Month: January 2015

friends, make a difference in someone's life, relationships, the butterfly journey

Are You Investing in Your Relationships?

livingwholecoaching

A new year, a new you, a better version of you!  One of my goals for 2015 is to invest in the relationships that I hold dear to my heart.  I would admit that I have not really taken a close look at my relationships until my husband said, “in order to have a friend, you have to be a friend.”  Wow, ok that made me look deep within myself for the answer to that statement.  Had I really been a friend?

I searched over the relationships in my life and concluded that yes maybe I hadn’t been such a good friend.  At my age, I don’t believe that I would be making many new friends, acquaintances maybe, but real friends no.  So I looked back over the years for those who had been positive, encouraging, influences in my life.  Yep, I found them all in the history of my life.  Those who never were far away during the real struggles on my journey.

relationships

I thought back to the milestones that we had shared with each other; the good ones and the bad.  We never missed a beat.  We may have missed birthdays or anniversaries, but we never failed to reconnect at the most important times.  So I searched my heart and knew right away that I had to do something different.  I wanted to make the next leg of my life’s journey with them by my side.

I wanted to celebrate them, let them know how incredibly important they were to me and the world.  I decided that I would invest my time, money, and life to these few folks who God had so meticulously placed in the path of my life.  I work in the funeral industry and all too often I see people regret missed opportunities to cherish those who were important to them.  But once they are in our office it’s too late to change the pattern of the life that is now gone.

So I vowed that I am going to be the best friend, wife, mother, daughter, sister, grandmother, and person that I can be.  I want to give each of my relationships their flowers while they are living to enjoy them.  I will invest my time, money, and talent to bless their lives.  I want them to know without a shadow of a doubt that they matter to me!  And I want my life to reflect that I loved those dear to me and that I gave all that I could to make this world a better place.

Here are some of my ideas in blessing others:

  1. Send a card with flowers just to say “I love you and you matter to me”
  2. Take a day off work to spend the afternoon with my grandchildren just to laugh
  3. Buy a Valentine’s gift for my sister
  4. Take my mother to get a mani/pedi
  5. Have lunch and facial with my best friend

These are just some small things that you can do for someone special in your life.  You would be amazed of how something small becomes a “big” deal to someone who deserves it!  It’s time to invest!

Blessings,

Lisa

encouragement, self-discovery, self-examination, the butterfly journey

Worry About Yourself

livingwholecoaching

I had to share this funny video with you.  It was one of the cutest videos I had seen in a long time posted on Facebook!  Although the message was sweet and innocent coming from a 3-year-old little girl, it had some profound content that I thought worthy of blogging about.

The scene is a sweet, cute little girl in the backseat of the family car trying desperately to hook the belts to her car seat.  (This is a daunting task as I have tried many times and failed to buckle my grandchildren in).  Her dad says, “you want me to help you?”  And with the sweet small voice she says, “no I can do it myself.”  As she continues to struggle with it her dad asks again, “what do you want me to do?”  She so innocently says, “worry bout yo self!”  Well you could have bought me for a wooden nickel!  It was too cute!

But how much message is really in those little words?  Worry about yourself, could be a nice way of saying mind your business, but I didn’t take it that way.  I look at it as saying we can always find something wrong or we know how to correct someone else’s issues but we can’t even see our own issues.  Isn’t that the truth?  It is always easier it seems to let someone know what they are doing wrong or not addressing in their lives, than it is to understand our own shortcomings or bad choices.

That is why I am learning (you see that I’m learning) to ask God to show me my own issues so that I can work on me and then I can come along side of someone who may be dealing with similar issues and help not hinder.  I never want to be in a position that I can’t see my own stuff, my own issues or where I fall short.  None of us are perfect so there is always something to work on.  I believe staying humble is the best ingredient for being in a position to help people when they need you.

So don’t stop “worrying about people”, but make sure you have the right attitude when you are trying to help them.  Make sure your reasons are pure and if they aren’t then “worry bout yo self and let God do the rest.

Blessings

Lisa

depression, encouragement, God, the butterfly journey

Could It Be You?

livingwholecoaching

20130610_CleanHeart_DM When you are involved in an unpleasant situation, do you naturally look at the other party as the reason for it?  I’m not saying that you are wrong for doing that because in some cases it could very well be because of someone else’s role that the situation occurred.

But this is what I want you to think about for a minute…could it be YOU?  I know you have examples for me that prove that it is not always you or it never has been you that caused a situation to go south.  However, hear me out.

I’ve shared my testimony with you many times, but since I haven’t blogged in a year (and I hope that I will have some new followers) I will give you a little bit of my story.  Thank God it has been over 7 years now since I suffered with major depression.  During the latter part of my dark journey I started asking myself and God why did I get to the place that I was in?  Well talking to myself I could explain a lot of my demise by pointing my finger at others.

God took me in another direction.  He pointed his finger at me!  Me?!  I did this to myself?!  But I didn’t fuss with God, I just listened, because at that point in my life that is all I could do.  I humbled myself and listened to God.  I allowed God to show me, myself.  Wow, what a journey that was; not pleasant at all.  What it did for me though was examine every choice that I had made.  The good, bad, and the ugly.

It was then that my life began to change…for the better.  I learned the most life lessons during this season of my life.  If you want to truly be free and walk in a better relationship with not only yourself, but God and others, you would embrace self-examination.

Would you agree that God only wants the best for you?  When He cares, he wants to show you ways that may be contrary to the what the world teaches you.  He wants to move you into a new level of “trusting” Him.  And if you can’t trust Him with your life, your entire life, than you have a lot to learn my friend.

Give yourself a chance to be the “best” you and trust God to show you, you.

“Create in me a pure heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within ME.” Psalm 51:10 NIV

Blessings, Lisa

2015, dream bigger, dreams, encouragement, New Year, the butterfly journey

Dream a New Dream 2015!

livingwholecoaching

While I was thinking back over the last year, I noticed a common theme…I don’t stick with the plans that I have for my life. I am not sure what happens to the zeal for the things that I so long to do, but I get overwhelmed with life in general and I just stop!

Not good! There are so many wonderful, worthy plans that I want to accomplish and unfortunately time is not standing still waiting for me to get my act together.

God is always faithful even when we are not. When I was crying and complaining about my own laziness, He began to intervene on my behalf. Wonderful right? Well not so much. What God did was allowed me to be in a situation that caused me to be uncomfortable. Very uncomfortable and usually when I’m uncomfortable, I run. I run far away from the situation, the people, my calling….everything. My head in the sand.

But this time God said no more running. You will stay and you will face this situation head on with me by your side. Wow! Everyday I prayed as hard as I could for the answers to come, what do I do, where do I go, can I escape? Everyday for months I prayed for an answer.

One day it finally came! Yay, but hold on it wasn’t pleasant at first. The same feeling of hurt, pain, and confusion came as it did for the many days before, but this time I reacted differently. I trusted God and I did it His way and boom the outcome was not the same!

I say all this to let you know that until I was able to conquer this situation and the way it was making me feel and react I was going to be stuck and not doing the things in my life that I long to do. You see these situations come to blur our focus, cause us to retreat, to throw up our hands in surrender. Instead we should figure out the reason for the test and learn to conquer it and not allow it to conquer us.

So now that God was able to get my attention and teach me some wisdom, I am more than ready to move into the life that He was created for me. Without that situation rubbing me the wrong way and me learning to deal with it in God’s way I would still be stuck.

God told me to “dream a new dream in 2015”, not to let go of what He has already showed me, but to breathe new life into those things. I need to encourage myself and recognize instantly when the enemy is trying to distract me from my calling.

2015 is my year, what about you?! You can take a close look at the patterns of your life and determine that what held you captive then will not be the same thing that holds you back this year. Time for a good self-evaluation and talk with God. Let Him show you what you need to do to move toward your destiny.

Blessings,

Lisa