Excerpt: "Live Like You're Blessed"
May 16, 2006 -- Dr. Suzan Johnson Cook's book "Live Like You're Blessed: Simple Steps for Making Balance, Love, Energy, Spirit, Success, Encouragement, and Devotion Part of Your Life" is based the acronym BLESSED. The word's letters helped form her proposal for better living through faith. Cook, a pastor, is the first woman to be elected president of the Hampton University Ministers' Conference which represents all of the historically African-American denominations.
Cook uses her own stories as well as the stories of her parishioners to teach the readers about overcoming adversity. She tackles problems like low self-esteem, domestic abuse, personal debt and spiritual poverty. To help relieve one's burdens, Cooks suggests prayer. She reminds readers to give thanks for blessings they already have.
Read an excerpt below:
Chapter 1: Steadying the Seesaw
I heard a story recently about a woman who was proud that she was able to push herself beyond the limits of endurance. And she did manage to get a lot done in the course of the day. But then again, her "day" didn't really end at sundown, or even close to it. In fact, this graphics designer found herself working until 2:30 one morning, and only stopped when she could no longer hold her eyes open. Wanting to have plenty of time the next morning--there was so much to do--she set her alarm for 4:30 a.m. This way, she could finish the work project, get her son off to school, run errands, and take care of household chores.
Just as she'd planned, she was up two hours later, waking herself with a cool shower and mug of steaming coffee. She read her son's homework and convinced him to redo certain sections, while she made him a special breakfast of pancakes. Soon she was waving goodbye to him at the bus stop. Knowing that two hours of sleep hadn't been nearly enough, she scheduled another two at mid-morning and fell into a deep sleep.
When she awoke, she figured that some kind of gooey mucus or something had dried over her eyes, because her vision was out of focus. When a warm water rinse failed to do the trick, she started panicking, thinking about all the reasons she needed her eyes, wondering for instance, "How will I see what I want to draw for work? How will I see how to get down the street to pick up my son?"
She started praying, begging God to help her get her sight back. "Forgive me for bothering you," she started. "God I know there are people who have it worse than me ... people who can't see and can't hear. But please, if it's your will, let me see again."
That calmed her down a little bit, and sometime in the next hour, her vision began improving, but still wasn't back to where it had been. She phoned her physician, scheduled an emergency appointment, but almost pulled a no-show, because she began seeing with complete clarity again. Still, puzzled over why the loss of vision had occurred, and terrified that the episode was the first sign of some terrible illness, she kept the appointment and submitted to a complete physical.
After a full exam, her doctor said he couldn't offer any explanation for her loss of eyesight. The doctor told her she was healthy: great blood pressure, cholesterol, blood sugar. And the temporary loss of vision, he assured her, was not a symptom of degenerating nerves, brain tumors, etc. He added, "I have to admit that I'm stumped."
Grateful and eager to get on with her busy schedule, she thanked the young doctor and was about to say goodbye, when he turned and asked, "By the way, before this occurred were you involved in anything that might have caused you a lot of stress?"
She laughed, and at least that felt good, now that she knew death wasn't imminent. "Doctor, I'm always doing something stressful. Last night, for instance, I was on a deadline, so I only slept for two hours ... But don't look so surprised. I took another two hours this morning as soon as I sent off the completed job." When he failed to look impressed, she said, "I try to catch up on my sleep on the weekends."
