For some reason, don’t even ask me why, we ended up watching The Secret on Netflix tonight. I guess we’ve watched everything else. And it amazed me how every single thing they said mirrored The Bible. For real, if you substituted all the times they said “the universe” for “God” it was straight from faith. Their “secret” is to ask, believe, and receive. Immediately I thought of Matthew 7: 7-8 “Ask and it shall be given to you. Seek and you will find. Knock and it will be opened for you. For everyone that asks, receives. He that seeks, finds.” One of their things was that if you visualize you already have what you want it will materialize into your life. Mark 11:24 “whatever you ask for in prayer, believe you have received it, and it will be yours”. A third thing that was their “secret” was to have gratitude. If you complain about something you attract that into your life. But if you focus on the good and what you are grateful for, you attract good. Philippians 4: 6-8 “Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things.”
Whether I liked The Secret or thought it was hoaky and goofy, they weren’t entirely wrong. Focus on the good, never stop asking for what you want, visualize you’ve already received it, and give thanks in all circumstances and lives will be changed. And in every case I will thank God for it.
I’ve been having neck and back issues for almost a decade now. I started going to our chiropractor friend this month in the hopes of easing my everyday pain. He took some X-Rays and in our last session we went over them. One thing he was concerned about was the way my neck curved opposite to what it should be. He said it is most likely from looking down too much over the years. He said we can do adjustments but if I didn’t change the way I did certain things then in 5-10 years it would be past the point of repair due to bone spurs and other issues. That freaked me out a bit. I had no idea my neck was so messed up. I always thought my lower back was the worst of it.
After hearing his advice, I started thinking about all the times I look down throughout a normal day; I look down when I’m walking so I don’t trip and I take an average of 10k steps in a day, I look down when I’m writing at my desk and half the time while I’m typing for work and I work 8 hours a day, I look down whenever I look at my phone, I look down for an hour before bed while reading. I realized that I spent a good majority of my day looking down! But how do I change that? Today, I had to keep reminding myself to look up while I walked, even if it felt uncomfortable to not watch where I stepped. I propped up my papers while I typed so I didn’t have to look down to enter the information. I feel like there’s really nothing I can do for writing at my desk. I can’t hold paper up and write at the level. I am consciously making the choice to not check my phone so much and when I do to hold it up at eye level like a weirdo. Last night while reading in bed I tried propping my book up on my bent knees so I wasn’t looking down but that wasn’t comfortable or relaxing. I thought about laying down and holding it up to read, but reading makes me sleepy and I’m worried if I drop Outlander 4 on my nose it’ll break it. I’m probably going to have to get creative with that one, because you know I’m not going to quit reading, even if I become a hunchback!
For sleeping he gave me a special thereputic pillow. He said I would most likely hate it for two weeks but then I’ll love it. He wasn’t entirely wrong. Maybe it’s just so different from the pillows I’m used to sleeping on, but I’m hopeful and optimistic it helps.
Just another brick laid in my road to a better and healthier me, I guess. I have a one year care plan set up to go twice a week for twelve weeks, then once a week for twelve weeks, then every other week, and then eventually down to once a month that I can maintain. He said it’s the equivalent to getting back in shape. You can’t work out once a month and hope to get fit again.
Anyway, I’m going to get back to finding a new comfortable reading position where I won’t be looking down. If you have any suggestions please let me know!
Otherwise I’ll have to read like this lady and I have no idea where I’ll find another lady friend to lay in my lap and listen to my stories.
Being told I look down too much also made me think of it from a spiritual point of view as well. All this time I’m looking at my feet while I walk, at my desk while I work, at my phone, there is a big beautiful world happening all around me. If I don’t look up more I just might miss it. I’ve had a lot of little reminders to be present in the moment and not get distracted by things. This was just another one of those. I feel like God’s trying to tell me something here.
Being told to look up more also reminded me of one of my favorite Miranda Lambert songs, Virginia Bluebell with the wonderful line, “pretty little thing, sometimes you gotta look up and let the world see all the beauty that you’re made of, cuz the way you hang your head nobody can tell, you’re my Virginia Bluebell. Give it a listen. It’s beautiful.
As an author, it can be a fine line to walk in reading for work and reading for fun. I have been studying the French Revolution so much lately in preparation for writing my next book that every word felt like a task to complete…not exactly relaxing, though not unenjoyable either. But it definitely isn’t the same as curling up in bed, setting my little pillow on my lap to prop up my book, and disappearing into the mind and hearts of familiar characters I have come to love as friends and family.
I take my reading time before bed seriously. I like to have about an hour to get good and tired, and usually that’s all about it takes. It’s such a great activity to not only keep my mind and imagination active and sharp, but it slows me down too, makes me really picture what I’m reading so I can watch it play out right inside my mind.
Occasionally, I’ll meet someone who says they don’t like to read, or they just can’t because their mind thinks of other things. I get it. My mind does that too. In fact, it just did it right now. I was reading The Drums of Autumn in the Outlander series and I thought, “hey, I haven’t written a blog post in a few days”, and off I went. My husband is like that 24/7. His brain is always in hyper drive so he has a hard time reading unless it’s reading to learn a new skill.
Night after night, I’ll see him playing on his phone before bed and I think of all those studies that say you should give yourself 30 minutes of no screen time before bed to really relax and decompress from the constant stimuli in our lives; ie TV, tablets, computers, phones. Reading is a great alternative unless you’re one of those Kindle/Nook enthusiasts. I’m not knocking it, I promise. It’s just not for me. I’m too much of a page sniffer to ever give up a physical book. I have been enjoying my Bookbub emails every morning, though, to snag a good free Kindle book once in a while. My digital library has grown enormously this way, and yet I never seem to go for my tablet to read (unless I get stuck somewhere like in a lull at work or in a doctor’s office. Then, it’s perfect!)
What started as a nice little post about getting back to the good feelings that come from reading for pleasure as an author has quickly turned into rambling nonsense, so I’m going to get back to reading. I hope you all have a lovely night!
With the wonderful weather we’ve been having, it’s felt like summer for weeks but now it’s official. Summer is here! This will be a unique summer for us because we are staying with my parents while our new house is being built. That means we have a little less to do, a little less to worry about, and a lot more time to enjoy the season. Some of our favorite things to do in the summer include:
1. Swimming
Charlotte had a lot of fun helping to fill the inflatable pop up pool grandma got her and she is in it almost every single day
2. Parks
There are so many parks to visit in the Valpo area, plus the park in front of our new build is finished so we get to go visit it every Sunday when we check on the progress of our new home
3. Soccer Camp
We signed Charlotte up for a week long soccer camp with the Valpo Parks Dept so she could test it out before joining a league this fall
4. Drive-in Movie Nights
The 49-er Drive in Movie theater is a fun treat for the whole family, though we usually only make it through the first movie
5. DIY Projects
With all the downtime we have not doing projects around the house, I’ve started doing what little I can for when we move in and to help around my parents’ house.
6. Family Walks
There are so many great places to hike and walk in Northwest Indiana with the Dunes State Park just down the road and more. We definitively take advantage of this all we can (on days where we won’t sweat our faces off)
7. Catch up on Reading List
I have taken advantage of my downtime to catch up on my mile long reading list that includes; books 4-8 in Outlander, Twisted Fairy Tales from Disney, all Magnolia Journals to date, Make Something Good Today by Erin and Ben Napier, and so much more! Charlotte’s been pretty impressive with her reading as well, checking out 5-10 books a week from the library.
8. Dream about New Home
I have been a Floorplanner.com, Pinterest, Home Design magazine, HGTV junkie this summer dreaming up all the wonderful ways to make our blank canvas of a new build our dream home (on a budget of course)
9. Clean Out Junk (In the home and in myself)
While all our stuff is boxed and packed and at my mom’s and his mom’s and storage, this is the perfect time to clean house so to speak. First task is closets. All our clothes are at my parents’ right now so that makes cleaning out our old clothes an easy one-day task. Charlotte is growing like a weed so I need to bag up her too small items to give to her little cousin and I definitely need to simplify. Too much of a good thing is no good at all, and I have way too many clothes! We are also selling a lot of our Lego “inventory” so we don’t just have money sitting on the shelf when we could be using it for our new house. This summer is all about simplifying for me.
I am also using this downtime to get back in touch with myself, God, my family, and take stock of it all. I want to improve my relationships, learn to love others better, recognize my flaws and improve on myself, accept my quirks and imperfections, applaud myself for my creativity and talents, and dig deeper into who I am. I want to envision what the best version of me is this summer and then go after that.
10. Invest Time in our Businesses
I am investing more time in my authorship business and in my new home decorating business I am in the process of launching this year. It feels so good to be my own boss and to create beautiful things like stories, characters, and homes. This is what I was made for.
For two days now I have been in a crabby kinda mood; I’m short with everyone, I am rolling my eyes at every little thing and doing that annoyed teeth sucking sound, and just being generally unpleasant. I used to be annoyed a lot, especially as a moody teenager and then a moody 20-something. But that is not how I want to live my 30s (or 40s or 50s or 60s). I’ve found I have to be incredibly intentional in policing my moods and negativity. It’s no secret that I dealt with my fair share of depression and anxiety (quite a mix), so I am always looking out for those little backslips into that, and I nip them good!
I take a lot of walks around the back parking lot at work, mostly for my back, but also because it’s a great way to squeeze in exercise and clear my head. On my first walk I like to pray. It’s a very informal yet routine-like talk with God and I always come out feeling better. I talked about how I’m feeling, how I’m irritated and I wasn’t sure why, and most importantly asked for help to not feel crabby anymore. Almost immediately I felt like I should apologize to my husband for being an irritated crab and allow myself to vent to him a bit about my grievances; I signed Charlotte up for soccer but I don’t ever get to see her in action because I’m at work, but it seems like everyone else gets to go, I’m starting back to normal working hours this week so instead of getting off at 3 every day like I have been the last two months it’s 5, twice a week I have to drive 30 minutes one way for a 5 minute back adjustment at the chiropractor, losing even more precious time, I’m worried about not getting to spend enough time with Charlotte and this is her last summer before starting full-day kindergarten, I’ve been obsessed with all the details of starting my home decorating business, and the list went on until my head was spinning! But it did feel good to vent; to my husband and to God and both listened with love and sympathy.
A cute missed soccer moment
The most important part is I chose not to dwell in the venting. Once I said it, I had to let it go. To do this, I then started to thank God for the very things I complained about; thank you for providing me with a full-time job during these uncertain times, a steady paycheck to help support my family with, with work I don’t hate and at a place that is like home. Thank you for our health. Thank you for providing a way to show my daughter all the fun and wonderful things she can do, to be able to give her new experiences in life through soccer and ballet and karate and more. Thank you for giving me the motivation to go to the chiropractor to help the pain in my back. I believe I was brought there for good reason. Thank you for the pain relief I’m already experiencing. Thank you for gifting me with multiple passions and talents and for not limiting me to one thing but letting me experience so many different joys in my life.
And just like that, my attitude changed completely! I didn’t feel overwhelmed or overburdened or stressed or sad anymore. I got my work done, I finished up the last of the prep work for my home decorating business’s consultation folders, and I started organizing my notes on the French Revolution so I can start writing my next novel.
I came home to an empty house, something that is truly rare these days, and instead of being annoyed at any number of things I couldn’t grumbled about I said thank you again. Thank you for this moment of peace. I poured myself a big glass of lemonade and caught up on reading some Magnolia Journals while I waited for everyone to come home.
It actually turned out to be a pretty awesome and accomplished day. So, don’t give up hope if you’re feeling irritated with life. It sounds so simple it couldn’t be true, but it is; try a new perspective and watch it take life inside of you.
