed the lawyer. “Am I the only honest person here?” He pulled out his check book. “Look here. I wrote out a check for the full $150,000!”

*********************

Harry walked over to the Priest after services, “You know Father, I am really stuck in a quandary. I would like to attend church next week but I just can’t miss the big game.”

“Oh Harry!” said the Priest as he put his arm around Harry. “That’s what recorders are for.”

Harry’s face lit up. “You mean I could record your sermon?”

*********************

After sending their son Paul away to college, Susan and Joe would receive regular requests for money. After one late-night call, Joe agreed to send some money. Before hanging up, he added, “I notice that you left your Physics book here. Should I send it?”

“Uh, oh yeah, OK,” Paul responded.

Several days later, Susan discovered that Joe had sent $1100 and started to reprimand him.

Joe shook his head and smiled. “Don’t worry, I taped a $100 check on the cover of the Physics book and a $1000 check inside the cover.”


Men and Mermaids

Posted on by Joanne Guidoccio

menmermaidsWhenever I mention mermaids, I notice the emergence of Duchenne smiles on the faces of all the men in my circle.

What is a Duchenne smile?

Very simply, it is a smile that is characterized by the raising of the lip corners which in turn raise the cheeks and form crow’s feet around the eyes. French physician Guillaume Duchenne first recognized this smile while conducting research on the physiology of facial expressions in the mid 19th century. According to Duchenne, that distinctive smile is associated with a strong positive emotion.

duchennegeorgeAnd, of course, George Clooney.

My conclusion—21st century men are still intrigued by those Sirens of Greek mythology, preferring to focus on their physical beauty and enchanting songs. Male minds can easily conjure up images of wavy auburn tresses, mesmerizing green eyes and a curvaceous body.

So, when I describe the protagonist of Between Land and Sea as an overweight, middle-aged ex-mermaid, I’m not surprised to see a variety of facial expressions. The men usually laugh and joke about Isabella’s extra years and pounds.

At a workshop, an argumentative lawyer was very blunt in his criticism: “I don’t understand why your mermaid has to be old and fat.”

“Fifty-three is not that old.” I ignored the weight issue.

He persisted. “It is when it comes to mermaids. Why couldn’t you let her be young, thin and beautiful?”

Thankfully, the conversation was interrupted by the facilitator’s call to resume the workshop. A few minutes more and I might have lost patience with the annoying lawyer who couldn’t accept my vision of an older mermaid.

Very few men are as argumentative as the lawyer. My male friends and relatives want to hear more about Isabella of the Mediterranean Kingdom aka Barbara Davies and the international banker who dumped her. Several are amused by the concept of a mermaid carrying extra pounds, and one friend asked if the artist was planning to feature an overweight mermaid on the cover.

In The Coming of Arabella, the unexpected arrival of Barbara’s perfectly-preserved twin sister evokes more traditional responses (and more Duchenne smiles) from the men of Carden, Ontario.

How would the men in your circle react to an older, wiser mermaid?

Cool Treats for Non-Foodies on a Budget

Posted on by Joanne Guidoccio

coffeebananaThis coming week, we will be experiencing the dog days of summer in southern Ontario. As the Humidex soars beyond 30 and even approaches 40, I find myself spending more time in air-conditioned comfort and less time preparing meals.

Not such a bad thing for a non-foodie, but I do have to eat. With one book released in June (A Season for Killing Blondes) and another to be released in August (The Coming of Arabella), I need to maintain optimum energy levels.

And to satisfy my Frugalista nature, I also wish to do it on a budget.

Here are some of my favorite go-to foods while I’m in the editing and promotion caves.

Continue reading on the Story Reading Ape’s blog.