Tag: self reflection

Six Word Story (107)

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What does the word intimacy stir within you? For each of us it’s probably quite different, and yet the same, with flashes of moments spent with lovers or dreams of the ones we wish had wandered into our lives to stay but didn’t. But is that what intimacy really is?

I have learned it is only a small scratch on this word’s surface.

Intimacy needs have nothing to do with physical love or desire at all. True intimacy between life partners goes much deeper than alone sex could ever take you, and often the intimacy of friendship is much healthier.

It’s something every human soul longs for at our core.

Reaching for it makes us vulnerable.

Vulnerability is terrifying, but without it, true intimacy can never be achieved.

Have you experienced true intimacy? Are you still looking for it?

I would love to hear anything about your experiences and thoughts about it in the comments below. It’s a topic I think a lot about.

Copyright ©2023 Mary Grace van der Kroef

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Six Word Story (95)

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Have you ever felt the wind beneath your wings?

Those moments in life when things are going well and the momentum lifts you high above the twisting paths and stones that trip others up?

Have you ever felt tired in those moments of success?

In those highs, we are still working.

The blessing in them is that if we spread out wings of trust they can carry us far while preserving our stamina.

But…

Holding wings open requires strength.

Ride the updrafts, but be vigilant in watching for those places of pause you still need.

©2022 Mary Grace van der Kroef

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Pause

marygracewriting6 Comments
https://youtube.com/shorts/tfK4XxnMK6g

‘Pause’ is one of the 36 poems in my new poetry collection, ‘Words of Weight’. Now available at Amazon as an ebook and paperback book. Or barrow it with the Kindle Unlimited program.

If you have read my new book, please consider leaving an honest review. Each one is important regardless of star value, and we appreciate each one.

(Review on Amazon or Goodreads)

Titles Available by Mary Grace van der Kroef

Six Word Story (88)

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How does the environment affect our perception of the world?

Weather we want to admit it or not, it often plays a key role. This can be a good or bad thing.

Awareness.

Boundaries.

Bravery, to face the things we can not change.

Understanding we are also part of the environment, and we touch others just as they touch us.

Knowing our perception doesn’t always equal truth, but is still an important part of understanding.

©2022 Mary Grace van der Kroef

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Six Word Story (72)

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Interruptions. Changing of plans. We rarely look for those things, but if you know anything about river adventures, you know that a portage is often unavoidable. What do you do when you find a proverbial canoe on your shoulders, instead of in the water where it belongs?

Keep walking, carry a good compass, bring a friend along to help with the load.

These are things easier said than done. When your legs ache, when you’re tired and it’s dark and you can’t read your compass, when you and your partner find verbal combat easier than carrying a canoe… In the middle of at a portage doesn’t always seem like an adventure, but that’s life. We don’t always recognise the adventures we are on when we are standing in the middle of them.

Perspective. This is my reminder to remember and check my perspective.

©2022 Mary Grace van der Kroef

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Six Word Story (60)

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Spring, a time many of us long for after a long dark winter. We grow again and unfurl our blooms… Just to have a frost crisp their edges.

Some of us weather it fine, some of us might carry blackened scars from unexpected transitions. Still, some of us might have to drop our first blooms. But don’t worry, you will grow new ones. Whispers of what once was, and promises of what will still be.

©2022 Mary Grace van der Kroef

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Six Word Stories (56)

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It usually surprises people when I tell them, “I do not care for the Christmas season.”
“Arn’t Christians supposed to love Christmas?”

I guess most of them do, but I can’t help but feel an emptiness behind the brightly covered packages and glitz this world throws around during the holiday season. Expectations are high, but things never seem to pan out the way I mean them to. So why write about this now that the Holidays are over, and becoming a memory?

Because the light of Christmas is not supposed to stay locked into a few weeks of the year. The person of Jesus Christ grew and walked away from the manger, taking his flame of light to the very valley of death.

So today I choose to remind myself that though a modern Christmas leaves me empty, and ancient Christ fills me with light.

Look beyond how culture paints things to deep roots.

©2022 Mary Grace van der Kroef

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Six Word Story (55)

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Ordinary. It’s a word we dismiss, and a state of being we overlook. We search for the special spark of the EXTRAordinary. In doing so, we miss so much.

The gift of an ordinary love.
The strength of an ordinary family.
The hope of an ordinary marriage.
The protection of an ordinary house.
The wealth of an ordinary life.
The seeds of an ordinary faith.

For when ordinary built and maintained, storms reveal how it has grown the extraordinary. Don’t cast aside your ordinary.

©2022 Mary Grace van der Kroef

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Reflections (1)

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Thoughts on this statement?

I know keenly that things I once assumed proved wrong. My opinions have changed. So the way I write and interpret poetry will do the same.

Does that make my earlier work obsolete? No. They give glimpses into the journey my heart has been on since birth.

Read poetry, any literature really, with a grain of salt. Thoughtfully. Joyfully.

Words will change you, words will challenge you. Give yourself some grace and space to grow past them.

©2021 Mary Grace van der Kroef

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Six Word Stories (51)

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The thing about truth is, it just is.

It’s many faceted and affects different people in different ways. But truth is truth.

We can disguise it, ignore it, or bury it, but still it is what it is at its core. It can not cease to be.

From the beginning of time, the human tongue has had a problem with truth. It’s the only thing in creation I know of that regularly spews out lies and truth at the same time.

It’s a tragedy of our human existence that we so often muddy those waters…

But our ability to do so speaks volumes. We are able to choose. We are able to change. We are able to learn better.

My prayer is that we would no longer be afraid of truth, and avidly seek it in everything. From who really put the empty milk carton back in to the fridge, to the truths about what is happening in the world at large. May truth always teach and become clear. Amen.

©2021 Mary Grace van der Kroef

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