This post is a Five Minute Friday Post – again, written on Monday. Someday, maybe I’ll remember on Friday. Until then, enjoy. At Five Minute Friday we write to write. Not to edit like crazy, just to write for five minutes, stop, and share.

Roy Lake

This Week’s Writing Prompt: BEGIN

It’s hard to get started. It’s hard to sit down and commit yourself to something new, something that takes a risk and is scary. Some people start easily. The reward part of their brain gets fired up and they just go.

I’m not quite like that.

I’m grateful that I can start slow.

But I must start. And it is a new beginning.

A new beginning of words and prayers. A new beginning of opening my heart to the dreams that have been growing inside for years at a time. A new beginning to try. Yes, to try. It’s scary to try. It’s scary to begin. Because what if the goal doesn’t come to completion?

But the alternative? To not try? Well, I would hate to think of what would happen if I did not try. Regret. Sadness. A missed calling?

No. I won’t do that. I will begin.

I have begun. I have begun by letting a little bit of the present go. I have stopped.

Beginning for me required me to stop.

The ironic thing is, that at the beginning of all things, even God stopped. He made it all, said it was good, then He sat down and stopped. Not that he didn’t continue on, but he rested. He took a sabbath.

I have been practicing Sabbath every day for the past two weeks in an attempt to reorient myself to begin again. It has been strange to let go of previous responsibilities. It has felt odd to sit in silence by myself for hours at a time. I am tempted to fill the time with frivolous things, but no, I have stopped in order to begin.

And so I will… stay tuned.