Their Story

Ok, I am sometimes frightened by the way ideas come to my mind. I feel like I'm always tuned in to what's about to happen. I might listen to a song, and then that Sunday, we will sing it at church. I often know who's calling before I look at the phone, and occasionally know it's going to ring before it does. I'm weird, I know.

I spent the better part of December out of touch with my usual reading of books and blogs and keeping up with what's going on. I like to take a break during December to really look back on the year and then focus on what I can do different in the coming year, how I can tweak, simplify, refine, improve or do away with.

Although much of the month was consumed by emotional stress and the backlash of poor choices, both mine and someone else's, I decided to start writing my book. I have clear direction. It came to me as I was talking to a friend at work several weeks ago. I know her mom died of breast cancer when she was young, but one day when it was slow at work, she shared her story with me. Her story made me cry and her story made me see the vulnerable, hurting little girl that is still inside of her. I saw her through God's eyes, and how sad he must be when we hurt. And then I thought about the way God made her, her bubbly personality, her boldness, her compassion for others, all of the things that make her a nurse. And I feel that for some reason she was compelled to tell me her story. It made me think of other nurses and their stories. And why God made us nurses... it's not just a job choice, to be a nurse, it's a compelling passion that you can't deny.

I always know people who are compassionate and merciful by whether or not they cry when someone else cries. People who are able to deeply feel what others are feeling, are more than compassionate, they are empathetic. Nurses are like that.

On the flip side, nurses can also be too compassionate, caring too much, taking on too much, taking too much responsibility for other peoples feelings. The place where are stories come from, our past, has made us who we are today.

So my book is about nurses (and maybe others), it's about "Their Stories............."

Oh, yeah, so back to my weirdness... or what I call confirmation. At the leadership training I attended today, there was talk, not just once, but twice, about people telling their stories....hmmmmm.