Tag Archives: Julie Seedorf

I Believe In Miracles

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I believe in miracles. When I say the word miracle the thought that comes to mind first is a big life changing happening such as what we Christians celebrate on Easter Sunday with Jesus resurrection.

As Holy Week for Christians is being celebrated I ponder what we believe today. When I was a child it was easier for me to believe in the miracle of Easter and miracles in real life. Although as a child I can’t name one miracle I believe happened. Again–think big–life changing–someone coming alive again–miracle thoughts. But I still believed they could happen. I didn’t have anyone anywhere proving to me miracles couldn’t happen. I had faith as a small child does.

Lent and Holy Week as a child still have impact. I knew what Lent, Holy Week and Easter was, and I held it in reverence. There was no debate on whether I would attend the Stations of the Cross and Holy Week services. Even though I protested the length of the Saturday Evening services, which went on for hours, I had to attend the service.

Good Friday afternoons was also a given for services with stores closing for two hours so churches could hold Good Friday services. There was nowhere to go during that time so you went to church. At home we also made Lent a special time and I had no doubt what Easter meant and yes, I had Easter eggs and Easter bunnies but the main focus was on the religious part of the holiday.

These practices remained with me through most of my adult life but this year I feel them failing. I haven’t attended religious services as much as I usually do. Wednesday evening Lenten Services were missed. The outside world intruded on my life, not for any good reason but the fact I let it. In the world we live in my Christian holiday practices are not front and center and it makes it harder to stay true to the things I was taught so many years ago. I must say I feel Easter this year has almost become just a blip on my radar and I don’t like feeling that way.

As I ponder my reaction this year I look around me and wonder what is going to happen years down the road. Will the religious holiday of Easter disappear from our lives? I look around at children and even my grandchildren, and wonder if they truly know anymore the meaning of the reason we celebrate Holy Week and Easter Sunday. Even though children are being raised in the churches, is the little time they now spend in church going to make an impact on their lives?

It used to be communities made accommodations for people to practice their religion. Communities adjusted their schedule for the churches. Now the churches adjust their schedule for the communities so people will come to church. Sunday School and activities adjust to shorter times to accommodate sports schedules and more. If churches didn’t adjust schedules, would anyone attend? Yes we have more diversity in religions but I suspect all religions might be having the same problem.

And so we are back to the question–will Easter eventually just fade away? Will the miracle at the tomb no longer be remembered? Since that was one of the first miracles I was awed by as a child, will my and others beliefs be changed, especially when it comes to miracles? If my recognition of Easter changed this year because of society’s influence on me will my recognition and belief in miracles be changed too? Has it already? I have never seen someone be raised from the dead. Is that perhaps why my celebration of Easter has fell by the way side? Is it too hard to believe the story of Easter? Is it too easy to get mired down by the rhetoric of the politicians, the hate groups, the naysayers and so our belief’s crumble from what we believed as a child. Or if those beliefs were never there or never taught then why would we believe the story about crucifixion and resurrection?

I will tell you why I believe in miracles. I pray for a friend to be healed from a twenty-two year battle with cancer. I ask for a miracle of healing and my friend tells me she already has many miracles because she is still here and still fighting. She has lived to see her grandchildren. She feels she has had her miracle even if she is not healed.

A baby of a relative is born early and has many health problems. The parents consider it a miracle that the doctors were able to save him and he will live a good life. The doctors and modern medicine being brought into their life were their miracle.

I see my Christmas Cactus grow and flower and I see a miracle because I haven’t killed it yet. I see miracles every day. They may not be the earth shattering miracles that we expect but they are in itself a miracle. Had I not been brought up to hear the Easter Story, the way I look at things might be different. Our journey starts with the impressions of our childhood. Will the Easter Story be part of the childhood of the children of today?

Does Your Community Have A Gratitude Attitude?

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My column from the week of February 22 in the Albert Lea Tribune and the Courier Sentinel.

Boris the shysterCan a negative attitude make or break a community? It is always interesting talking to people when they move to a new community. Does negativity itch, get scratched, become infected, and break open and spread to an entire community?

I was feeling the negativity recently in conversations with different groups of people. Some outsiders, you know, those who move into a small community but never fit in because — gasp — they aren’t from here, remarked that it was hard living in a community always being reminded they couldn’t do something a new way because it has always been done a certain way and they wouldn’t understand because they aren’t from here.

Another group was complaining about businesses and business owners and things not being the way they thought they should be, so they would never support the business again and they would tell everyone about it.

Another conversation was with business owners. They told the opposite tale of nothing ever being right no matter how hard they tried. And admitting they weren’t always cordial to their customers because it was hard keeping the smile on their face day in and day out in the face of such negativity.

As a former business owner, as a customer and as a person who moved to a smaller and new community for a short time, I could identify with the feelings of all of these groups. I have been the crabby customer, I have been the crabby business owner and I have felt like the outsider. I must say all of these situations fed the negativity in me, the negativity that resides in all of us, and festers if it is fed by our contact with each other.

Here’s a little tip, not everything that is said is entirely accurate all the time so as Mr. Negativity is fed, it grows sometimes with untruths and explodes. Pretty soon we all jump on the bandwagon and join in because we want to fit in to the conversation.

There is a saying in business that the customer is always right, but I don’t know if I agree with that premise in the world we live in today. My reasoning comes from a phone call I received when I was in business. The phone call actually wasn’t for my business, it was a wrong number but when I picked up the phone the language and screaming coming out of the other end was not for the faint of heart. I asked who they were calling and they named the business. I told them who they had reached, and they profusely apologized and hung up. The phone rang again, it was the same caller, and they apologized again for their language and their rudeness as it was to be directed at another business. My thoughts were why apologize if they were going to call the other business and repeat the mistake message I had heard. No business owner deserves to be treated to verbal abuse.

They say it takes 10 compliments to cancel out an insult. As an author, I get reviews on my books and most of my reviews are positive but it is the one negative that I always remember and the same can be said for things said in our communities.

Bullying wasn’t a big factor for me when I was growing up. I can only remember two instances in my middle school and teen years when it happened to me. The key is I remember those instances, the negativity directed towards me, more than I remember some of the positive complements or experiences during those years. And I remember who directed those attacks. The memories of those people’s actions have lived on for more than 45 years.

The best way to keep our communities from growing — the best way to close our businesses — is to not support them by our words, what we say and by how we treat those who are new, those who choose to run their businesses and those who chose to shop and visit our businesses in our communities.

Choose to help our communities and our businesses grow by planting seeds of encouragement and positivity instead of feeding the weeds of negativity shutting down anything positive that is trying to peek up between those weeds. The choice is ours. Our communities health may depend on it

 

 

Authors and Editors, We Need One Another!

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love my editorsI love writing and when I write my creativity takes me along

with the story and I get lost in it, not caring about comma’s etc. I put comma’s in the wrong places, forget to use quotation marks and forget about correct sentence structure. I check my finished work and try to clean it up, but usually it is a mess. That is where my editors come in.

I want to highlight two people who work magic with my books. One is my publisher and editor plus being an author, Patricia Rockwell. When my manuscript for Cozy Cat Press cropped-ccplogonegative-e1433524649126.jpgis ready I send it in and she crosses the t’s, dots the i’s and makes me look better. She does this for all of her authors at Cozy Cat Press as she is the owner and publisher of the company.

Another person I rely on is D.A. Sarac and The Editing Pen. 1f71c0_74832be138cf469cb3612d72986d5b76I always feel it is good to have more than one set of eyes so I have her edit my independent books I publish under Hermiony Vidalia Books and the books I send to Cozy Cat Press. She has become invaluable to me. In fact, she too makes me look good. My new book The Penderghast Puzzle Protectors was  a mess when it came to comma’s and quotation marks. You would think I would learn but in my excitement and haste I miss many things and I hate editing and Annie Sarac loves editing.

Not only has The Editing Pen been invaluable to me with editing, she has also helped me with my promotions. An author needs to write, edit and promote and it is exhausting and so we ask for help. The Editing Pen offers a wide variety of services and support for authors.

I did try at one time to publish without an editor and it was a big mistake. I have learned my lesson. Every author you read, hopefully has a good editor in their back pocket. I am lucky to have two.

My new book will be featured here on Monday, so stay tuned, sign up to follow this blog  and for my newsletter where you can find the sign-up on julieseedorf.com.

For me this is thank an editor day. I just made it up. Thank you Patricia Rockwell and D. A. Sarac. You are the trick I carry in my back pocket to help my career be successful. And I would guess you would love to edit the post and all my snafu’s.

If you have an editor out there you love, leave a comment. I will choose one lucky winner to receive a surprise. And if you are a reader and don’t have an editor, make a comment anyway. I love to hear from you. And make sure you check back to see if you have won.

It’s Happy Editor’s Friday. Thank an Editor.

Edited by Patricia Rockwell and D. A. Sarac

Edited by Patricia Rockwell and D. A. Sarac