I'm not really sure what is causing it, but I feel like I'm having a spiritual growth spurt. I keep having all of these great personal insights that almost knock me down with their power.

Today my thoughts were about life purpose. I decided that:
The Purpose of My Life is to make other people's lives better without making mine any worse.

I like to help others. To be a positive influence in the world. But I really don't think anyone should do that at the expense of their own happiness and health.

And I think some people flip flop my life purpose a little....that THEIR life purpose is to make their own life better without making anyone else's any worse.  And that is still pretty okay.

But I like mine. It fits me well. Nice and snug and comfy.

I've always wanted to be a writer, not so much because I thought it would make me rich, but because I always knew I had something important I wanted to say.

But once I got into the business, I realized that I often wasn't writing for the reasons that I set out to. Although I've made it a practice to never take writing assignments that went against any of my personal beliefs, I have often struggled with the money and the copyright aspects. Is it more important to be able to write the positive, meaningful things that I want to write? Or is it more important to make money? If I have a positive thought or idea or suggestion that might help other people through life, is it more important to horde it to myself until I find someone willing to buy those thoughts, or is it more important just to share them?

I often compared my works to the old adage "Why buy the cow when you can get the milk for free." I assumed that giving away my writing for nothing would devalue it.

But today I realized that the point is Udderly MOOOOoooooooot. I need to write just as much as the cow needs to give her milk. My creative cup runneth over.

So I'm asking you to visit my blog: http://www.betsyfranz.blogspot.com/

And maybe even use the link provided to subscribe to it. Or at least visit it from time to time.

And I'd love it if you are an editor or you know an editor that wants to buy some of my work. But even if you don't buy anything from this old cow, I hope that some of my words can help to quench your thirst.

I had such a powerful spiritual insight today, that it almost brought me to my knees and I wanted to share it

For the past ten + years, I've been helping my elderly mother with the medicial and legal problems that have been associated with this stage of her life. During that whole period, I've been trying to get my siblings more involved in the whole thing. Throughout the whole process, I couldn't understand why they haven't extended more love and more support and more care not only to my mother, but to me as I am going through the additional stress from the situation.

Yesterday, another situation arose and I approached my sister about it. Again, her response seemed to show a complete lack of love. And it was then that this line by Khalil Gibran flashed through my mind:

"Think not that you can direct the course of love. For love, if it finds you worthy, will direct your course."

In my mind, God and Love have always been interchangeable. God is Love. Love is God. and I realized how incredibly, inCREDIBLY lucky I am that God has decided to direct my course in this entire situation.

I have been trying to direct Love's course by wanting and expecting my siblings to act differently. And of course, I can't direct Love's course. Only God can.

As stressful and heart-breaking as this entire ordeal with my mother has been, it also has taught me an entire new level of love. And certainly anything that teaches us more about love or lets us feel deeper love is truly a blessing.

I've always received a lot of inspiration and encouragement from nature. Whenever I am going through a rough time, it seems like I can walk outside and see some miracle of nature that I didn't expect to see and it always makes me calm down and realize that everything is going to be all right.

I've been having a pretty rough couple of days trying to deal with a legal issue for my elderly mother. Its a SERIOUS issue that has required me to deal with several lawyers (one of them very immoral and unethical) and spend several hours on the phone with Medicaid.

At the end of the day, I was sitting here looking out my office window and I saw a fish in our little pond. A Miracle fish. The reason it is a miracle is because when we went away on vacation several months ago, we came back to a blue heron that was eating our fish. We only had seven small koi to begin with and we haven't seen any fish except a dead one for 4 months, and its a LITTLE pond.

But lo and behold, there was a little koi, swimming around like he has been there all along.
I have no idea how he survived the heron OR the fact that we haven't fed him for months or done anything else to the pond, but there he is.And he just made me realize that what I'm going through isn't so rough after all. If he can make it through all of that, I guess I can make it through this new stage with my mother.

I decided I would go through here and send friend invitations to all the people that look like they live near me. Too long of a process. Just thought it would be easier to STAND UP ON THIS HIGH MOUNTAINTOP AND SHOUT OUT HELLO FROM MELBOURNE, FLORIDA!!!

Anyone live close enough to hear me?

It is one of those stupendously beautiful days. So gorgeous outside that it makes me wonder what I did to deserve it!

Which makes me realize......I should go do something to deserve it!!

That's right. I won a brand new house in a radio station promotion. It was the same year, and just a few months, after I met that man that later became my husband.

Although it was a truly wonderful blessing to win that house (we sold it and used the money to buy the property that we live on now) I STILL say that meeting my husband that year was the best thing that has ever happened to me.

Fun, playful, creative individuals who live in my area who would like to form deep PLATONIC friendships.

I got an email message last night from a stranger. He said that he had recently read one of my articles in his local newspaper and that it touched him so much, he was wondering if I could send him a personal copy of the article.

I hate to say, that my first reaction was a negative one. I knew I hadn't sold that article to any newspapers and it appeared that someone was printing it without my permission. As a freelance writer, that is equivalent to stealing.

I was in quite a huff! Most newspapers and magazines would certainly know better! I wanted my just deserts (yes, that is spelled correctly. Look it up).

BUT, then I started thinking about it. Someone across the country was so touched by something that I wrote, that he tracked me down (googlewise) to send me a compliment. How cool is that?

It is nice to get paid for things that I write, but it is much nicer to know that my words can have that affect on someone.

I mean, I'm still trying to track down that newspaper, but it was a cool lesson from a stranger. It made me refocus my whole day and get back on the right track with the CURRENT articles I'm writing.