“Do not fear death, but rather the unlived life.
You don’t have to live forever, You just have to live”
Tuck Everlasting
Sandi and a Ugandan child
Hello! My name is Sandi Bird.
I’m a 48-year-old woman who has been blessed with a huge family. By the time you add my immediate family (my mom, my children, their spouses and their children) and my extended immediate family (my mother-in-law, my ex, his siblings, a few of my ex’s ex’s…yes, you read that right, all of my ex’s children from various marriages, their spouses and their children) I lose count. Once in the family, always in the family. It’s kind of being like a king or queen in Narnia. B-) I haven’t a husband in a lot of years. I guess in part because I haven’t really had time for one since the one I had ditched me in 1998.
I’m often asked, “So what do you do?” Funny, how hard can it be to answer a simple 5 word question? A much longer question, eliciting a much shorter answer would be, “How do you earn the majority of your income on a regular basis?” I could take the easy way out and say that I’m an LPN. That would be true for the second question, but only a partial truth for the first. Truth be known, I’ve lived a multi-faceted life that has led me to “do” a great many things, so much so that family and friends have a difficult time keeping up with me. However it is important to remember that who we are is not determined by what we do for a living.
What makes me think I have anything important to say to You?
I have to laugh at that question. I could say that it is because of my interesting and crazy past. That is true. However I want to get a plug in for the fact that I think a great number of people have important things to say…or they could if they were encouraged and given a chance to do so. In 1998 I was fresh out of a 17-year-long marriage and hurting desperately. I was depressed and suicidal. I felt like I was a failure to everyone: my kids, my spouse, my family, the world, and , oh yeah…God. If you had told me back then that I would travel the world – South America, Europe, Africa, and here in the States as well – helping people in the multitude of capacities in which I’ve functioned, I would have laughed you to scorn. And it would have made me feel even worse for the missed potential. Back then I felt that God could never use me again. I’d failed at life.
But my story didn’t end back then. And how grateful I am for that! Since 1998 I’ve traveled the globe both for ministry and for pleasure, I’ve started successful businesses. The two remaining ones are temporarily on hold while I focus on family situations (my mom’s fight with Stage 4 lung cancer and a son who is incarcerated). However with a renewed sense of direction from Michael E Gerber’s The eMyth Revisited, I am working toward relaunching both by the end of the year. I am a freelance writer and am reviving 3 columns I was writing on Examiner.com. Previously I reported on current events in the travel industry on Huliq.com, and I have recently been asked to step in as a guest writer on a weight loss blog. I’m also in the process of writing several books.
Secular and Ministry Work Background
My life has been very full and very blessed. Blessings do not always manifest is huge bank accounts, fancy houses, and expensive cars. More important than that are the relationships that we foster along the way and the value that we add to the lives of those around us…the forgiveness that we extend to others, a seed from which in time we reap a harvest in our own lives.
One of my greatest pleasures is meeting new people and learning about other cultures. When you boil it all down, we are all the same. We live, we die, we hurt, we feel joy, we all walk through this life with a great potential or calling. It is in helping others to reach their full potential that we will eventually fulfill our own. I live my life to serve. If there is any legacy that I hope to leave behind is that I lived to serves others as I saw Jesus do.
I have loved much, laughed much, been hurt much, forgiven much and have chosen to keep believing the best in those around me…Even those who have caused me the greatest pain. I have seen things both good and bad that most people will never have the opportunity or the time to see, and in experiences I am twice my natural age. Most importantly, I have experienced and know the love and forgiveness of my Savior and in the end, that is most important.
I am truly Blessed!
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