Monthly Archives: October 2021

31-Day Writing Challenge—Day 4 :: Comfort

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What word comes to mind when you want to strengthen someone? Whatever it is, I’d bet it’s not today’s word-du-jour in the 31-Day writing challenge.

I’m a words guy, so when faced with such a common word as comfort I decided to look it up—and what I found surprised me. The first definitions, both as verb and noun, had to do with strength. And there I was, pre-dictionary, with images of lying warm in bed, soft blanket pulled tight up to my chin, huddled down in—you guessed it—comfort. That image feels anything but strong.

Are you comfortable? Let me get you another pillow, a blanket, a cup of hot chocolate.

Yet as I ponder these newly-revealed etymological mysteries, it all makes sense. When do we need comfort? When we’re sad, scared, cold, tired, lonely. What does comfort do? It strengthens our heart from sad to glad, from scared to courageous; it warms our cold muscles, offers companionship to our loneliness, energy in our fatigue. It strengthens.

Maybe we don’t need to “get out of our comfort zone” after all. Maybe we need to get right into the middle of it—that place where we are strongest, most confident, most able to live out our unique calling for the world.

This entry is part of the 31-Day Writing Challenge 2021 from Five Minute Friday.

31-Day Writing Challenge—Day 3 :: Peace

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It’s quiet now. Late. Dark. Peaceful. It wasn’t always. But it is now.

I like the quiet. Crickets chirping in the dark. Cars in the distance, far enough away that they are nothing more than a soft hum. Some nights the stars go on forever, reminiscent of the fireflies of my Midwest childhood. Tonight, though, nothing above but an almost-midnight blue blanket … that I can’t see for the blinding white of my screen, the only interruption of the peace.

These moments alone, unhurried moments. Early morning or late night. This is peace.

This entry is part of the 31-Day Writing Challenge 2021 from Five Minute Friday.

31-Day Writing Challenge—Day 2 :: Content

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“Contentment is learned,” he said. But how? Like patience—tested by waiting and the temptation to impatience? Is contentment learned through discontent, through wanting, through thinking that more will satisfy? Or is it learned through having—and finding dissatisfaction (or even fear and anxiety) in the possession?

“Give me enough that I don’t steal from real need,” wrote the psalmist, “but not enough that I don’t need You.” And “with You as my shepherd, I am content—green pastures, running water, protection … nothing lacking.”

And it’s good.

Oh, that I may be discontent with my discontent—and content with my content.

This entry is part of the 31-Day Writing Challenge 2021 from Five Minute Friday.

31-Day Writing Challenge :: NEED

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Need is a funny word. So short. So used. So abused.

“I need a drink,” says one after a long day at work. “I need it!” wails a child, reaching with its whole body for the toy just out of reach on the store shelf.

I need coffee. I need to eat. I need you. I need ….

Every plaintive cry reveals our poverty—not real poverty, of course, just a perceived lack of something, or someone, without which our life feels less than we’d like.

And it is less. Not for lack of a toy or a drink or a partner, but for want of contentment, of satisfaction.

What I need is is contentment. Without it, I will always need more.

This entry is part of the 31-Day Writing Challenge 2021 from Five Minute Friday.