Now Choose Life

Choose Life in the after- after the spouse dies, after the marriage ends, after the kids leave

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My Walden

August 19, 2016 by Sharon




Still feeling that I love the life of an educator, I live by the school calendar not the regular calendar that everyone else lives by.  With that in mid, I guess it is appropriate that I start my new venture with what is the start of a new school year- August. I know many do not start back to school until after Labor Day, but every school I’ve ever worked in has started back in August. So here is to new beginnings…

Ever since I read Eat, Pray, Love by Elizabeth Gilbert, I have wanted an experience like that.  I always thought to myself “There should be a way to experience a rebirth without having to leave home.”  So over the course of the past few months, I’ve found a few books that I want to study and see if they can help me discover this second half of my life.  I want t slow down.  I want to find a new way to live my life- one where I appreciate nature, strive for healthy living, spend more time in solitude with bible study, meditation, reading and more writing.  I want the study of Walden as well as Henry David Thoreau’s journal and other books will help me find my Walden.


The Journal 1837-1861 Henry David Thoreau
August 19, 1851

The poet must be continually watching the moods of his mind, as the astronomer watches the aspects of the heavens.  What might we not expect from a long life faithfully spent in this wise? The humblest observer would see some stars shoot.  A faithful description as by a disinterested person of the thoughts which visited a certain mind in threescore years and ten, as when on reports the number and character of the vehicles which pass a particular point.  As travelers go round the world and report natural objects and phenomena, so faithfully let another stay at home and report the phenomena of his own life,— catalogue stars, those thoughts whose orbits are as rarely calculated as comets.  It matters not whether they visit my mind or yours,–only that is comes from heaven.  A meteorological journal of the mind.  You shall observe what occurs in your latitude, I in mine.

I love what HDT says here about travelers going around the world to report on what they see but that another can stay home hand report on his/ her own life.

There is incredible beauty in living a simple life- I want to document that aspect of life.  

Not every post will be a Walden post, but I will share my study and experience of following in HDT footsteps and seeing where it takes me.

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After her husband’s sudden and unexpected death, Sharon McCuistian found herself a widow at the age of 48. With two grown children in college, Sharon had to find a way to live in her new reality. She turned to the things she loved to help in her grief: faith, family, and friends. Her love of words and writing became the cathartic venue by which she began to process her loss. It is through her grief journey that Now Choose Life was born. Read More

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