Dubai · Gratitude · Life · Personal story

They All Work Together…

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In my native language, we have a saying that ‘if I start to count the goodness of the Lord, night will come and the day will break over and over again.’

They may sound like mundane stuff but in my heart they speak of the abundance of God’s grace.

There were very trying moments of 2015 for me and my family, but one big lesson that I learnt and would continue to carry over is that being thankful and committing my prayers to my Lord and Master eases my burden for sure.

This time last year, I was ensconced in my lovely house back in Houston. No way on my radar did the move to Dubai really feature.

Like the saying that, tomorrow is pregnant and backing a child as well, by the second quarter of 2015, we made a major migratory move across the Continent from US to UAE and I am grateful that it went smoothly.

I am grateful that we have adjusted to our beautiful environment and embracing it as well. It has not been a seamless effort, but since I chose to look at the rickety parts of the bigger picture with positive lens, it has made the journey more interesting and adjusting far easier.

I look at 2016 with expectant eyes. I have no idea what it will bring forth, who knows?

There might be major changes yet again or minor ones but this I know for sure ”that all things work together for my own good.” 

Have you taken a look at your big picture lately? What do the lines tell you? You might be surprised to realize that as displaced as some of your lines may be, they fall in perfect places and that is enough reason to be thankful.

You can join Colline’s  or Maria Jansson gratitude challenge platforms.

© Jacqueline Oby-Ikocha

Photographs · Wordless Wednesday

Under The Glow Of Street Lamp…Wordless Wednesday

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A link to my neighbours/Community · Blogging · Echos Of My Neighbourhood · My Thinking Corner · Reblogs

Where Is My Blogging Heading To?… I need your input.

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‘What is my 2016 outlook for my blog?

When I started blogging in May 2015, I had no idea what tangent it would take and how engaging it could get.

All I knew was that I had this burden to write poking me in the ribs. I had started writing so many stories and books but never arriving at the end. I needed something that would hinge and balance my writing lifestyle so, I decided to poke my toes in, to feel the waters, to be motivated and to learn.

I find that I like these blogging waters. Truth be told, I love these blogging waters 🙂

Even on cold days, there are voices to keep you warm and to encourage you on the journey. I wanted to feel the pulse of my own blog first before wading in deeper and I believe that I am gaining a little more confidence as I go on, which brings me to this point.

There are Two (2) ideas that I have been fomenting and have actually started on my own. I wish to push it a little further by inviting you to join me and to also seek your counsel just in case you have ideas on how to make it work a lot better.

I want to invite you to join me on any or both ideas enunciated below:

  • My Thinking Corner: In my attempt to grow, I always strive to keep a positive frame of mind especially in these trying times. I would like to invite you to join me in sharing on Tuesdays, your short snippets of positive, inspiring, motivating, health, spiritual, advice, clips and posts that can serve as a prop for others. I call it my thinking corner because, I actually take out a bit of time in a day to think, encapsulate my thoughts and detoxify my mind.
  • Echos Of My Neighbourhood: This is a little space to share your photos of bits and pieces of wherever you are at any point in time. It could be houses, backgrounds, activities and so forth. No hard and fast rules. Just ping-back’s and we can build it from there.

I would appreciate your feedback if you are interested in this. It may be possible to get the WP engineers to advise on how to create a page for any of this, but that would depend on the success of response received and I will enunciate the modality for both a bit further in another post.

  • Let’s talk about Re-Blogs:

If you’ve noticed, I have been doing a bit more re-blogging than I used to and it hasn’t affected publishing my own posts in any way.

Why? On the average, I read at least a hundred posts a day and sometimes more, leaving comments, likes – when I don’t have comments and so on. I always find posts that resonate, motivates, inspires, teaches me and a lot more and would love to share them with you as well.

I waited to understand a little bit more about re-blogging and I know that not only is re-blogging all part of networking, sharing, complimenting and encouraging others, it is a practice that I want to embrace a bit more.

Initially, I  must express that I was a bit concerned about re-blogging so much of other people’s work, worrying over the fact that it might reduce the authenticity of my work. I did not really want to start something that I didn’t have much understanding of.

Now, I think I feel more comfortable to re-blog as many posts as possible on specific days and times.

I find no problem in writing my posts from scratch, but there are also loads of beautiful, inspiring and wonderful posts by others out there which needs to be shared and it would be a shame not to do so if you can.

Although, I always recommend and link other bloggers posts on my Short Stories Series each week, there really is always room for more. ‘The generosity you extend is also the generosity that you receive.

I am giving you the heads up in this direction so that it doesn’t come as a surprise.

If you have any issues about your articles being re-blogged, please do let me know so that I don’t offend anyone.

Lastly, let me reiterate that I would really appreciate your candid feedback on this post with regards to my challenge invitation and your opinion about re-blogging.

© Jacqueline Oby-Ikocha

Five Sentence Inspiration · Inspiration - Motivation · My Thinking Corner · Quotes For You

Tuesdays’ Five Trickles Of Inspiration #3…

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  • Your acute desire + Your driven focus, will get you to your desired destination.
  • No one else will believe in you, if you don’t believe in yourself.
  • Are you walking backwards or forward?  If you are walking forward, then let go of the past mishaps and stop bench-marking your life with them.
  • Take a good look at the word IMPOSSIBLE and break it down. What does it say? To me, it says, I’M POSSIBLE.
  • Age has never been a deterrent to creativity. Stop hiding behind those numbers.

© Jacqueline Oby-Ikocha

Creative Writing · Devotions · Photographs

Silent Words…

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Uncategorized

January Victory Calendar & Hallelujahs!

Reblog. I always love seeing an aspiration come true. Congratulations Deb 😊

deborahcrocker's avatarTalking to My Weight Loss Counselor-God!

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Happy New Year!

It’s a new day! It’s a new beginning! My God is a God of second chances. With this new year He is giving me more second chances.

New victory calendar

This is a link to the new Victory Calendar for January 2016. I pray it works better for you than it did for me. I have some helpful hints at the bottom of this post. Hopefully they will work for you.

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When You Quit, You Win!!!

Reblog. Quitting is never the easiest of accomplishments, but where there is a will, there is always a way.

rollingblogger's avatarrollingblogger

I am a quitter! I admit it. I have quit smoking. I have tried to quit eating processed, unhealthy food, but it hasn’t happened yet. I have quit feeling sorry for myself. I have attempted to quit negative thinking.

I have quit holding others responsible for my issues.

I have quit waiting.

I have quit putting things off.

I wish the world would quit this poor me, serve me, pay me attitude that has somehow materialized within the past 20 years. And I am being serious!

When I was in high school, if we wanted something we got a job for $5/hour and worked after school for it for three or four years! Sometimes our parents helped pay for a car or our education, but we ALWAYS paid our debts back.

We have somehow in 20 years become a world that thinks everyone else owes us something. Shut up! Grow…

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[Blog Event] The Great Book of Lists

Reblog. I love lists and I guess a lot of you do so as well. This might interest you 😊

Laduchessederat's avatarLa duchesse d'Erat

Dear Friends,

I invite you to live an experience for the forth coming year : build your own Great Book of Lists.

Lists reflect your happiness, your hopes, your project, your inclinations, the person you were, the person you long to become.

At the end of the year, 52 lists will offer a unique capture of your year. Compiled together, they’ll composer your Great Book of Lists, a gold mine of information in which you’ll be able to dig later on.

It will contain, I hope, humour, love, surprises, silliness – maybe – and many treasures for sure.

Each Monday, I’ll post a new theme and you’ll have until Sunday to publish you post, with the #TGBOL hashtag and a ping back  to the post of the week you participate

I’ll publish a round up on Monday.

The comments section is all yours to suggest themes for the forthcoming lists.

Don’t…

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The Toxicity Cleanse Lifecoach Book

Reblog. Toxicity cleanse. This might interest you.

Life · Personal story · The Daily Post

Reading Drivel…personal

Consistent habits can become defined and after a while forms our characters.

Sometimes in these character mix we find certain habits picked up, which are not only unsavoury, but serve no meaningful purpose whatsoever.

I have my own fair share of habits that I am still trying to let go of, so that I can have room for more positive growth in my life.

Recently, one major challenge has been late night nibbles. Sometimes, I can go for weeks without doing so, then something goes off somewhere and I am back to a frantic bout of the nibbles. A big work in progress here.

However, one of such habits that I have been successful with, was my abrupt decision to stop reading books that I have no better words to describe them other than calling them licentious, x-rated pornography in literature, the only thing they lacked were depicting coloured pictures to match their words.

No, they were not good old fashioned romantic reads, nor what some would describe as soft porn, they were vile, page after page harsh content of lewdness and gross sex, which actually had the reverse effect of offensive for me and I was left wondering how someone could sit down to write a hundred and something pages of utter rubbish.

My curiosity was sated, my conscience was annoyed with me, no particularly worthy knowledge was gained from such dalliance on my part except some vibrant imaginations that were unfortunately painted on some part of my brain cells and it was not a regret to dump reading such drivel by the wayside.

I pencil the past readings down as research, but my money will not go to fund such further waste of my time.

© Jacqueline Oby-Ikocha

The Daily Post Happy Endings

Tell us about something you’ve tried to quit. Did you go cold turkey, or for gradual change? Did it stick?