blessing

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Is My Disability A Blessing Or Curse?

Is my disability a blessing or a curse? I was up late with that question and couldn’t sleep after hearing Dr. Amy Kenny speak at the Creative Justice Conference. She brought up so many great truths and points regarding disabilities and life. But in my mind, they seemed overcasted by her continual focus of being created disabled while emphasizing the nuance of being disabled in her identity as apposed to having a disability as part of who she is. She would say, “I am disabled. I am not a person ‘with‘ a disability.”

I wasn’t created with my disability, though. At least not with the paralyzed body I have lived with since I was 15 years old. And I don’t believe God orchestrated my car accident that resulted in my spinal cord injury, either. The body God intended me to be created in was fully able in the physical sense of walking and functioning without the challenges of the paralysis I’ve had to endure for the last 3 decades and continue to experience today.

So with Amy Kenny’s emphasis on how being disabled is defined with the meaning of being blessed within her created identity, I struggled with the deeper question within myself, is my disability a blessing or curse?

Blessing

The Jewish Rabbi in ‘Fiddler on the Roof‘ quite truthfully said that there is a blessing in everything. The nature of our humanity, no matter what struggles and sufferings we are enduring, is rooted in an identity that reflects God’s character and presence everywhere.

In the very beginnings of creation, the word God used for blessing was the Hebrew word “Baruch“. (Gen. 2:3) While it was especially spoken of over the Sabbath, the same blessing was given over all creation. Repeatedly, he would speak the words… “And it was good.”

Reflecting that same characteristic of God, Dr. Nathan Lopes Cardozo, a Jewish scholar, also shares, “How wise were the sages of Israel when they instituted the custom of making a blessing on almost anything, whether it is eating, drinking, observing natural phenomena, or smelling extravagant aromas. They depicted all these activities as nothing less than totally miraculous.”

Blessings are not the riches of good health, accumulated wealth, or recognized successes. It is not in finding your healing or getting rid of pain and anguish. It is in finding the miraculous in everything that is a part of life both in physicality and experience. Or more meaningfully, it is in recognizing God’s love and presence within every given moment in time — we do not possess blessings; we submit to our relationship with them in God’s revealing.

As my friend Dick pointed out in conversation this past week, the disabilities I experience do not limit the ways God reveals his blessings through the experiences I face — and for sure, it is my friends who truly reveal God’s presence and goodness around me, too.

I also love the way Maya Angelou describes it when she wrote:

I believed that there was a God because I was told it by my grandmother and later by other adults. But when I found that I knew not only that there was a God but that I was a child of God, when I understood that, when I comprehended that, more than that, when I internalized that, ingested that, I became courageous.

Ramsey, K.J.. The Lord Is My Courage (p. 5). Zondervan. Kindle Edition.

When we find the disabilities in our life, we experience the blessings from them shaping our identity not because of them, but because we begin to live with them courageously, mercifully, gracefully, and lovingly for God’s revealing presence being at work and present in our lives and in the lives of those around us. As the old saying goes, we are blessed to be a blessing.

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#blessing #Curse #SpinalCordInjury

(edited)

Is My Disability A Blessing Or A Curse?

Is my disability a blessing or a curse? I was up late with that question and couldn’t sleep after hearing Dr. Amy Kenny speak at the Creative Justice Conference. She brought up so many great …
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#Cat in the #NewYear

Here's placing my commitment to engaging in positive thoughts that will work positive energy that will materialize my wish/prayer that this year, & many following, will be MUCH MUCH BETTER than 2022 was to/for me.

And I #Hope & #Pray that 2023 bring MUCH #Joy , #peace , & #relief to #all of us that #Suffer from #devastating effects of #ChronicIllness , especially those of us whom are asked to #endure #ChronicPain , especially those of us, that suffer continuous non-stop pain, especially those of us who's entire body is afflicted, for I do know that #Pain does kinda cancel out/prevent us from any/all pleasurable #Emotions . At least, personally speaking, I'm always miserable, & since I lost my cat a little past last New Year (of 2022),, so went my smile, & any & every semblance of the person I was. The person I liked being. Please, #god , give me a sweet cat soon. Very soon, I'd really #hate to #Lose hope again. So please don't hold back on my #blessing of a cat too long. I need #help & #relief . Please don't make it all disappear into the #dark #pit I've lived in. For all too too long. #please bring me #light & #Hope to see this to its fruition. I need to bring home a Cat. Know that. You do. , I ask,in #Jesus ' name. Thanks for reading my post, all you caring & supportive #mightyfriends 🙋💗🍬 #MightyTogether #peace

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Resin earring stand for the teacher I work with. Happy World Teachers Day!

The teacher I work with is a fantastic teacher, she's still young, yet quite mature, warm and loving. She's very supportive of me and I feel grateful to work with such a wonderful lady. She is also a model, so I thought this earring stand just personifies her beauty and grace. #ArtTherapy #Teacher #recognition #blessing #Work

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#blessing #hairbrush #detangle #loveit

#BrushingLittleOnesHair
#LittleOneBrushingThereOwnHair
Anyone with chronic pain , Fibromyalgia, sore hands, wrists, and sore arms trying to detangle little ones hair can take some time and increase pain levels, well this brush is a saviour for my wrists, arms and hands for when I got to help brush out daughters hair. A 30 minute hair disaster turned out to be 5 /8 minutes tangles all out and she can manage brushing her own hair with this brush with ease!!!
A win win!!!😊😊😊😊😊😊👍👍👍👍👍

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Deep breaths 💕🙏

"May your heart radiate the love that you are. May you be at peace, a source of healing for others. You are a blessing to this world."

#blessing #DistractMe #cptsd
#abuse #sexualabuse #ptsd #highlysensitiveperson #gifted
#mthfrmutation #pyrroledisorder
#insomnia #constipation #Anxiety
#obsessivecompulsivedisorderocd
#hypoglycemia #crohnsdisease #irritablebowelsyndromeibs
#chronicepsteinbarrvirus
#myalgicencephalomyelitis
#Disability #Depression #lymedisease
#psychosis #Recovery #MentalHealth

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If u all don't mind praying for me, I need a financial blessing now, to go through the future. I've been off work since September, was supposed to have surgery for severe Carpal Tunnel and Dequervains Tenosyvitis, got diagnosed with Covid was getting disability, have no support, care, etc.

Not seeing the light at the end of the tunnel.

Thanks for ur prayers.

#Christianity
#Nosupportsystem
#unloveable
#Acceptance
#struggling
#blessing
#Jesus
#painflare
#ChronicPain
#Insomnia

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#grateful #Healing #NewChapter #Osirisismypurpose #selfsufficencyoverCodependentcy #My

Hey mighties!💪🏾💪🏾💪🏾❤❤❤
I just wanted to say that this little human being is my purpose to #StayPersistent and #resilient #MyOsiris and being a #Punkmama has been a #blessing . He is my heart and I love him! He #inspiresme to be #Bestme and I am so #thankful ❤❤❤❤

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#pet #pettherapy #Love #Cats #companion #alone #Furbaby

What would I ever do??? & where would I ever be???? without a cat!!! I've lived alone mostly all my adult #Life . I KNOW I'd be #hospitalized a lot more & would suffer extreme #Loneliness if I didn't.....i have a few hermit crabs too; but they are in an aquarium & can't walk up to me & rub their little heads against my knee as I sit on the couch watching a movie &/or listening to my playlists 🎶 I'd be much more #stressed & #depressed without my little Gracie- Wasie! She's truly a big #blessing for which I am so very #grateful 🐱!!!!

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