ThiS Is My YeAr!

I'm not a New Year's resolution person.  I don't make them.  I never have.  I always saw so many people make resolutions and then a few weeks, or maybe months later they've gone back to their old habits and they feel like a failure.  I look at resolutions as the world's attempt to keep us feeling like we are unworthy.

What I have been doing over the last 4 1/2 years is putting my new life together.  One of those steps was choosing something about myself that I would like to change for the better and then working on that.  When I say something about myself, I mean something on the inside.  My first big challenge was to learn to love the person looking back at me in the mirror.  I would have to say, by far, that was the hardest one for me and the most rewarding!  I really do love me!  That doesn't come from ego by thinking that I am outwardly beautiful.  It comes from inside my heart by knowing that I am beautiful on the inside.  I like who I am.

I decided a few months ago, way before New Year's Eve that 2015 was going to be my year!  It is!  I can feel it.  I have an overwhelming faith that it will be!  I have that bubbling up, excited, overflowing, joyful expectation in my heart that God is going to bless me abundantly more than I could ever imagine this year!

Yesterday afternoon I took a beginners Yoga workshop and it physically kicked my butt!  I have not been physically active in a few years and I've decided it's time to get back in the game of life.  However, I do realize that it is not going to be easy!  I'm ready to put in the work.  I said all that to say that I was very sore this morning and didn't go to church so I turned on Joel O'Steen to listen to him.  I really like listening to his messages.  Guess what his message was about today?  You guessed it, "This is your year!"  I started smiling and thinking, "Ok God.  This is awesome!"  God was confirming to me again through Joel's message that this is my year!  Woohoo!

There are several things that I would love to see happen in my life this year
and God knows what they are, but I'm not going to limit myself to those.  I know that what God has in mind to bless me abundantly with is so much more than my small mind could imagine.  I have already had a major blessing this year and it's only January!

Just so you know, it's your year too!  It is!  Just have faith.  Keep telling yourself this is my year!  This is my year of abundant blessings and see what happens.  Don't expect things to go badly.  Expect them to go good!  As a matter of fact, expect them to go abundantly good!  Even when your in a situation where you can't possibly see how anything good could be happening, it can and it will!  Whether it's poor health, a lack of financial resources, unmet needs, etc., abundance can and will be given to you, if you will just allow them into your life!  It doesn't require luck.  All it requires if for you to ask and then believe that it will happen.  Unwavering faith!

Oh YeS!  I Am BLeSsEd!

My ChRiStMaS StOrY!

This is my Christmas story 2014.  Can I just say that at the beginning of December I realized I did not have any Christmas joy.  I know, that's sad.  I tried very hard to find it, but it was nowhere to be found!  I was looking forward to the whole holiday season with Thanksgiving,  Christmas and New Years, then right after Thanksgiving I felt my Christmas spirit leaving.

I used to have bins and bins of Christmas decorations.  I went all out for many, many years decorating for Christmas.  I decorated the house and the yard.  I decorated the office where I worked.  I loved baking Christmas cookies and goodies and sharing them with friends and family.  I usually did all the decorating by myself.  Sometimes the kids would help for a moment or two, then they were off.  My husband never participated, but that never stopped me, though it would have been nice to have him share in that.  I loved Christmas as a child, and I wanted to make sure my kids loved it too.  It was my mother's favorite holiday.  She couldn't decorate enough.  My dad loved it too.  You know what, I was successful because, my children do love Christmas!  They both are sharing that love with their children and spouses.  I love that too!  It makes my heart sing!

Now, I'm down to half a bin of decorations that I keep in my daughter's attic.  She took it down for me when she got all of her decorations down from her attic after Thanksgiving.  I brought the bin home, hoping that I would find my Christmas joy in it.  I took out my Christmas tree ornaments and unwrapped a few.  They are very pretty and I love them.  I looked at them, wrapped them back up, put the lid back on the bin and took it back to Heather's house.  There was no joy there.  It really made me sad to look at them.  I was so hoping that my joy was in there.  Being sad to see things that should have brought me joy was puzzling to me.  I had been hoping to recapture that Christmas joy I had as a child, but it evaded me.

This is my second Christmas season, single. (Really it's been 3 years, one was while I was separated.)  Maybe that's it.  Maybe that's where my joy went.  Maybe it left right along with my marriage.  Maybe it went away with all those years of hoping and dreaming of sharing Christmas and for that matter, every holiday, with someone who loves them all as much as I do.  I'm not sure.

My children are the only reason, as an adult, that I loved Christmas, or any holiday for that matter.  My husband made sure he sucked the joy out of every holiday.  Every holiday for 38 years.  Actually, honestly, he sucked the joy out of every day.  I know it doesn't seem like there could be someone alive that found absolutely no joy in anything, ever.  What I've come to understand recently, is that even though he did that, I still allowed it to happen.  I'm going to have to be honest and accept the blame for that.  I had to find a way to get joy back.

I guess my post divorce expectations were way too high.  I thought that as soon as I got divorced, surely the man of my dreams (Because I certainly hadn't been married to him.) would show up and my life would be filled with joy!  I had this fairy tale attitude about it, I guess.  Two years later, that has not happened.........yet.  I say yet, because I know it's going to happen.  I just don't know when.  I guess one of the hardest things for me to put into practice is that I must make my own joy!  I know that I am the only one who can make me happy.  I know that is my responsibility.  I'm ready for that challenge.  I am learning that lesson.  I am making positive strides towards that goal.  I have come very far but I realize I'm not there yet.

I did finally buy a wreath for my front door, at the urging of a good friend and I also sent out Christmas cards, which I haven't done for probably 15 years.  I was thinking that maybe I would find my joy in those.  I did enjoy doing those things, but I did not find my joy.  Then it happened!  God loves to surprise me with His wisdom unexpectedly.  He knows I'm a sucker for surprises!

Two weeks ago I went to the dollar store.  I was looking at the ornaments to add to a Christmas shirt for an ugly shirt contest.  By the way, I was hoping to find my joy doing that, but I was only going through the motions.  It seemed like out of nowhere, a woman about my age stood beside me.  I didn't really pay her much attention.  She was looking at the decorations next to me.  It startled me when she started talking to me.  She said that she thought she bought a 3 foot Christmas tree but it's 4 feet and she was getting some ornaments to fill in the extra space.  Really I was wondering to myself why she was telling me all that!  I told her I didn't even put up a tree.  I told her I think the grinch stole my Christmas this year.  She started saying things like, "Jesus being born is the reason for Christmas. And the cross is the reason to celebrate.  And that Jesus gave it all for us, etc."  Then she just walked away!  I didn't even have time to respond.  She left as fast as she had appeared!  Isn't that amazing?  I know all the things she said are true!  I believe all of them!  I try to live them!  Her words resonated through me.  I don't think she knew just how much I needed to hear her say those words.  From that brief encounter which probably didn't last 2 minutes, I found my Christmas joy!

It just came flooding back and I started to smile!  Now, I'm getting ready for the after Christmas sales!  I'm going to buy some new decorations and a tree!

I've decided that I'm going to rock Christmas next year.  When I was a child, we had a silver aluminum tree with the color wheel.  I always loved that tree!  It used to make me so happy.  I would sit and watch it for hours!  I hadn't thought about that tree in many years and I'm guessing it came to mind because it brought me so much joy.  So guess what tree I'm buying for next year?  You guessed it!  A silver aluminum Christmas tree with a color wheel!  It's going to be AWESOME!  I've learned the lesson!  I have my joy and I'm not going to lose it again!

To that mystery lady who helped me find my joy, thank you!  It just goes to show you that you never know who your words will inspire!  I found my joy!  It was there all along, I just needed to be reminded of it.  As a matter of fact, I'm going to rock every holiday from now on! What used to be a source of hurt feelings and emotional pain, I am going to use to spread love!

To all my wonderful family and friends, Merry Christmas and I love you all!  Christmas blessing to all of you.  Enjoy your family, safe travels, and make some wonderful memories!  I hope you have a Joyous Christmas!  I know I am!  Joy to the World!  The Lord Has Come!

Joy To The Newborn King!

A God Moment!

I just had a God Moment!  Thank you, God, for that moment!  I have had a few God moments before, but they are rare.  They are also, at least for me, at the most unexpected time.  That said, they are awesome!

I had to stop what I was doing and write this down.  I was in the kitchen making some breakfast.  I have been in a lot of pain for about 4 weeks.  It had gotten worse the last week and I was struggling with managing the pain, but back to my moment.  I was just talking to God in thought, and saying in my head, "God, Why am I always in pain?  I just don't understand why I'm always in pain?"  The very second I finished that thought, God said, "You are always in pain because you don't think you are good enough.  I said, "What? I am good enough.  Remember, I already worked on that."  God repeated louder, "You don't think you are good enough, but you are.  You are always in pain because you don't think you are good enough."

I really started thinking about that. Why would God be saying that?  Being good enough is the very first thing I started working on with myself when I first became single again.  I thought I had that all figured out, but God was telling me that on some level I still feel,
"not good enough."  Being made to feel that I was not good enough my whole life has caused me more pain, emotionally and physically, than I could ever express.  I've read a lot of writings about how we get back from the universe what we put out to the universe.  I believe that.  If God was right, and let's face it, God is always right, then he just gave me the key I needed to unlock the blessings of my journey!  Wow!  I am blown away!  You see, without knowing it, I had stopped for an honest, pure moment to talk to my Father.  Not begging, not whining, not crying, not pleading, just asking!  And He talked right back to me!  Stop and take that in for a few minutes!  Isn't that just amazing!  Mind blowing! Life Changing!  God just stopped to talk to me!  How "good enough" am I that my Heavenly Father spoke to me!

Can I tell you something else?  In that moment, I felt "good enough" all the way to my soul.  All of the "not good enough"
moments in my life seemed to disappear and were replaced with God's love!  I don't feel angry deep down inside, I feel peace.  I don't feel hurt deep down inside, I feel love.  I feel good, deep down inside.  I've never felt good deep down inside.  I think I'm going to love this:)


What I have figured out is that, I thought I had fixed the "not good enough" in me, but I didn't even consider that I needed to allow God to fix it. I had been asking "god" to help "ME", when I should have been asking GOD to "help" me.  I had unknowingly put myself ahead of God.  That shocked me that I would do that, even unintentionally.

I had been having problems lately with several things I thought I had taken care of and fixed in myself.  Little feelings kept coming up and causing struggles that I thought were no longer issues.  I was spending a lot of time trying to figure out why this was happening.  It didn't make any sense.  After all, I fixed it, right?  I was trying to find answers all by myself.  I would talk to God about them, but I always asked God to show ME how to fix them.  I'm not going to do that anymore.  I'm going to remember that I don't have any answers and I cannot fix anything in myself, but God has all the answers I need and He can fix everything in me if I will just stop trying to do it myself.  Now that's powerful:)

 GoD MoMeNtS RoCk! 

Changing Things!

With the change of season, I started thinking about how much I've changed over the last 6 months.  Change is good!  It is, even though most of the time I change because I have to, not necessarily because I want to!

I love it when our world changes from winter to spring, but I'm not very excited when it goes from summer to winter!  Now I know fall comes after summer and before winter.  I like the fall, I guess.  At least I like it much better than winter!  I like how fresh the air feels.  I like the crispness in the morning and I like the decrease in humidity.  But winter!  I do not like being cold!  I don't!  I don't like having to wear long pants and socks and closed in shoes!  I like flip flops.  No, I take that back, I LOVE FLIP FLOPS!  Don't even get me started about having to wear a

hat, coat and gloves!  I don't like that my car is cold inside!  I don't like those few minutes when I start my car and I'm waiting for my seat heater to warm up my seat!  Ok, so I know all my friends up north are laughing hysterically right now.  They are saying, "Really.  You live in Florida!"

What about me has changed over the last six months?  I decided to pick one thing about myself that I didn't like.  I'm not talking about physical attributes.  I'm talking about something on the inside that I just didn't like.  There are several things I wanted to work on, but God showed me that I have to start with only one.  More than one thing at a time was just too overwhelming.  I think that's where I always made my mistake.  I tried to change too many things at once and I could never reach my goals.

The first thing I chose was how much I disliked being alone with myself.  I didn't want to spend time with me.  I was very discontented and bored with myself.  I couldn't see what I had to offer myself.  Then things started to change!  How you ask?  I asked God to show me how to be content with myself!  I needed to learn how to be content with being all by myself, all day and night.  Instead of telling myself how bored or lonely I was, I decided to try telling myself the opposite.  What I've found is that I like my own company.  I like being with me.  Of course, I think I'd like being with me even more if it wasn't cold or rainy and I could go for a walk or bike ride or I could lay out in the sunshine!  I do love the sunshine!

Now that I've mastered being alone and liking it, my next conquest will be to have power over the thoughts in my head.  I've been working on this one for so very long.  At my age, I've dealt with an awful lot of stuff.  That stuff, mostly bad, likes to play over and over inside my head on a moment by moment basis.  I've decided that my brain loves to live in the past.  I can have a pity party all by myself, all day long if I want to.  The thing is, I don't want to anymore.  I've found that it is easier said than done.  I have tried many different techniques to try to elevate the need to replay the past over and over.  I'm still a work in progress but I'm proud of the progress I've made!

What I've learned is that change is very, very hard.  It's so much easier to stay the way you are.  If you don't like who you are, which I didn't, then understand that the work is tough, progress is slow, but the results are so worth it!  I just hope that I can move much faster at change than I have been.  I want it now!  I want the new and improved me today!  Reality sinks in again and I realize that no matter how bad I want the new me, it is a process.  Just like bad health, I didn't become the me I am overnight and I can't become the new me overnight!

I Am Changing Daily and I Love It!

What Do You Think?

Do you know that what you think about your self is what you are?  Now hear me out!  Think about that for a moment!  It's huge!  So what do you think about yourself?

I know what I thought about myself for most of my life.  Let me give you a peek inside my mind for the prior 50+ years of my life.  Most of my life, even as a child, I thought I was worthless.  Even if I try to put that thought in perspective, in the mind of a small child that didn't know any better, that's very, very sad:(  Wow!  How many children do we come in contact with during our lives and have no idea that they think they are worthless?  Worthless is an awful place to be.

I have spent a huge part of my life working within the education field and working with countless teachers and being a very small part of children's lives.  I know many, many wonderful teachers!  I know so many teachers that have put in so many countless hours working hard to make the lives of their students better.  I know many teachers that have devoted their entire life to bettering children.  They are wonderful people.  That's just a small shout out to all my teacher friends that I know and love!  I'm just thinking how I had the opportunity to make a child feel better about themselves, and I probably fell short.  At the time, I didn't realize that some of the most difficult children or the shyest children are probably the children I needed to love the most.

Right now, I'm wondering, how many of the people I have ever known, whether as a child or an adult, knew that I thought I was worthless?  I'm just guessing, but probably no one.  I was very good at hiding it and very good at making people think otherwise.  It's something most of us probably keep buried very deep inside.  I know I did.  Really, how many people that you have ever met, would you want to know you thought you had no value?  Value is everything!

As an adult, most of my life, I thought I was worthless.  Deep down inside, no matter how hard I tried, or how great a mother and a wife I was, and I was very good at both of those, I felt worthless.  What happens when you do your very best and you still feel like you fall so far short of the mark you have set for yourself?  Then what?  What if the people that are so very important in your life make you feel like you are so unimportant?  What then?

Well, this is what!  Until recently, I spent much time, an awful lot of time trying to figure out how to make myself worth something.  That is, in my mind.  What have I figured out?  I figured out that the most important person who thought I was worthless, was ME!  What I have found is that my mind, the mind I thought I controlled, really controls me!  I've figured
out that the thoughts I think every second of every day, make me who I am.

Now hold on!  If that's true, and it is, what if I change what I think?  What if the thoughts I now allow my mind to think, say I'm AWESOME?  That is a life changer!  It is!  Think of the possibilities!

If every thought you think about yourself is how wonderful you are, how can you be anything but wonderful!  Take it a step further.  What if every thought you have is about how healthy you are?  How about how financially set you are?  How blessed you are?  How at peace you are?  How much you are loved?  Woohoo!  I can hardly contain myself at the prospect!

This is what I've been practicing and I invite you to do the same.  It will change your life!  It has changed mine!  I want you to know just how powerful your thoughts are about who you are!  I want you to love yourself!  That's what I want for you!

Please take a few minutes to be really honest with yourself.  It's not easy, that I know.  Think about what thoughts you say to yourself.  Think about how you really feel about yourself.  Think about all the things you think that you would not share with anyone else.  Believe me,  you haven't thought anything about yourself that I haven't thought about myself!  This is where you get to change everything!  This is where you get to empower yourself.  This is where you set yourself free!  Oh, I like that!  I really do! I hope you like it too!!!!  Set yourself free!  Change your thoughts and you change your world!

I Am Awesome!

Checking In!

I started my blog in August 2013.  Since it's been a little over a year I thought I'd check in with myself and see how I'm doing.  So how am I doing?  I'm fantastic!  I am in love with my life!

When I started this journey, I thought the goal was to find someone to complete me.  I thought I needed to find the person who was going to make me happy and love me and cherish me and respect me and..................well, you get the idea.  I was so busy trying to find that person that I didn't slow down and give God a chance.  I re-read my first blog and I said that God will never take something away from you without replacing it with something better, which He won't.  My problem was, I
didn't want to wait for God.  I mean really, did I think I could do a better job than God?

So much has happened during the year since my first blog.  I've had many changes.  I have a sweet, beautiful new granddaughter, who joins my beautiful Jadyn.  Most of the changes have been changes I have made in myself.  I've said goodbye to some friends I met earlier in the year, which is always hard, but sometimes necessary.  But the great God that I know gave me awesome new friends in their place!  I have met so many wonderful people that I am so proud to call my friends!  I am so blessed!  If you are reading this, then yes, I am talking about you!


I have dated a couple of guys this past year, very short term.  Did I say, very short term?  The biggest change I made in myself was my outlook on dating.  I was so busy looking for someone myself, that I left God out of it.  What I have finally, finally figured out is to STOP and GET OUT OF GOD'S WAY!  I am promised someone, way, way better than was taken
away. (By the way, that ended up being the biggest blessing of my life!)

I always told my children and now I tell my grandchildren that "a promise is a promise!"  So what am I worried about?  NOTHING!  Absolutely nothing!  And that's the best part.  It has made going out with my friends and living my life so much fun!  No pressure, just fun and I couldn't be happier!  I am very happy to wait on God now.  He will put the right guy in my life at the right time.  Not only that, I'm sure He will let me know it's the right guy!  Yea God!


So what have I been up to?  Well, I just went to my 40th Fletcher High School Pre-Party Celebration and Reunion!  Go Fletcher!  It was wonderful!  It was perfect!  I made great memories!  I loved it!

October is going to be a very busy and exciting month for me.  I can hardly wait, though I don't want to rush my life away!  

I'm going to my first ever Florida State football game!  I know, I know!  I can hear all my gator friends now (chomp, chomp, chomp).  I am so very excited about it!

I am also going on my first vacation in almost 8 years!  I am going to Gatlinburg, Tennessee!  I get to stay in the most beautiful "cabin" I could imagine!  I get to see the leaves change!  That is my next favorite place to be (the mountains in the fall) besides my beautiful ocean!


To sum it all up, I have the most wonderful life!  I get up every morning feeling so thankful and so blessed.  I look in the mirror and I love the person looking back at me.  I do!  I love her!  I never imagined I'd ever be able to say that.  My life is overflowing with wonderful friends, old and new, and wonderful family that I love so much.  I am making so many wonderful memories I can barely contain myself!  I am so excited to be allowed to live my life!  I cannot wait to see all that God has in store for me!  Woohoo!

Life Is Good!

The Cost of Possessions/Obsessions

I was thinking about the price some are willing to pay to have material possessions or harbor obsessions.  By cost, I don't mean what the item cost them monetarily.  I am talking about the cost they pay for allowing those possessions/obsessions to take the place of love.  I am pretty knowledgeable about the subject since that's how I lived most of my life!

We were created to love and to be loved.  That's why we're all here on earth.  It is!  Somewhere along the way having more things or losing the things we have, became more important than being loved.  Somewhere there are some of us that substituted material possessions or obsessions for the love that we did not receive.  I'm not talking about everyone.  Some people have been blessed enough to have found their soulmate.  I hope that you wake up every morning and go to bed every evening with much gratitude for that.  You are truly blessed.

There are those of us though, that somewhere along the path of our life, we realized we were not receiving love.  For many different reasons, we stayed in those relationships, so for our human selves to survive, we exchanged needing love from a person to trying to find it in other things.  Some worked hard and climbed the corporate ladder.  Some are serial college students always trying to acquire one more degree.  Some are hoarders, overeaters, drinkers, drug addicts, shoppers, perfectionists, obsessors, etc.  It doesn't matter what the possession/obsession is.  If it's being used to provide you with the love your soul needs from another human then maybe it's time to take notice.  When forced, and only when forced, that's just what I did!

Me, I was a shopper!  I love to shop.  I did.  I still do.  It was one of many reasons why, after my children were grown, I stayed in a bad marriage.  I was afraid that I wouldn't be able to do it anymore.  It was my crutch.  It was my "love."  I wouldn't have admitted that a year ago.  Time, much reflection, personal growth and many long heartfelt talks with God have allowed me to see the things that I refused to acknowledge earlier.  What I finally realized when I was faced with having to make the decision to stay in that marriage or walk away, was knowing that if I stayed, I would never be loved.  Not ever.  That is not only a sobering thought, but also very, very sad.  It came down to knowing that all the stuff I had acquired over 38 years had not shown me any love.  I loved my stuff, but it didn't love me back!  It did however give me momentary pleasure and many times that's what we settle for.  Ultimately, that is what my life had lacked all along, LOVE!


So I looked at all my stuff.  I looked at the monetary security my marriage provided.  I looked at my beautiful home.  I looked at the only life I had ever known and everything I would be walking away from and to me it was monumental!  I decided at that moment that none of it was or had been or will ever be worth the huge price I had paid for not being loved.

The great news is, I have never had one regret.  Not one!  All the things I was so afraid of walking away from have been replaced with wonderful things I never could have imagined.  Oh, I brought possessions with me.  I still like to have things that make me smile to look at them.  I have acquired some new possessions as well.  I still go shopping and I'm not going to lie, it still brings me great pleasure, but for a different reason, I LOVE IT!  The difference is, I'm not using it to fill the void of no love in my life.  I go because I like to.  What has happened since is priceless!  Just to name a few: Self-esteem, love of self, more peace than I've ever known, happiness, joy, independence, strength, a new life!

If you are reading this and seeing yourself in it, please know that you are the only one that can make decisions for yourself.  You are the only one that can decide that loving yourself and having the chance to build a new, wonderful life and possibly in the process find your soulmate is worth walking away.  You have to decide if staying where you are and not being loved is worth what it is going to cost you.  Trust this.  Let my words ring true, after 38 years, you will one day wake up, look around and realize that you made the wrong decision.  Nothing is ever worth not finding love.  That doesn't necessarily mean with someone else, it can mean that you never knew what it was like to love yourself.  You are worth it!  You are!

I am so happy that I decided walking away was worth it.  I am so happy that the little girl inside of me that didn't think she was worthy of love, took the chance!  It wasn't an overnight turn-around for my life.  It was hard.  Sometimes it's still hard.  It was painful.  Sometimes it's still painful.  It was frightening, but it's not frightening anymore!  I know I did it!   It took giving myself lots of love and grace and allowing myself to make mistakes.  It was about learning and growing and putting myself first.  It was so worth it!  My life is wonderful.  It really is.

The Choice Is Always Yours!