Feeds:
Posts
Comments

Posts Tagged ‘Reach’

Spiritual Journey: Reach

Posted in Spiritual Growth, Writing, tagged , , , on May 4, 2017| 10 Comments »

Find the round up of Spiritual Journey posts at Donna’s site, Mainly Write

Today our spiritual Thursday bloggers are writing about Donna’s one little word, Reach.  This was my word in 2015.  I chose it that year as I was finishing a manuscript that I wanted to publish.  That book is still not a book, but I don’t think it has anything to do with the word Reach.

When I searched my blog for Reach, I found this quote above.  Sometimes wisdom comes to me.  Today I needed to see this again.  I needed to remember that all we can do at any one time is to be present to it.

I switched my classroom Wonder calendar to May and found this quote waiting for me.

Personal Courage Month

Many of us have big things we’d like to do, but we’re too nervous or shy to try them. Try doing one thing this month that will get you closer to the big thing you’d like to do–tell someone about it, ask for help, read a book about it.

I have an idea that I will be sharing with an upper administrator today.  Fingers crossed he gets it, understands my goals, and pushes me forward to meet them.

I have an idea for a poetry book.  I’m reading, researching, experiencing, and playing with words.  It’s about process, practice, practice, and process.

I will revise my works in progress again and again until they are ready for the wider world.  Confidence, patience, persistence.

Reaching is hard work.

Reaching is stretching till it hurts.  Hold.  Then stretch more.

Reaching is shooting for the moon and landing among the stars.  I’m OK with the stars.  I have friends there.

 

Read Full Post »

The Reach of 2015

Posted in Slice of Life, Writing, tagged , , on December 29, 2015| 11 Comments »

Join the Two Writing Teachers blog for Tuesdays Slice of Life Challenge.

Join the Two Writing Teachers blog for Tuesdays Slice of Life Challenge.

 

sunburst Reach

 

My One Little Word for 2015 was Reach.  To be honest, I haven’t thought much about this word lately.  Why did I choose Reach?  I began the year with the image of an oak tree with outstretched branches.  I wanted to be like this oak, grounded in strong faith and reaching to new heights.  How have I done that this year?

Yesterday I took a walk in my parents’ neighborhood.  I have a new camera that I am playing with.  I learned that you can’t take pictures of birds when you are walking.  They flee.  But the clouds.  Oh, the clouds were amazing as the rainy heavy ones gave way to the light, the blue behind.  I took many cloud pictures.  (The one above I enhanced somewhat in Picmonkey.)

Where are those goals that I was reaching for?  They are illusive as goals tend to be.  I looked and noticed and was present to the moment of walking.  I captured this image.  This one is not altered.

winter red berries

Perhaps my reaching has become seeing, noticing, and being present to the given moment.  If a star cannot be reached, it can be your guide.  These last few days of 2015 seem to be pointing me beyond reaching, forward to a realization of who I am, right here, right now.  That’s not such a bad place to be.

Read Full Post »

Reaching

Posted in Celebration Saturday, Chalk-a-bration, Teaching, tagged , , , on September 5, 2015| 9 Comments »

Discover. Play. Build.

Ruth Ayres invites us the celebrate each week. Click over to her site Discover. Play. Build. to read more celebrations.

Reach copy
My one little word for 2015 is Reach. I was determined to reach with my writing. Take it to the next level. Well, this week came rejection. I hear from other authors that this is expected, normal, and we must power through, but it sent me into a slump. Because of Ruth’s invitation to celebrate each Saturday, I am climbing back up the tree and reaching out again.

I celebrate dancing! Friday night I’m tired, but I said yes to his invitation to go Cajun dancing. We only danced three songs, but we left smiling.

I celebrate rainbows. This week I’ve seen rainbows on two consecutive mornings on the way to school. One morning I pulled over and took pictures, the rainbow in the west, the glowing sun in the east.

Morning rainbow

Morning rainbow

Sunrise

Sunrise

I celebrate authors I admire. I received a signed copy of Over in the Wetlands, a beautiful book by Caroline Starr Rose about the place I live. She captured the magic of the wetlands, along with the fearful hurricane and the peace and rebirth that follows. She sent bookmarks and stickers for my students. I celebrate making connections with authors.

Over in the Wetlands by Caroline Starr Rose

Over in the Wetlands by Caroline Starr Rose

In the midst of a rough week of state pretesting, I celebrate Chalkabration. We went outside in the South Louisiana heat and chalked up the sidewalks with poetry inspired by Laura Purdie Salas’s book Catch Your Breath: Writing Poignant Poetry.

Chalking poetry

Chalking poetry

 

This invitation to Celebrate each week helps me to see that there is much to rejoice.  Rejection is small.  Reaching is big.  What are you celebrating today?

Read Full Post »

DigiLit Challenge

Posted in Blogging, Digital Learning, tagged , , , , on May 24, 2015| 27 Comments »

Please use this button on your site for DigiLit Sunday posts

Please use this button on your site for DigiLit Sunday posts

Summer has started for me.  I can sleep later (haven’t yet, but the opportunity is there). I can read or write whenever I want to.  My days are open to possibilities.

Today on the Two Writing Teachers blog, Betsy Hubbard reminds us to think about our One Little Word.  My word is Reach.  I would like to Reach for more teacher/bloggers to join DigiLit Sunday.  I have no idea how to do that.  So I am calling on my readers to help me.

I tend to be someone who rises to a challenge.  Last summer I joined in CLMOOC and plan to again this summer.  I will probably do Teachers Write  with Kate Messner and many other awesome authors again for the 4th year.

There are new challenges every day in this community.  Reaching out to create my own challenge is a bit scary.  What if no one comes?  I will stay true to my OLW and just do it.  For the next four weeks, I’ll post a challenge on DigiLit Sunday.  If you choose to do it, you can post it however you feel most comfortable, Twitter, Facebook, Blog, or GooglePlus.  I’ll collect the links and post them the following week on DigiLit Sunday.  Use #digilitchallenge. Be sure to tag me. (@MargaretGSimon on Twitter, @MargaretGibsonSimon on Facebook, and Margaret Simon on Google+)

Challenge this week: Turn an image of nature into a work of art: #photoart

For my photo, I used Waterlogue app on my phone.  Then uploaded it to PicMonkey to add the haiku.

Sunrise haiku

 

Reaching new challenges.  Playing with digital literacies.  Pass it on.

 

Link up your DigiLit Sunday posts or DigiLit Challenge here:

Read Full Post »

Reaching

Posted in Slice of Life, tagged , , , , on February 10, 2015| 15 Comments »

Join the Two Writing Teachers Slice of Life Challenge.

Join the Two Writing Teachers Slice of Life Challenge.

My One Little Word for 2015 is Reach. Kim Douillard puts out a photo challenge each week. Guess what the theme is this week? Reach!

So here are some of my own photos that Reach.

While most of the country is frigid, we are experiencing springlike weather here in Louisiana. The live oaks reach for the blue sky.

IMG_4247

I continue to Reach out with my prayer shawls. I delivered this one to Lyndel on Sunday. She is now wrapped in peace while she nurses her ill husband.

IMG_4262

The amaryllis gift just keeps on Reaching. This is the second blossom sprouting. I am not very green when it comes to keeping plants alive. This display of growth gives me strength. Thanks, Jen.

IMG_4264

I am still reaching for my poetic soul and writing poems to Laura Shovan’s Sound Poetry Project. Click on over for some poetry love.

Read Full Post »

Reach

Posted in Poetry, Spiritual Growth, Writing, tagged , , , on February 5, 2015| 3 Comments »

Click here to read more #spiritualjourney posts. Thanks Holly for hosting this roundup!

Click here to read more #spiritualjourney posts. Thanks Holly for hosting this roundup!

Since the new year, Holly has gathered our spiritual journey posts about each person’s one little word. Today my word Reach is the featured theme.

I haven’t really settled in with my OLW yet. Reaching takes active work. It’s not a passive word. I can’t just sit back on it and wait. I have to go out there and do something about it. I want to embrace this word Reach, but on these cold wet winter days, I’d rather be lazy, curl up with my dog and rest. Exercise another day.

I stretch my sore, tired muscles.
I look at the amaryllis, now wilting.
I notice new growth, a new stem creeping up alongside the blossom.
Where did that come from?
Sometimes without us even noticing, God plants new growth.
We can bloom again.

new growth

I chose Reach for completely selfish reasons. I have a few writing projects that I am working on and others I am thinking about. I set a goal to move forward with writing, to Reach for publication. Maybe I should have chosen a braver word, like Courage.

This month a Poetry Friday blogging friend, Laura Shovan, has started a poetry project to celebrate her birthday. I have been writing a poem each day to a posted sound. This project is stretching my writing muscles and giving me a creative place to go each day. Am I Reaching? I can think about this writing as stretching, exercising, and moving my writing muscles. All a part of Reaching. Follow this link to read poems about a thunder storm sound.

Perhaps when I read all the Spiritual Journey posts about my OLW I will embrace it, feel it, want to, own it. Today, I will Reach for Reach.

Read Full Post »

Fly

Posted in Spiritual Growth, Writing, tagged , , , , , on January 22, 2015| 4 Comments »

Click here to read more #spiritualjourney posts. Thanks Holly for hosting this roundup!

Click here to read more #spiritualjourney posts. Thanks Holly for hosting this roundup!

Fly word cloud 2

Holly invites us to reflect on our spiritual journey. For the next several weeks, we will be writing about different little words. Today is Michelle’s word, FLY. I made a Tagxedo image with my thesaurus. com search. My own little word, Reach, came up a number of times. I hadn’t made the connection before. When I selected Reach, I was thinking more about goals I want to strive for. But isn’t that like learning to fly, trying to pick up the tail winds and soar?

Discovering synonyms is a good way to ruminate on a word. I watch the birds when they fly. The hawk that glides across the highway in search of hidden prey. I am not like the hawk, a hungry hunter.

The hummingbird comes to the feeder, fluttering wildly to sip sweet nectar. I am not as desperate as a hummingbird who is so quick and finicky.

The seagull came up in my search a few times. Am I a seagull, like Jonathan Livingston, tired of materialism and conformity, looking for meaning in perfecting his flight?

With a wing for understanding and a wing for influence, my flight will be balanced. I will rise to awareness. I will strive toward space, a place to be me. A place to know I am loved.

With God as my compass.

Created on Canva.com

Created on Canva.com

Read Full Post »

Celebration Resolution

Posted in Celebration Saturday, Teachers Write, Writing, tagged , , , on January 3, 2015| 16 Comments »

Discover. Play. Build.

Ruth Ayres invites us the celebrate each week. Click over to her site Discover. Play. Build. to read more celebrations.

Reach copy

I chose Reach as my OLW for 2015. The recent gift of an Amaryllis bulb reminds me daily to reach. It has quickly grown about 2 inches in 2 days, reaching up to be a blossom.

Amaryllis 2

I am reaching out to other writers, sharing my work and encouraging theirs. A recent writing partner was introduced to me by Gae Polisner of Teachers Write and the author of two YA books, The Pull of Gravity and The Summer of Letting Go. Linda Mitchell and I have been exchanging poems for a few months. She is not blogging yet, so when she told me she had chosen her OLW, I asked her to write a poem about it. Here is her poem about the word Nourish. Love this word because you can nourish yourself as well as others. Her writing and advice nourish me.

New Year Resolution 1.1.2015
The women residing in me– but not limited to:
Daughter, sister, wife, mother, friend,
teacher, student, poet.

Whereas limited time is granted daily
by our creator and selfish choices;

Whereas desire to express meaning
is hindered by our ability to grasp
the essence of the language;

Whereas our attention and focus
is worn away and eroded
by frivolous pursuits;

Whereas our hope is to achieve
peaceful and mutual understanding
with our world;

RESOLVE, THAT the verb and action nourish
fortify all work, play and spiritual activity
January 1 through December 31, 2015.

And as such,

Be it resolved that we commit to:

Promote growth

Provide sustenance

Train, build and raise up

Ourselves, our loved ones
and our communities
beginning with prayer,
contemplation, word,
silence and
meaningful action
whenever and wherever
possible.

–Linda Mitchell, all rights reserved.

Read Full Post »