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