Quarterly Reflections
More on development, healing, love & reviving dead dreams.
New week, new letter! Hey everyone, hope you’ve all had a great start to the week so far. Today, I’ll be introducing quarterly reflections with Lessons in Seasons. A newsletter dedicated to sharing some of my top lessons and reflections each quarter. It’s so important we take stock as we go through the year and I hope this encourages you to do the same. Before we get into today’s newsletter, here’s a round-up of our newsletters over the last three weeks:
🗞️ Roundup of Lessons in Seasons
Rhieme Recommends 💌
💸 Finances: As we step into a new quarter, it may be time to review your finances. This is a free budgeting tracker by Uncovered Conversations. Simply duplicate it to use.
Podcast: ‘The Unforgiveness is Stealing Your Peace’ by You Can Rest Here: this episode is perfect for anyone struggling with unforgiveness.
Now let’s get into today’s newsletter!
Quarterly Reflections with Lessons in Seasons ☁️
Reflection 1
☁️ Accept the unexpected: Time and time again, the lesson on releasing timelines, deadlines and mental notes of grand plans comes up. If there’s one thing I picked up from Q1, it’s to let go of timelines. Sometimes we don’t realise, that we’ve set a pace and trajectory of our lives based on the happenings of others. Someone may have bought a house at 25 and all of a sudden the question of why haven’t I bought one, may come up. But why? Imagine if we had no access to the lives of others, would we still feel behind? Why do we use human clocks to judge the pace of our lives? Especially when in reality, there are truly no deadlines. Times and seasons are in God’s hand. Anything can change at any time, in a moment. I’m coming to realise that surrendering to God’s timing is the best place to be.
I trust that even when:
Life takes an unexpected turn.
Doors open & close.
Relationships end and new relationships spring forth.
God is in the detours, and all things are working together for my good.
Reflection 2
☁️ Remember what true love is: I’ve found myself desiring to love people around me in a greater capacity. Not the type of love that is conditional, but truly unconditional. To give from a place of overflowing with love and not for love. Often times we may find ourselves pondering on whether those around us are showing us love, care, support etc. But these days I find myself asking, how can I be the friend I desire to have? How can I continuosly invest in my relationships? Whether I’m particularly close to one or not? I think these are questions it’s important to ask, it it truly better to give than receive. We live in a world that can be quiet individualistic and it’s important we constantly remind ourselves that we are not here to simply serve ourselves. At the heart of loving others is the ability to receive love from the one who is the definition of love— God. Over the past few months, I’ve realised that I cannot be a loving person in my own strength. It is God who enables me to do this, through receiving His love and allowing others experience it through me. Another crucial aspect to touch on is, forgiveness. I know that feeling where it’s hard for you to receive or give love when you are hurting. And just when you are recovering from the hurt, something else tugs at you again. I get it, I’ve been there. But what I would say is, forgiveness is necessary to truly love. Sometimes we may never receive the apology we desire, but forgiveness sets us free in ways we may not even imagine. Our hearts need it.
🎧 Listen to this podcast episode for a deeper dive on forgiveness it’s amazing:
And as a reminder, to anyone who has been struggling to accept love, I want to remember that you are capable of being loved and receiving love. I highly recommend this book ‘Understanding Why God Loves You’ by Demi Osunsina if you want to dive deeper into this.
Reflection 3
☁️ Pick up Dead Dreams: Sometimes we don’t realise that the mundane routine of life, disappointments, unexpected detours and so on, could contribute to us limiting our expectations for our lives and seeing ourselves beyond our circumstances. Imagine this, you have a dream for becoming the vice president of a leading organisation however you find your present role deeply unfulfilling or you may be struggling to even get your foot into the industry. Let’s be honest, it is tempting to discount that aspiration and settle for less. Perhaps because it may seem more unrealisitic. But if we constantly settle because our present lives are far from what we envision, where is the room for faith? Faith has nothing to do with what is seen and I believe that faith first starts with the words God has spoken over our lives. I’m coming to realise that when God speaks over us, He speaks with the end in mind. We need to be intentional about coming into agreement with the words we have over our lives and asking God for the ability to see beyond the physical.
⚓️ One of my anchor verses is:
Romans 4:12 ‘ God made something out of Abraham when he was a nobody…. Abraham was first named “father” and then became a father because he dared to trust God to do what only God could do: raise the dead to life, with a word make something out of nothing.’
Pay close attention to the fact that Abraham was first named father even in his state of childlessness. It’s the same for you who is reading this, you may have words God has given you and you may look nothing like the words spoken over you, but I want to remind you that God’s words are unfailing. You may have failed. You may have made mistakes. You may have gone off course, but it is not too late to return back to God and immerse yourself in Him and accept His promises over you. Ask for specific scriptures that pertain to you and hold unto them. Some of us may even be afraid to pick up those dead dreams due to fear, but it’s important that we bypass this and move forward. I expand more on overcoming fear in the newsletter below:
But remember this, God’s word over you, will surely come to pass. Go back to those journals where you wrote endless notes of your dreams and aspirations. Ideas you know you ought to have executed a while ago, could you try and go again? Let’s not be the ones to slow ourselves down unnecessarily in times when the timeliness of our actions are crucial.
Reflection 4
☁️ Lay strong foundations: The quality of the foundations we lay today, will determine how long we last for. My most important foundation is my relationship with God and I’ve been actively looking for ways to strengthen it. Right now this has looked like being more intentional about having my quiet time daily, praying with friends, going out of my comfort zone to build community and joining my church’s discipleship course ‘Masterlife’. I felt the need to join this at the start of the year as I knew it was important to go back to the fundamentals of my faith and ensure I am truly well grounded. I don’t know what this could look like for you, but what I would say is, investing in our relationship with God is truly the most secure investment. You can start with where you are and if you’ll like to speak more on developing a relationship with God, please send me a message.
Reflection 5
☁️ Trust God Again: On the point of investing in our relationship with God, I also want to address the resistance some of us may feel when we feel like we have experienced repeated disappointed . Trust me, I understand, and I expanded more on this in my last newsletter. Today I want to encourage you to trust again. God is not a God of disappointment, and what I mean by this is, he is for us and not against us. When we go through situations that don’t seem to make sense, He is there and very aware. We may find healing hard especially in testing phases and when it feels like we have been let down big time. What has strengthened me in times like this is reminding myself of the nature and character of God. This has looked like meditating on scriptures, listening to sermons, recounting testimonies I’ve experienced and generally creating an atmosphere to build up my faith. If you find yourself in a questioning phase, I highly recommend listening to this sermon, it addresses this so beautifully. Watch here.
And lastly in all of this, being vulnerable and asking for help has truly been one of the best decisions I’ve made this quarter. We’re not meant to go through life alone. As we’ve stepped into a new quarter, I want to encourage you to be intentional about building community and lean on those around you. My messages are open as well.
Let’s Reflect
As we step into this new week, here are some questions to ponder on. Our first newsletter of the year included them:
Spiritually: how can you grow your relationship with God this quarter? What do you need to invest in practically?
Financially: how can you grow your finances this quarter? Do you need to save more? Be more disciplined with your budget? On the topic of budgeting, here’s a free budgeting tracker by Uncovered Conversations. Simply duplicate and you can use it on notion.🩷
Relationally: are there relationships you need to invest more into this quarter? Have you spent time asking loved ones how you can truly love them?
Health: how can you take care of my body? Are there unhealthy health habits you need to unlearn?
Professionally: how can you develop yourself professionally? Do you need to upskill? Take new courses?
Journalling Prompts
How has the first quarter of the year been for you so far?
What is the state of your relationships? Are there people you need to forgive?
What is one thing, you are actively working towards in this quarter?
As always I hope this met you where you are. Share your thoughts, share with a friend and I’ll see you next week! ♥️
Love,
Rhieme
“But if we constantly settle because our present lives are far from what we envision, where is the room for faith?”
You have no idea what this question is going to help me navigate in this season. Thank you 💛.