Another Way
By Bernadette A Moyer

You either find a way or you make your way. There is always another way, a better way, as life goes on we learn more and more about the value in our choices.

Every experience that we go through affords us the opportunity to learn and to grow; it also affords us an opportunity to respond with love.

There is always the “high road” the place where we respond with the most kindness regardless of how challenging our experience becomes.

When we stop, reflect and pause before a quick knee jerk response we allow ourselves that moment to think before we act. Most hurtful and negative responses are fear based. When we are secure in ourselves and when we know ourselves we need not fear.

“A bend in the road is not the end of the road …unless you fail to make the turn.” Helen Keller

Many times in life we will start out on one course only to re-evaluate and decide upon Another Way. Sometimes someone else makes that decision for us. Maybe a failed relationship or a failed job stops us in our tracks. Yet this is the time when we are afforded an opportunity to go Another Way.

For me, Another Way has always been a better way. When something or someone didn’t work the way that I had imagined it, I always found myself in a better place. New opportunities took their place and showed themselves.

This book Another Way will be available on November 1, 2015 and it contains several articles, blogs and essays and on many subjects but they are connected by coming about because I had the chance to go about life in Another Way.

As I finish this piece, I am preparing to leave for a week away to Las Vegas and one of my little dogs Chipper just arrived in my office. The hardest part about going away is leaving them behind. I know that if we still had minor children at home we would not travel near as much as what we do now.

Our life is different and we are living it Another Way. And it s full of life, of happiness, of pure joy and loaded with many adventures!

If what you are doing isn’t making you happy, you can always choose Another Way …

Bernadette on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/bernadetteamoyer
Books available at Amazon and Barnes & Noble

Did We Throw Out the Baby With the Bath Water
By Bernadette A. Moyer

My generation grew up with a healthy respect for adults, our family, our community and our church. We knew to respect our elders since they were older, lived longer and therefore knew more. When we grew up we were considered “chattel” that our parents basically owned, today kids are born with their own inherent rights.

Most of us were spanked and yelled at when we grew up and we never thought of it as child abuse. We thought of it as discipline and that our parents were trying to get our attention and help to form us into responsible adults.

Today, it seems, most kids feel like they were abused and neglected, they were physically abused, mentally abused and verbally abused. Was this the response to a generation that was abused by parents and some clergy, teachers and other adults?

Our schools are teaching our kids about abuse. Yet our military is still using the same methods as many parents that I knew used while growing up. We were yelled at and we never thought it was “verbal abuse.”

Have we raised a generation of kids that have no boundaries, were never spanked nor yelled at and if so how are they doing in this world? It seems like today so many young people are without coping skills and have a victim mentality. We have empowered our kids to where you can look at them a certain way and they are “abused” by the look you have on your face toward them.

What I see is a population of so many young people that doesn’t know what tough times are and seem more discontent that ever before. Young people who seem angrier and violent and disrespectful. We have taken God out of schools, we have taken the power away from the parents and then we sit back and act confused when so many young people are without boundaries.

Maybe I was old fashioned but my kids ate at the kitchen table and most nights we ate together as a family. Many of my peer parents allowed their kids to run the entire house with cookies and the like and then sat back and wondered why they had a mess complete with ants and rodents throughout the house.

We had expectations for our children as to what was and is acceptable behaviors. We tried to teach them that not everything in life is going to go your way and that not everything in life will come easy for you. And therefore learn to deal with things that may not be exactly as you like. Use it as a motivating force.

After the college shooting that took place just yesterday in Oregon my husband and I once again reflect upon how much respect we grew up with, in respecting our parents, our home, our community. It would never have occurred to us that taking a weapon to school or any public place and shooting at innocent people was a means of expressing our displeasure with life and with the world.

Even back then we knew that if we were unhappy it was our responsibility to find a way to enrich our life and to make it better. It wasn’t our parent’s responsibility or our community or our government that “owed” us.

Like everyone after the shootings took place I at first wanted to see what this shooter looks like and now I am like stop giving him any attention. These stories are newsworthy but let us give equal time and attention to the well balanced young people that are out there doing well in this world.

My husband and I both grew up with parents that weren’t afraid to express their displeasure to us, when and if we acted inappropriately. I don’t believe we would have so much violence in our culture if young people learned to channel their rage and frustrations toward productive goals and healthy ways of expression rather than by anger, hatred and a desire to destroy.

And I also question that if someone/anyone is diagnosed with any form of mental illness or a disability should they be allowed to own so many guns and weapons?

Peace to all the people in Oregon and May something good come from all this hurt and heartache. We pray.

Bernadette on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/bernadetteamoyer
New book! Along The Way is available on Amazon.com and Barnes & Noble.

A Harvest Season Prayer
By Bernadette A Moyer

May you have an abundance of light, love and laughter and may you be surrounded by loved ones, and may your heart be filled with joy.

We thank you Lord Jesus for all that we have, and we appreciate our family, our friends, the food that we share, the warmth of our home, and the peace and unconditional love that you bestow upon us.

May we love all people as you our Father loves us. We pray for all those in need that their prayers may be answered.

We pray for peace in our families, in our community, in our country and in our world. We pray that love wins and grace and gratitude reign.

We pray for light to cast over the darkest of places.

May we all share in your love and abundance for this harvest season and all the days of our lives

We pray. Amen.

Bernadette on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/bernadetteamoyer
New book! Along The Way available at Amazon and Barnes & Noble, be sure and check it out