Happy Friday! Time for my Five Minute Friday contribution. Check out the amazing five minute takes on Facebook or at Kate’s place at  fiveminutefriday.com by our special community of writers.

I’ve been sharing snippets taken from Five Minute Friday: A Collection of Stories Written in Five Minutes Flat. They are a testament to the value of the exercise. This week, I’ll share some perspective from Angela who I hope inspires you to check us out or, better yet, try your hand at focused, unscripted writing for just five minutes. And share it on Kate’s site.

“When I felt stuck as a writer, Five Minute Fridays showed me that was only in my mind. Sometimes I wrote my FMF piece only in my journal, because the prompt brought out raw feelings I wasn’t ready yet to share. Still, it helped me find my words again when I wasn’t sure I had anything to say.”

The timer has been set for this week’s prompt, START, so I guess it’s time to GO…

We start our life with a gasp of breath and a slap on the bottom.

We start our schooling {at least in the old days} with kindergarten complete with snacks and naps.

We start our spiritual awakening {at least in many cases} with the planting of seeds of faith.

We start our adulting by making mistake after mistake after mistake.

We start our careers {usually} at the bottom rung of the ladder and often not in a field we were trained in.

We start our future {in many cases} by getting married and realizing marriage is a full time job that takes plenty of work from both partners.

We start our later years {in many cases} slowing down, phasing out, looking back.

And some day, all of us will start a final journey across the River Jordan — some slowly, other quickly and unexpectedly.

But, do we start every day with a prayer? Do we look at the extraordinary in the ordinary? Do we appreciate a sunrise or sunset, flowers in bloom, designs in the clouds? … STOP

… Some things we can’t change. We can’t be physically born again. We can’t return to the “good old days”. We cant re-live the past.

But we can start honing our relationships on both the spiritual and human level. We can learn from our mistakes. We can go back to school or get re-trained or follow a new second career path. We can prepare for that final journey.

Wait, that comes down to starting every day with prayer and seeing God’s presence in the mundane and ordinary.

THOUGH TO REMEMBER: The world measures greatness by money, or eloquence, or intellectual skill, or even by prowess on the field of battle. But here is the Lord’s standard: Whosoever shall humble himself as this little child, the same is the greatest in the Kingdom of Heaven (Matthew 18:4). —  J.H. Jowett