Day 3: When you wake up in the morning, Pray to ask God’s guidance for your purpose, today.

     Today's practice is not a novel idea. I have a daily morning prayer routine that involves the Book of Common Prayer and the devotional guide that our church provides.  I pray daily that His purpose would be revealed to me. 

     Until fairly recently, I felt that His purpose was a mystery. And I still grapple with what I want to be when I grow up. But I am learning that His purpose is very clear. 

     As stated in John 13:34, "A new command I give you: Love one another.  As I have loved you, so you must love one another."   In 1 Peter, Christians are encouraged to "above all hold unfailing your love for one another." Paul reminds us that while these gifts are God given and the use of those gifts are essential for Christ's mission to be accomplished, none of these matter if love is not at the core of our motives. I love how in verse 1 of  1 Cor. 14, Paul says, "Make love your aim".

    In Mere Christianity, C.S. Lewis outlines that the Church "exists for nothing else but to draw men into Christ, to make them little Christs. If they are not doing that, all the cathedrals, clergy, missions, sermons, even the Bible itself, are simply a waste of time. God became Man for no other purpose.”

   If love is the aim, what does Christian love look like?
 
   Love that never fails to visit the elderly shut-in.

   Love that brings you supper when you are in the grip of grief.

   Love that changes diapers and rocks babies in the nursery.

   Love that makes preschool Christmas ornaments sparkling with glitter (Satan's dandruff).

   Christian love is that of servitude and humility. It always points to the Cross, that we are crucified with him so that we are resurrected into new life. 

  

Day 2 (months later) Spend 10 Minutes a Day in Silence

   It's been a long winter.  Cold, snowy, and dark.  Lately our North Carolina winters have been rather wimpy.  True, we have the occasional cold snap where we have to wear a heavy coat, and we push the heat up a bit- but this was an unusually rough winter.  As much as I try to embrace winter, slow down, and see it as an opportunity to rest and recharge from the normal pace of life- I miss the sunlight of Summer.
    Like our prehistoric ancestors, I hibernate.  It's harder to come out of my den of a bedroom. I want to sleep more and indulge in comfort foods which is not a good formula when trying to manage your weight. All inclination toward isolation, leaves me cranky and pessimistic. But I don't like taking pills and I'm not a very good patient. Which led me to find an outlet for these negative feelings stirring inside me in these days.  So, I'm dusting off the blog and picking up where I left off, hoping that twenty-four days from now this practice of healthy habits will have paid off. It will help that twenty-four days from now is the first day of Spring and Daylight Savings Time will have begun.  I am feeling better already!

Day 2:  Spend 10 minutes a Day in Silence

    

Day One: Take a Walk & Smile!

     The first challenge was to take a 10-30 minute walk everday, and SMILE.  It has been established in multiple studies that being active benefits us mentally as well as physically. Research reported in the British Journal of Sports Medicine found that walking 30 minutes a day boosted the moods in depressed patients faster than antidepressants. Why? Walking releases natural pain­killing end­or­phins to the body – one of the emotional benefits of exercise. A California State University, Long Beach, study showed that the more steps people took during the day, the better their moods were.
                                                         

     And it did! It probably was those beautiful endorphins firing, but it was also the inner teacher's pet, puffing her chest out with pride, saying- "I did something good for myself today. I walked today."  And that healthy behavior led to me making better health decisions in what I ate and how much t.v. I viewed.

    Tomorrow's challenge...sit in silence for 10 minutes a day.  I'm going to have to get up early for this one.
   

25-day Challenge: Tips for a Beautiful Life

  During a quick check of my Facebook this morning, I came across a post entitled, "25 Tips for a Beautiful Life." The facebook friend who shared it said she was going to print it out and put it on her refrigerator. I consider this person to be grounded, so I gave it a look and agreed that the suggestions were pretty good. I thought to myself,  if after 25 days of really trying to practice each of these tips daily, would I see my life differently?   Would I view my world differently?  If as the title suggested have a more beautiful life.  I am at a point in my life that I am sensing the passage of time very keenly.  I am approaching my 37th year.  I suppose if I have an average life span, I am at mid-life. At this mid-life point, I find myself asking am I spending it well?

  I love the quote by tennis great, Arthur Ashe who said, "You've got to get to the stage in life where going for it is more important than winning or losing."

            You can either dip your foot in wondering if the water's just right or you can just jump in!

                                                              Let's go for it, shall we?

Day One:  Take a 10-30 minute walk every day. & while you walk, SMILE. It is the ultimate antidepressant.

I'll report in later on today's experiment.

Enduring Patience

Geeze! It's been a while since I posted.  Sorry about that.  There has been a lot going on in my brain and around the house leading me to write this post on patience.  In fact two-thirds through writing this my computer froze up and I lost everything that I had written pre-freeze.  Ironic?

June was a month of decisions.  I decided to go back to work.  It was a tug-of-war decision in my heart and mind.  In my heart where my emotions lie, it was like a Jerry Springer-style episode entitled, "Working Mothers and the Children they Abandon vs. Stay at Home Mothers and the Children they Adore." Catchy, huh?  Ultimately, it was my rational thinking that won out encouraging me that sometimes the best and most loving act for my family is to leave them for at least a few hours a day to exercise my gifts and talents in service to others.

Off to find a job! Lo and behold I found what was essentially my old job! A job I loved and missed.  I jumped at the opportunity to pick up where I had left off.  I quickly applied for it.  The morning of my interview, I sat down with my coffee to read my daily devotion and what was it entitled, "Opportunity of Suffering".  This was not a good sign.  It should have been about God's goodness or his ever-presence, but not suffering.  Later that day, I interviewed then waited for a response. The response I received was not what I wanted to hear, but what I needed.  I was offered a position, but not the one I interviewed for.  This time I listened to my heart which knew the right thing to do was politefully refuse.  The position offered was not the correct use of my gifts and talents.  It would just be a job.

As I await the position that is the right fit, I'm practicing patience.  The Bible says patience is a fruit of the Spirit among Christians (Galatians 5:22).
Like a long distance runner, it is cultivated through endurance of our struggles. By responding with patience in these struggles, we grow our faith in Christ's power and purpose in our life. Always leaning on God, waiting, allowing him to create the perfect environment and circumstances for our lives. In our waiting, with enduring patience, we say to God, "I trust you to do as you see fit."

Going With the Flow

       As I eye my May calendar, I can no longer ignore the date circled in red and the daily "X's". Yes, the last day of school is quickly upon me.  Now, I know some of you parents out there are chomping at the bits for your children's school year to be over.  You've designed an elaborate homecoming as your kids pile out of the mini-van celebrating the end of another successful school year.  You've specifically created a "Summer Bucket List" board on Pinterest.  Summer is going to be BIG FUN at your house and I am happy for your family.... Meanwhile at my house, I am double checking to see if I have refilled my Xanax prescription.
      It's not that I don't delight for my children that their summer break is here.  Sometimes being a kid is hard.  My kids work very hard during the year, and I am glad they get some time off to relax.  Lord, knows their teachers do! That being said, summer break is hard for me as a mother.  Rewind to a couple of years ago, when my oldest child had just completed kindergarten. My son was getting ready to enter school and my baby was a little less of a baby anymore.  It would be my first summer as full time stay at home mom, and we were going to have a rockin' summer.  I did all the activities I just made fun of in the first paragraph.  I got to school early to pick up my daughter, and before we even got out of the school parking lot she was in tears.
       "Jill, what's wrong?" I asked.
       "I am going to miss my teachers!" She replied.  She was so filled with emotion that I could barely understand her through the tears.  It was not exactly the response I expected for the start of all the festivities I had planned for us this summer.  Had she not seen our bucket list?  Sobbing over your teachers was not on my summer intinerary!  Eventually we did have some fun. But, it means checking this control freak's expectations at the door.

       I know everyone enjoys things more when there is no set agenda and no rigid timeline. On most days we all start the day just willing to go along with whatever comes our way.  It's these moments when I'm able to have interesting conversations with my kids that really bond us together as a family.  Sometimes we make it to the library's Summer Reading program, some weeks we don't.  Instead we just sit on pillows in the living room, splitting a bowl of cheese balls reading a great book.  Sometimes we have scripted playdates with friends, but most days we don't.  Rather, we go for an impromtu picnic on the parkway and stand in awe at what a beautiful world we're blessed to have.  Somewhere, along the way I heard a writer describe parenting as "a lot like waiting for the right time to step onto the down escalator." A-men.
      This summer I'm going to impose a "go with the flow" rule at our house.  The dishes may not get done and the laundry may have to wait- but making memories with my kids will be at the top of my to-do list.  And when school returns in August we may all say, "that was the best summer ever!"
     

   

The Spring of My Discontent

   A week ago, my greatest nemisis began rearing it's ugly head again. I try to ignore her, but sometimes she's loud, obnoxious, and the harder I try to ignore her the more attention she demands.  Her name is discontentment, and I absolutely abhor her.  Discontentment has been a part of my life for a long time.  Does she visit you as well?  I can sense when she's around.  She sours my mood, changing my perspective on everything around me. Suddenly, I hate the color of my walls. I want to do something drastic to my hair. She makes my world seem ugly and small.  And worst of all, I feel like she laughs at me.  Making me feel that  I am powerless to change anything that could give me some relief.

   I was sitting on my front porch steps wishing that I had more opportunities to see beyond my narrow world. I thought about my Grandmother who was definitely a homebody.  She never had traveled much in her life, and was perfectly fine with that.  She was happiest in her home and garden than vacationing at the beach, in the mountains, or another state or country.  Although you'd never know it from my life's trajectory, I'm not entirely content staying put.  My dream is to see as much of the world as I can and take my family along for the ride. I would love to look at a map at the end of my life and see so many good memories from my travels.  

   Then the Boston Marathon bombings happened.  We all watched, as what should have been a celebration of the human spirit, turn bloody and chaotic.  As the authorities and media began piecing together the identities of the bomber we came to know, as Conrad knew, "the mind of man is capable of anything.” Like a switch flipping, all my longings seemed petty.  People were dealing with life and death decisions. While the surviving terrorist was (thankfully) captured, the five families were mourning the loss of their loved ones. Many survivors of the blasts were recovering from serious injuries such as amputations.  And those who thought they knew these young men sat in disbelief.

(AP Photo/Matt Rourke)

   It is my belief that God never causes bad things to happen. But he will use whatever he has at his disposal to teach us, and sometimes shake us.  That these "dark nights of our soul" can be used to deepen our faith.  I'm not sure I want my frenemy to go away completely. She moves me toward action. We can all use a little kick in the pants sometimes.