Sunday, January 17, 2016

Stress is a funny opponent.

Okay, so more often than not I spend a good bit of my day laughing, or whistling-I whistle a lot too. Sometimes it's laughing at something so funny it brings tears to my eyes. Sometimes I have to laugh to keep from crying. Sometimes I laugh because I really just don't know what other response to have.
Stress is a funny opponent. Stress tends to twirl you around on the dance floor, dip you romantically, and then drop you like a hot plate. Currently stress has me out on the dance floor but seems to be dipping me, dropping me, and picking me back up for round after round.  To be honest, I'm not really sure what to do with this. My brain is going a thousand miles a minute and I feel like I can't grab a hold of a single thought.
It's times like this that show me just how reliant I can become on myself and the people around me.  How often I count on a work out or a rant to friends to fix it or feel better.  How often I seek worldly things to calm me or comfort me. It takes me some time to allow my spirit to calm and heart to remember that it's not about me and I am not the one who can change my unsettled being to calm. Sometimes the Lord lets me fall on my butt one more time before he picks me up and escorts me off the dance floor for some quiet time with Him to refresh and reboot. One of these days I'm going to ask to be escorted off the floor and sit out a dance...until then I'm thankful for the grace that my Lord extends to me on a frequent and sometimes daily basis.

Monday, January 4, 2016

Timing and little things.

Isn't it funny how certain people, places, and things come to our lives at just the right time? Even when the time is not necessarily by our choosing? How certain songs come on the radio when you've held in a much needed cry for several days and you hear that song that always brings tears but at this moment opens the floodgates and you almost feel 5 emotional pounds lighter? How you watch a movie for the thousandth time but this time it catches you the right way and you laugh so hard you can't catch your breath- the kind of laugh that you've not been able to manage in a while because of how hard and heavy life has seemed. 
I've had a few of those moments over the last several weeks. Did it fix everything and wrap it up in a pretty bow? No, of course not. Did it fix all the problems I've been focused on in normal everyday life? Not really. Did it cause me to stop? Yes. Did it cause me to appreciate that solitary moment in time that my life was overtaken by an emotion I was forced to feel because I'd been too busy, or stubborn, or something up until that moment? Yes, it did. 
Funny story coming 'atcha- I really just have one large vice in life. That happens to be coffee somebody else makes. I'm not necessarily a loyalist but yeah, Starbucks and Dunkin (mortal enemies, I know) typically top the list. My husband and I are really trying hard to buckle down and meet some financial goals this year. So, for me, my coffee routine has obviously taken a hit...mostly because we have two children we need to feed but that's really the only reason...Now, coffee is not something I prayed about giving up. I did not give my coffee treat guilt over to the Lord. I thought it minuscule in the scheme of things and just decided to suck it up for a while. However, no less than 3 weeks after trying hard to contribute to our new goal I was gifted a rather nice gift card and then another one for Starbucks and Dunkin. I know it sounds trite y'all but it's the little things. I remember sending my mom a message almost in tears, she did cry, about how the Lord has control and cares about the big things like my heart and my salvation but he knows the ins and outs of my wants and needs all the way down to coffee. Honestly y'all, that is one of those "oh, how he loves me" moments that might not seem like a big deal to anybody else but boy did it rock my world. 
That being said, it's the little things. The song on the radio, the movie, the 6 minutes in the shower without interruption instead of 4, the meal a friend randomly brings, the random text with a thank you or encouragement, a cup of coffee. Don't discount the seemingly small life things. It's in those moments that our Creator shows his difference and his intimate and his personal. Don't miss it y'all because if we look over it, there might be a song on the radio with your name on it...