Thanksgiving

Every year Thanksgiving comes and goes so fast that I feel like I don't take enough time to just sit and reflect on all that I am truly thankful for. For a person who sits around a LOT, it's a waste not to focus at least some of that time on all the positive things in life that I have been truly blessed with. I don't expect anyone to read this rambly post, but it's a good chance for me to list some of those incredible things...

-First and foremost, I am so grateful that God gave up his Son to die for me so that I can live. I know I don't deserve it, but I guess that's the beauty of grace. I know I'm not always a "great Christian" (I hate that phrase..), but I am so grateful that God loves me as I am and that I am able to have a relationship with Him. I can't imagine trying to get through life without the Holy Spirit's direction and the confidence I get from my relationship with Jesus.

-Secondly, I am thankful beyond words for my family, specifically my parents. I knew from an early age that I was loved, valued, and beautiful. They allowed me to choose my own path and supported and encouraged me every step of the way. My parents taught me how to find joy in life and the importance of loving and respecting others. I hope and pray that someday I can give my children even half of what my parents have given me.

-I also have an incredible group of friends, for whom I am eternally grateful. It is so rare to have the kind of support, love, and friendship that I have in my life. My friends are my world. As we have grown older, I love watching and supporting my friends doing the things that God has called them to do, and I am grateful for the support that they give me as I follow my passions as well. I could go on about my friends for pages, but that might be another blog at another time...

-Bev is a fairly new addition to my life, and I can't imagine a future without him in it. I've never been in love before, and I hate to admit it, but I'm not exactly perfect at it. I am so grateful that God has brought him into my life, and I know that he is the man I am going to spend the rest of my life with. Bev has been so incredibly patient with me, loving and affirming me every step of the way, even when I didn't deserve his kindness. His genuine, compassionate heart and goofy, easy-going personality is exactly what I've been looking for in a soulmate, without me even knowing it. Being single has not always been easy- and I know that relationships aren't always easy either- but God is faithful and good and I am so grateful!

-I'm eternally grateful to MOKA for all the lessons I have learned in the past 3 years. Actually, this is more of a shout out to God again, since I remember a time a few years ago when I had no idea what I was supposed to do in life. What a terrible feeling- not having a passion and feeling a bit purposeless. I stumbled into a job at MOKA, and it didn't take me long to discover my true passion in life. People. I have been blessed to meet such incredible people through my work at MOKA and learn so many valuable lessons (another blog...), and I am so grateful to have a passion, an interest, a purpose. I know 'people' is kind of vague, but it has opened up so many doors and brought so much joy into my life that I can't begin to describe it. I won't be at MOKA that much longer, but the people I have met and the things I have learned will go with me forever. God brought MOKA to me at just the right time in life, and I'm so glad.

-I'm also very grateful for the Ganderson. Megs and I have built a home here, and I love it. We have two snuggly kitties who bring joy every day. Megs is a true friend and an incredible person, and I've learned a lot about communication and friendship through this experience. I know I won't be here forever, but I consider it home and so blessed that this all worked out so well.
I'm also thankful for financial security in such a crappy economy. Obviously, this is all changing very soon with my upcoming internship, but I have faith in God that this part of my life will continue to work out, just like it always has.
I'm thankful for opportunities. Travel. Grad school. Coaching. I've been blessed with so many opportunities, and I know that not everyone gets to experience what I have. God has been good to me, and I want to make sure I am not only thankful but that I at least attempt to pay some of that back.

Tomorrow I leave for West Virginia with Bev. Lots of time to relax, play games, eat, and do nothing, and I plan to force Bev and me to reflect on the real reason for Thanksgiving. "Thanks be to God for his indescribable gift!" (2Cor9:15)

grateful? for change

My roommate has this sweet new blog, where she's reflecting every day on something that she's thankful for. Now, I'm a terrible blogger, but I really enjoy reading hers and it's helped me lately to focus on being gratefulM. Pretty soon I'm going to be going through a pretty big life change. I will be leaving MOKA, where I have worked for 3 years and have absolutely LOVED... and I will be starting an internship in order to complete my master's degree in counseling. The past several weeks have been really hard for me, knowing that I have to leave a company that has given me so much, and so many people that I admire and adore, and move on to something new, and scary, with people I don't know and responsibilities that I don't know about yet. Oh yeah, plus the fact that it's an unpaid internship. That's right... no income... for at least 4 months. (Although I'm actually not worried about that part).

Anyway, yesterday I had another interview at Wegdwood and finalized my placement for spring. My anxiety level instantly went down. I've never been very good at change (as many of my friends and family can attest to...let alone changing my life when everything is going really well), but it certainly helps me to know where I'm going. I have a plan now. Yes, I'm still leaving, but now I know where I'm going. And it WILL be good. I am so grateful that the Lord has provided a direction for me, and I am learning to trust Him and know that it WILL be good. I'm also grateful that God led me to MOKA in the first place, because wow, what an incredible place to be. I'm also grateful for the people who have stuck by me the past couple weeks when I've been adjusting to the idea of change- DeeAnn, my supervisor, who has been more excited for me than I've even been, despite all the work that she will have to do because of my leaving, Megs, my awesome roommate, who I can come home to and just be myself, who will laugh at me when I spill my cranvod and mope around excessively, Bev, who has become both my quiet strength as well as my vocal encourager, and my parents, who have always been my safety zone when I start to get scared.

Taking this new gratitude approach to change, I can honestly say that today I am excited for my future. Change can be good, and God has always gotten me through it before. And as much as I have loved the past 3 years of my life at MOKA, I bet it will only get bigger and better from here!!

Plus I've got 2 kitties on my lap... how much better can life get??

My mission in life

After a good conversation with great friends tonight, I was reminded of something. My mission in life. Okay, who's to say we don't all have like 10 missions in life, but I know for sure that one of mine has to do with body image. I've always felt strongly about this- the devil tells people (especially women) that we are not beautiful enough, and it becomes consuming to way too many people. At first I thought it was society, and the way that media and images portray "beautiful" people, and to some extent, I still think that's true. But I also think it's straight from the devil- because I know of a few people in particular that no one in the world would ever think was not completely physically attractive, and yet those people think they are ugly, fat, and it causes them to not even want to eat food.

This makes me sick. The difference between me now and me back in college is that now I actually understand these people. I am one of these people. I struggle every day with what I look like. This happens no matter if I everybody around me tells me I'm beautiful or if I don't see anyone all day. This never used to happen to me, so I never used to understand it, but now I have been sucked in, just like so many other incredibly beautiful women, and my thoughts are constantly focused on appearance (exercise, eating, comparing, etc). It's incredibly disturbing.

Personally, this is something I am working on. Since I've never experienced this awfulness until a couple years ago, it has been a huge life change for me and has impacted me in bigger ways than I will take the time to share in this dumb post. However, I've been recently reminded how awful this is and am making steps to hopefully change myself in this way- through prayer (a HUGE piece of it), as well as making some healthier life choices regarding food and having some accountability to that. I'm not gonna lie- it is helpful when there are people in my life to tell me I am beautiful, no matter my size or shape.

However, outside of myself, I'm still unsure of how to fix this awful phenomenon that is taking over our world. But it is a personal mission of mine, and I am committed to fixing it, somehow. I've decided that I plan to live to about 95 years of age, so that means I have about 68 years to do something. And if that means even making one of my incredibly beautiful friends believe, if even for a minute, that they really are incredibly beautiful, then that will be worthwhile. But it would be nice to change the whole world. And what a stupid devil- he's gonna lose eventually anyway! Just stop trying.

That's it for now. Be on the look out for me to crusade around the world with my "You are beautiful" campaign. Just as soon as I figure out how to do that...

Adventures in Lawnmowing

Very rarely do I admit that a machine is smarter than a human. Unfortunately, I am sad to report that this was true for me this past weekend. The lovely machine below (named the Dominator due to recent events) outsmarted me on more than one occasion.

It all started about 2 weeks ago, when I noticed that our lawn at the Ganderson was beginning to look a bit like the Jungle Book...

Now, I don't do a whole lot of mowing. The one time I remember mowing the lawn at my parents house, I made the lines so crooked that my Dad told me I never had to do it again. I haven't done much here yet either. To be honest, Megan does about 90% of the yard work, but I thought, "hey, it's only fair that I pitch in- I'll mow the lawn!"

I kept waiting for the perfect time. I'm a busy girl, so there is little free time for me to mow the lawn. I plotted out a couple different days that I had enough time at home to mow- unfortunately, those days were rainy. Now I'm no expert, but I know mowing wet grass is not a great idea.

This happened for about 2 weeks. Then this Friday, I left work early and came home to relax. It had been quite rainy all week, but about 3:00 the sun came out so I thought I'd give it a shot! I was so excited- I love time at home to be productive. And seriously, we were quickly becoming the trashy house in the neighborhood that everybody is embarrassed about when they walk by.

So I pull out the Dominator. I start mowing, things are good! However, a couple rows into the backyard, it dies. Okay, I think, I've seen Bev put gas in here before, that's probably what it needs. So I get out the gas tank, and pour some in. I try to start it back up again, and it won't start. I get down close to the mower to examine, and I quickly realize that I actually poured gas into the oil tank. Not good. I run inside to do some Google work- basically, I learn that gas in the oil tank is indeed NOT a good thing, but I could remedy that by dumping the mower over and pouring the gas/oil into a pan.

So I go back outside, and dump it all out. A little bit scary, considering I really don't want gas and oil to be all over the backyard. Then I refill the oil and the gas, things should be good. I manage to get it going again, success!! However, a couple rows later, it dies again. Now the cord won't even pull, it's basically stuck. After a few minutes of yanking (and hurting my shoulder of course), I decide to call my Dad, the guru of all things home-ownery.

Dale reports that the mower is probably overheated (it was 90 degrees), so that makes sense. I give it a little time, sit on my deck, read a book, etc, then I decide to try again. With a little finaggling, I get the backyard done! Success! This whole process (for the backyard only) took about an hour. I realize that's it's late, and my ride is coming to pick me up, so I save the front yard for a different time.

So today I got home and decided to conquer the front yard. This is exciting! Looking forward to getting rid of the jungle, so I get started. Shortly after my first row, the mower dies again. Now, I know the oil and the gas tanks are full, so I don't give up. Persistence is key. It starts a few more times, and I get a couple more rows done, but it keeps dying. Finally I figure out that maybe the grass is TOO long, so I adjust the blade so that it doesn't cut so closely. This seems to work, and I get the front yard done. Unfortunately, because the blade was so high, the grass didn't get cut as short as I would like, and it probably will need to be mowed again within the next 2 days. Yeah right.

The Dominator really made me work this time, but in the end, I did conquer the lawns and we are no longer the white trash dumpy house on the block. Victory is mine!!! Two important lessons I learned from this month-long process of mowing-

1. Double check which tank you are pouring gas or oil into. They're not exactly supposed to mix- bad for the environment and all that.

2. Do NOT wait so long that you have to actually mow twice to even get the grass down to a respectable level. If you cut the grass more often, it's actually much less work than if you let it grow and grown and then decide to chop it all at once. Yikes.

Unfortunately, there are no after pictures of the Ganderson lawn. Next time maybe. If there is a next time...

Not enough TIME

Am I the only person that feels guilty when I have a morning to myself? I've been looking forward to this weekend for weeks, mostly because it's one of the only weekends this whole summer that I didn't have anything planned (a trip, the cottage, family in town, etc). The problem is, it didn't stay un-scheduled for long. Take today for instance. I started out with the whole day free, to do whatever I felt like. Now it's going on noon, and pretty soon Jen and Jules are coming over, then later tonight we're all going out to dinner downtown with Laura and the gang. Don't get me wrong, I really want to see my friends, I've missed them desperately for about the past month. But I also had about 3 or 4 other possible activities for the day that I had to turn down, let alone if it was sunny out I would really want to be outside. I hate saying no to people, but I also really need to have time for myself.

I'm just struggling today with the concept of time. Mostly that there never seems to be enough of it. On top of working full-time, going to grad school (which is not only going to class but all the homework on top of that), and coaching a team, I also work out every day, have incredible friends (who all have similar busy schedules at least), and a boyfriend who I love to spend time with (although I'm not sure he believes that sometimes). Not to mention my family, who I also love to be around. I love all of these things, and that's why I feel guilty so often. I WANT to hang out with Bev more often, I WANT to have one-on-one time with my friends, I WANT to be able to go home and just hang out in Jenison for the day like I used to. I just don't feel like I'm ever giving enough of my time to any one thing. There's also more I'd like to do (like volunteer, complete extra projects around the house, etc), but I can't even begin to think about adding those things to the schedule.

I know it sounds like I'm having a pity party. I know I'm not the only busy person in the world. I just feel guilty sometimes because I am neglecting people that care about me, or really great things that I would love to do. But bless my Mom's heart- she gave me the best advice this morning- "sometimes you just have to have some time for yourself, and you shouldn't feel bad about that." Thank you Mom, you always seem to make me feel better. Now I'm going to go read my book, because gosh darn it- I can!!

Today's Emotional Disaster

Well, I sure was a mess today. I won't go into details (considering my emotional stability is still a little shaky), but I do want to document this day so I remember how much better I feel now.



This morning at church we sang about grace. I cried until I was puffy, which didn't stop much as the day went on. Basically, I have not really liked myself very much lately. I haven't liked the way I look, the way I feel, some decisions I have made, and just the person that I have been. My heart is not in line with Jesus right now, and that hit me pretty hard this morning. I am so grateful that God shows me grace- no matter how far I fall away from Him, He loves me anyway. I am committed to getting my heart back in shape- it's a crappy feeling not liking yourself. I want to be a role model for girls I coach, I'm going to be a therapist- I guess it's only fair that I go through some junk myself so that I know what it takes to struggle and get through it.



Then I went to Bev's. I made a mistake and was hoping he would be able to show me grace. I certainly didn't deserve it, but I guess that's just the thing with grace. Being the poor communicator that I am, it was difficult to talk through my feelings and share with him what was heavy on my heart. When I was done, Bev proved to me what an incredible man he is. I've never dated someone who is so completely accepting of me, all my strengths as well as all my faults. I've never felt this safe, accepted, special, and loved before, at least not from a man. When he offered to pray with me, I lost it again.



It's interesting to me that about the time I start dating a man who is completely crazy about me, I begin to lose my own sense of self-esteem and security. That seems a bit backwards, and I'm tired of it. I'm sick of myself, and I don't want to feel that way. I'm committed to putting God first in my life, because let's be honest- I can't be a good girlfriend, a good friend, or a good person in general without first loving God.



I know this is probably a bummer of a post, but I told myself I would write what's in my head. My heart has been very heavy lately. Tonight it feels light again. In fact, being home with the kitties and a Golden Girls marathon makes me feel pretty dang good. Kinda wish my roommate was home.... but I'll survive. I'm pretty much never home when she is, so it's only fair. Good night all!

"But he said to me, "My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness." Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ's power may rest on me." (2Cor12:9)

Fresh Start

I have decided to start over in the blog world.

Reading through all of my past blog posts, I've discovered that I am not exactly a riveting writer. Unfortunately, the way I write is similar to the way I think, which can be summed up in one word: random.

I blame my random thoughts and words on the fact that I am a very simple girl. No, not simple meaning "slow", although I am certainly not the quickest in some areas. I mean simple as in when I experience something, whether good, bad, or neutral, I tend to experience it and then store it away in my brain somewhere so I can move on to the next moment. This is helpful in regards to not getting extremely emotional (at least not very often) or dwelling on anything for extended periods of time, but not helpful when there are people in my life who are very interested in what is going on in my life and in my head, and yet by the time they ask me, I have already dealt with it, moved on, and want to take a nap or eat some food. It has never been natural for me to talk about myself. Whether that means what happened during my day, what I'm thinking about, things I'm struggling with, or basically anything, it just doesn't come out naturally, for whatever reason.

However, this significant flaw in my otherwise flawless personality (haha I am funny) does not mean that I have nothing to say. In fact, I probably have plenty to say if I actually allow myself to think about it. So this Blog-a-Log will be my conscious effort to put some of the randomness of my brain into actual grown-up person dialogue. Okay, let's be honest, maybe not so grown-up, since the topics I am most comfortable discussing include bowel movements, goofy work stories, and cute things my kittens just did, but I will agree to post consistently nonetheless.

Now since I am technically paying lots of money to sit here in this grad class, I should probably begin paying attention, which means I will stop rambling for now. But before I go, I must make a shout out to the 2 folks that I get most of randomness from....

(Yes, those are guitars on my glasses. I am indeed a rock star. Just call me Rock n' Balls Ganderson)