Archive for October 2013

“Love never ends.”

Last week I was in quite the mood. This week, I would really like to take a different tone. Not that I am not still angry over what happened, but because the last time I held onto and dwelled on some incident that happened there, I ended up with a physical demonic attack.

Be angry and do not sin; do not let the sun go down on your anger, and give no opportunity to the devil. (Ephesians 4:26-27, ESV)

So, since there isn’t anything I can really do (besides either blog about it, or go get in someone’s face), I “let go and let God.” Sometimes I have to do that multiple times a day. πŸ˜‰

I wrote about demons a couple of weeks ago because I don’t think (at least among the more conservative/fundamental churches), spiritual warfare is being taught in a way that prepares believers to fight. Spiritual warfare is not simply a battle of wills within your mind. The battle of wills is putting sin to death within you. But I digress, and I’ve already written that post.

I think something else that has been neglected in being fully taught is love. And therefore, we have a culture that largely has no idea what love is both inside and outside the church. We largely equate love with affection for another person or sexual attraction to another person or even pity or sympathy. Each of those can and do operate outside of actual love. Because love isn’t about what you get out of it.

Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. (1 Corinthians 13:4-7, ESV)

Love honors “for better or for worse.” It’s what can recognize the repentance of an adulterous spouse, forgiving and remaining. It is what stays with the alcoholic drug addict when almost everyone tells them to boot them to the curb. Even when they deserve to be booted to the curb. Love doesn’t care what your social class is. Love doesn’t care what color skin you have. Love doesn’t care what political party you belong to or even whether or not you belong to one. Love doesn’t provide a list of rules to earn the love because love knows everyone is created in the image of God and no one can ever be good enough to earn the grace that Jesus provides through his death, burial, and resurrection.

For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. For one will scarcely die for a righteous personβ€”though perhaps for a good person one would dare even to dieβ€”but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Since, therefore, we have now been justified by his blood, much more shall we be saved by him from the wrath of God. For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, now that we are reconciled, shall we be saved by his life. More than that, we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received reconciliation. (Romans 5:6-11, ESV)

Love doesn’t wish ill on others. Love doesn’t dance on graves. Love reaches out to the broken.

Let love be genuine. Abhor what is evil; hold fast to what is good. Love one another with brotherly affection. Outdo one another in showing honor. Do not be slothful in zeal, be fervent in spirit, serve the Lord. Rejoice in hope, be patient in tribulation, be constant in prayer. Contribute to the needs of the saints and seek to show hospitality.
Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse them. Rejoice with those who rejoice, weep with those who weep. Live in harmony with one another. Do not be haughty, but associate with the lowly. Never be wise in your own sight. Repay no one evil for evil, but give thought to do what is honorable in the sight of all. If possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all. Beloved, never avenge yourselves, but leave it to the wrath of God, for it is written, β€œVengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord.” To the contrary, β€œif your enemy is hungry, feed him; if he is thirsty, give him something to drink; for by so doing you will heap burning coals on his head.” Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good. (Romans 12:9-21, ESV)

When I started this post, I didn’t know how in the world I would write it. It just seemed so hard, probably because I am still learning how to truly love. Turns out, though, that the scriptures speak more than I ever could. And I fail so often on most of these. But I will wrap this up with one final appeal to the church. First, always remember that even we who are believers were once enemies of God, and were reconciled only because the Holy Spirit drew us and enlightened to us the once for all sacrifice that Jesus did for us enabling us with the faith to believe in him as Savior and make him the Lord of our lives. We have done nothing to make ourselves better than unbelievers nor one another. Jesus did it all, and He did it because he loves us.

In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. (1 John 4:10-11, ESV)

A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another. By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.” (John 13:34-35, ESV)

Maniacal Monday #21

Know how to start a Monday off right? Oversleep. Slept right through the alarm (or hit snooze in my sleep), and was awakened by the dogs barking 15 min after I should have been at work. Fun times.

I finally finished the VIRTUAL RIDE for breast cancer hosted by Run with Jess this weekend. 31 miles of during October, and a lot of butt pain. lol I did manage to take a picture while I was riding during my second ride (the 12.5 mile one):

photo 1

Less than 4 miles into and I was already in pain. And I’m pretty sure I was even rolling downhill when I snapped it. πŸ˜‰ I rode 11 miles on Saturday, and that was all I could do. That left me 4.1 miles to finish yesterday, and as soon as I sat down on that seat I knew that was going to be a long 4.1 miles with a sore butt. But, after about a mile, my butt didn’t hurt so bad. Probably because my legs started to hurt worse. haha After it was over, I had the hubby snap a shot of me on my bike with the medal, because who doesn’t love bling?

photo3-smaller

Now I have to start running again since I have a 5k coming up next month and a 12k in December.

I had to ask a question of Jamie this weekend. “Do you want to graduate on time, or do you want to do summer school or another year of school?” She’s 2 weeks behind, Chad is 4 weeks behind. Craziness. I’ve cut off internet for both. James said yesterday that they needed gas for their mopeds, and I told him I had been deliberately not getting more gas for them for the same reason they have no internet. And since he isn’t making them do their work which is the whole reason he isn’t working at a real job that actually pays, I have a fun-filled pending talk to have with him.

Anywho, Amber tore up my hand yesterday while we played. I didn’t realize the damage until I put on lotion and it burned us. I was very amused at KitKat’s ungraceful falling off of things she was sleeping on over the weekend.

Funday Friday #20

There are multiple reasons why I don’t blog about work, but there are just some things that need to be shared. This happened the other morning before I went to class. I have no idea what the conversation was about nor even what I say to prompt the following conversation, but I found it amusing. It is in reference to my “happy pills.”

J: Did you take your pill this morning?
Me: No, I started taking them in the evening instead.
J: Maybe you should think about switching back.

So the snark hasn’t just manifested itself in my blogging. lol And I want to add that I am loving class even with all the stupid user mistakes I made this morning. πŸ™‚

I finally got the kids scheduled for counseling. Chad can balk all he wants, but his is mandatory thanks to the fire alarm incident. Jamie should be happy now because she has actually asked for it. Repeatedly. This all kind of came up the other day in a discussion at work about insurance coverage when I complained about not being able to have the gold plan at the end of the year thanks to Obamacare. I made the statement that my really good mental health coverage might not be so good under silver. I was asked why I am so familiar with the mental health coverage. “Because we are the crazy family.” Fun times. πŸ˜‰

I have to get 15.1 cycling miles in this weekend to complete my October 50k. If I can get that in in one day, that would be great. But it’s been 2 weeks since I rode, so spreading that out over 2 days might be better. I guess we’ll see. I also need to mow the yard. Yeah, the hubby could do it, but I really like that alone time where I can’t hear anything but the mower motor. We brought all the plants inside a couple of days ago except for the really big ones. They might find a new home unless James brings them in.

Tiger needs to be fixed. Any volunteers to pay for that?

No relevance to anything, but…

Being counter-cultural

This may end up being a continuation of yesterday’s post though not in any specific manner. By that I mean I am not publicly elaborating on the incident. Or well, at least not until James and Lee talk to a couple of other folks and get to the bottom of what led up to Saturday’s incident. And to set the stage for where I am coming from on all this, let me give you some info on my background for those who don’t know. I grew up in very conservative Missionary Baptist churches who considered Southern Baptist too liberal, but not so strict as Independent Fundamental Baptists. My dad was a deacon, and both of my parents were very active in the local church with my dad generally also being active in the local association. Essentially, I fall under the category of “preacher’s kid.” I often say I’ve been a Baptist 12 years longer than I’ve been a believer even though I no longer belong to a Baptist church.

I walked away from the church when I was 19, and it took nearly 20 years for me to return. When I came back, everything changed. I wanted to read my bible. I wanted to study it. I wanted to pray, and have learned through the reading and studying and my less than eloquent prayer that praying isn’t about asking for what I want that I think will make me happy. I was the prodigal son for those 20 years away. But I was also still in the mindset I had grown up in which amounted to the prodigal’s older brother. And I fed that with talk radio and reading certain pastors and Christian writers. But I just couldn’t keep it down. It kept me hungry all the time because somehow I knew I wasn’t really growing, and was instead stressing on things that weren’t mine to stress on. This is also why I don’t blog about politics anymore. I was feeling too militant.

Now with that out of the way, maybe I can remember what I was going to write about. πŸ˜‰ Using “counter-cultural” is usually used by Christians to other Christians to live differently than the world because we should not look and/or sound like non-believers. We are to be salt and light among the world to point to world to Jesus. And so we have our own culture, but if we aren’t careful we make our own culture a little-g god of its own. We forget that our holiness comes from the finished work of Jesus Christ alone and start acting like we are able to behave good enough to be worthy of grace. Once we do that, then we ourselves become the judge and determine who is worthy to belong among us by imposing a “conservative” set of rules that are meant to show 1) that we ourselves are spiritually mature and 2) to impose a faux spiritual maturity on spiritual babies who will either learn how to pretend or will eventually go away because they are made to feel so uncomfortable by being unable to live up to those who have deemed themselves spiritually mature enough to be the judge.

This is how many churches end up bearing more of a resemblance to a country club than a gathering of followers of Jesus. Instead of reaching out and embracing the lost, we end up reaching out to fill our pews with people who either already look and act like us or who are willing to pretend in order to fit into the church culture. Instead of making disciples, we are making cliques. Then when someone dares to buck against the church culture we unbiblically run them off (often in secret or known only among our little gossip cliques), or when someone gets fed up and leaves on their own (whether because of the gossip and backbiting/slander or not), they are shunned and treated as enemies. And then we wonder why our churches are in decline and/or outright dying and why we aren’t growing. It really isn’t rocket science.

Now the works of the flesh are evident: sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these. I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God. But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law. (Galatians 5:19-23, ESV)

There is quite a contrast between the works of the flesh and the fruit of the Spirit. Country-clubbing your church isn’t fruit of the Spirit. Constantly telling the single mother that she is living in sin and then gossiping about her is not a fruit of the Spirit. Having an angry outburst at a former member who has been picking up food for your food bank every other Wednesday for the last 5 years even AFTER leaving your church because he dared to pick up a bag of food for his son is not displaying the fruit of the Spirit. This is why we need people in the church being counter culture to the church culture so that the church can be salt and light instead of just another one of the world’s exclusive clubs that treats the Word of God as merely a rulebook.

Full speed ahead

I had big plans and topics for this week. But things aren’t working out like I had planned. I’m in class for a couple of weeks so my mind is more occupied than normal with that. Last night was my scheduled counseling, so it was already late when I got home, and eating and going to bed were about all that happened. Tonight I plan to go to Al-Anon, but that’s going to depend upon how I feel when I get home. Plus, I have a basket full of laundry from Saturday that needs to be put away which also means I have some pants and tops that need to either be thrown back in the dryer or actually ironed.

Now, I have a post sitting in my drafts folder that kind of sums up why I don’t believe in coincidences. However, I’ve never really liked how it sounds because since it primarily involves me, I am afraid it seems self-aggrandizing. This weekend there was an incident with Lee that I won’t get into the details of because I have gossiped that enough even though I am still pretty pissed off about what happened to him. Anyway, James and I were informed of the incident that evening when we got to Lee & Rachel’s. Through the course of all of this, James and I convinced Lee & Rachel to come to church with us at Newhope church. We normally go to the afternoon service, and they were all for that. Since I played with the worship team that day, I was there for all 3 services, and therefore got to hear Pastor Nate’s sermon 3 times.

I’m going back up a little at this point because I just realized it is relevant. The incident occurred where we (both my husband and I and Lee & Rachel) used to go to church, and only involved one person there. It actually probably involves 2, but the other one is purely speculative based on information I shouldn’t know, but do because it indirectly impacted me. Anyway, I dumped part of my knowledge as I finally had the evidence of who was at the root of most of the trouble-making and connected a bunch of dots. And I was then told about another lady who also used to attend and why she finally quit going there. That crap pissed me all off too, because it’s so blatantly unbiblical, self-righteous, and downright mean and just plain evil.

So, there we all sat during the 3rd service, and Pastor Nate said, “If other churches don’t want you, we do.” That may not be the exact quote, but it’s the exact meaning. And that was the only time in all 3 services I heard him say that, which just happened to be the one service that Lee & Rachel came to…their first time there. And after what had happened the day before. Coincidence? I don’t think so.

Now, for the friends I have at the old church who read my blog, I am not making a sweeping indictment of the entire church. Almost everyone there embodies how a follower of Jesus Christ should walk and conduct themselves. Also, I want to state for the record that I love each and every member of that church. But there are some destructive actions that have been made for at least 4 years that will have to be addressed sooner or later if that church is ever going to grow. And that means that someone is going to have to stand up to the bullies in truth and love.

As obedient children, do not be conformed to the passions of your former ignorance, but as he who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct, since it is written, β€œYou shall be holy, for I am holy.” (1 Peter 1:14-16, ESV)

Insert clever title here

I had some small personal victory this past weekend. I also have some big old fail albeit with vindication. I was going to elaborate on the latter, but I have stewed on that too much, and it’s not my problem at all now that it has resulted in cutting all ties. As for the victory, well, that was one with my own self-esteem. Not that the war is over, just a couple of battles.

The hubby and I went to Lee & Rachel’s again Saturday night for dinner, and he decided before we left that I should take my guitar to play and sing around the fire. Really? How long have we been together and how did he not know what kind of terror that brings out in me? Ok, yeah, it’s not like they have never heard me play and sing. But I conceded and took it along with my old binder full of chords & lyrics & real sheet music. And much of what was in there was stuff I haven’t played since high school.

But that said, I played some Fleetwood Mac, Stevie Nicks, Eagles, Alan Jackson, Bangles (don’t judge me), and a couple more that I can’t remember. I know the whole Fleetwood Mac/Stevie Nicks is shocking for anyone who knows me. πŸ˜‰ You know, songs everyone knows but don’t know until you hear it. And I might have had way too much wine too.

I made my debut with the C.O.R.E. Worship team yesterday. 4 songs 4 times each, including sound check. Was a long day, but, oh man. It was so much fun. It is such a privilege to be able to play with a group of such talented folks. My mic went dead during the first service. That was fun. I mean, I was ok with that, but since part of my role was vocals, having a working mic is kind of important. πŸ˜‰ Pastor Nate preached, and brought it! When I got home last night, I was wiped out tired, and I crashed into bed about 8. I didn’t drag myself out of be until 6, and was dragging then. But it was all just physical. I haven’t felt mentally wiped out like I expected. I guess not having to deal with a bunch of drama or dealing with dreading a bunch of drama makes a difference.

Our neighbors had their art festival over the weekend. I can’t remember if they host it once or twice a year. Regardless, we had the overgrown white-trash yard this year. But whatever. One of these days the yard will get mowed and maybe even before winter. LOL!

I have several topics in mind for the rest of the week. Whether or not they move from mind to keyboard remains to be seen.

KitKat got really lovey over the weekend, and not even in a bid to get fed. Jamie said she will change back. I kind of look forward to that because she picks times I don’t want her on me to get on me. You know, like a cat. πŸ˜‰

Have a great week!

Funday Friday #19

5 for 5. You know, this has been a good week. All the same problems exist. I’ve been crazy busy, and maybe even a bit more than normal. But aside from an episode yesterday morning, I feel mentally better than I have for a while even though I am still pretty overwhelmed. I’m sure that 12.5 mile cycling trip Sunday had a lot to do with it. I mean, I rode to exhaustion which I am sure burned off a lot of the adrenalin my body thinks it needs. I need to keep that in mind and keep up with running and cycling.

Last night was rehearsal for Sunday. I was pretty stinking nervous heading over there. I’ve been to rehearsal before so I knew what to expect, but I hadn’t ever been an active part of it. And to be perfectly honest, I was terrified of majorly screwing up the songs. After all, it’s 5 songs I had never played, and 2 I hadn’t even heard. Funny enough, the song I was most familiar with is the one I have the most trouble with remembering the chords. I had a blast. We went through all the songs but one and then took a break before coming back and going through again like a dry run according to the service schedule. I chilled out a lot after the first 2 songs during the first run through. I think all the practice I’ve been doing this week has helped with my mental state as much as the bike ride last weekend. And this song is just a great pick-me-up:

Got a kind of busy weekend in store, but it’s going to mostly be fun stuff. I have to do some Algebra tutoring with Chad which I’ve been putting off, but it does really appeal to my inner math nerd. We are going to Lee & Rachel’s tomorrow evening, so that will be fun. It was such a good time last time I kept thinking “Why haven’t we done this sooner?” Church will be an all day event for me since I’m playing with the C.O.R.E Worship Team, but I am looking forward to it.

With the lack of tater tots and/or wine and/or hard cider and/or pumpkin spiced lattes over the past week, I’m loosing a few pounds again. Huh. Who knew? πŸ˜‰ Ok, I knew. Comfort eating and drinking is how I got fat to begin with. I am also more convinced that the pumpkin spice is not gluten free anymore. :wail: Not that my scalp or hands have recovered from my last glutening. But my digestion has. You’re welcome. #everybodypoops πŸ˜‰

Demons are real

I started writing this post back in March, and then abandoned it to the drafts hole. As I write this “intro,” I am still teetering on the fence on whether to finish it and post it.

I have spent a week debating whether or not to write about what happened to me last week. For various reasons. Good, bad, or whatever. πŸ˜‰ I did tell a couple of people about it, so I didn’t hide it and/or pretend it didn’t happen. I mean, not that I could pretend it didn’t happen because I had a rough few days over it.

I had a demonic encounter. And I brought it on myself.

26 Be angry and do not sin; do not let the sun go down on your anger, 27 and give no opportunity to the devil. (Ephesians 4:26-27, ESV)

I gave opportunity to the devil. And it was over something that didn’t directly involve me, and was something that I thought I had let go, but when I was struck, I knew immediately that 1) I had just “physically” been struck though I could not see what hit me, and 2) that I had dwelled too many times for too long on a particular event. That scared the crap out of me. Not the attack, but the fact that I invited it. Then I spent the next couple of days fighting off an onslaught of angry thoughts about various other events where I should have spoken up and pointed out how things that were said and/or done were both unbiblical and unloving. But I remained silent in fear of confrontation. Mainly. Because I have a strong fight or flight response to confrontation, and flight is default. Part of it is that I know deep down whatever pisses me off the most, is more often than not something that I struggle with. Also, I have been known to act/speak without thinking through the whole situation and ended up at least as wrong as whatever I got hacked off about.

But anyway, as I came out of this encounter, I faced several things about myself that were exposed because of it.

    Self-righteous arrogance pisses me off because I am so self-righteous and arrogant.

    Gossip and backbiting piss me off because I have done and find that I still do it myself so often.

    Controlling busybodies piss me off because I am such a control freak.

    Dismissive know-it-alls piss me off because I have long been a dismissive know-it-all.

    Elitists piss me off because I am one too.

So as I envisioned my anger as righteous anger such as Jesus had when he drove the money changers out of the temple, it seems as though I have a lot more in common with the money changers. I love to be right. And I love to argue, except that I hate to argue because I suck at it. I realize the complete contradiction that statement is.

All that said, and everything offset in the blockquote is from March, this hasn’t been an isolated incident. That was just the first one that happened where I recognized what was happening. I had suspicions that there was demonic activity going on around me, and prayed for discernment. I still continue to pray for ongoing discernment to know the truth about my own ongoing struggles to know which are internal and which are external. In other words, what is coming from the old me, and what is demonic influence/oppression.

Now at this point, I still haven’t seen a demon while awake/conscious that I am completely sure was a demon. I did see something run through the living room earlier this year that I thought at first was KitKat until I looked again and couldn’t find her in the living room (and she can’t move silently that fast anyway), and then asked Jamie if KitKat was in her (locked) room. Which she was. So it wasn’t KitKat. Too small and dark to be Gizmo. So I erred on the side of caution and rebuked it.

I have had dreams (nightmares) over the years where there was a presence trying to get me that I could feel, but never see. These dreams are always different from the nightmares of murderers, rapes, nuclear detonation, snakes, spiders, car wrecks, falling, tornados, etc. In the last couple of years, I had one of the “presence” dreams only I saw it coming at me, and knew exactly what it was waking up as I cried out to Jesus. I have since heard people describe demons they have seen, and it was exactly what was in my dream.

Why am I sharing this? I think there are a lot of Christians who are completely ignorant as to what spiritual warfare is about because they don’t truly believe demonic activity can have any contact with them. That said, I do not believe that a believer in Christ, sealed with the Holy Spirit can be possessed by demons. But there is no scriptural basis for the teaching and belief that demons can’t do anything to you once you are saved. In fact, I would say the Bible teaches just the opposite. They can touch us and they can afflict us and they will do it because the enemy “comes only to steal and kill and destroy.” He already has the lost, and he has already lost. But what better way to keep unbelievers in darkness than to damage the Light because as believers we are the light of Jesus here on earth.

So don’t believe you can’t be touched or influenced because you are still at war, and the enemy is real.

Ephesians 6:11-18 English Standard Version (ESV)

11 Put on the whole armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the schemes of the devil. 12 For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places. 13 Therefore take up the whole armor of God, that you may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand firm. 14 Stand therefore, having fastened on the belt of truth, and having put on the breastplate of righteousness, 15 and, as shoes for your feet, having put on the readiness given by the gospel of peace. 16 In all circumstances take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming darts of the evil one; 17 and take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God, 18 praying at all times in the Spirit, with all prayer and supplication. To that end keep alert with all perseverance, making supplication for all the saints,

Battling “hunger”

I’m sticking to the schedule again. 3 days in a row! 😯

Molly blames Petra for turning me into a health food nut (for lack of a better term), but really, Dr. Garlick takes the bulk of the blame. Petra just reinforced what he has been telling me for years. Not that I trust her over an M.D., but I see and talk to her a lot more than Dr. Garlick. I don’t consistently heed her advice either. But she is pretty consistently right which is why when she looks me in the eye and tells me “You need to stop _____,” I tend to do it. Especially when she points out the glaring why. But I digress.

Anywho, I mentioned in a post a couple of days (or weeks) ago that my lax eating led to my constant “hunger.” I quote hunger because I am by no means really hungry. After reading Eat to Live and making an effort to eat that way (which was why I twice attempted to eat vegan), I learned the difference between how my body tells me I’m really hungry and when my body just wants to eat something. When I eat food that contains no msg or any artificial flavoring, I don’t have a problem with the stomach growling food craving. The craving is almost always for bread/pasta, cheese, or sugar. When I eat foods that haven’t been artificially flavored, I don’t feel the need to eat as much, and don’t get the overwhelming cravings for high-carb, low-nutrition comfort food.

Yeah, so above where I digressed, now I will get back to where I started to prematurely go. Petra called me out for comfort eating and drinking. Starting with “You need to stop drinking.” She didn’t say it all harsh, but I had been saying it harshly to myself. And she’s right. I was seeking comfort in alcohol and food instead of Jesus just like she said. I think it may go deeper than that, and that I have elevated comfort itself (or my ideal of it) as a god. This is why I have to abandon my old coping mechanisms because all they ever did was mask and deny the real problem(s) which in turn never got addressed.

All this said, I am turning back to healthier eating by eliminating the artificial flavorings and colors. And definitely the MSG. I know I need to eliminate the artificial preservatives as well, but while not eliminating totally, I am keeping those minimal. And no more Pumpkin Spice Lattes from Starbucks. :sigh:

“You got big dreams?”

I’ll start off actually blogging according to my weekly topic schedule. That said, I think I am just going to go back to the whole writing about what I feel like writing about whenever. Or not writing when I can’t come up with anything. Anywho…

I really got sick of running. Though, I don’t think I got so much sick of running and I find myself not near as motivated to run without Karyn or Molly “forcing” me out for a run. That’s not to say that I have stopped running. It’s just an explanation as to why I haven’t run in about 4 weeks. It has emotionally taken a toll on me too. I guess I really didn’t understand just how much better I feel after a run. I say that as I remember Dr. Garlick telling me to keep running in order to burn off that fight or flight reaction my body is trying to do over the life stress. I can’t change what is going on around me, and while I am learning (or unlearning/relearning) how to deal/respond to things out of my control, I need an outlet. An outlet that doesn’t involve me having a pity party playing the victim to have people feel sorry for me as this post is starting to turn. πŸ˜‰

So that’s why I bought a new bicycle. Unlike running, I have always loved cycling. I signed up for Jess’ October virtual race VIRTUAL RIDE for breast cancer which is a 50k ride. I haven’t really done any “serious” cycling since I was in my late teens, though not a lot of that was really serious. See, when I was in 2nd or 3rd grade, I received a permanent grounding from riding bikes because I wrecked one too many times trying to pop wheelies. My dad was a bit overprotective when it came to me getting hurt. Of course, it only managed to keep me off of my bike as I had plenty of cousins who would let me ride theirs. But when I was 18, even though I was still in high school and still living under my parents’ roof, a lot of rules expired. I got my ears pierced and I bought a Huffy 10-speed from Walmart. For the rest of my senior year, I rode that bike to school. Uphill both ways. πŸ˜‰ It took several weeks before I was able to ride up that hill on St Vincent Street from Harding Street to the house. 5 blocks of hill. Only 2 blocks of hill from our house toward school, and that side of the hill took a week to conquer.

But then I started biking all over town. Deadria went with me once and swore never to ride with me again. LOL! But her younger brother Leroy would, and so would my cousin Steve from down the street. Except Steve couldn’t ride all over town, I don’t think. Or didn’t want to. That was over 25 years ago. Anyway, I also rode quite a bit around Conway for a while in college. Gradually, I stopped riding and instead drove everywhere because after that first year of college, I took summer classes AND worked part time. There was just no time for biking. There isn’t much time now, but I want to make time. Because I love it. And eventually my butt won’t hurt from the seat when I ride. πŸ˜‰

Now on to a slight subject change. I got a couple of emails yesterday from the worship leader one adding me to the planning site, and the other adding me to the worship schedule…for this Sunday. I might have panicked a little because I thought, “What if it’s songs I don’t know?” Looked at the 5 songs, and the panic was a little justified. Recognized 1 title and that is a song that I know is new. 5 songs that I don’t know, and I am scheduled both for guitar and vocals. But I downloaded the chord charts and lyrics and actually listened to the songs, and 3 of the songs were familiar. One of the 3 was very familiar. I relaxed some, but not entirely. Last night I actually sat down with my guitar to play along, and calmed down a lot. They aren’t hard to play overall. I only really have to concentrate hard on memorizing the chords. I don’t expect to be singing lead on any of them, and the harmony vocals don’t seem hard to learn. Also, I won’t be the only female vocalist. I’m still nervous, and it really is kind of silly since I will be up there with a complete band, and there were a few times at New Life Praise where I had to lead completely solo, just me and my guitar. I think maybe that is why I’m nervous. Anyway, I think I will be ready for rehearsal Thursday night.

And for all the friends who encouraged me to audition…

Yes, I have watched that movie way too many times. I was a hard core fan of the cartoon when I was little. Don’t judge me. πŸ˜‰