It's been a torrid week here in New Zealand.
I don't like following the news, but even I would have to have been living under a rock not to have been caught up in the fallout of our country's worst ever mass shooting.
It's hard to stay upbeat and grateful when atrocities like this occur in your back yard.
I grew up in Manchester in England when the IRA were running their terrorist bombing attacks in England. I thought that when we moved to New Zealand I'd gotten away from these kind of hate crimes. It appears that I have been mistaken.
My first reaction was to immediately cease what I had planned for the weekend--I was going out of town to support a dear friend of mine who was getting baptised--my sudden fear of being in a place of worship after one had just been targeted. But I decided that if I chose the path of fear instead of the path of faith, that I would be allowing this vile and violent act to dictate the way I chose to live my life.
I choose to live in the light.
I went to my friends baptism and it was the best place that I could have been at the time.
Whatever you choose today, my wish for you is that it is a positive choice that brings love, light and gratitude into your life.
It is going to take some time for our country to recover from this attack, but what I've seen over the last week is that we are clearly a country that embraces diversity, faith, community and love.
I'm blessed to live in a special part of the world.
Yours in love & gratitude,
Toni xx
PS I've previously talked about how my Passion Pulse is the bedrock of my life. If you're interested, click here and take a look.