Pressing On

What’s in a name?  Everyone has a first name that they were given by their birth parents.  Most people keep that name from day one, and it stays with them until the day they die.  Occasionally, people change their name, maybe first and last, because they didn’t feel like the name really fit them, or maybe it did fit them but they wanted to be someone different.  Other times, people can get nick-names that other people give them at different times in their life based on quirks they have, or physical characteristics, or embarrassing experiences that have now defined you in another person’s life.  Or, maybe we give ourselves names because of how we feel about ourselves and how we see our value in this world based on how others treat us.

It’s easy for me to establish my value & identity on what I hear others say about me and how social media tends to dictate what I should value, and even, if I have any value.  So easy, that I knew I had to make a change.  At the beginning of 2017, I reached a point where I was dissatisfied enough with the messages around me and about me that I knew that I needed to turn them off.  This led to really minimizing my presence on Facebook to almost nothing, but I also knew that I had to make other changes as well.  Most of my life I’ve been overweight....because of my own eating choices and decisions not to push myself to exercise.  I’ve never really been a very athletic person nor have I maintained any interest in team sports since my soccer days in elementary school.  Once I got into a routine of laziness and over-eating, that routine has been seemingly impossible to break.  Which is where I was in January of this year.  I was at the heaviest I had ever been and the year in front of me seemed like there was no plan to be any different.

But since September, we had been studying a book by Max Lucado called “Grace” in the small group with our church, and it had been speaking to me.  I thought I knew about the importance of showing grace to others in my life but there was one thing I had been missing.  Did I think I was worthy of God’s grace in my life? Was I really accepting God’s grace in my life?  Who was I?  It’s that last question that has really captured my attention and caused me to examine things in my life.  It came down to realizing just how much God loves me for who I am right now and how much he has planned for my life!  You see, part of getting overweight and staying overweight is the idea of failure.  I thought I was a failure and always would be a failure because when I would try to exercise and eat a little better, the power of food (which is what I took comfort in) and encounters with soreness and joint pain always won out.  So, I guess I was just always meant to be overweight and lazy, right?

No…not at all.  When I started to really think about how much God loves me everyday, no matter what, is when I knew this wasn’t what or who I was.  If I made a mistake, so what, God still loves me.  “But it’s too hard!” I would say.  Again, no.  Because God loves me, he will give me the strength to succeed.  So I started to really cut back on the amount I was eating and started eating healthier. I spent weeks trying to figure out what healthy foods agree and don’t agree with my weird digestive system (still fine tuning this) and I stopped shoving all the sugar and fat in my mouth all the time.  And I started moving....walking early in the morning, then biking some too, then training the right way for two 5K’s I signed up for in a little over a month.  In the midst of joint pain from my body getting used to all this activity, waking up in the middle of the night with leg cramps from exercising, learning the hard way that I need to stretch better, and learning how to workout with a sprained ankle (because apparently I still don’t know how to walk down stairs sometimes), I start to feel better, start to lose the weight that has been building up for the last 20 + years, and start to realize that I am not who the world tells me I am. I am the creation that God made me and I can do ANYTHING in the grace He gives me each and every day.  Just as God has allowed be to make extraordinary changes in my life in over the last three month, I know that when I wake up tomorrow I will know who I am and Who I belong to………and I will press on.

What Remains of the Destruction

There are times when I write in order to workout my own thoughts and emotions because it is hard for me to grasp what I see around me and it’s the only way I know how to try and process the events, and in what I see now, the carnage. I am writing this less than 48 hours after the results of the 2016 presidential election and the view is bleak.  I don’t say this because of the individual that has been elected into office but because of all the anger, hatred, mocking, gloating, screaming and shouting that is in almost every social media post, news report, and conversation that is within earshot. 

I understand the emotion that has built up over the course of the last two years with every commercial, debate, rally, news story, and online article that has decried every single candidate with expletive after expletive.  Emotions that push neighbors, co-workers, and even fellow church members to ridicule and mock one another because of differing beliefs and opinions.  Emotions that bring us to the point of publicly questioning the strength of each other’s faith, patriotism, ethical beliefs, and attitudes towards racism, sexism, xenophobic, homophobic outlooks on the world.  I am most troubled by hearing aand reading these statements from people who proclaimed more than their fair share of “amens” in churches led by pastors who have reiterated to congregations of the dangers of this very behavior over the past several months. 

 But when your emotion drives you to call any candidate, political supporter, or anyone else the thousands of hateful, dirty, disgusting words that have been uttered over the last two years……what does that make you?  A Republican?  A Democrat?  A Christian?  A Pro-Life or Pro-Choice advocate?  A Patriot?  Maybe, but so what? When you condemn, criticize, chastise and berate the very people that are created and loved by God, what does that make you?  When you lose your temper and scream at those expressing their opinions...exercising the very rights you hold so dear to your own heart....what does that make you?

When you’re angry that the world around you hates Jesus and doesn’t eve recognize Him anymore…..maybe it’s because they don’t see Jesus in you?  Maybe the Jesus that you proclaim is in control of this nation no matter who is in the White House, is weeping as He sees what his children are saying and doing to each another. 

Maybe…there is a time to just….be….quiet.  And now, so will I.

What's your story?

If there’s one thing I’ve learned it’s that everyone has a story. While it may not be a Hollywood blockbuster set to score written by John Williams, it’s still there. This is a story that no one else has ever heard because this story can only be told by your own words about events that have only been seen through your eyes. The trouble is, we spend a huge amount of time avoiding neighbors and co-workers purposely just so we don’t have to tell a story that they might desperately need to hear. 

Sometimes the story doesn't have a happy ending and it may still have some blank chapters at the end, but that doesn’t mean it’s not worth sharing. The stories that we bottle-up inside ourselves shove into the deepest areas of our heart are the ones that someone around you desperately needs to hear. Maybe it’s the experience of losing a family member or close friend that broke you to pieces, or it’s the loss of a relationship or job. Maybe it’s finding your life’s passion after years of a bitter and regret-filled life. Whatever your story is, whether it’s on chapter 3 or 80, it’s not meant for you alone. You see, my story isn’t just written by me. Everyone around me: family members, friends, neighbors, co-workers, people in my church, are all part of my story. Their experiences, laughter, tears, dreams, regrets and hope is what helps me see the world around me in a way that my eyes aren’t able to see, but only if they tell me their story. And just as my life is richer with their lives, I owe it to them to share my story. It’s not just my story and their story, but it’s our story.

 So what next? Don’t wait until you have a typewriter, don’t proofread over and over just waiting for the perfect words, and don’t wait until you complete three years of Toastmasters. Sit down and write or just talk to someone, but whatever you do, just share. So, what’s your story?

Reclaiming Your Life

Many of us have heard of the term “reclaimed wood”.  This is wood that had once been used as a door, or rafters in a house, or an old barn that had been torn down because of years of neglect or maybe even a fire. Or maybe it was an old piece of furniture like a chest of drawers that had been set out for the trash because of one too many gouges in the side, or a corner that got chipped off or perhaps a knob broke off.  For whatever the reason, the previous owner no longer wanted the chest and it was then considered trash.  But when used construction material or used furniture is taken, stripped of paint, sanded down, and old nails and screws are removed so it can begin a life as something new, this is called reclaimed wood.  Someone has seen something beautiful and found value in that piece of wood, old window or old dresser. 

A lot of times things can happen in our own lives that damage ourselves in ways we think are beyond repair.   A lost job, a lost loved one, an emotional hurt or maybe a sin we’ve committed that we just can’t seem to forgive ourselves of and are certain God will never forgive either.  These are life-changing events and sometimes we allow parts of our life to die after they’ve occurred.  We allow the pain to scar our minds and souls so we spend the rest of our lives with an emotional limp that never seems to go away.  We feel that because of the pain and hurt and suffering we’ve experienced that it’s clearly a sign that God has abandoned us or even worse, was never with us at all.  But the fact that we know what pain feels like means that we also know what it feels like to be healthy and vibrant.  It means at some point we have already experienced God’s love and grace in our life whether we realized it at the time or not. 

Deuteronomy 31:8 says,

 “Do not be afraid or discouraged, for the Lord will personally go ahead of you.  He will be with you; he will neither fail you nor abandon you.” 

Now this doesn’t mean that God keeps us from experiencing pain and sorrow because He doesn’t.  The reason there is pain and sorrow in the world to begin with is because people’s sin and selfishness create them with our actions and our own words.  This was not God’s design for Creation, it is what we made it by allowing sin into our lives.  But this verse means that despite the pain and sorrow we have of our own making, God is with us and will never abandon us.  He will always make himself available for our healing and restoration.  He will reclaim our lives if we let Him and we can reclaim our lives to serve Him.  Those parts of your life that were once scarred or dead can now have those nails removed, those nicks and gouges sanded down, and new purpose can be found in what was once left to rot.  Will your life ever be just as it once was? No, but it can still be beautiful and others around you who might have gone through or are going through the same pain you experienced can find hope in your life and can learn from your experiences. 

We can choose to rot like wood sitting in a pile in someone’s backyard, wasting away or we can reclaim our lives for God and allow the beauty of the scars in the weathered wood of our lives to find a new home with a new purpose.  Choose a new life.

Content

Content -- noun - Having substance and measurable.  That which fills a particular spatial area. 

I must provide definable, measurable, and quantifiable value for everything I do, everything I say, and every interaction I have with others.  The world constantly screaming in our ears that we should be making the most of our lives and making sure we don’t fritter away the final hours of each day.  Life has a way of assigning a series of lists and check boxes to every day, and then lying awake at night figuring out how to check more boxes and make more lists the following day.  That is how I feel life has become for me to a degree, and that if I don’t make my quota of meetings, errands and completed chores then my life will have been nothing but a waste.  Nothing I've ever done is enough and my lists of lists are never complete, only growing.

But, I’ve been accumulating too many books that need reading. I’ve driven by too many wooded trails that need exploring.  I’ve spent too much time scrolling the News Feed making sure I didn’t miss anything the rest of the world is doing. I’ve been too busy making sure I check-in at every gas station and Starbucks I frequent.  I’ve spent too much time thinking about what to say than I do wondering if I have anything worth saying.  I’ve expressed too many opinions aloud rather than leaving too many words best left unsaid: criticism, complaining, arguing, and disregarding.  I want to spend more time loving others, helping others, and loving the Creator that has given me the opportunity to love.

Content -- verb - to realize that wherever you are, regardless of how much you have or don’t have, you have enough.  To be joyful with God’s provision in your life.

A weekend with Papa

Have you ever had a time in your life that was so wonderful and filled you with so much joy that you wish time would freeze and you could live it over and over again?  This past weekend was one of those times for when I had the extreme privilege of hearing Wm. Paul Young, author of "The Shack" speak at my church and at a men's retreat.  throughout the series of talks that spanned over three days I laughed, cried, and learned how to feel God's love in my life in brand new ways that I never thought was possible for me.  I cannot possibly share all of the stories Paul told that were both heart-wrenching and utterly hope-filled at the same time, but I wanted to share just a few things that my Papa has been trying to tell me all along.

1.  I love you! I love you! I love you! No matter what you do son, I love and I will always love you.  No matter what!  You can't change this and I won't change this! I am love.

2.  You do not belong to fear and sin.  You, my child, were created in My image, and I am always good.  If there is pain, sorrow, hurt or sin it did not come from Me.  So if I am always good, and you were created in My image, then you do not belong to sin, you belong to me. If you do not belong to sin then sin does not define you, only my love defines you.

3. I don't bring pain and death into this world, but that doesn't mean that I won't use it for something better, something monumental.  I did not create death, but I can use death to create a bigger and better life than you can imagine.  

4. I cannot lie because I am always good.  So, if I ask you to trust me, then nothing can happen that won't be good.  Nothing.

5. In case you've already forgotten, I love you!  

This is what Papa told me this weekend, and if you are quiet and listen really carefully, He's telling you too. If you want to hear part of what Wm Paul Young shared this weekend, you can go to Cornerstone Church's website and listen for yourself.  Now go talk to your Papa!

 

Where has the time gone?

It’s happened again this year.  In fact, it’s happened more than once this year.  An entire season has gone by far more quickly than I anticipated.  Thinking back to around Memorial Day, I can remember that I had a mental list of things that I wanted to do and projects that I wanted to tackle that just didn’t get done.  What happened?  Life happened: work, sleep, and mostly times when I was just feeling completely unmotivated to do anything and always thinking to myself, “Well, I’ll do that next weekend.”  It never ceases to amaze me how quickly time passes by and how large my ambitions are vs. how committed I am do seeing something through to the end. 

Unfortunately, there are other areas in life that can fall into this same pattern.  We have so many good intentions that never make it past the planning stage. We put off phone calls to family members and old friends to the point where we don’t think about them anymore. We let the Bible sit on the table gathering dust and choose to turn on the T.V. instead of talking to our Father who misses hearing from us.

I often forget that from the day I was born, my time on this planet was already pre-determined and I don’t get an unlimited number of tomorrows or next weeks.  What I choose to do today and every other day is critical to my life and the lives of others.  The opportunities I have to comfort, hug, or even say “I love you” to someone decrease every single day and I don’t get those moments back.  The chances to show hope and love to my neighbors, co-workers, even the person in front of me at the grocery store slips away with every sunset and before I know it, there are no more chances and no more tomorrows. 

I don’t want to think to myself, “If I could live my life over again I would…” rather I want to know exactly where my time has gone and know it was spent well.

The cradle will not rock

My job is fairly uneventful. Mainly a 9 to 5 type of work with some travel thrown in the mix here and there.  I can say it’s been pretty carefree and uninteresting for the most part, that is until this week.  It just so happens that I was scheduled to fly to Boston 24 hours after the bombing at the Boston Marathon two days ago.  There was definitely a pit in my stomach when I heard about this on the news on the drive home when it happened.  Panic and fear immediately hit a city and an event that draws immense international focus and attention.  I was hoping to get an email immediately saying that my conference was canceled.  I was hoping that the hotel, which is one block away from where the blasts happened, would say that everyone has been evacuated and it is closed until further notice. But no, this wasn’t the case.

When I got to Boston I wasn’t quite sure what to expect.  Would there be mass chaos or people everywhere in the throes of emotional breakdowns? No, this still wasn’t the case.  What I saw, and still see around me here, is quite the opposite.  While everyone is all too aware of the tragedies of two days ago, the people of Boston are not defeated.  The faces I see around me are still smiling, although maybe not as much as they normally would.  People are still laughing and courteous, although maybe a little more wary of their surroundings than they might otherwise.  The city is still embracing one another, even the visitors such as myself, as they would have otherwise.  The spirit of Boston is still vibrant, and I think even to the point of patting the rest of the nation on the back and saying “It’s going to be okay.”

What does it mean to be tested and tried?  What does it look like to get up when you fall or you're pushed down?  I’ve experienced triumph and I’ve experienced failure and disappointment.  I’ve been beaten down to the point where I almost haven’t been able to get up.  But this is the first time since 9/11 I’ve witnessed first-hand an entire community stand back up and brush itself off.  I don’t think it’s possible to fully understand the events that this city have experienced in the last 48 hours, but I am grateful, and privileged, to witness the recovery that is happening.  I’m glad I came, I’m proud of this city, God Bless America!

The Day In Between

Yesterday, it all went down.  The man who spent the last three years of his life dedicated to loving others without concern of what the world thought, who performed miracle after miracle for people who both praised his name and I’m sure some who just took his gift and threw it away, was humiliated, beaten, and then spent hour after agonizing hour hanging by spikes ripping into his flesh.  It was brutal and excruciating pain, made all the worse by Roman soldiers pointing and laughing while throwing die to see who would get his only possessions he ever owned.  But his entire life was preparing him for this day……..it was destined to happen from the beginning.  And why was that?  It was because of me and because of you.  We were the hammer, the hammer that drove the nails into his body.  We were the ones who chose to turn away from God time and time again.  We had our own agenda and our own game plan.  We chose evil, and hate, and nasty words, and death, and tearing people down, and letting people starve, and letting children wallow in sickness and did nothing.  We should have been up there, hanging from those beams and writhing in pain.  We deserved this.  But that man, the one named Jesus, he did it for us.  In fact, just as he was being taken captive by the those soldiers the other day, he turned around and gave a little nod to the disciples, saying, “Don’t worry, I’ve got this.” This was yesterday.

Tomorrow, well we know what’s going to happen then.  Jesus was telling us all along what would happen.  While he would die, he would live again.  He would live forever and we could too if we were willing. Yep, that’s what’s going to happen tomorrow and I can’t wait! It will be the best day ever! But what do we do now? What can we do now? What do we know how to do?  Well there is one thing we know how to do because we did it so well before, and that is to be the hammer.  But this time, what if instead of causing pain and death we choose to heal and free.  What if tomorrow, on that amazing day, we look around for people who have build up these walls around themselves.  These walls of anger, fear, failure, pain, sorrow and loneliness that have been building for so many years.  The walls that are now thick and tall, and take our hammers and chip away at them.  Some of these walls we might only crack a little bit, but others might come down with one swing.  What if we hit, and hit, and hit, and hit these walls with love, compassion, understanding, patience, and most importantly God’s forgiveness so that we aren’t the only one who get’s to see Jesus live again and reach out his hand to us? What if other could see and experience this as well?  It’s about time this hammer of mine did some good in this world.

Trainwreck-Celebrating Holidays as a Wiltsey – Part 2

While the time between Thanksgiving and Christmas has always been my favorite time of the year, I’ve always remembered it to be mostly chaos.  Growing up I don’t recall much about this time of the year being particularly relaxing as we were usually trying to balance our everyday lives with buying a Christmas tree, cleaning, baking, shopping, performing in school Christmas plays and wrapping presents. This was also usually the time of year when my parents would decide to put a fresh coat of paint on the walls before company came.

Over the years, I’ve developed a unique skill of being able to wrap presents of just about any size and shape without too much difficulty.  This was usually a result of being the only one who would wrap about 75 or so presents for the entire family into the wee hours of the morning………even my own.  I would as why was I bothering to wrap my own presents when I already knew what I was getting, but that was a fairly irrelevant point.  Now for most families, food is a fairly significant part of celebrating the holidays.  In my family, it probably attributed to at least half of the yuletide festivities.  Where most mothers might bake one, two, maybe three different kinds of cookies; that would never do with my mom.  She is an incredibly talented baker and would make probably three to four dozen different KINDS of cookies!  And she would make them for everyone: teachers, friends, neighbors, the mechanic, the doctor’s office, the dentist’s office (yeah lots of irony there), just about anyone and everyone.  She also loved to make gingerbread houses with elaborate details like stained glass windows, firewood in the backyard and Christmas trees in the front yard. But when my mom was running short on time during this season, she would recruit my Dad and I to decorate cookies into the early morning hours. You see, my parents thoroughly believed sleep deprivation was an essential part of the Christmas season.  I quite often had those vivid images of sugarplums dancing in my head along with other hallucinations.  The only way my Dad and I could finally get off the hook of decorating these cookies is when we started to ice them with little messages like “Help Me”, or making the snowmen with “yellow snow”. 

But I think one of the greatest character building tasks that my dad would give my brother and I to do is to test all the Christmas lights before we hung them outside.  Now this was back in the day when you had the kind where if one bulb was out, they were ALL out. And it was critical to makes sure all 10 of the 200+ light strands were tested and that all of the burnt out lights were replaced.  That is, after we untangled the thirty-pound tangled ball that they had morphed into over the course of the previous year up in the attic.

But all of this is still part of the amazing childhood that I had, and when I feel that longing to experience the Christmases of my youth, I just cover my hands in pine sap so they stick to everything I touch for about a week and a half.

Trainwreck: Celebrating Holidays as a Wiltsey – Part 1

As I sit and think about Thanksgiving tomorrow, the food, family, and all the many ways God has blessed me and my family in ways that are far beyond what we deserve; I am always brought back to memories from long ago of Thanksgiving and Christmas gatherings spent with my family.  I’ve been thinking about writing about this for a while, years in fact, because these are such amazing and happy memories that I recollect every year that define my family and how special they are to me.

Now let me start off by saying that if you don’t know me or any other members of my family, we can very easily be described as “unique”.  We can amuse ourselves endlessly with silliness and have a sense of humor that would cause many to scratch their heads. Growing up, we always spent Thanksgiving at my Grandmom Wiltsey’s house in Seaford, Delaware.  She lived in a rambler on about an acre and a half that backed up to a small pond.  I remember when we would drive over to Seaford the night before Thanksgiving and the two hour drive seemed to last forever.  But I always knew we were getting close when I would see the RAPA Scrapple sign on the side of the road in Bridgeville and I could hardly contain myself with excitement!  The day of Thanksgiving, my brother Paul and I would always find ways to occupy our time until the evening feast.  This could be shooting soda cans with the pellet gun my Grandmom had, taking the canoe out onto the pond (and then trying to shoot down fresh mistletoe from the trees with the pellet gun), or maybe racing around the fields on my Aunt Peggy’s Honda ATC. 

Finally, after many hours of waiting, it was time to eat.  The table was filled with the usual array of Thanksgiving goodies: turkey (which my parents always made me eat despite me being allergic and they thought I was faking this allergy for many years up until middle school), mashed potatoes, green beans, cranberry sauce (from the can, the only way to eat it), rolls, stuffing, and so on.  Now, I get to a part that is both disgusting and hilarious at the exact same time……..the trainwreck.  The goal of the trainwreck is to carefully select as many different colors of food and place them in your mouth all at once.  You then chew very carefully to make sure the “palette” is just the right texture and then look for an opportunity to make eye contact with someone else at the table. This can be anyone: mom, dad, aunt, uncle, brother, grandmom (well, she would fuss at you) or a guest (sorry Lori and Kris, you got no warning about this) Once you made eye contact, then you would open your mouth to display your “trainwreck” to them, but without letting anyone else notice you. This was usually the highlight of the meal, seeing how many times you could do it to as many people as possible.  And like I said, NOONE was spared from this experience.  Then, when everyone was full, and all 10,000 desserts were sampled, it was time to play Trivial Pursuit or Balderdash into the late evening.  

The rest of the weekend was filled with shopping, goofing off, and other halfway dangerous activities that my brother and I could get into, but it was the start to a holiday season that was sure to be filled with many more adventures.  As our family has grown and changed over the years we always have have a great time just being us, and for that I am truly thankful. 

We Have Broken Our Promise From 11 Years Ago

Eleven years ago today, this nation experienced a catastrophe so horrific that most people would never have conceived that it could happen.  We were thrown in to such a state of shock, turmoil, panic and sorrow that there is not a single person that was not impacted by those attacks. But rather than lashing out in anger and hatred, most people responded with such an overwhelming compassion and love for one another that nothing else mattered.  Rich, poor, white, black, Latino, straight, gay, it didn’t matter. We were all more concerned with caring and loving one another as if we were all one family. I think this may have been the closest we’ve ever come to showing the love of God in the history of a nation that was founded on a desire to love God freely and deeply.  And not too long after, the “Never forget 9-11-01” bumper sticker was plastered on just about every surface we could find.  Our hearts were changed forever.

Or so we told ourselves.  Fast forward eleven years later, and if you were to look at the newspaper today, the only thing you would see is “Romney attacks Obama”, “Obama slams Romney”, “Citizens are sick of bailing out the poor, the government, the military, the corporations” And everyone is screaming at one another “YOU MUST ACCEPT EVERY ASPECT OF MY LIFE NO MATTER WHAT!” and “YOU ARE NO GOOD AND IT’S YOUR FAULT THIS COUNTRY IS SO SCREWED UP!” We are all too consumed with who has their hands in our pockets and obsessed with holding onto “our” money as tightly as we can; money that was in someone else’s pocket before it got to ours.  We are filled with more hatred and intolerance now than ever before.  We feel the need to criticize everything we don’t agree with on Facebook, Twitter and on the bumpers of our cars.  In fact, the only things we support together are sports teams that have absolutely no impact on the welfare of our society whatsoever.

But if you really want to remember and honor, what happened eleven years ago, remember those who are in pain, sick, hungry, lost, unloved, hopeless.  Remember that we once needed someone else for help, and that we still do.  Remember that in long run, whoever is sitting in the White House is not going to fix everything.  They can’t, we can’t, but God can with us and through us.  Stop cursing someone’s name, but rather pray for them.  Stop blaming someone for what’s wrong, but instead ask, “How can I help?”  Stop spending so much time showing people that they’re wrong, but instead show them that they are loved.  That is a memory worth keeping.

The journey is part of the destination

How’s the commute?  What do you think of the commute?  How can you make that commute?  I hear these questions often since I started my new job five weeks ago.  Some people stare at me in disbelief when they hear that I’ve chosen to drive 100 miles on the days I have to go into the office.  Why on earth would a sane person choose to do this?

It’s quite simple; this is where I’ve been called to work during this season of my life and my life is not designed to be convenient.  We always want to get from point A to point B as quickly and painlessly as possible, whether it’s in a car or to working to reach certain milestones and goals in our lives.  But did you ever think that it’s what you saw, what you felt, how you reacted, and what you chose to learn during your journey that impacts how you finally experience the destination you’ve reached?  It’s about the attitude you choose to have, the grace you show others, and the thankfulness for what you’ve been blessed with, and the joy you are determined to have that determines whether or not your destination was worth the trip to begin with.

I firmly believe that our lives on this planet are only temporary, and this is far from the end.  I believe in an eternity that can be more wonderful than we can possibly imagine spent in God’s glorious presence; or one that can be more torturous and agonizing than we can ever fathom. I believe that it’s completely our choice whether or not we chose to accept God’s grace or not, but the extent to which we experience His grace and glory is determined on how we approach our “commute” to eternity.  I only pray that I chose to acknowledge the blessing and privilege of walking this journey each and every day, no matter what I encounter along the way.

Sometimes you jump off the diving board, and sometimes they yank the diving board out from under you.

Wow, just wow.  I am three days into my new job and it is exciting, scary and humbling all at the same time.  I now realize that my new boss was really paying attention to what I was saying during the interview process.  Describing yourself as a self-starter and able to create and design processes is most likely to result in a response of "When you show up for work the first day, we won't bother to unlock the front door for you because we know you will figure out how to get inside."

Don't get me wrong, I am loving my job so far and I am definitely not bored, but much of my orientation has involved sitting with a handful of people and getting a very brief view of systems with the hopes that my eyes can follow the lightning-fast cursor on the monitor and assuming I know what things people are clicking on.  And when I want to know where to find a certain document, spreadsheet or other piece of information, it is usually followed by pointing to the computer and saying "It's on the shared drive" or "It's on the website or intranet."  At least it was narrowed down to the intranet and computers on our company network and not the entire interwebs, that is helpful.

But this is all good stuff because I am becoming the office cubicle version of Bear Grylls.  In an office where most people don't drink coffee, I can make a cup out of used Xerox toner cartridges and use a bottle of circa 1987 White-Out as half and half.  Then while looking for those all-elusive policy documents on the shared drive, I will do my best not to delete years worth of financial spreadsheets and data and I may just make myself a privacy curtain for my cubicle doorway out of paper clip chains. I've noticed my new co-workers kind of look at me with curiosity as if I were just pictured on the 10 o'clock news and described as "the quiet neighbor that kept mostly to himself" and then was discovered with ten human skulls in my freezer.  They haven't really seen my true personality yet and when that happens, I foresee some type of crisis counselor spending a week in the office trying to calm people down.

This is going to be quite and adventure, well, as much of an adventure as a career in insurance is possible.  I will crawl out from under the sink in the bathroom, take baby steps back to my desk and re-do the TPS reports while I wait longingly for all that quality time I will have to myself on the drive home in the afternoon.

And now for something completely different........

You know you've had those days, weeks or even months at work when you've thought how you would stand up in front of your co-workers and boss and announce you were quitting, then you walk out the door then and there.  You have the perfect song playing on the CD player in the background, and you envision how moving your speech is, bringing some to tears, and then everyone gives you a standing ovation! You know you've thought about it.  Come on, yes you have, admit it!

I have always had the perfect scenario playing out in my mind and believe me, I'm going to win an Oscar for this performance!  But reality is something quite different. Two days ago, I submitted my resignation after seven years with my company.  With a week and a half still to go, this isn't turning out like I thought it would.  As I've talked to people and shared with them why I resigned, I've been realizing how important so many of them have been to me and what a positive impact they've had on my life.  I've had the privilege of working with many talented and special people from all over the country that have influenced me professionally and personally.  They've taught me about leadership, modeled integrity, and walked with me through personal loss in their lives and mine. And truthfully, I can't think of another group of people with whom I would have wanted to have in my life at those times.  So to all of my co-workers and colleagues who might be reading this, thank you from the bottom of my heart. Whether you realize it or not, God has blessed me richly for having known you.

The one thing that has brought me to this point, and typing this note tonight, has been realizing that God has been calling me out of my comfort zone. God has been urging me to take some major steps of faith and be obedient to His plan for my life; and I now see this more than anything else.  I realize that God placed me in the company where I've worked all these years so He could allow all of these people impact my life so richly.

And this is why the theme from "Rocky" will not play behind me as I pictured in my head and I will not stand on my desk and wield the Stapler of Justice for the last time. Instead, I will sit quietly and reflect on this tremendous gift I have been given, and be thankful for it. I will savor these last moments with these wonderful people and be comforted that I know God will bless this next chapter.

Will you quit poking me, already!

What is social media? While it sounds like something that happens when all of your Encyclopedia Britannica volumes start to chat with one another after you drop them off at the donation room at the Salvation Army at night, there is another definition. I have been able to consult with one of the world’s most renowned and recognized sources of expertise to answer this question: Wikipedia.

Social media includes web-based and mobile technologies used to turn communication into interactive dialogue between organizations, communities,and individuals.


That sounds all well and good, but it’s the whole “interactive” aspect that needs to be emphasized. Most people use Facebook, the leading social media website, as a means to interact as passively as possible with hundreds of "friends" so they don’t have to be inconvenienced by having to leave the house and talk to somebody face to face. For some people, the interaction needs to be ramped up a bit instead of just looking at other people’s posts on Facebook and then bring a post topic up randomly in a live conversation and you are trying to figure out how this person knew about the bacon-scented shower gel you bought at Bath and Bodyworks and wound up drinking half the bottle on the drive home from the store.

Facebook is also a great way to allow people to bond around common interests like "The Society For The Awareness To Promote The Proper Milking Of Northern Amazonian Tree Slugs" because it gives people a microphone to the world and they can talk and share about whatever they want whenever they want. But I have an idea to help restore a shred of dignity to Facebook. If anyone abuses their liberties to share freely by loading up your news feed with non-stop pictures of cats dressed as clowns or Farmville requests for help obtaining pig butter, you should be able to demote them to Twitter, where they only have 140 characters and then limit them to only post once a week. Otherwise, these people may hear a knock at the door and it's Mark Zuckerberg who walks into their house and smashes their keyboard on the table.

But in the end, I don’t know that most people feel that much more connected with one another or organizations on these websites. Because nothing beats that wonderful face-to-face interaction you have with the kid selling magazine subscriptions at your front door so he can go to Harvard in the fall. And no one wants to lose out on the ingenious advertising campaign of the mattress store that has a guy stand outside on the corner in an Elmo costume in 110-degree weather, because that is the commercial marketing that I want to see in person. 

My tombstone will read "I died from eating a balanced diet"

It has been an interesting week so far to say the least.  After meeting with the nutritionist for the first time, there were a number of areas identified that could be improved upon, one of them being the daily amounts of fruits and vegetables to be consumed.  Essentially, I needed to increase it from 0 cups a day to 2 cups of fruit and 2 and a half cups of vegetables because apparently cherry Pop-Tarts aren't considered fruit. 

Now I am a medical oddity, but not in the obvious sense regarding my brain function. I have discovered after about 4 years that include numerous trips to the hospital, several diagnostic scans and even exploratory surgery, my system does not digest roughage very well.  This includes eating large dinner salads, carrot sticks, celery, apples and I would imagine most species of trees.  I have tested negative for all of the obvious disorders and internists, gastroenterologists and a colon-rectal surgeon have no explanation for why this continues to be a problem.  I have had success in the past with small amounts of these foods, so I thought I would take a chance on Sunday and eat 6 baby carrots with some bread as a buffer.  Well, that did me in. 

I drove myself to the ER (I'm used to the ordeal by now and I can maneuver a car while in the fetal position) and they sent me home because I wasn't screaming loudly enough in pain at the time because apparently I need to be more liberal with my use of the pain scale.  So, I drive myself back home, get through the night and spend most of Monday in pain until I finally talk to my gastro doc and he tells me to go back to hospital and have the ER doc call him on his cell phone. Long story short, I am admitted to  for observation after a CT scan reveals a partial bowel obstruction.  One of the fun experiences I had this hospital visit was the privilege of having a nasogastric tube inserted which is the equivalent of having your transmission fluid drained through your nose. I got a shot of morphine before this was administered, but 2 minutes isn't quite long enough for it to kick in sufficiently.  After about 19 hours I get to go home and I am right back to where I started. 

So, the new eating plan isn't going as smoothly as I had envisioned and I'm not sure my life insurance will cover me for incidents involving a healthy lifestyle. Nonetheless, I am determined not to be defeated by the carrot stick and I will push onward and upward.  But first, I think I'm going to go drown my sorrow in a can of Redi-Whip.

I eat, therefore I am.

Food, I likes me some food.  I have never been particularly disciplined when it comes to my eating habits so usually if I saw something that I would like, I would eat it.  This means that I am a big guy.  I make wide right turns, I always calculate in my head the total weight of people in an elevator and look at the sign on the wall to see if I am endangering these folks.  And if you saw me in your rear-view mirror I would most definitely be larger than I appeared.

I've also noticed that as the years behind me are greater than the years before me and my body does not respond as well to trauma and shock that it once did.  I can walk down the street and oops, my leg falls off.  Or, I wake up with a stiff neck.  And most recently, I woke up one day and I noticed my left knee and hip were really bothering me.  What brought this pain on?  Sleep, yes sleep is now against me because I really don't remember being attacked by a team of ninjas and fighting them off at 2 am.

You take these two things together, and that means you have to start doing something differently. So, my wife and I are going to go see a nutritionist.  Part of this entails documenting for 4 days everything I eat to show the nutritionist. I know that the purpose of this is to determine what parts of my diet that I need to change, but part of me wants to have a little bit of fun with this.

Day 1

7 am: One peeled orange, where I ate the peel and threw the rest away.

8 am: 1 cup of coffee, with a half a teaspoon of cream and 14 teaspoons of sugar.

12pm: Lunch consisted two slices of wheat bread with 1 oz of White-Out spread on and something I found in a Tupperware container in the back of refrigerator, origins unknown.

3pm: snack - I intended to eat an apple, but just then I walked by a little girl selling girl scout cookies so I ate two boxes of thin mints.

6pm: Dinner consisted of 6 oz of grilled salmon with a light dressing of one can of cheez-whiz topped with crushed Oreos.

This probably isn't the best course of action to take.  One of my concerns is I will hear "Well for lunch, you can have 2 rice cakes and pretend your spreading something delicious on them and then make sure to drink 18 oz of diet caffeine-free room temperature tap water.  Make sure you don't put ice in it, those are just empty calories. Everything changes, and this includes my diet. But at night, I can still dream of the deep-fried Twinkies and Oreos I ate that one time, and then wake-up with a mouthful of pillow feathers.

This thing tastes funny!

So, I bet right now you're thinking to yourself, "Will this guy ever shut up?" Yep, I'm pretty much just blurting out what's on my mind.  Also, this blog doesn't yet look the way I want it to, and that's partly because I don't like to read directions.  I don't.  I will buy a DVD player, pull it out of the box, hook up a bunch of wires to the plugs on the back of the devices with all those nondescript acronyms, and then if it doesn't work after I sit there pushing buttons for 10 minutes, I will then open up the directions.  I will buy a car, start driving it down the road and will wait at traffic lights and quickly read the owners manual to try and figure out how to set the clock or turn off the windshield wipers.  That's just how I am.

So, I haven't figure out yet how to add all the little buttons, and doohickeys to the sides of this thing and I don't yet know how to make the background all sparkly and filled with puppies and rainbows.  And just maybe, someday I might set-up an e-store where you can buy drink coasters with my face on them.  But, this blob will change and evolve and probably look a little better over time.  Now, does anyone have any puppies I can superglue to this page?

I love music and unique artistry, this guy is very cool!