Thursday, November 18, 2010

Unexpected Sources of Strength (and they're fun too)

In keeping with the message of hope and a better life for all of us, I
thought today I would write about some resources that I have found
along the way that help with building us up in various fun ways. It's
a little unconventional but very easy to do and I think it helps a lot
to clarify our goals and strengthen us to reach them.

The resources that I'm referring to are movies, tv shows, books,
magazines, websites, music and so much more.
I'm planning to write about many of my favorites. There is something
to be gained from all of them. I'm pretty excited to tell you about
them too.

Today I'm going to start with movies and why I think they're valuable
(as are all of the resources I mentioned.)

If you know any thing about the guys and all of us in the Sleeping At
Last family, you have probably guessed that all of us are big movie
fans! I think it would be safe to say that Netflix and AMC cash in
with all of us.

Each of us has our own individual tastes but we also have lots of
cross overs as well.

For instance, we all LOVE PIXAR movies! If there's a new Pixar
release, the odds are good that we will be in line at the midnight
showing the night it releases. Even if we're on tour we find a way to
get there and see the movie. In fact, Ryan's dream job would be to do
film scoring for them.

As far as our other favorites go, they vary a lot. Dan loves old
movies with Charlie Chaplin and also "Star Wars" and westerns.
Actually, as I'm writing this, it occurred to me that "Star Wars" is
the future world version of westerns. Guess that explains it.

Ryan loves old movies and indie films. He also loves documentaries and
dramas (that are well done).

They all love "Harry Potter" and the guys also love super hero movies
as well (depending on which one).

And, we all love comedies.

Cayt (Ryan's wife) and Therese (Dan's wife) share the same interests
as their husbands (for the most part) however they also like girl
movies (as we call them) just like I do. The guys will go along to see
them but they rarely hide the fact that we're dragging them there.

As for me, I'm a very eclectic movie lover. I love chick flicks,
mysteries, love stories ,dramas, some sci-fi and some old movies too.
For example, I love "Signs" and I also love "The Holiday." I love
"Cloverfield" and yet I love "In Her Shoes." From one side of the
movie spectrum to the other and most things between. The common thread
in all of them is that they mean something to me in one form or
another. Sometimes it's just good entertainment and for others, there
may be messages of hope or answers to questions about what I should do
in a situation that I'm in. Some are a great escape from whatever is
going on in my world at the time. I plan to elaborate a great deal on
all of this in future posts.

Did anyone ever ask you to pick a favorite movie? It's hard to do.
There are sooooooo many great ones. Can you think of a movie that you
really love and one that puts you in a better mood every time you
watch it? Did you ever ask yourself why that is?

In previous posts, I mentioned filling our minds with good things and
movies can fit into that category. When we're struggling with
anything, we long for answers and sometimes an escape. Movies often
provide both. Often we don't have someone (or we would prefer not to
tell anyone) that we can talk about our struggles with.

Personally, I have not had the benefit of that for most of my life.
Many of the people that were in my life made it very clear that they
would not be the ones to go to. I've felt pretty much alone as I
struggled to figure out how to find the life that I wanted. This
pushed me to look for answers elsewhere. So I did. And God gave me
those answers time and time again and sometimes in the most surprising
ways. Movies were and are one of the ways.

I'm so excited to be able to share these great resources with you and
I hope they will bring you as much happiness and wisdom as they have
for me.

I know....some will say "But movies aren't real life. They're just
fantasy or unrealistic. You can't have that for real. People don't act
that way in real life. That's too idealistic. " Well, I think we've
all had enough of "reality" and we don't really need to have more
messages of horrible people, doom and disaster.

I think this world would be a better place if we all thought of these
"idealistic" stories as possible and attainable.

Maybe then, they would be!

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