One way trip?

This afternoon I took Selah to get a Christmas tree. We usually drive to it but I thought walking would he a good idea. She turned 3 today, and since walking made it more special for me, I hoped that would kinda push off onto her as well. I feel like she felt the same way. 

But it was a little longer of a walk than I planned and it was getting late. So when we got close, I called Beth to come so she could drive Selah back and I would carry the tree in the wagon that Selah rode on the way there. That way I could pull it a little faster over the bumpy road. 

I laughed to myself as I pictured folks that had probably caught both legs of my journey from their living room windows musing, "A kid one way; a tree the other way."

Noah

Noah totally fell asleep at the most awkward position in my arms. While I was walking through all the cars in the lot while Beth was talking to the salesperson inside. While I sang a continuous loop of the Ghostbusters theme. Because, Fatherhood. 

So, what's been going on?

All righty.  The month of October was a blur.  I came home from Vegas and immediately went to work.  Working on the job, with the baby, on myself, yadda yadda yadda.  Just been super busy.  Someone close to me asked me if I like being this busy.  I gave an answer, but since that time, and without trying, came up with another one that was closer to the way I feel:  I don't like being busy quite like I like being productive.

I hope that I'll get more and more productive for the month of November.

Flaw recognition

Did you ever have moments in your life where you realized things for the first time that were right in front of you?  One of those "can't see the forest for the trees" moments?

I only recently learned something about my personality that I have observed my whole life, but just never came to grips with the simplicity in its presence in my life as a fundamental character flaw.

I actually have a temper.  That I have the ability to lose given the right chemical reaction.  What are the ingredients, though?

One part surprise: This happens when I don't live in proactive caution that someone might come my way whose sole purpose in life is actually not to make my day better.  (Although it may sound similar at first, this is actually way different from always being proactive in the belief that everyone is out to ruin my day.  Yikes, there's no one like that out there, right?)

Two parts a generally passive nature:  This one has worked against me for as long as I can remember.  This is one that people would identify with if when reading the first sentence of the third paragraph, they went, "Whaaaaaa?"  I usually go with the flow.  Even when I don't want to.  And in doing so, it causes me to reach a breaking point.  Not cool.

Three parts pride:  Yes, my pride really can get in the way sometimes as this precocious, overbearing, arrogant misfit that silently says to everyone that comes across his path, "Ha! I don't know what you're thinking right now, but whatever it is? I'll bet I know way more than you on that topic!  In fact I know it the way that I know it AND the way that you know it."

This is a recipe for disaster, especially since you could change up the end result a million different ways when you think of a dash of setting, experience, audience (which I have, even if I'm by myself), and so many other variables.

So what do I do with this?  Well, I think the first step of recognition is already done.  Recently someone said something to me hoping to get a rise out of me and at first I really could feel the instinct coming up from the depths in the form of a sarcastic remark or something else I might be able to use to bite back.  I literally didn't say a word but I just looked at him.  I could tell that my choice really threw him for a boomerang.  He didn't know what to think.

So I've been able to practice this so far with strangers.  Now to work on this with an entirely different demographic: The ones that know and love and are closest to me the most.

Saved

It's now the 21st and Noah hasn't made his debut yet.  I'm not sure how I feel about that.  I admit I'm in a little bit of a whirlwind of emotion and thought right now.  A lot of it has to do with watching others in the way they live out their lives.  Some of it has to do with figuring out that fine line between being happy with me and yet at the same time never settling for just being content to stay in my comfort zone.  A lot of times I feel like I am able to think of every single solitary person I know at the same time and my biggest want is to have all of you together in one place:

The people that I've offended or hurt, the people that I've built up, the people that have hurt me, the people that have helped me, the people that I'm watching go through the worst time of their lives right now, the people that have everything going their way right now.

And I'd love to be able to get you to see how special every single one of you in every single one of those categories (and more) are to me.

I kinda wish I could save the world, you know?  Have you ever felt that way?  You see all the hurt and you wanna just save it?

The good news is that the hurt has already been saved.  The answer is in the very first bible verse I ever memorized.  My brother and I were at a puppet show performed at an event called Jesus Northwest back in the mid-80's.  It goes:

"For God so loved that world that He gave His one and only Son, that whoever believes in Him will not perish, but have everlasting life."

May you believe in Him.  Today.

Car! .... Run On!

Howdy!

Okay. I won't mince words. I picked a bad month to double my goal. Why? Well:

1. I'm about to have a new baby in the house. Am I really that dense that I think I won't be struggling to find extra energy to even maintain my current goal of 50 miles for the month?

2. I just discovered and learned some stuff about my stride that is basically forcing me to start from scratch as far as conditioning my body for running. Eep!

So that's the long and the short of it. I'll keep you guys posted, but honestly, the next time you hear from me will prolly be in regard to how seeing my son the first time changed my life.

Ta-ta.

My playing today.

Today I played different on the drums than I ever have before. I kept it so low volume-wise and so simple. I didn't do anything real tricky or abstract or obscure. Of course this is under the assumption that those words should really be in " " because it's all a matter of opinion. The probable reality is that everything I play is simple, it's just complicated to me. Also I'm sure I still played plenty loud at certain moments. 

I'm just saying that as a whole, the session felt so different compared to all the previous weeks. 

And I think I really liked it. I've decided that I'm going to commit to playing this new way from now on. 

Until I change my mind again. 

What are your thoughts? Could you tell a difference in today? If so what did you like or dislike about it?

Run 100

I'm thinking about a new goal for the month of September. It's gonna be pretty extreme seeing as how it will be double the activity I've been doing the past two months. 

I only recommend getting on board with this if you have been doing a fair amount of consistent running (or jogging, really).

It all kinda centers on the Nike+ app. 

I am going to call it "100 September." Basically the goal is to run 100 miles in the month of September. 

If you're interested in joining me, download the app, request me, and I'll place the invite on tomorrow night. 

Hope to see you there!

Another assessment

I actually feel like I'm running out of things to say.  Plus I feel strangely torn in a dozen different directions as to why I even wanted to start a blog.  I like inspiring people.  I like making people laugh with my words.  I like showing and telling things that I've experienced.  I like the idea of promoting myself (ain't gonna lie).  I like seeing readership.  I do I honestly do.  I think that if anyone said they don't like that part even a little bit, that they'd be lying.  But I do, I like seeing readership. 

I like talking about me, something I don't do very often in spoken word.  I like feeling the challenge of saying what needs to be said while at the same time saying it in a way that is not going to push people away--which out of all of this roughshod list, that's probably the one I have the most improvement yet to achieve.

Here's what I'm thinking, though.  I attempt do that everyday via tweets and status updates.  Sometimes in thinking about this blog I can't see it any other way than for just an extra "click" that someone has to do to simply see a little bit longer of a status update or tweet.

Not sure what I'm going to end up doing, but just wanted to talk about it a bit.

Word to the wise

I'm reading two books at the same time now. One is called Hung By The Tongue and the other is called...well, the other one is Think and Grow Rich which I'm not really reading as much as I'm listening to.  And it's not the first time, but rather I finished it and went right back to the beginning.

What's interesting is that I'm at a part that really grabbed my attention this time around.  And it has tied into the entire message of Tongue.

It's this idea of not being too vocal about your plans and the dreams that are in your head.  It's not an entirely new concept.  It's along the same lines as that one quote that I have heard for years that says, "I'd rather be silent and have people wonder if I'm a fool than speak and remove all doubt." - (or something like that.)

But the spin on where I'm at in the books is slightly different.  It's concerning partly the things you have in your mind to achieve.  It's actually really important to not blurt it out every chance you get.  It's gotta kinda be like Gandalf says to Bilbo:

"Is it secret?  Is it safe?"

Granted he was talking about the ring of power which was the representation of everything evil, but I think it still applies to your dreams sufficiently.

At the Egg & I

I haven't been able to turn off this book "Think and Grow Rich" on my iPod. I finished it a couple days ago and went right back to the beginning. I just now got into a section of it that I never noticed before that talks about leadership. It's really made me listen this time though; caught my attention. I can't remember all the points that have been made about what good leadership takes, but one was that good leaders are pleasant to be around. Always. That's definitely not me. Sometimes I just need the other person to be pleasant. But maybe, just maybe I can be pleasant more consistently each day.

Anyway! Back to the book! I think I'm gonna rewind that section and listen to it one mo' again. 

Over and over

If you ate too much, too late last night. If at 2:30 your eyeballs popped open on their own and refused to close again all the way up to your scheduled run time of 4:30. Even if you have to slow down, I mean WAY down, after the second mile. Even if your max is the second mile, or the first mile...or even the first half of a mile. Even if you started four years ago, quit for three, and the voice in your head said that the same thing is just going to happen:

Start. Just. Start. Start anyway. Over and over and over again.

Like Jon Acuff says, "The Start is the only part of the journey you can control." And definitely pick up his book Start.

And seriously guys. Spandex. 

Can't

Something that occurred to me yesterday on the road. I was on the road for the better part of the afternoon and evening. So I had a lot of time to think (and talk...Hi babe!), and I realized that I heard that word earlier in the day after a coffee appointment. That's not what was said, mind you. What was said was, "I'm just not good at inviting people to stuff."

That's what was said. 

But I heard the word "can't."

Later on, on the road, I realized something. It's not all that bad to think you can't. Not bad at all, actually. Here's the bad part: 

To think you're alone. 

When you think you're alone, you don't want people to know you "can't." When you think you're alone you, you think you'll always "can't." When you think you're alone you think no one is interested in helping you out of your "can't."

One thing that I've carried with me almost my whole life is a big, scary CAN'T.

But the few things I've done with it during that time is: I let folks know; I believed that it could change; and I listened to "can" giants to the point where, well, it's really not very big and scary anymore. 

So don't be afraid if you think you can't. After 15 years I'm still eliminating that word from my vocabulary.

Be happy.

I did it! I made it to my monthly goal of 50 miles with a few days to spare!

Few things I learned on this run:

1. It's good to take a break

This is the first time I ran since Thursday. That's almost a week off. What was the same was the pace. What was different, though, was the ease of that same pace. I credit the few days off. 

2. I have to have fun. 

My really good friends know the two or three endeavors I have in my life right now. I'm starting to have the truth firmly embedded: I must be wholly and outrageously content with this moment in order to pursue my dreams in a healthy way. (Didja notice the italics AND the bold? Woo hoo!)

3. Spandex really helps. 

Seriously you guys. 

Tell your story

Okie doke! Let it be known that I am officially in trouble! Why, do you ask? Well. I'm in trouble because Blogspot has added italics and bold to their app! Now I don't have to resort to all caps for emphasis when blogging from my phone. Yep. I'm in trouble. 

Tonight I met with friends at their kitchen to talk about the coffee. I don't know how to explain it. People talk about getting excited with stuff. This was totally different. On my way there I had this crazy idea to not take anything in with me. No DVD. No flip chart. No business card. Just samples and me. 

I sat down with them and literally started with these words, "I just want to tell you my story...first, I was born." This got a little bit of a laugh. I then spoke for about 10 more minutes totally unscripted about how I found myself to be in the coffee game.

I wish I knew how to say it in such a way that would help you really visualize what happened to me during talking, but essentially, well, you remember what I said about people getting excited about stuff. I, on the other hand, became ignited. I was truly set on fire from the inside out while this was going on. I did an entire presentation and didn't use one scrap of product materials. 

That's pretty much all I have to say. Oh yeah, I should probably use italics at least once in this blog post. And lastly this was my view on my way home. Seemed fitting.

Action

I have seen my future self so many times for such a long time that I think I'm ready to make it happen. I know that it's up to me to take action, but I also know that--deep down where fear likes to hide and strike only when its way of life is threatened--that I have always waited on something to happen.

But I also have been told that we are to not only wait but wait with expectation.

Where do you guys see a line of distinction being drawn?

Watch for it

I have been sampling a lot more coffee here lately which has been surprisingly a lot of fun! It kinda feels like an overall experience that would be worthy of sharing because of the little ways that I'm taken off guard by the things I notice and lessons I learned from it. Plus sharing these things on my blog is--just like with anything else--to take advantage of an amazing outlet for feedback or at the very least to just be able to see all my fears placed down on a "page," making them look much smaller.

I've started with just saying "hi" to people. Everyone I pass by. Complete strangers. One thing I've learned from doing that is that it is a really good way to tell if the next step could be taken which in my case has been, "How are you?"

I've noticed that based on what they say and how they respond I can judge whether or not I can keep talking to them. Crazy!

I've also learned that I need to always be ready. Because I was walking through the store yesterday focused on finding something there and someone said "hi" to me first and I just quietly and methodically smiled and nodded WHILE I WALKED RIGHT ON BY. 

Lesson for the day? With how many people I say "hi" to first, I better not be surprised when the same happens to me every now and then. And I need to be ready for it even when I'm focused on something else in that moment that it happens. 

Weight

Are you feeling a little bit weighed down lately?  Are you still carrying something around from last week that maybe you wish you didn't do or you wish didn't happen to you?  Are you under the feeling that your entire this week will be influenced and dictated by the stuff that happened in your last week?

To me all those questions had the answer "yes."  Along with what I just said, also sprinkle in a bit of "I have too many items on my plate to feel good about picking just one and focusing on it."  Yeah, I feel a little bit of that, too.

But just remember, you are only one person.  And you're gonna mess up.  You're gonna drop the ball.  You're gonna step out in an endeavor and things aren't going to happen just like you thought they would.  That's okay.  Just get up and try again.  And watch what you gain from it.

New music!

I hope that ya'll haven't missed me too much.  I can't really say for sure why it's been so long since I've updated ya'll on what's been going on.  I'd like to start posting a little more frequently, though, and I can realistically see it happening this time.  Reason being is that I don't feel as much of a need to wait for something monumental to happen for me to talk about it; but rather to adjust my internal lens of perspective a little bit more towards the persuasion of seeing the noteworthiness in every happenstance of the daily grind.  Also not gonna waste a whole lot of time trying to formulate and structure and lyricize my ideas in order to make you think, "Oh wow what profoundly poetic individual we have here!"  That's just silly.

I just downloaded Boston's "Foreplay/Long Time" on iTunes so excuse me while I air drum...

Okay!  So, I've spent the last couple weeks busting down the walls of my fears like I've never done before and I have to credit something that I read in Jon Acuff's new book Start.  I won't give it away because I think you would get a lot more out of it if you read it for yourself.  But I will say this:  Before reading it, I had no idea how much the title alone was a game-changer.  There, I'm not giving away any more!

2 minute warning

I get my biggest urge to blog when I have like 2 minutes to do it! Isn't that crazy?

I'm sitting here in my car outside of another branch for a meeting just gettin' in as much as I can until the next car shows up which could be anytime now. 

Is there a way to make this "try to cram something in when there are plenty of chances to do it with a whole bunch of time on your side instead" tendency to work for me? Is there a way for me to choose the opposite? Not sure! But someone just pulled up!

Conclusions.

I hate having to be honest!  I haven't even thought about my goals for the "second set of 52 days."

I can't even remember what they (all) are.

What does this mean?  Shall I come up with new ones?  Should I scrap the whole "project."  I'm always going to strive for something; but this particular regimen that I've carbon copied, should I let that go, too?

I think I'm going to.

Hmm...that only hurt for a little bit.  Onward!

Run wrong.

This morning as I was slipping away from the unconscious state, I came to remember a couple of occasions in my life where I ran away from something good. Like literally ran.

In summation I realized that that's something that I'm dangerously in the habit of doing. Maybe not so much in action but more so in thought. 

I spend way too much time "running" from the love that God wants so much for me to roll around in. I wanna roll around more. 

Dancing

Well!  It's going to be a little quick tonight for the blog post.  I don't know why but I've just really been in the mood to share more than I usually am.  So let's see, I have one more week of school.  After that same week is over I get to take a vacation.  That'll be fun!  Then at the end of my week off I have my graduation that Saturday, the 4th in Longview.

Today I remembered something that really made me crack myself up:  I remembered Elaine from Seinfeld and the way she dances.  What did George call it?  The full body dry-heave?  Well when I remembered it, I did it.  Yes, I did it.  Let me tell ya.  If you know what I'm talking about, and you need some cheering up, I recommend "the Elaine."  Like, right now.  Stop what your doing and do "the Elaine" for just five seconds.

Querstions

I've started to notice just how much I don't really give the answer to a question when it's asked. I started to notice it in myself because I first started to see it in everyone around me.

When I sent this to Beth I immediately thought of what she might reply with: "Please don't throw those away I'm going to use them for a craft for Selah!" or, "I'm sorry I meant to throw them out but I just forgot!"

What I'm afraid that she doesn't yet know about, is that my question was sent with the simple expectation for a "yes" or "no". And I'm afraid that my tendency to always ask her to explain herself will be the cause of it.

I want to start listening to the question that's asked. I feel like anything more is just noise.

Donations

Anyway, I'm talking on the phone about clothes that I just donated to Goodwill. Beth's reply was something along the lines of, "Yeah I was looking at my side of the closet in relation to how nice yours looks all cleared out."

I said, "Yeah. I'm tired of holding onto stuff I'm only kidding myself about..."
Pause. Then, "...dude I HAVE to tweet that."

More

I just got The Incredibles from Bethany!  She went to a garage sale on a whim while on her way to Brookshire's for some essentials.  She found a really cool table and chairs for Selah and the dvd was part of the conglomeration.  It's been a few years since I'd seen it, and totally forgot how good it was.  The animation, the music, the screenplay, it's all so good!  I watched it with Selah in my lap for the first time.  There was a line in it that got me pretty good.  Toward the beginning when they're getting married, and Mr. Incredible got there late, Elastigirl says under her breath to him, "I love you; but if we're gonna make this work, you're going to have to be more than Mr. Incredible." 

How often I preoccupy myself with only trying to be Mr. Incredible.

Worship

I was just driving home listening to KVNE and a song came on that starts with, "You are not a God created by human hands." Or something close to that. When I heard it I had this thought, "You are GOING to worship something. There's nothing that can be done about that. There's nothing anybody can do about that." And the question I asked myself was: Am I going to worship a god I created or the God that created ME?

Makin' a dent.

The past few weeks have been pretty neat. I haven't been able to say "see ya later" every day to Selah, but making it a point to do so with Bethany and her has made a difference in my mornings I can tell.

The bit about "following up on a lead" with music kinda fell through. I was planning on sending in an audition packet with The Old Guard Fife and Drum Corps. But they canceled the opening, or at least postponed it.

And I'm just about to leave here to have breakfast with a bro in Christ. So even tho it's not lunch, it'll still qualify. And I'm really looking forward to it.

What is hipster?

Would you like to know something truly unique about me? I feel worthy to use trendy words an average of 5.36 years after I first notice everyone else use them. Like with "legit." Wow, it took me forever to start using it and when I did I felt oh so cool. The example for now? "Hipster." I see tweets and instagrams all day with the use of that word in them. And I must admit every time I do, I feel like the maintenance kids on Monsters Inc.: "They're so AWESOME."

So I'm just apologizing ahead of time, sorry for the moment that I feel that it's right to incorporate that into my vocabulary. Sorry for all the confusion I may cause.

Under the influence

I just realized something. I have SO many people that I like to follow and just catch up with what they're up to. And their stuff is so incredibly inspiring and encouraging that I just can't get enough of it--sometimes.

Do you ever wake up in the morning and ask yourself what you're doing to inspire and encourage? All of the things I read so that I can extract something that I can take with me in my daily activity. But how effective am I in doing the same thing? How much time do I commit to doing the same thing? Why is it even that big of a deal for me? Why do I want it to be that way so bad?

These are the questions I ask. Plus a lot more. But a thought occurred to me this morning as I realized that I am still working to hear someone say, "Well done." That constant approval. How do I know this? Because all I can think about is the way someone else is living out his or her life to the fullest and how I can model what I'm doing after that.

In other words I'm still afraid to be me and to just throw myself out there with everything I've got and not be afraid of someone left in the wake of that only to go home and say something bad about me.

I'm kind of all over the place I suppose, but I guess I'll just have to take a mulligan with this one.

One final thought and then I'll close. I feel like I'm about to start, like Jon Acuff says, to "do work that matters and punch fear in the face." It may be all of a sudden or gradual, I don't know. Then again it's probably already begun.

Man! All over the place with this one.

One year old

Totally can't believe that this happened.  It literally played out like this.  I was sittin' around somewhere, remembered that I had started this blog a year ago but couldn't remember when in March it was, a few days later thought of it again, logged in this time, looked at the date of my first post, and saw that it read "3/22/2012."  I was like, "Whoa.  No way."

So, I wasn't sure what to do in celebration of it.  But at the same time, knew that I had to do something today and shouldn't really prolong the anniversaryic tone of today!  Ahem, yeah I just made up a word.

I had an idea that I've seen one or two people use in the past; copy sections of posts that are in the top favorite "blog moments."  Another idea was to copy sections of posts that have never been published; ones where I'm just sort of ranting about something.

Then at some point today I was washing my hands looking in the mirror and noticed the "lines creepin' across my face" and I thought a cool idea would be all the things that are different about me since that time that I wrote my first post.  The unfortunate thing is that it took about a nanosecond to go through the past 365 days and not only not come up with anything that's different about me that's good, but to realize so many things about me that's the same that are not so good.

I know what your thinking, because I started to think the same thing.  Oh Jason, please don't do your usual thing again where you only notice the flaws about you.  Well the truth is that, I want to have something good to say, but...I just feel like if I did make a brainstorm list of all the great things I did and all the milestones I hit, I would be both (a) lying and (b) avoiding.  And I don't wanna be that guy that makes everything sound better than it really is.  And as much as that might occasionally make me, go against my wish, to not come across as taking myself too seriously, well, at the end of the day, it's my call.  That's the beauty of it!  So...in the time span of a year I still...

...worry about the future.

...wish for an opportunity to come along day after day; only to realize that when one presents itself I spend many agonizing weeks not actually doing anything with it, and instead pick it apart in all the ways that it just would not work out.

...catch myself wanting to carry the pain of others, something of which even just my own by itself is too heavy for me to try to lift.

...try to do everything myself without first (and sometimes never) asking for help.

...want so bad for everyone to love me.

...will gossip on occasion.

...won't like the way I look sometimes.

...won't like the way I sound a lot.

...hate the mistakes I've made as if I haven't been forgiven.

...and, well, I think I'll stop now.  Obviously, I could go on and on, but I'm starting to remember that these are all things that don't really hold any power over me.  Oh sure, they'll pop up from time to time, and always without warning.  But I keep being reminded of the truth.  The real truth.  I'll take the same reminders all day every day for the rest of my life if that's what it takes.  I still know that all that stuff above has nothing to do with who I am.  And I'm walking more and more with that truth in mind.  Huh.  I guess that would be a good thing about me that's different.

Love you guys and it's been such a joy pouring my heart out to you for the past year!  I look forward to many more.

The next 52.

Something kind of funny happens whenever you don't blog for awhile.  You kinda feel it wither.  As the days turn to weeks it nags you more and more that you haven't put another literary masterpiece out there for everyone to enjoy.  (Now you see why I use the 2nd person pronoun).

Well, it's late, I'm tired so I'm going to give the next 52 days a real quick rundown.  Here they are:

Financial

Keep track of every dollar that I make on my part time job (using a spreadsheet).

Physical

Eat breakfast every morning.

Social

Invite a (homeboy) friend to join me for lunch once a week.

Mental

Limit myself to one movie (or two episodes of a TV show) a week.

Career

Continue to work on the lead I have from last month (more details on that when the time is right.)

Family

Kiss Beth and Selah every day before leaving for work and every night before I go to bed.

Spiritual

Sponsor someone for the next Road Adventure Seminar in Tyler.

This is going to be very fun!  I can't wait to get started tomorrow!

The first 52

Hard to believe it's been 52 days.  Even more so is the way I found that out.  I'm a little ashamed.  But not in a bad way.  In a fun way.

So here it goes; here's how I found out.  I was on my computer and I opened up my calender.  And I literally counted the days until I reached 52 and discovered that it was one day after the actual day that I was living at that very moment in time.  Literally.

Enough running around in circles!  By now you are suspecting that I'm avoiding the real issue.  The "accountabili-buddy" issue.  And you are so right.  So without further ado:


Financial

Start a "Dave Ramsey envelope" for a new car for Bethany.  -  This didn't even begin.  Not even one red cent.

Physical

No more "conking* out" on the couch at night and then waking up to go to bed. The night will start right.  -  I did okay with this one at first.  And I would even venture to say overall.  But, still, I didn't do as well as I would have liked.

Social

Call a friend every day after work.  -  This went well and I enjoyed it.  Despite all that, though, I still managed to slack off with it.  With how much I liked it, though, I can see myself picking it back up with ease.

Mental

Practice speaking Spanish at least 4 hours a week.  -  Didn't even start this one!  For the "aves!"

Career

Make one new contact / networking agent of some sort in the music community.  -  This one was amazing.  More to follow in a future post.

Family

Take Beth and Selah to visit Killeen one weekend a month.  -  I honestly can't remember if I did this one.

Spiritual

Memorize one bible verse per week.  -  With the help of this goal I finished my bigger goal of completing the memorization of Psalm 91!

So wow it kinda looks like I didn't do too well AT ALL.  I'm not too sure where to go from here.  I think that what probably needs to happen is I'll come back tomorrow morning with a new list.  I think I'll also decide what to keep and what to let go of.

All right, well, I'm pretty tired.  Hasta la-bye-bye.

*Yep, I still don't know if a "c" or a "k" goes there.

No title.

If there is one thing that being in school has taught me, it's the art of being productive.  Sounds random.  Almost like saying that one thing that writing a blog has taught me is how many times I don't use a comma when I should have.  Now that's random.  But to rephrase what I was originally saying, I definitely don't feel like I have become a master of only doing work that matters.  Far from it.  More than anything, when it comes to being productive, I have recently been made aware of just how unproductive I still am.

I'd say that I've been more productive the past couple months than I ever have.  At least that's what I would have thought if I was okay with being average.  If I was to be totally honest with myself and all of you, I would say that I've gotten better at appearing productive.  Big difference.  And so I've been asking the question, "What is truly productive, and what just looks that way on the surface?"

I don't really know where I would like to go with this.  I'm not sure if specific examples is more helpful, or if leaving it a little bit more "generally speaking" is.  So I guess I'll just wrap it up and share any other thoughts that might come up later, later.

A royal ramble.

This morning the only thing I felt like would really suffice for a journal entry was a big H-E-L-P-! across the entire face of the page, written diagonally of course; so that I would not waste any space.  I ended up not doing it, even though it's how I felt at the time.  But I couldn't find a Sharpie and I felt like God would definitely respond to a Sharpie.

I realized this morning when I sat down to do my morning routine that reading the bible is how I let God speak to me and writing in the journal is how I let me speak to God.  Sometimes I'll sit and be still and close my eyes and say, "Okay God I'm not going to say a word.  I'm just going to sit here and try to listen for your voice."  And I always hear silence.  Nothing.  And then a dog bark from outside.  Or a car speeding down our street.

I feel like I really need to hear--not only from him--but just him!  I need to hear him.  Out of that I'll feel like it definitely won't work if I'm the one talking or even if I'm writing because out of that it's still me "talking."  But then when I just sit still so as to try and listen for him, I don't hear anything.  So then I fall back to reading the bible.

I'm having a really hard time being content with where I am right now.  I want so much.  I'll read someone else's blog and something will trigger the reaction Aw! I wish I had that many people reading mine! Then I'll do some homework and let's say part of it requires me to research Harley-Davidson's financial statements and I'll think Ack! I wanna build a business as big as those guys! And I just want, want, want, want, want and I don't even consider what the heck it is that's driving me.  I heard this saying recently and I'm starting to believe that even though it was said to me completely out of context, I captured it because I would need to very frequently call it to mind because of the way I'm feeling right now:  Can't see the forest for the trees.  I think that's how it goes.

I just realized something:  The bible itself even says in it that God has spoken to us in the past through the prophets; but that he now speaks to us by his Son.  And that another name for his Son is the Word.  The bible is called the Word of God, too.  That's cool!

Anyway, I just thought I'd share a little bit.  Hope ya'll have an awesome day.

Run right.

I hope this all comes out correctly. One, because I only have a few very brief moments. And two because I am going to HAVE to be somewhat vague. But man I just HAVE to share.

Last night something happened to me at my part time job that was not very cool at all. I made a call that ended up being wrong and made a couple people mad. Really mad. To the point where I got cussed at. I spent the whole rest of the night basically planning my escape; preparing a phone conversation in my head to my boss this morning about how I simply can't work at this particular location anymore. I pretty much spent all night even as I got home going, "Okay so these are the best terms and conditions. Mm. No, these are. Mm. Actually, this sounds better." Making sure to (internally) sprinkle in a dash of, "See, this is the confirmation that you've given me, God, that I need to have this conversation...this is You trying to tell me...this is totally You, I just know it..." and on and on and on I went. My mind just racing.

When I woke up at 4:30...from the couch...(Guh)...I went into Selah's room just to see her. She was still asleep in her crib. When I put my hand on her arm she woke up, lifted her head up a little, rolled over, put her head back down, and immediately fell back asleep. I sat there as if the world stopped spinning for about 10 seconds and this thought occurred to me for the very first time since the little evening episode:

"There is nothing wrong with learning from your mistakes."

It doesn't mean that all these drastic changes must now occur. It doesn't mean that I have to have a serious sit down with my boss and tell him something along the lines of, "Look. I simply can't ever work here because this, this, this and this." It doesn't mean that it has to remain awkward between me and the guy that cussed me out.

What it does mean is that I can now stay there and just be better equipped. It does mean that I can now go back there tonight (which I had already scheduled myself to do), shake his hand and say "I'm sorry." It does mean that I can think like a man, act like a man, and reason like a man.

I do have to leave something behind. But thankfully it's not what I originally thought.

Part dos.

Welp, this series of previously posted blog entries will be a little shorter than I originally thought!  I had been listening to a little classic SCC at the time and got this song stuck in my head.  I just had to share it at the time and now I have to share it again!  Interesting that I recently read a chapter in Numbers that was a fresh reminder to me of God's grace and mercy and how much he has bestowed to us and how much I still need it to this day.

After this, it's back to original writing!  Woo hoo!

I've had this segment of Steven Curtis Chapman's song kinda rollin' around up there for the past couple days. I'd like to put some of it on here to perhaps inspire some to spend a few moments today doing what the lyrics suggest:

"There's no one more thankful to sit at the table than the one who best remembers hungers pain. And no heart loves greater than the one that is able to recall the time when all it knew was shame.

The wings of forgiveness will take us to heights we've never seen. Oh, but the wisest ones will never lose sight of when they were set free. Love set them free.

So remember your chains. Remember the prison that once held you, before the love of God broke through. Remember the place you were without grace, when you see where you are now. Remember your chains. And remember your chains are gone."

There's a bit more to it. But that's the part I've been singin' to myself in the car.

Love ya'll!

 

Originally written 1/19/2011

Ten is sooo...Zen?

Hey there!  So you may or may not already know this, but I actually started to "blog" before I started my "blog."  There was a couple of posts that were done on an old Facebook profile and then a couple of posts that were done on my church's website in the discussion forum.  I thought it would be fun to do a short series of stuff previously written; appropriately starting with one I put together when Bethany and I had been married eight years.

Eight is so stinking great.

So Bethany needed the good car today that I'd taken yesterday. Today, before leaving for work in the old clunker in a foggy haze (no, not talking about the weather at that unruly hour) I made sure I grabbed the empty to-go bag--that the polite fast-food clerk handed me the day before--out of the good car. About half way into my commute, I called her up to make sure that she was still on point for where she had to be, which was just a routine post-"I-just-had-a-baby" checkup at her Docta-lady's clinic. No harm there, right? Just a surface level conversation, yes? Ahem, um, yeah, not quite. What I thought was gonna be a quick "How-my-mama-and-em-durrin?" quickly turned into a "Let's-have-a-mobile-intervention."

Didn't have much of a choice because the first thing said by her as soon as the call connected was, "You went to Chick-fil-a."

Course me being the mild-mannered guy I am, I kinda played it cool: "What?" Now you know when you say that, you might as well have a big flashing arrow point at you with words "Guilty as charged" on it. Needless to say there wasn't much more time that it took for me to confess all of it and even every single FREE thing I might have snacked on like that handful of Peanut M&M's someone at work gave me a quarter for so I could get them out of the old-timey gumball machine. Sheesh.

So she proceeds to tell me that she found crumbs in the car. Crumbs that I so adeptly allow to congregate at just about every single place I set myself down at with the intention of "breaking bread." Next thing I know, she's trying to make ME feel better by telling me she does the same thing: You know, sometimes goes and gets some tasty fast food without telling me for SOME reason or another.

Then I think out loud (a little too loud), "Whoa, hold up...how do you know exactly where it came from?!" ....

"THE CRUMBS WERE WAFFLE-FRY SHAPED, JASON."

I don't think it needs to be said that I nearly drove off the road from laughing so hard.

*SIGH* Girl-boo. You've got my number. Always have, always will. You've taken this notion of "God's favor on my life" to depths I used to be deathly afraid to fall backwards and head first into. But I'm not afraid to now. Not anymore. I love you. In about 30 seconds I'm gonna hit the "Publish" button after typing all this from my cell phone. I'm thinking it just might not work. But if not, that's okay. I had a lot of fun putting it all together. Here it goes!

Originally published 1/26/11

The end of Jan.

This month has been so amazing.

That's about all I have to say.  So much so, in fact, that I feel like that sentence IS my blog post for today.  I'll try to write a little more, though.

I guess all I can really add to that, that would really summarize the thousands of layers of stuff that I think of when I think of the month of January in the year 2013 is that it's funny how different time moves and feels when you are trying. 

I don't know how the rest of the year will turn out, but I do know what I have written down.  And it started with me writing it all down.

I will say this, too:  I have started journaling quite a bit more.  I know, I know.  It started out on my "New Year's Resolution" list, then got bumped off when I decided to do the 52 days thing.  But as it turns out I still wanted to write in it.  It's quite literally just a prayer journal.  I don't have anything monstrously profound that I put together and make all fluent and poetic because I'm hoping that centuries down the line people will stumble upon it and become inspired.  Quite the opposite.  Some of it is raw.  It's unrefined.  It's ugly.  But it's me not holding anything back, because there's no need for me to hold anything back, because it's to God; who I hear knows me better than I know myself.

What I've noticed is that it's made my approach to even this blog a little different.

Rawr! I gotta close this up!  Okay, to sum up, the goals are going great.  I'll definitely be back here soon to talk more about it.  I can't wait to share how it's been going.  And I've been listening to Selah for the past half-hour be so irresistably cute in her crib that I just gotta go get her up now.

Take it easy!

Maaaan.  This is tough!  Or is it easy?  Easy to make the goals too tough.  Easy to make 'em too easy.  Easy to worry that I won't come up with goals that are a perfect balance between the two.  And it's so easy to bite off more than I can chew. It's even easier to take a look at someone else's goals, and try to make mine look similar.  And then upon realizing that, trying to make 'em look different.  Then to figure out a way I can find the middle of the road between making 'em look similar and different.  Then realizing that I'm stressing too much about it, and that I shouldn't care at all.  Then trying to establish goals that would indicate the middle of the road between stressing about it and not caring at all. Guh!

And that's the point that I'm at right now.  Sooo, what do I want to do over the next 52 days?  Yep.  Kinda had to go back to the beginning.  What do I want most?  And what steps can I take that will, at the very least, put me further than where I am now?  I had a lot of ideas and I can't do them all.  So I am literally going to have to cherry pick 'em as I'm writing this.  Hey.  It's what I do.

Financial

Start a "Dave Ramsey envelope" for a new car for Bethany.

Physical

No more "conking* out" on the couch at night and then waking up to go to bed.  The night will start right.

Social

Call a friend every day after work.

Mental

Practice speaking Spanish at least 4 hours a week.

Career

Make one new contact / networking agent of some sort in the music community.

Family

Take Beth and Selah to visit Killeen one weekend a month.

Spiritual

Memorize one bible verse per week.

So now that it's official, I feel a little better.  It's my list.  It's what I wanna see happen.  Therefore, I say:

"Bring it!"


*at first, this was spelled with a "k" which I thought looked better.  then while proofreading this out loud I thought it said "knocking**" at first glance.  so I changed it to a "c."

**and then when I proofread it a second time I thought it said "cooking" at first glance.  oh well!

The revision

Ha! Well, I totally should have seen this coming.  All the same, here is what I'm actually going to do this year.  It all started with me checking Twitter this morning--my this morning, that is; I woke up at 10:15 today--and Jon Acuff tweeted a link to a new post from his blog.  (You can read it here.)

I really like his idea because, well, I kinda don't want to do it this way.  It goes against everything I'm used to.  What do I mean, specifically?  I mean, I don't like to admit when something isn't working.  I mean, I like to pretend like I'm able take on tasks even if they are unrealistic.  I mean, I don't like the idea of letting go of the ways I've always done things even if there's a better one.  To bring what I'm trying to say around full circle in its application of my own life:

Take the goals I've come up with, for example.  I already don't like the thought of getting to the end of the short periods of time (52 days), assessing how well I kept to a goal, and then deciding what to do as a result.  Because sometimes I may find that I, in fact, will need to let go of a goal that I haven't stuck to very well.

I think that that may be [one of] the downfall[s] in me.  What if my stubbornness in letting go of a goal that I haven't stuck to has actually kept me from moving on to one that I would otherwise turn out to be awesome at?  That's pretty crazy to think about.  And just think about how many times that has been the case throughout my entire life?  Hm, wow, okay.  This new method is starting to get more and more appealing all the time.

I'm definitely on board for this new way of goal setting.  Anyone want to join?  It's definitely crunch time with it being the 1st and all, but I'm going to have to revise the goals that I started with and the list is probably going to wind up looking very different from the original, but...

I'm looking forward to it!