The hills are alive with the sound of...mantras...

Every day I try to get out of bed and face the hill shown in my photo. It looks so tame in this shot, I am kinda embarrassed, but it is a tough haul for me in the morning (there is a bend, it is twice as long as I can show in this photo). Most days it takes all three of my inspirational women, Boudica, Sarah Connor and Trinity and all of their combined muscle and a lot of swearing to get me out of bed, but I try. And I am always rewarded. See the gorgeous shot of the clouds enveloping Mt. Rosalie that I get to see on my way back each day, as the sun is rising.

I have a number of very steep and rocky "hills" that I am facing in my personal life. I cannot talk about openly these on my blog but they are always with me, especially on my still, morning walks. Today as I walked I contemplated the fact that Kate keeps bugging me to come up with a mantra. Yesterday, after reading my blog post about my exercise inspirations, I got a message from a friend, telling me that he also thought I needed a mantra and he had a suggestion for me. "DON'T TAKE ANY SHIT FROM ANYBODY". Hmmmm...been chewing on that ever since. And I like it! It works for me because "anybody" can mean myself and right on down the line to everyone else in my life. And it is short and to. the. point! (Side note: I was raised with ranchers and drillers, my language can be colorful. But as my friend Curtis' grandfather used to posit, 'God does not count it as swearing when there are cattle or machines involved.' Well, I am certainly a cow, so I am thinking that this exempts me from being held accountable for this...)

So...now I have a mantra as I face the hills in my life. I am going to try it out today. I believe that I do need that default in my brain to keep myself from being overwhelmed and to shock me into keeping my head clear and to plan and face whatever it is that God is going to ask me to face.