Am I who I want to be...

Listening to the radio in the car yesterday, there was a promo commercial for a concert coming up featuring Switchfoot. They played a snippet of the song This Is Your Life and it really got me thinking. The portion they played says, "This is your life, are you who you want to be?" Am I who I want to be? The short answer is no, no I am not. What's funny about that, is that for the first time in my life, that doesn't make me uncomfortable. For the first time that answer doesn't make me depressed and question who I am, but gives me hope, something to look forward to. I would like to think that I am better today than I was yesterday, but that is not always the case. Some days, I am the same as yesterday.

On a day to day basis, I do the best I can at being a Mother, a Wife, an employee, a friend, a daughter, a Christian. But multi-tasking is a blessing and a curse and if I really look closely, each of these personas only get about a 10% effort in a day in order to make up the total percentage of who I have to be each day. I want to be a better everything/everyone and I want to strive to reach that goal each and every day. But sometimes we get lost in the minutinae of the day and forget the bigger picture. In my attempt to try and finish a project for work, I ignore my daughter's pleas to go outside. In my attempt to rest at the end of the day, I don't cook dinner for my family like I should. In my attempt to find myself, I ignore my duties as a daughter or as a friend. In my selfishness, I choose to sleep instead of spend time with the Lord. And at the end of each day, I pray that tomorrow I can do better. Sometimes this may mean cutting something out, because somedays it just isn't possible to do it all. But really, at the end of the day, what you got done, is what you got done and is the world really going to end because there are dishes in the sink? The things that must get done have ways of rising to the top of our priority list, but sometimes our priorities are out of whack. Sometimes we needed to be reminded of the bigger picture.

Through out my life I have had many trials and I didn't always handle them well when I was in the midst of them, but my viewpoint on trials has changed recently. You see, if you think about it, we learn the most and grow the most when we go through trials. When living in the status quo, we don't learn big lessons, we don't grow our characters, we remain simply in the status quo. The status quo is comfortable, but if we live in it always, we aren't really living are we? If life is great, and everything is going along at an even pace, with no bumps in the road, we don't strive to be better, we don't strive to learn or grow. Think about when you fail at something. Do you analyze what went wrong? Do you learn from your mistakes? Do you change your actions in order to get different reactions in similar situations? The answers to all these questions, I hope, is yes. We analyze what went wrong when we fail. We learn, we grow. But, when we succeed, we generally as a rule, don't analyze what we did to figure out why we succeeded. We are too busy basking in the glory of our success. But did we really learn anything other than success feels good? Maybe on a occasion, but generally, we move on to the next big thing. So why is it so hard to look forward to trials, to want trials in order to learn and grow? Why is it so hard to try and see the bigger picture when we are in a trial? Why is it so hard to stop in the midst of a trial and ask ourselves, "What could God be trying to teach me? How is He trying to grow me?"

Since becoming a Christian, I am constantly wondering what God has in store for me. Knowing that God is my strength in times of trial, I am not so scared of what's to come. I wonder what trials He has in store for me, in order to help me grow and learn and become more like Christ.

James 1:2-3 "2Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds, 3because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance."

This is your life. Are YOU who you want to be?

The Car

The Damage: $4600
The Pain: Bad

The Title

I tried to come up with a title, but since this is once again an update of what is happening, there really isn't much to describe it other than everyday life. I love reading other people's blogs and I know that my life has interesting moments, but at the end of the day, when I try and think of something to write, all I can think is, "It's all so normal." And I'm not a good enough writer to turn nothing into something. Hence my lack of posting lately.

That and I'm just plum tired all the dang time. With the first baby, I had to work full time, and I don't know how I did that, but at least I could come home and go to sleep for a little bit and I only had to worry about feeding myself and hubby if he was lucky. With this second baby though, boy golly is it different. I work part time from home in a "career job" and full time at home as a mom and wife. Needless to say, my full time job is suffering a little bit. Don't worry, Boo Bear isn't starving or anything, but hubby might be a little bit. I nap when Boo Bear naps, which does put some strain on my working hours as I usually get most of my work done while she naps. But I'm so dang tired!

Also with this second pregnancy I am noticing side effects that I didn't have with Boo Bear. Things like the, TMI, constipation and my mouth feeling dirty all the time. I am not by habit a very good brusher, sometimes forgetting to brush before bed, but lately I have been brushing all the time because it feels like bacteria ick is growing in my mouth at an alarming rate. My back is also killing me. I guess carrying around a 25 pound child doesn't help that. The doc said to cut back on carrying her around. At least she realizes that not picking her up at all is really not an option. It drives me crazy when doctors tell you to do things that just aren't possible. I am so blessed with my OB. She really is a good, people doctore and I would refer anyone to her.

In other fun news, we spent every night since Wednesday at the Church for a conference, learning about the One Anothers, how to treat those we come in contact with. As a baby Christian, I am constanstly convicted by what I hear at Church. Where as before I couldn't stand to go to Church, now I can't get enough of being around likeminded people and hearing God's Word.

With that said, I have to be thankful for all that we do have as my hubby had to take my car in today. Looks like it may be something transmission related which means something that will break our checking account or put us further into debt. But, alas, at least we have a car and at least we have the means to get it fixed.

Boo Bear is growing like a weed, both physically and intellectually. She has so many tricks that her father and I exploit, it really is kind of sad. She has gotten so that she will do them all in a row now if we ask her to do one. She will show us her muscles, which is a the flexing of her arms with an accompanying grunt. She will then do Serious Face, which involves looking down while frowning and rolling her eyes up in her head. And now her new one is Cookie Monster. Daddy asked her one day what Cookie Monster says while watching Sesame Street and she says in a gruff voice, argh, argh, argh, argh. It is too funny and I will try and capture them on film so that I can share the cuteness with you (You being my two readers that are left. I thank you for checking in).

Well, that's about all I can update right now. May your life be filled with normal things like mine, but humor, fun and laughter as well.