Planning Accordingly

Recently, I've started using a new type of day planner that Donal Miller came out with a couple of years ago.  It had gathered dust until just the other day when I got it out and am starting to use it for the first time.  It really helps you put things in perspective by asking a question.

Many day planners ask you to make your to-do list and prioritize accordingly.  That is a great and productive way to work and this planner does the same.  When you fill out each day though there is something that makes a significant difference to me at least.  It starts with the question, 'If you were to live today over again, what would you do differently?'  It's taken from the research of Victor Frankl.  He would ask his patients this question, I think the only difference was he would do it over a lifetime.

Let me clarify, the idea is to think about you at the end of your day.  Start out first thing in the morning and picture the end of the day.  If you could live today over again, what would you do differently?  We get caught up in the details of every day and forget what's really important. 

By now we've all heard one of the most common regrets of people on their deathbeds is that they wished they would've spent more time with family and friends rather than spending so much time at work.  We hear that and for a day or maybe a week if we're lucky we start seeing things through a new perspective.  We realize we need to spend more time with our kids instead of being so stressed about our living spaces being clean for guests.  We start realizing it's okay to leave work at work and not everything is going to be finished at the end of each day.  We realize friends and family need our presence more than our presents and so we give them a call to catch up on each other's lives.

If you're anything like me though, that usually doesn't last too awful long.  Daily pressures start coming to the forefront of our minds again and we forget our priorities and where we need to spend more of our time.  We become consumed in our work and neglect our physical and mental health.  We think our work is what makes us important and it becomes an idol or rather we become our own idol.  We forget that God is God, and we are not.  We forget to relish in the fact that we are His children and that's enough.

Critical Comments

I find myself fighting a critical voice that seems to pop up in my head fairly frequently.  It's tempting to pick apart what someone else says as not being the right way to think about Christ or the Bible.  What is the end goal though?  What good does it really do?

Some people are so quick to correct other people.  I have a strong tendency towards that myself.  It can be a miserable way to live.  We have to ask ourselves, what is our end goal here?  Is it to love the other person or to win the argument and prove how smart we are?

I see this especially on Facebook, way more than on Twitter for some reason by the way.  Everyone seems to have an opinion on just about anything.  People are quick to point out what's wrong with something someone else said and quickly enough there's a comment thread that is chasing a rabbit trail.

I find myself getting sucked into that so easily.  I often have to deactivate my account or at the very least log out for days on end.  While I enjoy staying up to date on people's lives and seeing what they're up to; weddings, babies and all that; more often than not I find myself unable to resist commenting on someone's status and getting fired up.  What's the use in that?  What am I really gaining by trying to point out how another person is thinking wrongly?  Chances are if they posted something that's super opinionated, they've already made up their minds on the subject, right?  Do I really believe a snarky comment is going to make them change their minds?

I love debating different topics with friends in person.  It challenges and stimulates my thinking and I like to think it does the same to their thinking.  If it is done over social media though, I don't think it's very useful.  If you can't see the person face to face, a lot is missed in the conversation.  Not to mention just how plain old mean we can all be on there when we're not seeing the other person's face.

People say things on social media about one another that they would never dream of saying to the other person face to face.  Granted, people have always talked behind one another's back and that's not right either.  The meanness I see on Facebook is another level altogether though.  As mentioned before, I'm just as guilty as the next guy.

It's similar to road rage in a way.  People get so angry behind the wheel and think other people are idiots and sometimes yell at them saying terrible things they would never say to their face.  Again, guilty as charged on my end.  

With that in mind, there's something to be said for face to face communication.  It's almost a lost are in some sense.  We're more connected than ever before.  I can get a hold of some of my friends via facebook, text message, regular old phone calls (because I was born in the 80's haha), direct tweet, instagram, email and I'm sure I'm missing one or two more in that list.  

Somehow, we're also more disconnected than ever before.  People watch their kids at sporting events and tweet or post about it, "At my kids' soccer game."  Are you really there?  I mean, are you fully present?  You can thank my pastor for that example by the way haha

People move of course, some of us overseas.  Many times though we don't even meet with friends who live in the same city.  We take it for granted that they're always going to be around.

Cynicism and Hope

I'm a firm believer that God can use any situation to bring Himself glory.  He can use anything for the good of those who love Him.  That's not to say it's going to be easy, not in the slightest.  If anything it will be harder and the situations seemingly insurmountable.  There is so much suffering in the world over, hunger and famine, war, preventable illnesses that cause millions of deaths in children under 5 and so on and so forth.

God is faithful in it all.  He is able to see how He's going to use things in the long term for His glory and His people.  We are so quick as humans to see suffering as evidence that there is no God.  We have such a small sense of history though.  We want God to move in our lives and in the world right now and how we want.

It usually doesn't happen that way though.  The Israelites spent 400 years in slavery before being set free.  And then they had another 40 years of wandering around a desert.  It's so tempting to give up in light of all the suffering and atrocities in the world.  For me it's even more tempting and easier to become cynical about it all.

What if there is a better way though?  I read a blog the other day that was talking about Lent and different things people give up.  She mentioned that many people give up meat, others give up social media and then she suggested the thing that cut to my heart.  She suggested trying to give up cynicism and replacing it with compassion and joy.

As a result this past week I've tried to become much more conscious about when I'm being cynical.  I'm trying to replace it with hope as that seems to be the opposite of cynicism in my view.  There are times where I feel like I'm making a little progress, but it is still so difficult.

It's not a matter of replacing cynicism with a false type of hope, something akin to positive thinking and nonsense.  Well, positive thinking and self help do get a bad rap sometimes.  Maybe that's misplaced though.  There's a difference between positive thinking resulting from a naivete that results in sticking one's head in the sand and positive thinking resulting from a realistic perspective that God is sovereign.  

In the Psalms David does a form of positive self-talk.  He asks himself, "Why are you downcast oh my soul?  Put your hope in God."  We are encouraged in Philippians to take every thought captive, another form of positive thinking.  I don't see how positive thinking is supposed to work outside of a belief system in Christ.

What exactly does one put their hope and positively think about if it isn't focused on Christ and His love?  Some people put their hope in themselves.  I've failed enough to know that doesn't work for very long.  Maybe others are self-delusional enough to think they can put their hope in themselves and neglect to remember all the times they've let themselves and their loved ones down.

I can get bogged down by my own struggles or by the struggles of people I know.  During these times, it's vital to follow David's advice and put my hope in God.  It's certainly easier said than done, though, isn't it?

The Gift of a Handicap, Part 2

That's not to say I'm sadistic or anything of the sort.  It's more realizing that I have a strong tendency to want to hog glory that really belongs to God.  I can remember asking God why He chose to work through my weaknesses instead of my strengths.  This was His answer to me, His grace is sufficient and His power is made perfect in my weaknesses.

It has taken a long time to submit to this idea; that God wants to work through my weaknesses to bring glory to Himself.  In my heart I get it so to speak.  My flesh still fights against that idea though.  In my sinful nature, I tend towards selfishness.  Maybe tend towards is putting it too lightly.  If I had my way, everything would go just as I wanted them to.

Everything would go perfectly and there wouldn't be any interruptions to my plan and every day would feel amazing and purposeful.  The problem with that of course is that if that was truly the case I would not become aware of my need for a Savior and Lord.  Sometimes you have to become so broken that you truly have nowhere else to turn to.

I still struggle with depression sometimes; although I pray the longer episodes are behind me.  A few years ago I went through about a 2 year depression, oscillating between moderate to severe levels.  My friends and family knew of course and were hugely supportive.  I just never want to go through it for that long again.  If you go through depression for any significant length of time, a feeling of hopelessness can become a cloud that you think will never go away.

For the most part though, God has granted me mental stability through the last 15 years of my diagnosis.  It is humbling to realize that the stability is all from Him.  Yes, I'm on a mood stabilizer consistently and other psychotropic meds on an as-needed basis.  I just happen to believe that is a form of common grace that God has blessed me and millions of other people who have mental illness with.  I truly see no difference between me being on a mood stabilizer and a diabetic taking their insulin daily.

If God has blessed doctors and the medical field with wisdom on chemical imbalances and how to treat those, why would I not use that as an aid to getting better?  Unfortunately, many Christians seem to think mental illness can be overcome by prayer alone.  Sometimes prayer does bring about healing because God chooses to work in that person's life by healing them.  Other times He provides medication and a support system that includes family, friends and medical professionals to help someone get through episodes of mania or depression.  He allows His children to experience the depths of depression sometimes because in our weakness His strength is on display for all to see.

The Gift of a Handicap

2 Corinthians 12:7-10 in the Message paraphrase states the following...

Because of the extravagance of those revelations, and so I wouldn’t get a big head, I was given the gift of a handicap to keep me in constant touch with my limitations. Satan’s angel did his best to get me down; what he in fact did was push me to my knees. No danger then of walking around high and mighty! At first I didn’t think of it as a gift, and begged God to remove it. Three times I did that, and then he told me, My grace is enough; it’s all you need. My strength comes into its own in your weakness. Once I heard that, I was glad to let it happen. I quit focusing on the handicap and began appreciating the gift. It was a case of Christ’s strength moving in on my weakness. Now I take limitations in stride, and with good cheer, these limitations that cut me down to size—abuse, accidents, opposition, bad breaks. I just let Christ take over! And so the weaker I get, the stronger I become.

This has been sort of a 'life verse' for me over the years.  As many of you know I was diagnosed with bipoloar disorder at age 17.  It has been a bit of a roller coaster ever since as you might imagine.  I have always found a lot of strength from this passage and think the message paraphrase puts it beautifully.

When a loved one is diagnosed with a chronic illness of any sort, either diabetes, mental illness, or any other multitude of them, our first thought is usually anything but seeing it as a gift.  A natural reaction is to feel sorry for ourselves whether we are the ones dealing with the illness or having to take care of that individual.  I can tell you for certain I've gone through the dreaded pity party many a time throughout the years.  If you've been reading my blog for any amount of time you can surely attest to that idea.

The first four years of my diagnosis I prayed almost daily for God to deliver me from this bipolar disorder.  Then the first episode of a major depression hit me my senior year of college.  I can remember being so angry with God; why didn't He deliver me from this?  All throughout Scripture and particularly in the Gospel accounts, God heals His people.  Why didn't the Healer provide healing for me?

Around that time I came across this passage and it clicked.  I usually read the NIV version and it states it differently of course, but the idea being God's grace is sufficient.  His grace is enough.  We are so quick to turn to God in our distress and ask Him to deliver us from whatever ailment we have.  Thankfully, sometimes He does deliver us.  Other times though, He answers that His grace is sufficient.

When I go through a depressive episode now, I truly try and appreciate it as a gift.  It is so hard.  I pray simultaneously that God would lift me out of the pit of depression.  On another level though I'm thankful.  Depression and pain have a way of throwing us to our knees and making us realize just how dependent we are on Him.

New Beginnings, New Identity, Part 3

Writing from Jan 5th, cont...

2015 is a year for building.  Steffani and I are going to lay the foundation for our marriage and ministry.  We need to build both of those upon the Rock that never changes.  For some reason, I want to try and build some stuff in our new apartment (new to us, originally built in the 20’s or 30’s.)  NMSI has done a great job at remodeling the inside and furnishing it with new appliances and flooring.

Now I want to build on that.  It’s fairly small so I want to get creative with how we go about storing different things.  I have some ideas.  I’m sure there are DIY websites about how to do different things like that.  The problem is I’m about as handy as a freshman in shop class who has never held a hammer before.  Steffani’s dad, Dwayne, is a really handy guy; he built their house.  Hopefully he can show me how to do a thing or two when I present an idea to him.

I will also add here that there is YouTube as a friend recently pointed out.  However, YouTube doesn’t solve all your woes.  I watched a YouTube video no fewer than 5 times about how to change the lock on a door.  It took me 45 minutes and I still didn’t figure it out.  My good friend Soebeck finally had to come over and show me how to do it.  Yeah, it was turned upside down was the only problem.  It took him maybe 2 seconds tops to figure it out.

Do they offer shop-type classes for adults?  Maybe I’ll look into that in Ft. Myers when we get back.  I could sure use the help in that arena.  Several years ago I took swim classes at a public pool with master’s swim classes and that worked out great, albeit swimming next to a lady who was three times my age and put me to shame in the water.  Maybe it will be the same with this; wonder if I could get someone to pose as my dad and take the classes they offer for dads and kids at Home Depot or Lowe’s that my friends talk about?  I can just picture the amazing bird house I would make at one of those classes hahaha

Steffani and I are very different people.  I was talking to a dear friend the night before our wedding and saying how I thought we should be good.  Everyone always talks about how the first year is really tough.  My friend said he and his wife were fine; there were adjustments of course but overall they were fine.  I think Stef and I will be the same.  We will of course have to adjust but I really think we’ll be fine.  Maybe that’s just naivete speaking and I’m more than willing to admit that may just be the case.  We’ll see in about a year one way or another, won’t we?

With Steffani by my side, I feel like I can do anything.  She is so amazing and such an encourager.  After planning our wedding I am really encouraged that we make a great team.  She took on some things; I took on other things; and we both delegated a ton of the work to our friends and family.  She took on the vast majority of the planning to be sure with the decorations and details but I felt like I did a fair amount of helping out when she needed me to.

I couldn’t be happier with where we are at right now.  I’m so in love with Steffani now.  I’m sure the ‘in love’ feelings will ebb and flow over the years but we are fiercely committed to each other.  That’s what matters and what gets a couple through all the hard times ahead.  My parents have told me countless times that you must be committed to commitment to make it through.  Feelings are fickle and can’t be trusted too often.  Your commitment to God and each other are what count in the end.

A few weeks ago I was introducing Steffani to some friends at my home church in Sarasota.  After introducing her as my better half a friend remarked that she looked more like my better two-thirds.  When church was over I informed Steffani I was going to use that moving forward.  Ever since my friend suggested that observation, I’ve introduced Steffani as my better two-thirds.  It really fits us in my opinion.

New Beginnnings, New Identity, Part 2

Again, from January 5th, slacker!

You can let just about anything define who you are as a person.  I’ve let anything from bipolar disorder to singleness to minimalism define me.  It’s so hard to remember that Christ defines who we are.  His death and more importantly His resurrection defines who we are.  Everything else comes secondary in defining us.  We often define ourselves by what we do for a living, what relationship we’re currently in, our nationality, our socioeconomic class, our race, our denomination, what kind of coffee we drink, truly just about anything.  All those things come secondary to who we are in Christ.

2015 is a new year and with it comes a new identity for me.  I am still His and that is still my primary identity.  Now I’m married though.  Two become one.  I am no longer just my own person nor am I solely responsible for my decisions and their consequences.  My decisions and actions have an immediate effect on my wife who has to live with me every day.

As we were driving to Ft. Lauderdale the other day, she said she liked introducing me as her husband.  When she said the word husband I immediately felt a huge new sense of responsibility.  God has entrusted Steffani to my care.  He has tasked me with loving her like Christ loves the Church.  That carries a ton of weight with it.  It is no small matter and is not to be taken lightly.

Maybe that’s why I took so long to come around to the idea of marriage.  Some people act so flippantly about it like it’s no big deal.  Marriage is a huge deal, and should be treated as such.  It is not to be entered into lightly.  One must weigh the consequences of the decision you’re about to make. 

I can remember for a long time telling people I’d never get married because I couldn’t get the cost/benefit analysis to work out in favor of marriage.  Women would tell me something about when you’re in love that won’t matter.  Well, it does still matter, but I forgot one key factor in my analysis.  He who has a wife of noble character has no lack of gain.  It’s in the book of Proverbs and is something that should be taken into account.

Now, I realize cost/benefit analysis when looking at a relationship is about as unromantic as can be.  That’s just how I tend to think though.  Ever since 2008 or so, I’ve gained an interest in economics.  It started because people were talking about the state of the economy and I had no idea what they 

were talking about.

It seems like if I say I will never do something, God causes that very thing to happen.  For several years, people asked me if there was any country I had no desire to go to.  I would always reply I truly had no desire to go to South East Asia.  As it turns out, I spent 10 months there in the span of about 18 months, who knew?  Ever since about age 22, I told people I was never going to get married.  Lo and behold, I’m now married.

It’s been said that you make plans and God laughs.  It’s really true.  There is wisdom in planning of course, but we need to hold our plans loosely knowing that God might ask something different of us than what we originally had in mind.  It’s kind of hard to try and explain that to potential partners for our ministry.  We want to open an entrepreneurship school in Central America or the Caribbean but we also recognize God might lead us somewhere differently.

New Beginnings, New Identity, Part 1

Wrote this on January 5th, sorry for the delay!

As of December 31^st, 2014, I am a married man.  I married the woman of my dreams, Steffani Taylor (now Hemming.)  I’m still getting used to wearing the wedding ring.  It’s a bit weird and reminds me of when I first started wearing glasses.  At first, it just feels weird to have something on your body at all times that wasn’t there before (minus sleeping for the glasses.)  I look down at it often and am reminded that I have now taken on a new identity.

For roughly a decade since college I was single.  I’d go on a few dates here and there, but no real relationship to speak of.  I was happy about it for the most part.  There were bouts of loneliness to be sure, but overall I was happy being single and free.  I did a ton of traveling, had a good job with good benefits and had great family and friends.  Although I will add that I was miserable at my teaching job on and off for the last few years in particular.

Many of my single friends, especially females as one might imagine, were a bit preoccupied with the desire for a relationship.  Oftentimes I’d pray for God to take away the desire for a relationship.  He listened to my Grandma and Steffani and others rather than my own selfish prayers.

During the last half of November and early part of December prior to coming back to the states, I went through a series of what might be called identity crises or existential crises.  If you’re single for a long period of time you start to identify as single.  I traveled around the world on a solo trip for 8 months.  Starting in 2006 I went to different countries every chance I could get.  I spent a lot of time alone; both at home and abroad.

When we were leaving Myanmar, it occurred to me that I had spent roughly a third of the past 4 years living out of a large suitcase (or large backpack) and a backpack.  2 bags were essentially all I owned.  Yes, I had stuff back at my parents’ house in Illinois, but as far as what I had with me it was a big bag and backpack.  It symbolized freedom to me.  All I had to worry about was contained in those 2 bags.

Ever since I graduated college I’ve been somewhat of a minimalist.  Freedom is found in simplicity if you ask me.  It will definitely be an adjustment to own more stuff.  Thankfully Steffani and I are renting a really small apartment in Ft. Myers so we truly won’t have room for a lot of stuff.  When we flew home from Springfield to Ft. Myers in December I sent down 4 bags worth of stuff. 

There are more things in my closet but I really want to take the time to sort through things and get rid of just about everything.  It just takes a certain amount of time to sort through everything.  I have a ridiculous amount of baseball cards that I just need to admit are probably never going to come back in value like they did in the late ‘80’s/early 90’s when they were all the craze.

New Year's Resolutions

I wrote this on January 28th, so it was already late, then I forgot to post it!  Ahh!!!

Due to a few extra happenings in December, I realized during our honeymoon that I hadn’t made any resolutions for 2015 yet.  This, my friends, was an issue.  I made goals last year and for the first time in as long as I can remember I actually hit most of them, 6 out of 8 to be specific.  75% is a passing grade in my book!  Some of them were “shoot for the moon” type goals, and I even hit a couple of those thanks to God’s help.

So, I listened to the same podcast I listened to in late 2013, got my pen and paper out and went to town.  I quickly realized I had too many goals written.  That’s one of the keys to actually hitting your goals; not having an abundance of them.  As I said, last year I had 8 goals total.  When I had finished brainstorming I had 18, way too many to keep track of.

All 18 were good mind you, but if you have 18 goals you really don’t have any.  It’s too many to keep track of.  Many business leaders have different categories to help you think of goals.  One of the guys I listen to frequently suggested 7 categories so I went with that to help me focus.  7 seems like a lot of categories but some goals easily overlap different ones.

The seven categories this particular guy suggests are spiritual, financial, social, family, career, physical and intellectual.  As I said before, you can make several goals that overlap categories so you don’t end up with I don’t know, like 18 or so when you’re finished.  After narrowing the list, I still have a ton.  I decided to prioritize and have 5 goals on the front of the card and the rest on the back.  I carry the card in my wallet to remind me to stay focused.

A lot of people also suggest making SMART goals.  SMART usually refers to specific, measurable, achievable, relevant and time-bound.  Sometimes people use different words for the acronym but those are the usual words associated with it.  The reason for using SMART goals is because if goals don’t have at least a few of those than they will never happen.

For instance, you can make a goal or resolution to lose weight.  It’ll never happen or at the very least has a much lesser chance of happening.  If you say you want to lose 20 pounds by June 1^st, then you have a higher chance of success.  If you check in with someone regularly you have an even greater chance of succeeding.  Even if you just record your weight on a regular basis it would increase your chances. 

Something I learned in my time in Yangon was the importance of measuring things.  It was in regards to business plans of course but it makes sense in many different areas.  I will add a caveat that many people are trying to measure students’ progress which sometimes makes sense until we started measuring 5 year olds on a weekly basis for ‘data-driven instruction.’  Even in the higher grades a lot of the measurement tools we use are woefully inadequate and do nothing to advance the overall goal of educating our students well.  Some people think we just need to make better tests but making the same tests that every teacher uses across the nation hardly seems logical.