My blog - how to follow and comment

Well, my last post got some responses! HOT DOG!  What I found out was that it is hard to see how to comment on my blog and it's not clear how to "follow".  So this is my "how to" post!

Comments:

At the bottom of each post you can easily see 3 check boxes - funny, interesting, and cool are the boxes.  Right above those boxes a little to the right it will either say "No comments" or "1 comment" or "2 comment" etc.  Click that and it will take to you a comment box!

How to follow my blog:

There is a section in the upper right titled "Followers".  A little bit more to the right there are two little boxes one on top of another.  Click it!  Another box pops up and in the upper right corner it says FOLLOW.  Just click it!

If you ever feel the urge to encourage other to read my posts you can simply copy and past the address bar at the top of the page.

Thank you!  Be sure to leave a comment so I know my directions are understandable!

D. J.

Maybe my last post....

Well this may be my last post out here.  I love a place to get my thoughts "down on paper" but I just hate that I am the only one receiving benefit from it.   Bummed.

A couple of things have been going through my head this week.

First  - worshiping our Heavenly Father through singing/music.  I get so excited to watch people worship while they sing.  I love to see the surrender, joy and peace in their faces and in their motions.  Even those who have tears streaming down their face - many are just before God laying it out there for Him to heal, to take care of, to love.  It is beautiful.  I am sad for those that can't seem to plug into this outlet to totally bask in the glory and presence of God.  When I am participating in the worship team and I get to look out at everyone often times I try to "see" God and focus my praise on Him.  I also begin to wonder and even ask God sometimes, "Are you pleased with this", "Does this make you smile", "does this honor You" ...Then I think about that day when all is said and done and nothing remains except worshiping our heavenly father.  That will be an amazing time!  In my physical knowledge and understanding I wonder what it will look like.  If I am able to look around - I would see nothing for as far as I could see -except everyone worshiping God - literally a sea of worshipers.  I know I would be excited. But then I have to think about all those that aren't there.  That decided to NOT follow Christ.  Will I think about them on that day?  Will God?  Will God have emotions of joy and of loss?  I hate the thought of people living without a personal relationship with our Lord and Savior.  I also hate the thought of God losing one of his children.  Does this spur you into action?  It does me, it motivates me to live as He has called me to live and do what he prompts me to do.  Times a wasting - we've got to get moving.

Well I was going to touch on a couple more things.  But I think that is a good amount to ponder for today.

Lots of love to all.  Please comment so I know this is getting read.

D. J.

I Think I am going to Quit

Well,  I am thinking I am going to quit blogging on here.  I don't have any comments EVER!  I would like to think that my random posts would entertain while helping someone along their life's journey.  But so far - nope.  I have very few followers, and obviously even fewer comments.  I would do just as good to type out all my random thinking in my own online journal for my benefit only.  But while I am here I might as well post one more time...then I will decide.

Life is ever changing.  God is not.  God is God.  That means his instruction manual never changes - you know - the bible.  What is has to say today is just as applicable to us today as when it was written.  God intended it to be timeless, just as He is.  There is a key to living life in an unchanging fashion as well.  We should learn by studying the Word the way to live day to day regardless of the fact that things are ever changing around us.  I haven't figured it out yet.  That simply means I have not been in the Word enough for it to become clear.  But I know that I know - the answers are all in the Word.  I know peace awaits me.  I know confidence in what I have done is found His Word.  I know a better path is there to be found and taken.  I have a glimpse of it.  But in order to see more, I must continue down His path.  Many life events go into this pondering today. To many to go into. I simply do not have enough words to express the number of emotions I go through almost on a daily basis at this point.  It's all good.  It is life.  I have been greatly blessed and am amazed that God continues to pour out even more!

I am loved!  So are you!

D. J.

I can't help it, I am a numbers nerd!

Well, it's true!  I am a total numbers nerd!  I love to count, I love math, and I love to make spreadsheets with lots of calculations on them. I am also a little OCD which can really make my love of numbers quite funny.  

For example - there are 3 restrooms in my office building that I choose to use.  I can tell you how many steps it takes to get to each one from my office.  There used to be two parking lots to choose from when parking at work.  I used to be able to tell you how many steps it takes to get to each one.  I used to wear a pedometer - if you have ever used a decent one you know you have to enter your average step length - I measured my step according to the instructions.  Then I would go walk a mile while counting my steps then check to see if I calculated my step length correctly.  I love to set timers to see if I can get things done within a certain amount of time.  I love to balance checkbooks! Oh my, I could go on and on!

Anyway - all that to talk about a thought that has been bouncing around in my head.  I am a weight watcher.  Love love love Weight Watchers because it works (when I work the program), it is something I can totally live with the rest of my life, it helps me to realistically feed my family better, and because all food has a points plus value and I have a recommended number of points plus that I use each day - numbers!  The thought/idea - "Eat well 90% of the time" and you can lose weight, get healthy - yadi yada...  But I began to think - exactly how much is 90%?? As I was kicking this around the thought became just eating well "most" of the time.  

Are you ready?

If you eat 3 meals per day - that would mean 1/3 of a single meal could be "unhealthy or less healthy that what you have committed to"  - not much in my opinion.

So lets look at it this way - It you eat 3 meals per day for a week, that's 21 meals. That means 2.1 meals could be "unhealthy or less healthy that what you have committed to.  That sounds more doable but really when you look at your current eating pattern I bet you would have to cut A LOT of unhealthy out of your week.

But wait - what if you eat snacks each day too!?!

3 meals per day and 3 snacks per day - 2/3 of a meal can be unhealthy - again not much.

Per week - 42 total eats - a little over 4 could be "unhealthy" - again , I am sure we would all need to do come cutting back!

Now if you are a weight watcher this gets kinda fun and a little more applicable!  

My recommended daily points plus allowance is 36  per day which is which means per week I could spend 25 points plus on the less healthier options.  And I would also have to add that I would want to make sure I had met my good health guidelines before I chose a less healthy option.

I know - kind of an odd post.  But I wanted to do it because I wanted to see it "on paper".  Plus the 90% thinking could be applied to many areas of life...don't even get me started!  LOL!

Well I hope it was a fun little post for you today!

Lots of love!

D. J.

I would like to do research....female topic - females only

I have been pondering again.  

Okay - women - we all know we have a monthly cycle, right?  Well we also know there is about a week that our emotions are a bit on the edgy maybe out of control side of things, right?  I have noticed over the years my thought patterns during this time of the month tend to be more negative and less hopeful.  But I have also noticed that the week after is usually the most upbeat and most positive time of the month for me.  It's a great time for me to look at the upcoming month and plan, plan my workouts, my overall housekeeping schedule, menus, grocery lists.  Its also a great time to tackle a big job...be it cleaning my car inside and out, deep cleaning a room in the house.  Get the idea?  The following 2 ish weeks are really what I would consider my normal positive self.  

So, pondering all of this I would just about bet most of us women are the same way.  That is what I would like to research if I could. But since I can't...I had more thoughts about this that I wanted to share.  It seems like common sense but unless we actually think about it I don't think we realize that we could use this knowledge to our advantage.  

First of all - that one dreaded week - PLAN NOTHING! LOL!  Well, don't plan to try to tackle anything major.  Do not plan to have any heart to heart conversation with your husband!  We are too raw, too sensitive, we are a little "too" everything, if you enter into these conversations you are setting yourself up for hurt feelings, words being said that you don't really mean, regret...Need I go on?  Plan an easy week.  For me personally I know I can easily talk myself out of going to the gym or working out - so I think I should plan a 1st thing in the morning workout so I have fewer reasons to come up with to try to talk myself out of it.  I also know I am super tired during this time - so I am purposely going to plan to go to bed way early each night.  I should keep housekeeping expectations to just picking up/maintaining.  Meals will be super easy and quick meals with quick and easy clean up.  I also need to make a list of things that I am thankful for and reflect on that often along with some encouraging and uplifting scriptures.  Many of us have cravings during this time - so if you are working on a healthy lifestyle simply plan the indulgence in moderation into this week.  I love MEAT during this time and a few sweets - in order to keep from feeling deprived and or guilty - plan them, have them (in moderation), enjoy them!  Allow yourself this for one week - geesh!  I know to not look for a significant loss on the scale - I should prepare myself to be thrilled to maintain my weight for this week.  

The second week - WOWZERS!  I should work on planning out that second week a couple of days before it starts.  This is the best time for me to get stuff done!  Seriously - I find myself making killer daily lists for that week and I usually have great success tackling it.  But just recently realizing what is happening to me emotionally and physically at this time- I think I can build on this even more.  I also tend to bump up my workouts this week.  I used to get discouraged that I couldn't keep up the workout pace that I have for this particular week - for the whole month.  But realistically I think it all evens out.  My workouts during the previous week are probably the least intense of the month.  This week would counter act that and the next two weeks are my normal.  It's so important to look at that whole picture sometimes. Are you seeing it?

The other two weeks - they are my "normal" weeks.  The easiest for me to handle weeks.  These are the weeks life make sense.  These are the weeks I need to just focus on balance and best performance in all areas.  Not MAX performance, just best performance.  I hope that makes sense to ya'all. 

A little over a week ago, maybe two weeks now,  I finished a book by Lysa Terkherst called Unglued.  It has helped me with my pondering.  She discussed the types of "unglued" we can be and I found myself in different categories depending on what "mood" I was in...I realized my mood directly related to where I was within the month.  

This is what has been on my heart and mind lately.  I feel like God is opening my eyes to how I work physically and emotionally so that I can be and do better each week for myself, my family and for my witness.  Knowledge is power if we apply it.  

I encourage you to start evaluating yourself and just see...do you have a rhythm each month?  I bet you do.  Find it and use that knowledge to your advantage.

Thanks for reading!

D. J.

Calling us to draw closer

Yesterday in our book study at church we discussed honoring the Sabbath.  Great discussion, new insight, my heart yearns to draw closer to God as a result.  Yesterdays Sermon - BOLD LOVE.   Great sermon, reminded that my calling is bigger than where I am, my heart yearns to draw closer to God as a result and to hear Him more clearly.  Today's devotion on proverbs31.org reminds me to beware when I am feeling spiritually comfortable, my heart yearns to draw closer to Him, to hear Him more clearly, and to receive from Him.

I so appreciate that God knows how my mind works.  When I hear think I hear something for the first time from God, I ponder, "Is this God or is this just me and my idea".  As I ponder if I do not get any more revelation or prompting from God I decide it must just be me and my idea.  If I get another prompting that lines up with this first I think, "I think this is God" It takes that third time for me to KNOW.  I appreciate that He gave me all 3 in less than 24 hours as my pondering was getting me excited and I was so hoping it was totally God.  As I hashed out this promptings with God I felt He was telling me - I have more I want to bless you with! To which I responded - But you have already blessed me so much, I don't need more.  God says - It's not a matter of your need, it's a matter of a Father wanting to give more to His child.  Please draw closer to me, listen to me and move in this area, watch what I will do!  I am in awe.  To be in a place of not having a dire worldly need and yet God wants to give me more.  I don't know exactly what the more is, that's not really what is important.  The importance is that even though I seem to be in a nice comfortable place of faith, God wants to be even closer to me and wants me to draw closer to him.  I feel special.  I feel loved.  

I think of my earthly father.  He moved about 2000 miles to live in our town, closer to us.  I am so happy to have him here.  I still worry about him, but I worry less because he is closer by.  Even though he is closer now, I know he still wants me to come and spend time with him.  I don't have to - we are both pretty happy just being so close now.  But we both want to draw together.  When we do - I think we are both so blessed by that time together.  I learn more about him, about how he is doing and vice versa.  As I learn more about him I learn more about what he needs from me as his child.  Is this sounding like another Father/Child relationship?

With both of these relationship sometimes I have to put things on the back burner for a while. I have to give us some of my personal desires.  But when I do the benefit that I get far outweighs the concern of what I have put off or given up.  I find myself wanting to spend as much time as possible in the presence of my Fathers.  I believe God honors this in more ways that I can realistically think of or see at this point.

Thanks for reading.

Lots of love!

D. J.

What is happening to the Roller Coaster?

Isn't our spiritual walk/journey so interesting?  I don't know about you but I know years ago when I was just becoming aware of the importance of being commitment to this relationship with my Heavenly Father that things were either HIGH or LOW.  I was either very aware and super excited about all that God was doing for me or I was in utter despair begging and crying out to God to rescue me.  Like a roller coaster.  An emotional roller coaster, and a spiritual roller coaster.  There were times I drew so near to God and times that I became distant from God - no middle ground.  There were times I could feel his presence and know his promptings without any effort and then there were times I felt so alone and isolated.  Up and down, Up and down.

Lately though I notice that it is not like that for me anymore.  So much so I have asked if maybe I have become desensitized to my relationship with my Father.  Wondered if I was falling away and just didn't realize it.  You see life is still happening - scary stuff, good stuff, I still make mistakes and need to be rescued from my stupidity, I am still aware of how blessed I am...but there is no ebb and flow.  

Let me give you a couple of examples of how life has been happening - just so you know - its still happening.

I keep two checkbooks in my purse.  One for two different accounts.  I haven't been very good at keeping up with my accounts lately (other than in my head ~ which is a big no no) but today I decided to check in on the accounts.  Things didn't add up.  I then noticed the checks in each of my check book were actually on the same exact account!  Do you know how disastrous this could have been?  Life happened in my checkbooks - praise God it just took some ciphering and online transferring and we sidestepped a HUGE mess.  God protected us.  In the past this could have resulted in an emotional melt down!

Around a month ago I found out I had an abnormal mammogram.  For about 45 minutes I battled being in a total tizzy!  Years ago this would have been a tizzy from that moment until the doctors told me something for sure.  But, God had seen ahead and provided me with a really great newish friend who is a cancer survivor and a believer ~ she was my first contact and she helped bring my brief tizzy to and end and helped shift my focus to the awesome power my master physician has.  My bestest friend of many years helped me get into a great clinic for further testing and was with me (physically and spiritually) the whole way!  

Big stuff - but I didn't have the high and low going on.  For the most part it was just a nice even trust in my heavenly Father.  Praise in his protection over me, praise in the fact that He always sees ahead and provides. Today I stay close to Him.  I am much better about being in prayer and being in the word.  Not because I HAVE to but because I love to!  My life has not necessarily become easier or less eventful.  But my faith has become my rooted so that I am not easily swayed.  I still stress from time to time, I still struggle with being ugly sometimes.  But all in all I can tell God has gotten to my core and has changed me down deep.  He is still changing me as I will always be a work in progress.  

I LOVE Roller coasters ya'all - absolutely love them!  But I only love the ones that I choose to get on and then get to get off of in a few short minutes.  I don't miss the roller coasters of  being a newly committed Christian.  I don't miss the roller coasters of the early spiritual journey.  I certainly appreciate them and all that I have learned from them but I am SO happy to be on this side.  I can't imagine what God has in store for me next but I know it will be awesome!  Everyday is awesome with my God!

I hope I am making some sense as you read this or I hope you are being encouraged by it. That's my purpose in posting ~ I want you to be encouraged to stand firm and hold tight to the promises our Heavenly Father has given us.  I want you to know that the effort put into this wonderful relationship at the beginning becomes much more natural, easy, and beneficial.  Peace is about to overwhelm you like no other ~ even in the midst of life!

Lots of love to all of you!

D. J.