Climbing Snefflels

     I am a woman of conviction.  I was a little girl of conviction as well, but there's only so much a child can do to accommodate the urge to bring about change.  I prayed a lot.  Blanketing prayer, I guess you could call it, would cover my neighbors from robbers and my schoolmates from kidnappers.  And when I thought a little longer I would have to pray for the whole town because if my prayer only covered my road then people on the other roads were unprotected.  And what about other towns!!  Eventually, even as a child, I knew "God, please don't let anything bad happen to anybody or any animals!", was just grasping at straws.  It hurt me, then, to feel so helpless and I didn't understand how God worked.

     Okay, so I don't completely understand how God works even now but I do know that he works through me, us, we......people.  And I've learned through experiences and relationships that different people have different convictions than mine.  And just as mine are to me, their convictions are based on their individual knowledge and experiences and are in no way less gnawing to them when left neglected.  But as an adult I can no longer hope in blanketing prayer to cure all that ails this world.  I know that God expects me to act, because of what I know.  And I know that because of this expectation I am responsible for my inaction.  Gnawing; the most appropriate word I can think of to illustrate personal conviction.

     So a change in my life is underway and I've approached the undertaking as a mountain I have committed myself to climb.  (Yet another Jules Verne inspiration as Mt. Snefflels contained the entrance to the vast wonders in the trek toward the '...Center of The Earth').

     Over the years I've prepped mentally.  I've talked to my loved ones casually about the eventual plunge and have received support as well as scoffs.

  "Good for you!"

  "Why bother?"

 "You're not going to make anyone else do it too, are you?"

 and 

"I've done that myself!  Let me know if you need any help.",

 are the responses I've received.  Although not always encouraged, I feel mentally and physically prepared for the venture.  I've bought my gear and have recently taken the first steps upward toward the peak.

      My progress is slow; slower than I would like.  I don't always enjoy the solitude I feel or the backward steps I occasionally take to make the change seem more normal or me, seem more normal.  I have yet, however, felt no regret in choosing to act.  I have never felt regret when I've chosen to act on a conviction.  I don't think I've ever met anyone who has.

     Even now my soul sometimes yells in frustration and desperation, "God, please don't let anything bad happen to anybody or any animals and that fear would be gone and people would become good....(and this is about where I trail off)."  Of course now I feel silly.   But, I picture God smiling at the reflection of my 'little girl' self cuddling under her Snow White sheets hoping to change the world overnight, and He doesn't see me as silly at all.

Do you have your own 'Sneffels' to climb?  Take the challenge with me at
www.inspiringchallenges.blogspot.com