Category: time

Categories
friendship time

Depth of Relationship

Conwy December 24th 2025

I’ve been pondering this overuse of the phrase “we are family” or “our community” or even “finding your tribe” because recently I was hurt by that usage of those phrases expecting more than was to be given. Then we went to see Ben Elton, the comedian, who is a year older than me and on a similar wave length. He went on about how when we were young community meant those people in our location that we had to get on with whether we liked them or not. I would say similar for family – a group of people we are related to by blood that we have to tolerate whether we like them or not.

I have been in churches where there has been great emphasis on “we’re all family” then we move away and that whole connection ends. The same with work families. Once one leaves the connection is gone. It is a business relationship working towards a purpose not that tolerating and supporting relationship. This is fine but we must be careful not to confuse the two.

I was chatting to someone about this and we think it is because everyone is so busy and so disjointed . For instance if I leave a church or work then I get involved with something else then I become too busy with that to keep up the relationships, and those I’ve left behind are too busy too. It isn’t that they don’t like me but they don’t have the time.

These supportive/business transactional relationships are about finding places we feel safe from the others, those who disagree with us, but we’re all so busy we don’t really connect. Yes when we write we say profound things and sometimes we all do share our hearts back and forth. But we are all too busy doing the connecting to have time for the depth too often.

I am blessed with my life at the moment because even though I’m busy it isn’t too structure. I have time to hang out with those small handful of people who I can share my life with, and who also have 2-3 hours or more just to “chew the fat”.

I was lucky to spend 3+ hours with a friend the other day. We talked about loads and both of us as we came to the end said “now I understand what I’ve really been wondering about” and “I’ve change my mind on that point of view”. We have time to challenge each other because we have made time to put in the hours to hang out.

Maybe we need to use different words than community, tribe, family? Or maybe give those words different meanings? If we all listed the groups we are apart of then we could be honest and say things like “I love writing with you one Saturday a month/every Tuesday fortnight” or “I love chatting about Bible stuff and God once a fortnight/once a month” or “I love your regular post on WordPress/Substack/Facebook” then follow it up with “but that’s as far as our relationship goes”. Be honest enough to say “I’ve got lots of other things I love doing and people I love being with and areas of live I want to explore so once every month/week/fortnight/occasionally and only in this specific area”. Perhaps that would let go of the disappointments.

So taking it back to the group where I was hurt it would have been great for the leader to say “it is awesome the things we are sharing over this period together. Make the most of it because I’ve got a busy life and I suspect you have to. You also all live miles apart. Enjoy this but don’t be sad when it finishes because finish it will” would have been much nice than to talk of us all “finding our tribe” and being “family”.

It is a bit like when on the radio a DJ will end a phone call to a random caller by saying “love you, bye”. I think it makes the words “I love you” become trivial too. And I think that’s what is happening with community and family.

Perhaps, if we were honest about the lack of depth in some of these online or business type relationships and groups it would give us all time to find those few special people that we can share deeply with, that know enough about our lives to poke us when we’re out of order, to hold us when we’re hurting and hiding it. I think we all need people we can trust to hold us when we’re trying to hide our hurts but that takes time to get. That is not the same as someone who responds to a blog post or even that we meet on Zoom for a group or even those we meet in groups monthly.

So let’s not get confused with family and tribes and communities and expect them to fulfill our needs. Maybe I’m saying this to myself!!!

And also let’s leave time for our families even when they annoy us, push those buttons, don’t meet our needs. Let’s not forget them in our busyness to replace them with some other online community.

Categories
enjoying time

Enjoying Time

Photo by Jordan Benton on Pexels.com

I feel led to write this post today, Pentecost Sunday. A day when we remember the Holy Spirit landing in tongues like fire on Jesus’ follower gathered in Jerusalem. What we often fail to celebrate is the patience of these 120+ people. We don’t know for sure how long they had been in Jerusalem but they had all gathered. It was a special day in the Jewish calendar, so not unusual for them to be gathered. But they didn’t know what was going to happen. Jesus had told them to gather in Jerusalem for the Holy Spirit to fall but they didn’t know what would happen or how or what next.

Imagine this – they have all been gathered together, chatting, praying, eating, sharing their stories of the last 3 years or so and, I suspect they’d “got it” almost by now. I wonder if they thoughts “well life is short. There isn’t much time, we understand the whole thing Jesus was on about. We’re ready to go.” But they waited And to me that is the miracle. How often are we willing to wait? Wait until God really tells us it is time to go?

But this post isn’t just about waiting it is about accepting we have “enough” time, like we have “enough” of everything really.

The followers of Jesus knew their time was limited but, I hoping, that when they looked back on that time of waiting in Jerusalem that they saw it as special. A time of hanging out together. Of being together. Of, as well as hearing stories also hearing hearts.

So much at the moment is about not “wasting time”. We are brought up with it. How many of us have been told “go and do something useful. Don’t waste time.” Or as we’ve got older instead of being able to relax we are hold, or fear, that we “haven’t done ‘enough’ with our lives”, that we need to do things, “keep busy because we’ll be dead soon”.

We fit in “down time” but it is as an activity rather than a nothing time.

Many of today’s Pentecost sermons will point at how once the Holy Spirit fell all the followers were then busy and doing as if not doing that one isn’t being a “good Christian”. Yet I remember reading a book [can’t remember who it was by now] by an American charismatic preacher who was rushed to A&E with a heart attack. When he was asked his profession the medical staff said “we could have guessed. We get lots like you in here.” and went on to say how, from their experience Christians in ministry was that they were all overworked! Not a good look! Especially when you note that the early church was started by a large group of people waiting. Waiting till power came to them because they knew there was “enough”time to do all God wanted them to do

I’m going to finish with the the whole of Saturday 18th May’s post from Henri Nouwen because to me the whole of it says how hard it is for us to find 10 minutes minimum to just listen to God. Not as an activity but as a joy to be with the one you love and the one who loves you unconditionally

An aside before you read the quote – my husband and I spent yesterday afternoon and evening not doing anything other than hanging out chatting, drinking tea, drinking wine, eating, not planning anything but sharing thoughts and hearts and it was a wonderfully afternoon and evening. We need to be doing that more often with Jesus.

Listen to your heart. It’s there that Jesus speaks most intimately to you. Praying is first and foremost listening to Jesus who dwells in the very depths of your heart. He doesn’t shout. He doesn’t thrust himself upon you. His voice is an unassuming voice, very nearly a whisper, the voice of a gentle love. Whatever you do with your life, go on listening to the voice of Jesus in your heart. This listening must be an active and very attentive listening, for in our restless and noisy world God’s so loving voice is easily drowned out. You need to set aside some time every day for this active listening to God if only for ten minutes. Ten minutes each day for Jesus alone can bring about a radical change in your life.

You’ll find it isn’t easy to be still for ten minutes at a time. You’ll discover straightaway that many other voices, voices that are very noisy and distracting, voices that do not come from God, demand your attention. But if you stick to your daily prayer time, then slowly but surely you’ll come to hear the gentle voice of love and will long more and more to listen to it.

Listen to the Voice of Gentle Love
Categories
january time

January

Found this on many sites of internet with no source so …

I was pondering why I think January seems to last “forever”. I’ve managed to read 5 books already in amongst planning workshops, walking the dog, have a room redecorated in my house, writing some, meeting up with friends, etc. So I’ve not been idle but I’ve fitted it all in in the last 25 days! And really we were still in Christmas holiday mode for the first couple. Oh and I’ve also watched 3 Netflix series and blogged some. So why does it seem like January will never end.

As I was googling I did find this piece in the New York Times which is worth reading – The Scientific Reason Why January Last Forever – Though without sounding too pedantic I’m sure if it is really scientific it should say “feels like it lasts forever”. “Lasts forever” is a bit of a fact. January really doesn’t last forever it just feels that way.

So why do I think so?

For us as a couple we spent time during our 10 days Christmas break planning things for 2024. Not resolutions, not even what we want to achieve, but holidays and seeing people. So, including husband’s work trips, we have 5 trips on the calendar. One each for the first 5 months of the year; a trip to see my son and his wife, a holiday for in May to a place I’ve been wanting to go to for a couple of years, 2 walking/climbing trips for husband and the 1st work trip for him of the year. I’m also wanting to slide in trips to see my mum and my daughter. It is all about looking forward not being in the moment.

Even things like looking forward to the days getting longer, the weather warmer, is all not being in the moment but waiting for a better day!

There’s also the “healing of the credit card”, the Dry January, the Veganuary, and all those other things people give up after Christmas, which come with a “waiting for January to end so one can get back to drinking/eating meat/spending/etc” Again all looking forward and not being in the moment.

Added to that not everything has restarted. I didn’t restart my writing groups until the middle of January. A church group I want to join doesn’t start till February. Even with doors open for me to run workshops they are all for later in the year.

January is a dormant month but we don’t do dormant. So much in society tells us to be planning for the future that we don’t relax into hibernation mode. We are pushing, hoping, waiting, for the next thing. Perhaps if we could hunker down and allow the season to unfurl around us maybe then it would not seem like it was taking so long.

I nearly wrote “to get a move on and get over itself”. I think too often we see January as a month to endue and not to enjoy. Perhaps we need to learn how to enjoy January – and we all know when you’re enjoying something time flies past!

Categories
time trust

Time Poor?

This photograph of my dog has no relevance to this post – apart from him never being time poor or time rich – but it for one of my readers who told me how much she loves my posts but especially the ones with photos of Renly, who she knows personally!

I was a meeting the other night and there were people there who kept saying they were “time poor“. I had heard the expression before but not really engaged with it. I think what they meant was they were doing lots of things and so were busy.

I response in my head in the meeting was to think that maybe they should be thinking about what they are meant to be doing and asking their hearts if this was what they should be doing. And then my next thing was to want to boast and say that “now I’m healed/healing I am time rich“. But then I realised that both those responses are wrong. I am comparing and being proud. Neither of which is being respectful to the people I was with who are working really hard for my little town.

As I pondered it and did some journaling around my thoughts I realised I often panic that I don’t have time to do things and that this is what is stopping me getting some work that I should have because I’d be great at it. But I am also worried that I won’t have that allusive “enough” time to do all I think I ought to be doing. So in reality I was no better. I still think I could be “time poor“.

So more listening to my heart, listening to God who Created the Whole Universe, listening to the Universe. Then I realised that if I listen to my heart then I do have enough to do each day the things I am meant to do each day – whether that is keep house, run workshops, visit an ill friend down south to relieve her husband, see my mother, have coffee with my friends, be in school to do the things I am great at doing there. I will do what I am meant to do with the energy and time I need to all that.

So not “enough” as in the worrying that there isn’t enough but trusting that each and every day what I choose to do from listening to my heart will be what I am meant to do, and that I will not do too much or too little, will not be too busy, too time poor, but will glide through calmly knowing that I am being what I’m meant to be with enough time, energy, resources, experience, etc that I need. And then like my little dog I can enjoy the moment, seize the day, and live life to the full of who I am and what I love to do.

An aside – too often we see “living life to the full” as being super busy, but I am finding that the more I listen to my heart, to God, to the Universe, the more I am filled with deep joy, deep contentment, deep peace and a freedom to trust, the more I know that I am living life to a fullness that I never had when I was busy.

Categories
2020 cleansing God healing restoration time trauma waiting world war II

Heal the Land

This picture is of Beech Clump, near Kilmington Village, Wiltshire. Back in the mid 1970s my then boyfriend’s paternal grandparents lived at Kilmington and we would go and visit occasionally. As we would drive along the B3092 from Frome he would point out a hill with a clump of beech trees on it that pushed out of the flat plains but was dwarfed by White Sheet Hill ridgeway behind it. Back then there was a large gap in the centre of the trees and Steve would tell me about an RAF plane that had crashed there killing all on board, and of how his father and his father’s friends went over to the hill, once it was safe to do so, and took away pieces of airplane. The narrative 40+ years ago was that the trees would never grow back again because of the trauma that had happened to the land. Though back in the mid 70s the word “trauma” would not have been used.

This weekend my husband and I stayed in a self-catering cottage in Mere so we could visit both our mothers who live half an hour in each direction from Mere. It was our first trip outside of Wales since lockdown so was a bit of an intrepid adventure. On our first night in the cottage we climbed Castle Hill, Mere, and as I looked over I saw Beech Clump. It now has a full head of trees and doesn’t look as if anything has happened there.

I went back up Castle Hill first thing Saturday morning just me and the dog and, as the mist was rising, looked over again at Beech Hill. I felt as if God/the Universe was saying that if we give it time then our trauma will heal and things will grow again. The traumas that have happened to us are real and they hurt a lot and we are not to live in denial of them. But given time to work through the dross, to cleanse and heal things can grow again. The deep thing for me was that nothing can grow and we cannot be all we are meant to be unless we allow ourselves time to heal. It is all about time and waiting.

Beech Clump is once again restored to being a hill with a clump of beech trees on it, but it was still the place where 20 RAF airmen where tragically killed back in 1945, which I think is even more tragic because it was so close to the end of the war. It was also very exciting to come across RAF Zeals and the Dakota Memorial, Beech Clump and find that there is a memorial to the airmen who were killed, each listed by name. So the trauma is remembered, acknowledged, but the land has healed and become all it is meant to be. That means the same can happen to me, to you, to anyone.

Thanks to John Grech publishing his article on Hidden Wiltshire about Beech Clump. Check out his post to see the photos.