Fill the page with the breathings of your heart.
A quote by William Wadsworth with a minor tweak by yours truly.
Happy 2021 Everyone! February is right around the corner and I am finally getting back in the groove with a new series.
But first…
An Update: We suffered a little setback here at the abode in December. My mom and I both ended up sick on Christmas eve (I’ll talk about that another day with another letter of the alphabet). Although we are doing much… MUCH… better at the moment, we’ve been moving mighty slow for the past month.
I was forced to recalibrate my compass and focus on what matters—which was taking care of my mom for several weeks—and (thank God) it’s turned out to be a positive experience with some awesome perspective shifts. That being said, I’ve had a LONG time to think about this series and I’m excited to get things rolling!
When I did my series The Alphabet Game, I wrote about the things that I love from A to Z. In this new series, I’m going to talk about life and the thoughts that come to my mind as I scroll through the 26 letters. I’m also going to have some fun with illustrations—and there will be no judging here because I’m doing some of these for laughs as a little “play therapy.”
A DAY WITH A & B
AMBITION
The first word I thought about was ambition. I like to think of myself as one who has a lot of ambition (after I’ve had my coffee, of course), and ambition is a word that we hear from our parents, teachers, employers, and a truck load of self-help books. Then we grow up and talk about it with our kids, and we pray (and sometimes shout) that they’ll have some ambition when they grow up.
Ambition is at the top left of my image. She is up on the seesaw doing jumping jacks (of course!). Ambition is kind of like the engine of a car. Automobiles might look nice, or have fancy accessories, or even be stocked full of everything a person needs to do a long road or camping trip… BUT, it has to have a running engine (ambition) to move. Otherwise, that vehicle will be parked in the driveway looking all shiny and pretty—with no real desire to go anywhere. That’s what ambition is to me.
Another thing that came to mind is that ambition is one of those double edged words. A person can become obsessed about their dreams and desires if ambition gets out of control. As they race their way to the top (or what they think is the top), they trample all over anyone who gets in their way (people who have ambitions of their own) and they leave a big mess behind them. One ugly pile of greed. It’s kind of like a carbon footprint, but it consists of human beings that have been damaged in the process rather than greenhouse gas emissions.
ADDICTION
These thoughts about ambition led me to addiction because being over-ambitious is a lot like being an addict or an alcoholic. As a matter of fact, there’s a pretty BIG list of things that people can obsess about, overdo, or overindulge in that can reduce or destroy their quality of life and their relationships.
Off the top of my head—and aside from drugs and alcohol—people can overdo and become addicted to adrenaline (extreme sports), eating, exercise, gambling, gaming, money, pornography, sex, shopping, and even work.
Over-ambition looks a lot like addiction (to me) because when you’re over-ambitious it’s like you’re wearing blinders (denial maybe?). You can only see and focus on what’s in front of you, which is usually the things that YOU want. You lose that peripheral vision that allows you to recognize the needs of others. It takes some thoughtful self-reflection and willingness to look at yourself openly and honestly to see that you’ve gone bonkers outside of the boundary lines of normalcy and/or human decency.
Addiction is down on the ground there in my image. She’s holding her drink in one hand, and she’s holding herself up with the other. Let’s just hope she doesn’t knock over the seesaw and send the rest of the letters flying! What I’m trying to say here is that I think that there are many things in life that are fun and good, or even positive and useful—but only in moderation. When we wander into the land of “excess,” we’re headed towards instability.
BALANCE
I was so happy with where these thoughts took me, because I realized that life is ALL about balance. This is something that another blogger has said to me before, but sometimes I just have to see things for myself before they sink in.
I’ve included two balancers in my image—I suppose they could be twins—but one has lost her balance (I guess we need to call her imbalanced now) and she is tumbling toward the ground. Maybe she was over-ambitious with her jumping jacks, or maybe she drank too much? Who knows!? But look at her twin go! She is postured in the middle of the seesaw and is as stable as could be. Not too far to the right, and not too far to the left. She is perfectly balanced.
So, ambition is good and all, but what’s really important in life is balance. You don’t want too little of the things that make you tick, but you don’t want too much either. That’s my two cents anyway.
Thank you for reading! I hope you enjoyed my thoughts about “A” and “B,” and my artwork as well.
Balance is the key to everything. What we do, think, say, eat, feel, they all require awareness and through this awareness we can grow.
Koi Fresco
I’ll be back in a few days to talk about the letter “C.”
Stay balanced!
A Sprinkle of Faith 