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I say a lot of stupid things. Sometimes I'm very selfish when I'm tired or overworked. I obsess over how terribly unkind I seemed. This week, I've been thinking about the verse in Luke 6:31 where Jesus commands us to "Do to others as you would have them do to you." When we think of this Golden Rule, we often use it as an excuse to point the finger at others. I know in the past, when someone has been unkind or uninviting to me, I choose to do the same. After all, if that's how they've treated me, isn't it an indication of how they want me to treat them? How ridiculous does that sound when you see it written but how often do you do the same? How often do you live in bitterness and unforgiveness because of a similar mindset? Love Like Jesus One of my wise friends told me that I should strive to love no matter how I feel towards the person because Jesus loves us despite everything we do to Him. He's always there, always offering a hand, blessings, love, etc. even though we do not deserve it. I'm trying to get better at this, showing up even when others have not shown up for me; being kind when they have been unkind to me. I cannot control their actions but I can control my actions, how I love and treat them. I want to always show love no matter what. I want to always be there even if they aren't there for me. In the past, I viewed this as "draining" but when my cup is being filled by Jesus, I have an overflowing supply of love to give. He is love and He is my strength. Give Others Grace to Grow
It's so easy to bash those who weren't there for you. It's so easy to feel sorry for yourself when people weren't there for you during your worst moment. I hear so many people say (and I've most definitely said it myself) that those who weren't there at our lowest have no place to be there when we are promoted. I disagree with that now. I think that we should give everyone permission to grow spiritually and emotionally. Who they were when you were at your lowest may not have had the ability to love you and guide you through that hard time. It's no excuse for them but a further understanding. Don't allow it to make you bitter. I have so many stories that I could tell of people not understanding me, not supporting me, not helping me up when I was very low. I felt like it was just me against the world many moments. I didn't have people calling to check up on me. I didn't have anyone with me for a lot of life changing moments. I didn't get to experience the joy of a lot of amazing moments because I was experiencing these moments alone. And I'll admit, it's very hard for me to brush it off when people go through the same and I'm expected to be happy and celebrate them. It's very hard. But I'm choosing my hard. I would rather fight through my feelings of betrayal and choose to love despite it all or I can choose to sit in that feeling and never get over it. Like I said at the beginning of this post, I myself say some crazy and embarrassing things. I want to be forgiven for the times I have been unkind, the times I talked more about myself instead of asking "and how are you?" I want to be seen for who I am instead of defined by my past. So, I'm choosing everyday to try and do the same for others. I read something on social media the other day that didn't seem to sit right with me. It was suggested that once you become a believer, you no longer experience anxiety, depression, or any other mental illness struggle. This incorrect belief can cause so many lost and hurting souls to turn from Christianity. Becoming a Christian is not a magical solution for every problem you will experience this side of Heaven. Becoming a Christian is realizing that we have a Helper this side of Heaven. I've struggled with so many emotional issues my entire life. It does run in my family to struggle with mental illness. Becoming a Christian did not eliminate my anxiety. It did not eliminate my depression. It did not eliminate my OCD tendencies. However, becoming a Christian has helped me to conquer each situation where these feelings arise. If you're a new Christian (or even a seasoned one), rest assured that experiencing these emotions does not make you any less Christian. Here are things that help me anytime I'm going through one of many emotional distresses.
Because I struggle with several issues, my depression often is a result of having a chaotic outer life. If I clean, make time for my hobbies, and get in the gym, my depression usually loosens its grip. Experiment and see what helps loosen the grip for you. Maybe it's writing, reading, getting outside, etc. Find something joyful and remember that life isn't meant to be lived in defeat. Being a Christian does not mean you will no longer experience these emotions. If anything, you'll be attacked harder because the enemy wants you to lose faith. Keep holding on. Fight harder. It doesn't become easier but you will get stronger. For most of my life, I’ve considered myself a multi-tasker and took pride in this. I have a Type A personality so I like to get as much as I can done in a day as I can. Thus, multi-tasking comes in handy. However, it’s extremely stressful over an extended amount of time. I found that a lot of my work wasn’t quality work. I was able to get a lot done, but none of it was amazing work like I envisioned. I’m relatively intelligent and I have a built-in entrepreneur mind, so I set out on a quest to figure out what my deal was. Our society stresses over the idea of multi-tasking. With our advanced technology, we allow our minds to be distracted by our cell phones, office phones, personal and work emails, and work demands. ALL AT ONE TIME. How and why do we do this? I’m guilty of responding to every demand from all of my lines as soon as I can, distracting me from a single goal I was working on. In my former career path, I got so frustrated with myself because I have this constant need to multi-task and answer everyone’s “urgent” needs right then and there. I recently read and re-read this fantastic article on Forbes.com. Why Single-Tasking Makes You Smarter not only encouraged me to focus on one thing at a time but also that there is chance for adaptability to this notion of single-tasking. We have been met with the notion that we have not reached 100% of our mental capacities. I challenge this notion with the idea that single-tasking could possibly change this. What sort of changes can we make in our lives– whether this be personal, business, family, etc.? How would our businesses be changed if we were able to focus entirely on one subject/task/problem at at time? Would our problem-solving skills increase? Would our customer service fail or improve? Would our family life be more satisfying? How to Single TaskForbes mentioned ways to improve and adapt to this notion of single-tasking. I’ll paraphrase and include my own thoughts.
1.) Give your brain some down time. I have always been huge on breaks, for myself and for employees. When I helped lead the service department in a grocery store, I always tried my very hardest to get every service partner on their breaks on time. I found that they were able to work with a more positive attitude and more effectively. Because I knew the importance of breaks for myself, I also tried to make it a priority for myself to get them on their own breaks on time. My mentality was that there would always be a line of customers but if my partners do not feel as if they are a priority, customer service would fail. Take care of yourself, your employees, and business will follow. Step away from your work for a few minutes. Yes, most Americans spend most of their week at work, but we were created for relationship. Don’t allow your brain to be entirely created for business and business alone. Take care of yourself. When you’re able to take care of yourself and pour back into yourself, you can pour out more ideas a lot quicker than if you do not. 2.) Focus without distraction. I used to practice this one quite a bit. I would set a timer where I focus solely on one thing before giving myself a break. (Lately, I've been slacking in this area since I work from home and now have a son to watch.) I found that I was incredibly more productive when I focused for interval sets of time. It gives me short goals to aim for while putting in quality work. It's also not as overwhelming to say "I'm going to work for 15 minutes" as opposed to "I have to work 8 hours today." If you break it up into chunks of time, it becomes easier to achieve and not as challenging. 3.) Make a to-do list. I love to-do lists! Seriously, I have been making them since I was a teenager with 0 responsibility. I have a daily to-do list and a weekly to-do list. On my daily, I rank my tasks in levels of importance and which I would like to get done first. Since I’m more productive before lunch, I do the more draining tasks first, the tasks that I know I would just procrastinate with after lunch. For my weekly goals, I try to put in a little work at the end of the day when my energy is draining because I know I have a week to perfect the goal. Single-tasking is still something I'm trying incredibly hard to work on because I know the rewards for myself will be worth it. Jobs require that we have the ability to multi-task and it is almost impossible to get by in this business world without the talent, but I highly encourage you to make this top priority if you’re seeking quality over quantity.
Here are a few ways to help change your perspective on your Mondays:
There are too many Mondays in life to dread every single one. I don't know about you, but part of living an abundant life is trying to enjoy every part of it, even the days that I used to hate. Mondays symbolize new beginnings. We love the start of a New Year but we hate Mondays. Why is that?! Change your perspective and I promise it will change your life! I started viewing Mondays the same way that I view a New Year and it changed my life for the better. It made me feel happier, more energetic, and it helped me to accomplish my goals to get to where I am now. You can do it too. Are you a controlling person? If you answered yes, you get points for honesty. If you answered no, stick with me throughout this post while I explain that you may actually be more controlling than you think. I didn't think I was a controlling person until I realized this. And realizing where my issue was has helped me tremendously in my relationships. When someone hurts me, my immediate reaction is to either tell them why they're wrong and why they should change, how they hurt me and how it makes me feel unloved. "What are they thinking? Are they criticizing me? Are they judging me? Do they love me less? How do they view me?" These thoughts obsessively control my mind as I try to self-guide my way through these emotions of feeling betrayed, unloved, forgotten. Healthier RelationshipsHere are ways that I've gotten through this, matured in my own healing, and have established healthier relationships:
A More Joyful LifeIt's not easy to establish these habits but I promise once you do, life becomes so much more joyful. I'm still in the learning process of all of these steps (and maybe I will always be) but it's becoming easier and easier to subconsciously and consciously choose to focus on myself, my reactions instead of someone else's reactions, and how I can change instead. We cannot control someone else's journey. All we can do is focus on our own perceptions.
Here's a great article to read if you'd like to read further on this subject. This has played such a major role in living life abundantly. I don't remember what grade it was. It may have been 2nd grade. I had always taken such pride in my schoolwork. I wasn't exceptionally smart, but I loved (and love) to learn. We had so much going on that year that I won't dive into. Despite it all, I had always been able to focus. "Focus, focus" was my motto. No matter what was going on in my little world, I wanted to succeed. So, to my surprise one year, I was told I had failed the math TAAS test (Texas Assessment). To me, failure meant I had lost my identity. I thought it meant I would have to be held back a grade or even take summer school. For some reason, neither of those happened and I was able to continue on. I must not have failed by much. But in that moment, I was terrified. I didn't want to be defined by this failure but I allowed it to. I always obsessed over missing important information in school. When we learned to tell time in elementary, I wasn't there that day and I don't remember anyone taking the time to show me what everyone else had learned so I was frustrated. I wanted to know what everyone else knew! And in middle school, when my peers were learning "fun" things in Math, I was frustrated because I had to miss out due to a "foster child" obligation. I felt like I was always playing catch up. You know those dreams we all have where we're running but we aren't really going anywhere? Our feet won't seem to catch up to how fast we are willing to push them. That's how I felt. Always. This feeling drove me and followed me in every area of my life. When I learned about Restoration Prayer Ministry (go to www.cwlinc.com for more information), I realized that I had so many generational curses and sins that I had to "catch up" on praying for. I stayed up so late because I was terrified I would get behind on it. I became obsessive over the details and a perfectionist over not missing a detail in prayer. When I went to college, I would quickly fall behind because I was always working 2 or 3 jobs and this same feeling of defeat would rush over me. And even in my last career, I always felt like I was playing catch up with casework and I hated that feeling. It impacted my mental health. I always felt like I was playing catch up. Others didn't understand the depth of the anxiety I had about not having control over my life. I wanted to have everything in place. I wanted to know that I could handle it all even when I couldn't. I had such deep issues from not being in control of how I wanted my early life to go. This feeling of wanting to be "all caught up" and in control regularly impacts my relationship with Christ and with others. When I get behind on my Bible readings, I start all over so I can stay on track. When I get behind on placing priorities on relationships, that's also why I give up. I become so overwhelmed with this feeling of failure that it overwhelms me and drowns me. And sometimes, it's easier to start over than to change my mindset. The Prodigal SonI love the Parable of the Prodigal Son. I wish I could say that I've only been the prodigal daughter once in my life but that's not true. I have been the prodigal more times than I can count. I'm always running, stopping, coming back and then right before I get back, I run again. In this story, it says that "But while he was still a long way off, his father saw him and was filled with compassion for him; he ran to his son, threw his arms around him and kissed him." (Luke 15:20b) The son didn't have to catch up to the father; the father ran to his son. I don't have to "catch up" to God. I don't have to catch up on my Bible readings. The quantity of it all means nothing if I am not desiring a relationship, a deeper understanding of Him. To know Him is not something my human mind can ever catch up to. The human brain has no capability of truly grasping the concept of God. He always passes up our expectations. His thoughts are higher than ours. He surprises me all of the time. So now, instead of stressing on how much I need to "catch up" to where I used to be, I am simply enjoying learning more, soaking it all in. Eliminating StressStress is impossible to avoid but it's necessary to eliminate stress that we create for ourselves. Playing a game of catch up will never do good for your soul. We won't always have it all together and that's okay. We aren't meant to live life playing catch up forever. Find where you are and aim for progress instead.
Don't let others fool you when they say they have everything figured out for their life. That's not for us to know. Part of the adventure is not knowing but trusting that someone else does. Say no to unnecessary stress. <3 I've started a ton of posts on this subject. I never published them. They're either deleted or in my drafts because none of them measured up to everything I'm feeling right now. Here goes yet another attempt to capture this whirlwind of a life. Hopefully this one is the one.
Surviving has been a common theme for me. I'm a survivor. I survived trauma. I survived and was able to come out on the other side of a lot of unfortunate events. Something I asked myself during my most recent career was, "How am I thriving?" I know so many survivors. We all have such unique stories. Even each of my sisters have a different story than I do. However, I realized during those three years that I never asked myself how I'm thriving. To survive trauma is one thing but to thrive after a horrendous event or terrible stage in life is entirely different. We are capable of so much more than we realize. When I'm asked how I went through what I did, my only answer is "It's the only option I had. If you had to survive, you would have too." Often, we view someone with many accomplishments in life completely different if we knew about the obstacles they had to face to get there. Why is that? It's also difficult for anyone else to make something of themselves but for some reason we expect less from someone who has experienced hardships. Why is that? I hope I don't come across as harsh or insensitive. That's why I've started and deleted so many of these posts. I only want you to look deep within yourselves and ask why. Why do we expect different things, different successes, different stories for people regarding their background, race, sex, sexual orientation, or whatever it is we perceive as a hindrance. It's amazing to look at how far someone has come and the trials they faced to get there but it is so important to hold up higher goals for them, no matter who they are or what they went through. Expect big things and often people will rise to meet those expectations. I have not been thriving these past few years. I felt like it was "expected" of me to stop where I was in my career because I was offering hope to children who are in the position that I used to be in. I have always had these big dreams, world changing dreams. I've had them as long as I can remember. No amount of money in my pocket or life experience has ever changed that. I knew that my destination was far greater than my present situation. I expected more for myself than others expected for me. Yes, I had potential to change a lot where I was in my career but I also knew what I wanted to be and who I wanted to be and that career didn't line up at all unfortunately. But that's okay. It's okay to realize that where you are is just a temporary situation for growth. I grew so much. I learned a lot. It was a life changing experience. However, I always knew it wasn't a forever career. I tried quitting several times and everytime I asked for advice, I was told "You have so much to offer these kids." But in my eyes, I wasn't offering as much as I could. That's why it's so important to do your own search instead of depending on other's opinions. I listened to a video today and it really spoke everything I've been thinking this past six months. So often, we think we have to choose between our health, our happiness, and success. Why can't we have it all? We can! Everytime I watch videos where people talk about the amount of stress they went through to get to where they were, it never appealed to me. I'm a hard worker. When I want something, I stop at nothing to get it. But I value my well-being because I put myself through so much and I saw the danger in that. I lost my motivation, I lost sight of myself, I lost sight of relationships with people, with my family. I gained weight (wish that would have been something I lost, but nope! haha). I gained a ton of stress. I gained debt from spending money to fill a spot that was missing. There's some real talk that a lot of people just don't admit from their behind the scenes. I know now that even with all of my dreams and goals, in order to fulfill these successfully, I would have to make sure that I was thriving at the same time. So, what does thriving look like to me? Well, I have an 8 month old so sleep is unfortunately placed lower on my ladder. But, that's okay! I try to make up in other areas. I'm eating healthier. I make time for a work out everyday. I go outside. I make plenty of time to play with Jackson, to read to him, to stop and smile and encourage him. I have time to write. I have time to read. I have time to focus learning to build a business. This is thriving to me. Your definition of thriving may be different. I asked myself what it would take for me to thrive and I'm living everything out that I wanted for this moment in my life. Two months from now, that may change. And when that time comes, I will work towards that. If it's possible at all for you to sacrifice just one thing in order to thrive, what would that be? I was raised to think life is all work, hardly any play. And that's not okay. We should be able to enjoy life, to enjoy each other. If you're in school and you're incredibly stressed, change one thing that will decrease your stress. Learning can be fun. Make it fun. If you have a stressful job and you hate it, re-evaluate what you can do to change your career. I did this after months of promising myself I would leave and I never had the courage. Let me encourage you. It's worth it. I'm not saying starting over isn't going to be hard. Yes, it's going to be difficult. It's hard to start over. But I would rather choose this type of hard than the hard of living a comfortable and miserable life. Choose your hard and make it worth it. Thrive. This is my path to healing.
On this side of heaven, we will never be completely healed, completely pure. However, I have spent years pondering the word healing. To be on your path to healed means thriving in your relationships: your relationship with God, with your spouse or significant other, with yourself, with food, fitness, confidence, etc. For so long, I have considered my healing "good enough". I no longer look at pictures of those who have hurt me (rather in my childhood or in my very recent past) with deep pain and bitterness. I now see them with different eyes. I don't look at my childhood with a feeling of "what if". I see things differently now and because of that, I viewed myself as healed. Boy, was I wrong. I am a different person than I was five years ago and I am so thankful for that. However, insecurities that were deeply rooted in pain came to the surface very quickly when I embarked on this new season in my life. I had huge life changes happen very quickly and I was not prepared for all of it. I have communication issues when I feel deeply hurt and I realized that the root of this communication was not rooted in anger or simple inability to communicate but rather in insecurity. When I become insecure over how I'm feeling, if I'm allowed to feel a certain way, I immediately shut down. When I become insecure in my relationships, I shut down and it impacts everything around me. So lately, I have been finding things that hinder my confidence, my self-worth and I'm eliminating it. I did delete my social media until I felt that it no longer defined my self-worth. For me, it only took a couple of weeks. For others, it could be longer. Healing is not a linear process; it is a spiritual process. Don't put a timeframe on your healing and compare it to others. I also took a huge leap of faith recently and realized that I was staying in my current position based out of fear. I have always known that my calling isn't a typical 9-5 job. I do not regret any of my time here (I only regret the changes in myself that I allowed to occur) but I have officially given my Letter of Resignation at my current job. I knew I wouldn't be here forever but it is still bittersweet (with a little more sweet than bitter, ha) to be leaving a position that I honestly did feel passionate about. I knew that God paved the way for me to be here, making it obvious that it was meant for me. BUT I strongly believe that we are led to things for seasons. While I have been second guessing my decision to leave for weeks, I know it's time for me to go. I want to encourage you as well: Sometimes God calls us to persevere through the burn out. I persevered through my burn out. There were weeks and months where I was constantly depressed because I poured out way more than was being poured into me. But I felt led to stay and I really am glad that I did because the lessons I learned in staying were important for this season where I am leaving. It taught me grit: hard work and determination. I've been focusing on not comparing myself as well. We are all so different. We all have different personalities that bring a lot to the table. We are all made to look different and we should not be ashamed of who we are. I recently deleted all of my posts here on a whim. A small part of me regretted it as I watched my hard work and years of writing disappear but a bigger part of me knew that it was time for a fresh start. This blog brought me so much healing and now, I need a different path of healing: one that searches deep within me for the root of most of my issues. I have only scratched the surface and while it has changed me and made me a happier woman, I still have a long way to go. I hope this journey encourages you all as much as my previous journey encouraged you. <3 XOXO |