Hard is not Impossible

How is it that another weekend has come and gone?  I'm so not ready for Monday morning, but it will come regardless...

I'm starting Unglued by Lysa Terkeurst.  Today I read the first two chapters and took notes.  One quote that really resonated with me was, "Hard doesn't mean impossible."  In Lysa's context, she is talking about controlling our emotions and how they lead us to react.  This is nearly impossible for me.  Lysa describes different reactor types (I've not gotten to them yet), and depending on the situation, I react differently, but it is hard for me to differentiate between my feelings and the truth.  I feel like a failure, God tells me I'm chosen.  I feel stupid, God tells me that if I call on Him He'll show me great things and that if I lack wisdom I should ask and it be given to me.  I feel unloved at times, God says He's loved me with an everlasting love.  So even though it is hard for me to seperate feelings from truth, I  know that nothing is impossible for God and that His Spirit is working within me.

Needless to say, we'll still come Unglued.  Case in point?  I logged onto SPSS tonight and set out to do my first homework assignment.  Now for those of you who are unfamiliar with Biostats, all I can tell you is that I would probably do just as good taking a boat to Africa, going into the deepest jungle, and trying to speak the native language.  Ok, maybe it's not that bad.  Sadly, though, I'm just not a numbers girl... never have been, never will.  I got a headache.  My heart started pounding.  I worked on the assignment and just when I thought I had it figured out, I realized I didn't.  So I started over.  It still wasn't right.  Wallace, calm as he is, was answering my questions, and I had my two books out.  The tutorial video wouldn't work.  Did I mention that I had a headache?  ADHD Wallace decided that at that moment, it would be a good time to move the old couch out of the office so that he could move the treadmill in.  So he proceeds to pick the couch up.  It won't fit through the door.  He pushes and pushes and shakes the computer desk.  The whole time I'm sitting there staring at all these numbers and getting more depressed by the minute.  More Unglued...

I didn't scream.  I didn't even quarrel.  I just decided that I'd done all of it I could.  Tomorrow will be a new day. (For a procrastinator like me, that's an awesome plan. Scarlett was my hero).  I saved my work and emailed it to myself so I could try to watch the tutorial tomorrow evening sometime.  I even calmly expressed myself to Wallace.  He had no clue he had upset me. 

Yes, this class is hard.  It's not impossible.  I just need a new perspective.  A good night's sleep, and it will seem better.  And even if it doesn't, I'll make it through.  All things work together, and God's got a plan =)

Welcome, Fall

Fall means football and nippy weather and hoodies and Ugg boots.  It means the end of volleyball season and open gym for basketball and preparation for Christmas shopping. It means birthday shopping for October babies and presents for my November baby.  It means Thanksgiving with no room at my Mom's and touch football that sometimes turns into tackle with brothers fighting.  Lots of fun things about fall...

Even though summer is my favorite just because I have time to read and there are trips to the beach and the swimming pool to relax, sleeping in and lazing around, I really like fall.  I don't necessarily like the cold weather, but I do enjoy watching the leaves change color... and have I mentioned how much I like football?  High school, college, professional... that pretty much takes up my weekend.  It's during this busy time between volleyball games and practices that Wallace and I get to hang out.  We always grow closer during football season...

Tomorrow is the first official day of fall.  While I hate to see summer go, and warm weather go by the wayside, I'm embracing football season and fall. Here's to Halloween and touchdowns and laughing with TO's fan club, with snuggling in my hoodie and my Bobcat blue Uggs, to cheering so loud that I lose my voice... to leaves changing and being surrounded by orange, yellow, and red... Happy Fall, Y'all =)

Live Like That

My Caleb is something else.  He's funny and smart.  I am amazed by him every day of my life. Sometimes it's a good amazement... sometimes, not so much.  Tonight, it was the good kind.

There are days when we fight like cats and dogs.  Caleb is stubborn and can be very sassy.  He likes to call me "Woman" and sometimes he means it in a not so nice way.  He doesn't like to do homework and he likes to stay at home and watch TV, which totally contradicts my lifestyle of run, run, run...  He gets mad at me and I get mad at him and we tend to explode.  I'm trying to work on this.  I know he gets a bad temper from both me and his Dad and I can't get mad at him when it's my fault, right?  Especially when you consider that he's seeing me model some of the very same behaviors that I'm quarreling at him about. 

Even with his temper and his sassiness, he's still a great kid.  He is compassionate and caring most of the time, and he is just too funny.  He looks at life in his own unique way.  He's a whiz at technology... any kind.  Yesterday, he got a notecard from his teacher talking about how fun it was to have him in the classroom and how caring he is.  He got the biggest smile on his face, and my heart stretched just a little bit to think that I might have had just a little bit to do with that... let's face it, it takes a village, and Caleb has a very supportive village: Grandparents and great-grandparents and aunts and uncles and great-aunts, and all of these girls he calls his sisters...

Anyway, back to today... we had a really good evening together.  He went and hung out with my Grandma Na while I went to a parent meeting for the academic team.  I'm always flabbergasted by how mellow Mamaw is with Caleb (and Dylan and Mason and Landry...) If we had done some of the stuff they do when we were little, Jen, Glenn and I would be cutting our own switch, or at the very least sitting on opposite ends of the couch (which is hard when there's three of you.  Which is why we would usually catch Mamaw with her back turned and high-tail it down to Jen's, leaving Glenn to face her wrath... we really were mean cousins sometimes...) After I got finished, we went to McDonalds and just had a good conversation.  After church, Caleb cranked up his Ipod in the car.  He is like me and has an eclectic taste in music... but tonight it was all about Francesca Battestelli and the Sidewalk Prophets, who are going to be in town tomorrow night. He likes to tease me about "This is the Stuff", which really could have been written for me, dealing with lost car keys and lost phones and running late.  We sang it at the top of our lungs, and then he selected one by the Sidewalk Prophets.  "This is my favorite one, Mom.  Let's sing it, he said." 

Tears came to my eyes (and are right now as I'm typing this) as I listened to my little boy, who will quickly become a man belt out these words.  I know he doesn't know exactly what they mean, but then again, maybe he does.  Maybe that's why sometimes he will give up money so someone else can have something or why he prays so fervently for people he knows that are in trouble.  Maybe that's why he wanted to give the little girl the skateboard at Christmas time when Mission of Hope came last year.  Sure, he can be selfish, but I'm thinking maybe he gets it a little... "I want to live like that
And give it all I have So that everything I say and do Points to You If love is who I am Then this is where I'll stand Recklessly abandoned Never holding back."

Train up a child in the way he should go and when he gets old he won't depart from it... (my paraphrase).  When he gets old, he'll live like that... Lord, this is my prayer. 

Jesus Freak

Tonight I really didn't want to walk on my treadmill.  I'm tired, and it's been a long, rainy day.  All I really wanted to do was get in the bed and pull the covers over my head, but I needed to walk since I chose to drink half of a peanut butter milkshake...

So walk I did.  I put my Ipod on shuffle and flipped through until I got a song that I "felt" (anybody else guilty of doing that?  Leaving it all up to chance and then making the decision anyway? Sounds a lot like me in life...) I listened to "Revelation Song" by Jesus Culture and got my praise on.  How can you not, "Jesus Your name is power, Breath and Living Water"... How worthy is He?  Then "10,000 Reasons" by Matt Redman, "Bless the Lord, oh my Soul, Worship His Holy Name".  Toby Mac "Me Without You"... and then "Lose My Soul", one of my favorites.  "May Your Kingdom be what wakes us up, and lays us down". 

And then, as I closed out my walk, DC Talk... Old School.  "Jesus Freak".  "What will people do when they find out I'm a Jesus Freak?  There ain't no disguising the truth"

That's how it should be.  No disguising the truth.  No question about it.  Jesus living through me, in me, working through my actions.  The Bible says that they will know us by the fruit that we bear, and His fruit is patience, love, kindness...

My job is to let Him work through me, demonstrating these fruits, so there will be no disguising that I am His.  He's Worth it. 

Balance

It is the middle of September, and I just read my first book yesterday.  There is something wrong with that.  Granted, I'm reading about seven books right now, but to just finish one book in 15 days? 
Sadly, I'm not seeing any reading time in my near future, either, unless you count a Biostatistics book and an SPSS manual. 

Sometimes, you have to sacrifice to get what you want.  I'm telling myself this tonight... nobody signed me up for this doctoral program.  I filled out the application myself. And I do want this... but how much? 

I won't be finished until 2015.  That's a long time.  Caleb will be a teenager (oh, my... that in itself just might be more than I can take).  I'm reminded, though, that with hard work comes results and God has a plan and a purpose for everything. With that being said, I've been having some Unglued moments.  (Plug for Lysa Terkeurst's new book.  Can't wait to start reading!)Been smothering pretty bad.  Woke up the other morning with heart palpitations because I had so much going on.  So much to do... so little time to do it.  I'm sure you've been there and done that.  Everyone can relate to being overwhelmed, and if you can't, you should probably write a book and make lots of money from the rest of us. 

I'm a procrastinator, which makes this worse. I'm also one of those people who can't say "No".  So this means that my plate is more than full.  I have really been prioritizing lately, and I'm happy to say that even in my craziness, I think I'm starting to get it right. 

God first.  That means getting up in the morning and opening my Bible.  I'm reading in 1 Peter and in Colossians with a couple of online study groups, and just finished Esther in my Chronological Bible.  I haven't taken a Sabbath day the last few weeks, but I'm changing that this weekend.  Well, except for a couple of hours of Biostats.  (And just to be funny, I do pray while I'm doing biostats.  I need all the prayers I can get).

Family second. Hence the going to volleyball practice and elementary basketball games with Wallace.  Just hanging out.  Fighting with Caleb over homework.  These two guys are the most important people in my life, followed by my Mom and Dad and sisters.  I've got to keep showing it.

Then, work... and school.  One day at a time. Which is why I am so often typing lecture notes the night before class. 

I read on Facebook a status that I really liked, which kind of spoke of this. I hope Stephanie doesn't mind me stealing it...

"Isaac laid the foundation on the order of how we should treat aspects in our life. “And [Isaac] builded an altar there, and called upon the name of the Lord, and pitched his tent there: and there Isaac’s servants digged a well.” (Gen. 26:25.)
God is the highest most being and should be exalted first. We should not confuse God as ...

church and church as God. Instead we should include an alter in all areas of which we live. Everywhere we go God should be first and foremost. The tent is our family. The man is the head of the home whereas the woman is the heart of the home. With the two intertwined, our children can grow in a loving, safe environment. Finally, the dug well represents our work whether it is within a church or our careers. If we follow Isaac’s foundation, we will find more stability in our faith, home, and work."

 

So, in all of my ramblings, there it is. Balance and stability... and maybe even some time somewhere another to read a good book.  God bless, and good night. I'm going to take advantage of God's lullaby- the rain on my tin roof =)

What I Learned this Weekend

As I sit here tonight, I know what I want to write but I don't know how to get it out of my head.  Life is like that sometimes... all these thoughts whirl around and around and leave us feeling dizzy, and noone knows it but us.  We spend our lives in a blur, going from here to there to yonder, barely resting long enough to lay our heads on our pillows and fall into a dreamless sleep, only to awaken the next morning feeling as though our bodies never stopped.

I can't believe it is already halfway through September.  This year has truly flown by, and this weekend was no exception.  The saying goes time flies when you are having fun, and this weekend was no exception.  Here's some of the things I've learned this weekend...

1. Motivation comes from the heart, and we come alive when something pulls on our heartstrings.  Friday night, I watched my boys in blue get demolished in the first half against Somerset.  They just weren't in the game.  They were slugglish and never could get into rhythm.  They left the field looking rejected, and let's be honest, it's no fun to watch a game like that.  Then, at halftime, I'm not sure what happened.  All I know is that these boys have a guardian angel watching over them.  I think Zach kicked their butts into gear, because when they came back out they were on fire.  High school football is heart at its finest... leaving it all on the gridiron. I'm just happy that I get to go along for the ride in the bleachers.

2. We always need to be thankful for the little things. Saturday morning I went with Mom, Kami, and Caleb to the Walk to Defeat ALS at Rupp Arena.  We walked in memory of Joe Henson,  a local physical therapist who passed away from ALS a couple of years ago.  I didn't really know Joe well, but my Mom did. Joe was one of her boys.  As a teacher and cheerleading coach, Mom has given her heart to more boys and girls than I could count. She's celebrated as they went on to get married and had babies, worked with some of those babies, and she's also mourned and grieved with them and for them. As we walked the laps around Rupp, Caleb saw a couple of patients in wheelchairs, which led to conversation about how blessed we are to be able to walk.  I don't enjoy exercise all of the time, but it is a privilege.  As is breathing without effort, and laughing at a good joke, and hugging my family.  We take for granted the small things...

3. It's great to be a Jackson Tiger... As a Breathitt grad, I bleed blue and white.  I've been raised that way.  In the last couple of years, Itty Bitty Jackson City has gotten into my blood as well.  I guess you can say that I'm just confused, because I cheer for so many different teams.  Kids are kids no matter what, and we should support them.  So Wallace, Mom, and I drove to Frankfort and cheered on those Jackson Tigers in the State All A Soccer Cup.  Our kids at Jackson are great.  The soccer team performed well, and the 4-0 score did not reflect the effort left on the field.  Our pep section rocked (my opinion might be biased, as my favorite volleyball girls made up a large part of the student section)... Jackson made its presence known.  I'd love to see the same in basketball...

4. I am madly in love with my husband.  Really and truly.  Wallace and I have had some rough times.  I've not  been shy about putting it all out there.  For a while, I really thought we had totally lost our way, but things happen for a reason.  This weekend, we spent a lot of time in the car together, which has always been some of our best times.  And the last few weeks we've really been making an effort to hang out and talk.  Relationships need time invested, and with our busy schedules, we had kind of let that slide by the wayside.  One way I've been doing this is going to volleyball practice with him.  I take my papers to grade or my homework to work on or a book to read.... and tonight, as I was making notes on leadership, I looked up and saw it.  His whistle was around his neck and he was teaching those girls about some play, and they were listening, and all was right with the world.  Now sometimes they roll their eyes at him, and mutter under their breath, but this practice there was none of that.  I just felt my heart swell.  I've always loved him... but I'm beginning to like him again.  And I think he's beginning to like me again, too.  Someone once said that the secret to marriage is falling in love with that person over and over again. So today was a good day.

5. I am a true procrastinator.  I have lecture notes to write... for Tuesday.  I just laid my book down in the floor.  I'll do it tomorrow... tonight, I'm headed to bed.  This blog may not have made any sense at all... and if it doesn't that's probably good.  If it does, hold on.  Stay motivated.  Cheer for the underdogs.  Love with all your heart, even if there is a chance that it may get broken.  And get a good night's sleep, because everything looks better in the morning.  =)

Gifts of the Word

It's been a while since I've written about my Joy Dare, encouraged by Ann Voskamp, writer of 1000 Gifts.  I've been keeping track and am well over 700 now.  It's really opened my eyes about being thankful... today, on the way to work I heard the song "Should've Been" by Citizen Way and a line really hit me where it hurt... The song is talking about his wife, his kids, his family, his life, and he says, "If I'm so thankful, why do I easily forget that you died for all of this?"  How true is this...

We have so much to be thankful for, yet in the hustle and bustle of everyday life it's easy to get sidetracked.  It's easy to focus on what you don't have and forget what you do.  Easy to take for granted the person you love the most in the world, easy to think that you'll always have that moment, easy to get disgusted over all of the laundry you've got to do and forget that it's a blessing that at least you have clothes.

Today's dare was to find three gifts in the Word.  The more I read the Bible, the more I love  it, and I'm not just saying that.  I've always loved reading, but have never read the Bible through.  This year, I've soaked it up. I know it won't always be like that, and there are days that it is harder than others.  Like today... I'm reading in 1 Chronicles, and it's basically the genealogy of the Israelites as they are preparing to travel back to Jerusalem from Babylon... so it's so and so begot so and so and the names all run together.  The beauty of this, though, is that they are people.  They lived a story, which shows that life is a gift and that God is writing our story just as He wrote theirs. (And no, I didn't list it as one of my gifts of the Word.  I didn't get that much out of it... grin).

My first was a verse from 1 Peter, 1:8... You love Him even though you don't see Him.  How beautiful is that?  I love Wallace... really love him, and am just realizing how much.  I love him because I see him every day... because we talk and communicate and share things. This love can't compare to my love for Christ... and I've never laid eyes on Him.  Can't even imagine how I'll feel when I do.  He is the culmination of our faith, that we can believe that we live because of Him even though how we do so is a mystery even the angels wonder about...

My second was a verse from Psalm 111- I heard a sermon preached on it this weekend.  The wondrous works of God, and His abundant love and mercy... may I never forget it.  May I never take it for granted.  May I never stop being overcome by it.

And then, for my third verse, I played that whole open the Bible and see where it falls trick... and it opened to Luke 24. The greatest gift in the Word. the Word made flesh, risen and Alive... How fitting is that?

And tonight I went to Bible Study and listened as Brother Gary talked about the Word, and how faith is hearing the Word,and how having knowledge of the Word will keep us from being deceived.  Knowledge of this gift... may we always be thankful...