{"id":94,"date":"2016-06-12T03:45:51","date_gmt":"2016-06-12T03:45:51","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/wordsforthisday.com\/?p=94"},"modified":"2016-06-14T17:41:01","modified_gmt":"2016-06-14T17:41:01","slug":"catching-the-waves","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wordsforthisday.com\/index.php\/2016\/06\/12\/catching-the-waves\/","title":{"rendered":"Catching the waves"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-91 alignleft\" src=\"http:\/\/wordsforthisday.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/Screenshot_2016-06-12-16-27-10-1024x576.png\" alt=\"Screenshot_2016-06-12-16-27-10\" width=\"550\" height=\"309\" srcset=\"https:\/\/wordsforthisday.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/Screenshot_2016-06-12-16-27-10-1024x576.png 1024w, https:\/\/wordsforthisday.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/Screenshot_2016-06-12-16-27-10-300x169.png 300w, https:\/\/wordsforthisday.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/Screenshot_2016-06-12-16-27-10-768x432.png 768w, https:\/\/wordsforthisday.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/Screenshot_2016-06-12-16-27-10-1200x675.png 1200w, https:\/\/wordsforthisday.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/Screenshot_2016-06-12-16-27-10.png 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 550px) 85vw, 550px\" \/><\/p>\n<p>The purple ring seemed to give me superpowers. But I know it only worked because I made a choice. A choice brought about by the ripple effect created through the choices of another.<\/p>\n<p>The ripple effect of these choices&#8211;choices of love, service and selflessness&#8211;made by this, my new found mentor, took seed in my heart immediately following her funeral service.<\/p>\n<p>The ripple effect of her choice to always help the poor and downtrodden caused me to give money&#8211;free from doubt or reservation&#8211;to a woman outside of a restaurant.<\/p>\n<p>The ripple effect of her choice to do what she loved even if it meant &#8220;dancing with the bookshelf&#8221; caused me to sing karaoke with my kids&#8211;because I secretly love karaoke&#8211;when normally I would have allowed fear to keep me as a silent spectator.<\/p>\n<p>And the ripple effect of her choice to be a &#8220;do-er&#8221; with a zest for celebration caused me to take a late-night, impromptu trip to Walmart with my girls to fetch a new karaoke machine when the old one wasn&#8217;t cutting it.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone wp-image-93 \" src=\"http:\/\/wordsforthisday.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/textfree_1155299866134911476-1024x577.jpg\" alt=\"textfree_1155299866134911476\" width=\"568\" height=\"320\" srcset=\"https:\/\/wordsforthisday.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/textfree_1155299866134911476-1024x577.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/wordsforthisday.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/textfree_1155299866134911476-300x169.jpg 300w, https:\/\/wordsforthisday.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/textfree_1155299866134911476-768x433.jpg 768w, https:\/\/wordsforthisday.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/textfree_1155299866134911476.jpg 1136w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 568px) 85vw, 568px\" \/><\/p>\n<p>But perhaps the ripple effect that I&#8217;m most grateful for came from her choice to love.<\/p>\n<p>She would look at me&#8211;whenever I had the privilege to speak to her&#8211;with genuine eyes full of wonder and curiosity. It was an expression reserved not only for me but for all she met. I believe it is because she had eyes that truly looked outward, focusing on, and being interested in the light and life of others.<\/p>\n<p>And as someone who often looks inward&#8211;focusing on my own fears, insecurities and need for comfort&#8211;this was the ripple effect that I needed the most.<\/p>\n<p>So this morning I put on my purple ring&#8211;because purple was her favorite color&#8211;and I prayed that the Lord would bless me with eyes that looked outward. A prayer that was answered in ways that I never dreamed possible.<\/p>\n<p>The purple ring may not have given me superpowers, but my choices&#8211;choices brought about by the ripple effect created through the choices of another&#8211;have forever changed my life.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter wp-image-92 \" src=\"http:\/\/wordsforthisday.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/Screenshot_2016-06-12-17-47-11-1-266x300.png\" alt=\"Screenshot_2016-06-12-17-47-11-1\" width=\"367\" height=\"414\" srcset=\"https:\/\/wordsforthisday.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/Screenshot_2016-06-12-17-47-11-1-266x300.png 266w, https:\/\/wordsforthisday.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/Screenshot_2016-06-12-17-47-11-1-768x865.png 768w, https:\/\/wordsforthisday.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/Screenshot_2016-06-12-17-47-11-1-909x1024.png 909w, https:\/\/wordsforthisday.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/Screenshot_2016-06-12-17-47-11-1.png 1080w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 367px) 85vw, 367px\" \/><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The purple ring seemed to give me superpowers. But I know it only worked because I made a choice. A choice brought about by the ripple effect created through the choices of another. The ripple effect of these choices&#8211;choices of love, service and selflessness&#8211;made by this, my new found mentor, took seed in my heart &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/wordsforthisday.com\/index.php\/2016\/06\/12\/catching-the-waves\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;Catching the waves&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-94","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordsforthisday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/94","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordsforthisday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordsforthisday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordsforthisday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordsforthisday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=94"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/wordsforthisday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/94\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":97,"href":"https:\/\/wordsforthisday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/94\/revisions\/97"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordsforthisday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=94"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordsforthisday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=94"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordsforthisday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=94"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}