Welcome to Five Minute Friday!

Our facilitator, Kate Motaung shared the prompt — this week PERSPECTIVE — with the FMF crew last night to expand and embellish. And, of course, we meet and greet at her place (in the Community section at fiveminutefriday.com) to share and network. It’s fun, fun, fun … and keeps our neurons sharp.

I’ve been sharing thoughts from our writing corps about the value of the exercise. They were taken from Five Minute Friday: A Collection of Stories Written in Five Minutes Flat, compiled by Susan Shipe. This week, don’t listen to me, listen to Holly.

“The Five Minute Friday community helped me see what the online community was all about. When I first started going to the Twitter party and linking up with everyone, I was so new to all this. Everyone welcomed me right in and were so encouraging. Then a couple of years later, when we all got to meet at the the FMF Retreat, it was amazing! The online community in real life, putting names to faces, and hearing everyone’s voices. It really made the community come alive. I’m grateful to be a part of such a wonderful group of friends.”

And that’s what we are … friends who support each other, laugh with each other, cry with each other, listen to each other, share with each other, pray for each other. I would really like to have you join us weekly or as you are able. We don’t have many “rules”, but “suggestions” which are available at fiveminutefriday.com/

With that said, it’s time to let the mind wander as the fingers try to keep up. The timer has set so it’s time to GO …

After our Twitter party last night, the thought struck me the success of this writing group is precisely because we all come to it with our own perspective. Our individual world is flavored by our past, our relationships, our common goals, our divergent experiences, our uniqueness, balanced against our sameness.

Through it all, our personalities develop and it is displayed in our collective writing. As a male, I don’t view prompts as a female might. As an octogenarian, I might have a different perspective than a 20-something. As a widower with a long marriage, I might view things differently from my single or newly-married peers. My family dynamics are different than your family dynamics. My work experience is different than your work experience.

We are all unique — uniquely made. Yet we all have a history that flavors our perspective. We’re all traveling to the same destination, but along different routes with different stops along the way. We all have a story to tell, each … STOP

… coming from a different perspective.

And that, my friends, is what Five Minute Friday is all about,

THOUGHT TO REMEMBER: The best way to escape your problem is to solve it!