An Excerpt

My book, “288 Chances”, is a collection of writings that reflect some of my thoughts on everyday life and the moments that make up our day-to-day existence.  Inspired by a single word, I wrote whatever came to mind, the first thoughts that popped into my head, without thinking too hard. It was important to get my thoughts down as quickly as possible, without caring about grammar or punctuation, before the train left the station and the words escaped me and I found myself with my fingers poised over my keyboard – and nothing.  When the inspiration on seeing the word was immediate, my fingers couldn’t type fast enough!

One of the words in my book is “Unexpected”.  What first enters your mind when you see the word?  Perhaps you’ve recently experienced something unexpected, something you weren’t looking for to happen.  We would hope our unexpected is always going to be good, but as unpredictable as life is, it may not always be welcome.  I happen to think the most important thing about unexpected, good or bad, is what we learn or gain from it.

Here is an excerpt from my book.

“Life is full of unexpected.  It it wasn’t, we would all know the why, what, when and where every event in our life would take place and how it all turns out.  Unexpected events can change the very direction of our lives in an instant.  Unexpected – tragic changes us one way.  Unexpected – happy or joyous changes us in another.  The real challenge lies in how we react and respond to these unexpected moments, how we grow, change, learn or benefit from them.”



Maybe you learned something about yourself through an unexpected experience in your life.  Maybe it was good, maybe it wasn’t.  But just maybe you discovered a positive quality in yourself or perhaps an inner strength you have that you hadn’t realized was there before.  And maybe you’ll find five minutes to sit down and write about it sometime.

As I wrote in my book “Unexpected can show us things about ourselves we might not otherwise see”. 

Will you look at your next “unexpected” as misfortune or as an opportunity?

Think about it.

Thanks for visiting!

Brenda  :)

My softcover book is available for purchase now at WestBow Press, a division of Thomas Nelson, Barnesandnoble.com, Amazon.com, and other online retailers.