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Showing posts with the label Everyday Life

What To Do First to Make a Profit

The PF Women Team at our Annual Team Retreat  ~ 2018 Today on Seth Godin's blog, he said: It's tempting to decide to make a profit first, then invest in training, people, facilities, promotion, customer service and most of all, doing important work. In general, though, it goes the other way. Yes, it does. If you are waiting to make a profit before you do these things, in my experience you're  not going to make a profit. So many organizations, ministries and churches are struggling with financial issues. I know your pain. As anyone who follows our story knows, our ministry was in a ton of debt four years ago when I came on as director.  Since that time, we've gotten out of debt and turned a profit every year.  God has done amazing things through out team, for which we give Him the glory! I find that what Seth is saying here is absolutely true, with one disclaimer. For Christian leaders, spiritual disciplines must always be first. Before we started i...
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I'm Not Lonely Anymore

Have you ever been surrounded by lots of people, yet felt like the loneliest person in the world?  Me too. I've heard lots of people say they have, including many ministers.  The issue isn't whether we're surrounded by people, it's about a heart-connection. Kindred spirits.  Understanding on a deeper level.  We do need community -- and God has created us that way. But it's not community that I'm thinking about today.  I used to feel an ache as a woman in ministry because although I was surrounded by  people, few if any knew the weight of that which I carried.  The issue wasn't whether I could find someone to go out for coffee with. There were those who gave invitations, but sometimes I didn't feel the level of trust or understanding to share with them.  What God showed me was that I needed to reframe the issue of loneliness.   I saw loneliness as a bad thing.  A horrible thing.  Somethin...
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5 Ways to Increase the Joy in Your Life

1) Choose joy. Yes, this is something you determine!  Choosing joy doesn't mean you ignore tragedy, trauma or challenges. It's about making a decision to choose joy despite obstacles. Choosing joy even in the midst of struggle is important because the Bible says, "the joy of the Lord is your strength." (Nehemiah 8:10) Especially in the throes of problems, we need strength more than ever. Making a decision to choose joy even in trials brings us greater strength which in turn helps us with issues we face. That's easier said than done..." you think. I agree. And I'm not naive. I say this from the perspective of one who has overcome what therapists term, "complex trauma, significant loss and complicated grief." Yes, choosing joy is possible, even when going through all that. 2) Be thankful.  1 Thessalonians 16-18 says,   " Be joyful always; pray continually; give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God’s will for y...
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Living Free

"The moment you can visualize being free from the things that hold you back, you have indeed begun to set yourself free."---Unknown Everyone's talking about freedom, today! There are many different areas of our lives and our world where freedom is needed.   I am passionate about living free, as far as it depends on me. I find this is often a process with different facets of life. At times it is a journey rather than instantaneous, to move into a new realm of freedom. Today I have joined forces with my dear friend, Laura Dennis, to write a 2-part post -- the first half of which is on her blog today. We're sharing on the subject:  "Freedom in Standing Your Ground: Sometimes Adoption and Reunion Ain’t Pretty!" The second half will be at my Adoptee Restoration blog tomorrow. Hop on over to Laura's today and check out our post there.
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Sometimes Truth Bumps

There are times truth bumps into somebody else's comfortable world. It's there that we are tempted to be silent about the truth. We are tempted to compromise, to retreat back where we are safe from hurting anyone's feelings. To be sure, we don't set out to hurt another's feelings. But sometimes truth bumps into them and creates an unintended wound. It's important at that point to remember, it's not about us. It was never about us. When truth bumps and it hurts, it's their issue. Totally their issue.  And when they react, they aren't reacting at us but at truth, which can be extremely uncomfortable. Almost unbearable in fact. Why forge ahead when it would be so much easier to stop and avoid all that?     "All that is necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing." ~Edmund Burke
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The One Question I'm So Sick Of (And a prayer...for us)

"What do you want?" This is a very popular question people are often asked in business, in counseling, in coaching. I've never had a problem knowing and describing exactly what I want. Ever. My entire life I have been able to define and articulate what I want, how I want it, when I want it, and who I want it from right down to the exact details. For all of that realization, I am often frustrated. Because I've found that defining what you want doesn't solve your problems. Even knowing what you want and going after it wholeheartedly doesn't solve all your problems. Because sometimes no matter how hard you try, it doesn't go the way you want it to go. Sometimes it also takes more than one person to make it work. Like the song says, "It takes two to make a thing go right...it takes two to make it outta sight..." It's been my experience that anything I want that is possible to achieve by myself, is no problem. When I desire somethi...
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How to Handle a Bad Day

"Depression hung over me like a black cloud...and it was hard to find my way out at the time..." These were my words during a sermon a few years ago and afterwards a lady rushed up to me and said, "you mean YOU were actually depressed? Because I can't even imagine that. You seem so...together... " Truth be told, all of us go through hard times. And all of us have rotten days. Me included. I happen to be having a good day today. But a while back I was having an absolutely horrible day. And because so many people seem to think people like me never have bad days like they do, I got the brilliant idea, "I'm going to video record my bad day!!!" Yes, I know that's kind of bizarre but I have a passion to share transparently with people.That's why this blog is about transparently leading and relating from a faith perspective. So I did what was for me, a courageous thing. I recorded scenes during 24 hours...even waking up in the morni...
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When You're Waiting For Something To Be Restored

Are you waiting for something to be restored? I understand. I'm waiting too. I heard the story of a preacher who was awakened one night by the enemy. Evidently a few demons were trying to mess with him and they started shaking the bed and actually moved it across the room. He commanded them to stop in the name of Jesus and they did. But after thinking about it a moment he said, "Hold on...first, PUT IT BACK in the name of Jesus!!" The demons put the bed back in it's original position, and left. Then satisfied that things were restored to their rightful place, the preacher went to sleep. For a while now I've been saying to the enemy PUT IT BACK IN THE NAME OF JESUS. Permission to be perfectly honest here? Sometimes I struggle between saying put it back, and the fact that some people say it may be time to accept a new normal. There are people who would counsel people in this situation to grieve the past, accept the loss, and move on. If moving on...
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What's The Secret To Overcoming a Disappointment?

Are you disappointed? Feeling like you don't know if you can handle one more let down? Permission to encourage? Truth:  I get disappointed every day. Really. In some way, I get let down every single day. Today I counted twice, once on a small issue, another time on a big one. Sometimes I think people read blogs or watch people from afar and they think they lead relatively disappointment-free lives. I was preaching one time and in giving an illustration said, "One day when I was feeling depressed..." and went on to tell a story. At the close of the message a woman came running up and said, "You get depressed? I never imagined that..." Reality is that every person including myself faces disappointments. Nobody is exempt. What's my secret? I keep going. This week I was telling one of my career coaching clients the importance of going forward. He said, "Ummmmm...what choice do I have?" I told him, "Well, to be honest, I'...
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Maybe Fiction Isn't a Waste After All...

I've often wondered why people read fiction. I can count the number of fiction books I've read in my adult life on one hand. My reading appetite has always been a steady stream of non-fiction with a heavy emphasis on spirituality, self-help, biographies and cooking. Anything else has always felt like a waste of time -- something that wouldn't really apply to my life. Being the consummate time manager, my goals always center on something meaningful that I can use in everyday life. Fiction to me, has always felt like an escape. My thought has been,"If I need to escape my life, I'll just read something that can help me get rid of whatever is so sucky it's making me want to escape my life..." And that's pretty much how I lived until last year when my friend Rich Tatum was talking to me about reading fiction. He encouraged me very strongly that I needed to start reading it. Rich says that for me to go to the next level as a writer  I need to read...
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What I Learned Wearing a Night Guard
and Dealing With a Murder

  " You must do the thing you think you cannot do!" ~ Eleanor Roosevelt “Take it out! Take it out!”  This was my urgent plea last Friday when my dentist put a night guard in my mouth for the first time. I thought I was going to throw up! Gag! Yuk! I hated it.   I seriously thought I could not stand it for one more second.  I drove home thinking, “I don’t want to keep this thing in for a second let alone eight hours a night. They advised me to wear it during the day for a while to get used to it. I listened to their instructions and started wearing it a few seconds at a time, then a few minutes, and kept increasing the time. I also listened to the wisdom of friends who also wear a night guard and told me to press on, that I would get used to it. Well, I’ve worn the night guard every night for the past three nights and amazingly I’m at the point where I can’t imagine what I ever did without it! It helps tremendously.  I realized aft...
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One Ingredient That is Essential to Produce Quality Work
(Are You Missing It?)

Most of what I do in my role as a career coach is over the phone and online. Inevitably during resume work, I have to tell a client, "okay, I'm just letting you know, when I get quiet, I'm very much still here. I am working hard on your behalf, as you'll see in a moment..." After a few minutes they'll say, "Are you still there?" "Yep, sure am..." I reply. "I'm sending something to your e-mail right now..." And in a few moments they read something I just wrote based upon what we've been talking about and they respond with something like, "Wow. Um, just wow...that's really good. You've just truthfully stated my experience and accomplishments in a way that makes me sound like I should be running for president or something..."  Mission accomplished! There are so many thoughts running in my head right now, so much I'm processing, much of which I am writing. I'm putting the finishing touches...
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My new love affair

I'm growing cilantro. This is what I started from just a few seeds in this pot a month ago. I'm growing basil... and tomatoes...peppers...summer squash...and more. We're not allowed to have gardens in our yards in the neighborhood I live in, however we can grow vegetables in pots on the patio. In addition to the food, I'm re-planting almost all the perennials in my front yard that were killed in the wintertime frosts two years ago when it was unseasonably cold. All our neighbors experienced that too. Mostly only the really large plants and palms survived.  Others replanted a lot sooner. I've been slow to restore everything because it wasn't my passion before.   But things have changed now. I've been weeding and working out there almost every day. For hours. It will take me until the end of summer to get things perfectly in order according to the plan I've been developing. I used to hate this. I mean dreaded it! I wrote whole...
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Let them hear you laugh

 "There she goes again..."  I buried my face in my husband's shoulder, uncontrollably laughing, trying to get myself semi-under control, (I never get fully under control, lol) as we were out to dinner last night. Our former children's pastor, Trinity Mackley, came into town and stayed with us for the last two nights. We went out to dinner -- he and Larry and I along with Jordan and Savanna. In our conversation which was quite delightful, I was reduced to cry-laughing. This happens often. I laugh so hard I sometimes fall off the couch. Or leave the room. Or bury my face in a tissue. I've had passersby thinking I've had too much to drink, when I wasn't drinking at all. One time somebody offered to call me a cab. In all seriousness. That made me laugh even harder. My kids are used to it. They just say, "there she goes again..." and shake their heads in amusement. They get a kick out of the fact that I laugh at my own stories and jo...
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Why "know it alls" are really dumb

People who think they know it all drive me crazy. I rarely hang around with people like that because they just tend to frustrate me.  But that's not why they're dumb.  Today we took Savanna to Juniper Springs in the Ocala National Forest. Larry took this picture while we were there. We spent time walking on the trail that leads from Juniper Spring to Fern Hammock Spring . I saw "boiling springs" for the first time, standing over the bridge looking into the clear water.  I've never seen water this clear, even in the Carribbean.  It was pretty amazing. Looking down into the water it looked as if it was boiling at the bottom. This was fascinating to me and I just stood there and watched.  I learned that "boiling springs" is from water turbulence on the top surface of a body of water, indicating the force of a high discharge from a spring vent below. I love learning new things. I've heard it said, "when you're through learning, you're t...
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Be different...but never indifferent.

People are often encouraged to be different. That's a good thing.  God created us to stand out, not blend in. Different is good. Indifferent is bad.   Indifference is actually deadly. I'm preparing a message to preach this weekend at a women's event. I was asked to speak on the theme, "Greater Things." Those aren't possible if a person lives with indifference. If we really want to live in such a way that we make an impact we have to be concerned about something beyond ourselves.    When you only give attention to yourself or your own agenda, you've actually started to decay. One of my favorite authors, Elie Wiesel once said, "because of indifference, one dies before one actually dies." He also said that, " ...the opposite of love is not hate, it's indifference. The opposite of art is not ugliness, it's indifference. The opposite of faith is not heresy, it's indifference. And the opposite of life is not death, it'...
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How to avoid a bad day

Nobody's life is perfect. I know you probably have a few people that you think have near perfect lives, but really, they don't.  There are those who have fulfilling lives, who are happy. But nobody escapes challenges in life. Not the rich, not the well-connected nor the educated. Nobody! We look at people who are granted great responsibilities in life and we think, "Wow. What a privilege it must be to lead this or that." Yes, it's a privilege, and it also comes with a price.  I've learned the more people and things I'm responsible for, the greater my challenges. So what's the key to waking up and having a good day in spite of all that's pressing on you? I can only tell you what I personally do, and that is determine my contribution to the day. Aside from the skills and talents I will use to get various things done it starts with my decision of what the other ingredients I'm going to include. For me, gratitude is the biggest ingredient t...
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It's true love

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What's so hard about getting started?

Yesterday someone asked me the same question I've been asked so many times..."how do you do it all?" There are many answers to this question however to begin this post today I'll say two things: 1) I don't do it all. 2) What I do manage to get done consistently begins the same way. I get started. It's not always easy to get started for an abundance of reasons. Many people don't like to get started because starting means you might do something and fail. Other people realize the great amount of work something significant will take and they dread it. It comes down to ~ do you want to do something or not? You can't do it all, but you can do something. So what are you going to do? "All glory comes from daring to begin." ~ Eugene F. Ware
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Is your style of time management Jesus-approved?

“If I can stop one heart from breaking, I shall not live in vain; If I can ease one life the aching, or cool one pain, or help one fainting robin up to his nest again, I shall not live in vain.” ~ Emily Dickinson  If I don't take time each day to help somebody, what's the use of this day? I live my life to worship God. And I've learned that as one gets in the presence of God, He stirs a heart to serve, to be broken and poured out on behalf of others. Taking time to help, to serve is not a burden. It is the great blessing imaginable. Stopping to help others gives life meaning.   Some people who teach on time management share how to isolate yourself from people so you can get everything done.  One thing I love doing is sharing with others how they can get things done so they can spend more time helping people. Because really... what could be more amazing than helping people? Think about it. Jesus came to earth to help people.
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Who's ultimately in charge of your time?

Surrendering your schedule to God is so important for two reasons. First, the most important thing we do in all of the roles we carry is to point people to Him.  Second, seeing the hand of God move in hearts and lives makes the mundane or difficult things we go through worth it all. Tuesdays are very busy days for me and my working day doesn't typically end until late as I'm doing a full day of ministry stuff and coaching.  On Tuesday nights I always have a meeting with my boss Kathryn to give a report on all my job seekers and assignments. Last night I called and she  said she was still on the phone with a client, and asked if I had the flexibility in my schedule to give her 30 minutes grace. I was thrilled because I realized I could squeeze in time to ride my bike at sunset. I said, "Can I have 35 minutes because my bike route takes exactly that long..." She said, " take all the time you need, you're doing me a favor..."  I was pedaling along...
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