Thursday, May 29, 2014

Coming Clean

It happens to ALL of us. Stress, major life changes, death, deployments, disease.... too much too fast and that creates a loss of perspective and wavering self-discipline.

What is most annoying about these circumstances is that it becomes incredibly easy to fall back on habits that you thought you had gotten rid of. 

Even the strongest people are not exempt from being challenged in this way. My response to these situations are very much inline with thoughts expressed in Healthy Lifestyle Part I and Part II.

It's the darn sixth element of "struggle" that I spoke of in those two blogposts that is the motivation behind this entry. 

It is totally normal to face the Struggle Phase and experience a loss of perspective. It is also absolutely normal for waving discipline to completely frustrate all of your well thought out plans. 

It is also normal to sometimes feel like the Struggle Phase is lingering well beyond the amount of time that seems "fair"... shouldn't someone else being having their turn? No! Never wish that - ever!

What this really means is that you now find yourself needing to regain perspective and discipline...what do you do? 

I don't know about you, but what works well for me is to create a specific goal. In order to motivate myself to reach the goal I listen to certain music or reread things that make me feel good, like:
Continue In Patience (Uchdorf Video)
IF
Personal Dignity
10 Years Ago Today
Abiding Love

So, in order to overcome the desire for caffeine... AGAIN, I am going to follow my own advice right now.




Sunday, May 18, 2014

R.I.P. In Life and Death

In the last two weeks my younger sister, Rebecca (age 35), passed away and my husband was deployed.

During this time I have had some of the sweetest moments of my life.

God is good to me. Life is beautiful, no matter how ugly people can be to each other. 

So often we hear the term "rest in peace" (R.I.P.) in reference to the dead, but it has a greater application. We should be able to rest with a peaceful heart in life as well as in death. 

Yes, this has been a tough time for me, but peace has been ever present during this time as well.

I would give more detail if I could articulate it. But the details aren't as important as the take home message noted above.