Every once in a while I get an image of myself as I’d like to be: admirably self-controlled, unruffled, good-humored, respectful of others and therefore eliciting respect for herself, setting high standards for myself but being tolerant of others . . . the list goes on. It’s a picture of my so-called “best self.” That person doesn’t actually exist, unfortunately, but I find that picturing her is helpful. Last night, for example, we were at a restaurant celebrating a family birthday and I had ordered chili rellenos. Very, very good. But there were two of them, and I knew after finishing one that I didn’t need any more. I could save the rest for today. But that second one, with its crispy crust (always get the crispy rellenos! it’s a rule of life) was very tempting. I looked at it; it looked at me. And I thought, ‘My ideal self wouldn’t eat it. She’d stick to what she decided to do.’ So, while I did cut off one corner, the rest came home with me and is sitting in the fridge even now, waiting to be consumed for lunch.
self-knowledge
Time Refuses to Be Managed.
Today I sat down to go through an accumulation of notes I’ve taken over the past couple of years, mostly from sermons at my church and lectures at Bible Study Fellowship. I was particularly looking for ideas that I’d scribbled down in the margins about possible blog posts, while also reminding myself of the wonderful spiritual truths that have been showered down upon me from various speakers. I don’t know that I intended to spend quite as much time as I did, but now I have a manageable little pile of notepaper with various areas highlighted. So I decided to go with the idea that ended up on top, quoted above. Here’s the entire quotation:
Be Grateful that You Can’t Afford to Buy One of These!
I’ve been watching a program called “Impossible Builds” on our local PBS station on Wednesday nights (until they started up yet another of their endless fundraising marathons—sigh) and have found myself equally tickled and saddened by it all. (That’s a pretty hard pair of emotions to hold onto at the same time!) The series will include an office tower in New York City, but so far the three projects showcased have all been luxury homes, either downtown condos (in Miami) or vacation homes (in the U.A.E. and, I think, Saudi Arabia).
I Can See Clearly Now!
I wrote in a previous post about my identification with Teddy Roosevelt’s poor vision and his utter amazement when he got his first pair of glasses. I’d be interested to know how his vision problems progressed as he got older. Since Benjamin Franklin was the inventor of bifocals, I’d assume that TR at least had that feature available to him. And there were some primitive contact lenses as early as the late 1800’s, although it doesn’t appear that he ever wore those.
Are You a Recruit, a Volunteer, or a Servant?
A number of years ago I was acting as a group discussion leader in a Bible study group, and we were given a document titled “Are you a servant or a volunteer?” This happened near the end of the year when I was feeling a bit weary in well doing about being a leader. I loved my group and interacting with them, but I felt burdened and somewhat resentful about all of the time I had to spend in leadership meetings in order to spend 45 minutes or so guiding a discussion based on prepared questions that everyone was supposed to have answered in advance.So reading the article cemented my decision not to serve the next year. (I’m sure that was not the intention!) I had realized that my attitude fit the “volunteer” mold much more than the “servant” one.
A Partially-Consumed but Worthwhile Book
Everything Happens for a Reason: And Other Lies I’ve Loved
I heard about this book from an episode of “Fresh Air Weekend” that kept me sitting in the parking lot of a restaurant recently and made me decide that I must get hold of it immediately. So I used one of my Audible.com credits to get the audiobook, thinking that I’d love it as much as I had the interview. I was going to plunge into it and not emerge until I was finished. It was going to be great.
Well, not so much.
I managed to get through about half of the audiobook, finding myself less and less willing to get back into it. Finally, yesterday, I started it again and then thought, ‘I can’t do any more of this.’ I may or may not go back and listen to the final couple of chapters, but I’m done with the ongoing story.
Do You See the Real World, or Just Your World?
The source for today’s post is the sermon my pastor, Josh Waltz, preached yesterday. As I think I’ve mentioned, we’re going through the Old Testament book of Ecclesiastes, and what a fascinating and encouraging journey it’s turning out to be. Yesterday we were in chapter 7, and Josh started out by telling a story about Teddy Roosevelt’s childhood from his autobiography (named, aptly enough, The Autobiography of Theodore Roosevelt
How Did My Time-Tracking Week Go?
I wrote last week that I had signed up for the Laura Vanderkam Time-Tracking Challenge for 2018, in which participants were asked to log their activities for one full week, 168 hours. I’m happy to say that I stuck to it for the full week this year (having almost immediately dropped out last January) and also thoroughly enjoyed reading Laura’s daily updates (link is to the first day’s post; you can then read the rest if you’re interested) on how she spent her own time. I used my fun app, toggl, which I’ve written about several times, most recently last week, and this morning I had a neatly categorized weekly report, all ready for me to look at and then send on to Laura. I managed to record a total of 167 hours and 22 minutes, so only a little bit of time fell through the cracks. How did I do? Here are some highlights:
Letting Go and Making Room
I had planned at some point do a write-up about all the different blogs and podcasts I follow, and maybe I’ll still do that, but perhaps it’s a better idea to deal with some of my favorites on a more individual basis. So today I’m taking ideas from two blogs, one a recent discovery and one that I’ve followed for some time. They each deal with the concept of simplifying and decluttering, and they each wrote a recent post that together form a unified whole. (I had a terrible time with that previous sentence.)
So the blog I’ve been following for some time is “Happy Simple Living” authored by Eliza Cross. If you follow me on my Facebook author page you saw the post I put up yesterday about her moment of truth in the garage as she contemplated two bins labeled “bookends.” She realized that those bins represented her dreams that someday she’d put them to use in a happy home; that those items represented the hopes she had going into a marriage that failed. I won’t try to re-tell the story here; I’d encourage you to follow the link above and read it for yourself. In the end, she decides to get rid of them. They represent a life she no longer leads, and they’ve been sitting unused for 11 years. Time to accept reality and move on.
A Start on New Year’s Resolutions–Why Deny Yourself Pleasure?
My good intentions to write a separate post last week about each of my NYR’s went by the wayside, swallowed up in all sorts of family activities. I hope everyone reading this post had a great time with family and friends over the holidays, but I know it’s inevitable that for some of you this time of year is especially hard. The Ostroms over at Pinch of Yum lost their baby last year, and they struggled over what to do this year about various traditional celebrations. I know there are days to come when there will be empty seats at our table, but for now we’re all hale and hearty and thankful for it.