This book teaches...

I have read the book "Every Woman's Marriage" many times over. A friend asked me for advice recently that I could give them before they got married. I found myself thinking of things I learned from this book a lot. So I decided I would revisit again. See what things I have and have not accomplished that I wanted to accomplish the last time I read. It is amazing to me how every time I read it a new angle is enlightened to me. Even more inspiring is how I have found that almost all of the concepts apply to more then just my marriage, but to relationships in general.

After reading a little last night I thought I would share some of my opening thoughts. I would highly suggest that if any of this speaks to you...which if you are a women...I almost guarantee it does...that you go grab a copy of the book for yourself!

Last night I read through page 11.

I love Shannon's stories about her life. I can almost substitute in names and you pretty much have moments in my life! How quickly the thrill of a relationship changes. I can see a correlation both in marriage and general everyday friends. All relationships have a romantic stage in my mind. One definition of romance is to woo or seek favor with. There comes a time when that isn't the daily case though. No one can support those standards long term. Everyone wants to get to a place where they don't have to work to be loved anymore. They just want to be. But in marriages especially we think that is what it should be like.

Shannon shares "With each passing day, I slipped into a depression. In hindsight, I realize that my unhappiness wasn't about what my husband was or wasn't doing; rather, it was about how I felt about myself. I needed Greg to affirm me, to make me feel beautiful, and to convince me that I was desirable, because I didn't know how to feel any of these things on my own. But at the time, I felt sure he was to blame."

Wow. Isn't that so true. I've been sharing with people recently how I have found that manipulation is rot in every women's heart (see page 61 in book for more on this). How we try to get people to do what we want so we can be affirmed in some way. Sometimes I feel like an ever open abyss put on this earth to constant recieve affirmation but nothing to ever come of it. Ryan could tell me 1 million times a day that I am beautiful but if I don't think I am beautiful it will never stick on me. It is an evil trick I think. Satan tells us we deserve to be affirmed. So we seek everyone affirming us. It is good to feel good about yourself. No one can deny that. But what the enemy oh so kindly leaves out is that it's no ones job but my own to feel that way. More on this later though...

When we are in that place of disillusionment, which living in America where media is flooded into us like a typhoon is easy to happen, we always think there must be something better. I love the story Shannon shares about Helen. The women who thought the if onlys. "That things will surely get better right around the corner." If only they bought a house, had children, infants grew up, husband gets a promotion...yadda yadda...as time passed by. Helen finishes with "I've been waiting for twenty-seven years, and frankly, I wonder if we'll ever have the marriage I've always longed for."

Shannon finishes the section with this "....she'll more then likely discover that there's one denominator in all her realtionships-her. As long as that common denominator is unhappiness with herself, she'll be unhappy with any relational equation." In context she is talking about a women thinking that her best option might be to find another spouse. But honestly when I read this statement it just spoke to me on so many other levels.

The first time I read this book was about 2 1/2 years ago. When I read the first chaper it really awakened me to some real life facts. The fact that no one would ever affrim me enough. There is not one person on this earth who can honestly meet that need for me. Like I said I'm an abyss, I will just absorb and absorb each one with no real change. God is showing me more and more how women need to hear this.

If I could give every one of my friends a copy and make them read it I would. Want to know where I got my wisdom? Well Jesus had a big part in it. But this book is a great tool in expressing what the bible really says about us.

Here is in excerpt from what I'll be reading tonight:

"Let's face it. Nothing magical happens once we put those rings on our fingers...At some point we have to put on our "big-girl panties" and go through the work of resolving our own issues, remedying our own insecurities, and becoming happy with ourselves before we can truely be happy in marriage."

Dude. Pick up a copy of this book.

"Every Women's Marriage: Igniting the Joy and Passion You Both Desire" by Shannon and Greg Ethridge

Santa

I've been thinking a lot about what I want Holiday traditions to be like for the twins. There are a lot of cool things I want us to do as a family. Of course anyone who knows us knows that our kids will surely be taught the "real meaning of Christmas" by taking an annual trip to Hallmark. Hahah just kidding :) you know what I mean.

So I'm posing a question to all you out there especially those that might have an interesting take or idea on it all. Like Eric Matsko who told me they only put up a tree and all every other year.

What are your family traditions? Do you get pics with Santa? Do you bake cookies together? Do you go to a midnight mass? Do you have other blending ideas that incorporate some holiday cheer and speak the message of Christ at the same time?

Psalm 42:8

Sometimes when I wake up in the mornings I am singing. I know it might sound a little odd, but it is like my heart has been full force belting out all night. I thought I would share what was flowing last night:

I'm the man with all I've ever wanted
All the toys and playing games
I am the one who pours your coffee,
corner booth each Saturday
I am your daughter's favorite teacher
I'm the leader of the band
I sit behind you in the bleachers
I am every man

I'm the coach of every winning team
and still a loser in my mind
I am the soldier in the airport
facing giants one more time
I am the woman shamed and haunted
by the cry of unborn life
I'm every broken man,
nervous child, lonely wife

Is there hope for every man
A solid place where we can stand
In this dry and weary land
Is there hope for every man
Is there love that never dies
Is there peace in troubled times
Someone help me understand
Is there hope for every man

Seems there's just so many roads to travel,
it's hard to tell where they will lead
My life is scarred and my dreams unraveled
Now I'm scared to take a leap
If I could find someone to follow
who knows my pain and feels the weight
The uncertainty of my tomorrow,
the guilt and pain of yesterday

Is there hope for every man
A solid place where we can stand
In this dry and weary land
Is there hope for every man
Is there love that never dies
Is there peace in troubled times
Someone help me understand
Is there hope for every man

There is hope for every man
A solid place where we can stand
In this dry and weary land
There is hope for every man
There is love that never dies
There is peace in troubled times
Will we help them understand?
Jesus is hope for every man

Here is a video to accompany for those visuals out there: "Every Man"

I picked this video because I love the picture of the slummed down against a wall person and on the wall there is graffiti that says I was here and then below it another I was too. Jesus.

Psalm 42:8
The LORD will command His lovingkindness in the daytime; And His song will be with me in the night, A prayer to the God of my life.

Wives

God is teaching me to be a better wife. To soften my heart and really use my differences as a women to further His kingdom.

Scripture o' the day:

Taken from Proverbs 31:10-31

An excellent wife, who can find?
For her worth is far above jewels.
The heart of her husband trusts in her,
And he will have no lack of gain.
She does him good and not evil
All the days of her life.....

Strength and dignity are her clothing,
And she smiles at the future.
She opens her mouth in wisdom,
And the teaching of kindness is on her tongue.
She looks well to the ways of her household,
And does not eat the bread of idleness.
Her children rise up and bless her.....

Charm is deceitful and beauty is vain,
But a woman who fears the LORD, she shall be praised.

He is a person.

Some days I remember my husband is a person. I'm sure many of you can identify with this idea even though you might not be married.

The closer we get to a person the more we seem to take them for granted. Being married we are reminded so much of the covenant of two becoming one and how it is a bond never to be broken. Most days I walk that out with ease. I have grown accustom to Ryan always being there. To the point where it would be like waking up and not having my left arm should he not be there.

Every now and then I have a moment where I am reminded that he is a person. A person who chooses to love me. He chooses to love ME! I am blessed with an amazing husband, sure, I'll give you that, but even in his lowest of lows, in the times no one else sees, even if he wasn't as great as a husband as he has grown to become, I still am amazed that another person on this earth loves me. Daily we grasp for people to love us. None of us can honestly say we have never striven to be loved. Yet so rarely do we truly appreciate the people who already do.

Let me always remember when I wanted him to love me.

Jesus give me more reality checks. Let me see the people closest to me. Let me realize they have hearts beating in their chests and the ability to be anywhere in the world. Yet they choose to be with me. Amazing.

God wants me to snuggle Him

I know for a lot of you reading that you are thinking O.K. this post is not for me. Some of you might think to yourselves a warm Jesus hug right now is just what I need and know exactly what I am talking about. Others might be scared. Scared if they give God a moment to touch them they might fall apart. Like that song by Superchick:

"And she fears if she cries
That first tear
The tears will not stop
Raining down"

I know I was in that place for a long time. But now I have been living in a new one. One that I consider to be progress, but not necessarily change as it pertains from going from glory to glory with God. God's grace (the element that takes us from one level to another that we could not attain on our own - a dwelling place moment) is going to bring me some change soon though. He has placed it on my heart.

Recently our Pastor at ODC gave an awesome sermon on covenant. What really touched me was the part about not acting because we feel like it or understand it but because we have made covenant with God to do so. It is an awesome revelation to carry in your heart. I won't say I never knew it. Honestly I knew the idea, but I realized that I wasn't using it as a filter on my life. I needed to keep it as a perspective that I stay in. Covenant is great. It should be the foundation of how we walk out our lives.

But God. I love to start a sentence that way. But God. Anyways...But God has been speaking to me that I can't stop there. I can't make it. I will dry up like a sponge and die! If you have talked to me at all recently you will know that feeling dry has been a problem of mine. I have to act on God's word. Not on emotion or understanding. It has to be my basis. There will be times when I don't get it and I don't feel like it, but God (again) said to do it.

Praise God that He wants more. Though those times will come when I must act on my foundation, in general God wants more from me in our relationship. He wants me to feel Him. To feel His presence, His love, etc. He wants me to seek Him. To seek an understanding of Him continually. He wants me to snuggle Him and spend time with Him. There my thirst will be quenched. My spirit will be filled. So I can once again walk in overflow.

So go grab some hot cocoa, light the fireplace, grab your bible, a warm blanket, and put on some Jesus music. God wants to be wanted. Just as we want to be wanted.

I agree.

I agree. I am not sure many of you have even given me the "right" to say that since I did not vote. But because I somewhat disagree with you taking my "right" to not vote and giving it consequences all I will say is that I agree with many of you who are setting "christians" straight on how they respond to the election.

Whether I voted or not I as a christian still do not have the right to complain anyway. I have the right to pray, to support, and to love Barak Obama. Haha...I love Barak Obama. Saying that out loud is a good test of heart. That doesn't mean I will agree with him on everything. If I had taken the time to go to the DMV with the twins and switch my address I would not have voted for him. It's clear I do not agree with him on many issues already, but I can't remember anyone in authority over me who I agreed with 100%.

Just a scripture for your thoughts that God has been placing on my heart:

1 Peter 3:3-4

Your beauty should not come from outward adornment, such as braided hair and the wearing of gold jewelry and fine clothes. Instead, it should be that of your inner self, the unfading beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is of great worth in God's sight.


God show us what it means to have a gentle and quiet spirit. Teach me to let my spirit speak more then my voice or my clothing.

More to come.

Eating

So for awhile now I have struggled with finding the balance between knowing who I am in Christ and dieting/working out. Just to be honest so you understand where I am coming from I will tell you that I struggled with anorexia when I was in high school. I don't know if there is a medical diagnosis for it, but personally I would say I had it. I would go all day long without eating then eat a small dinner. It was an obsession to look the way I wanted as a dancer. Like many other women I struggle with comparison and wanting look a certain way. After coming to know that God finds me beautiful no matter what I look like, I began a journey of wondering how I balance that thought and the thought that I wanted to live a healthier lifestyle.

After marrying Ryan I gained a significant amount of weight. For a long time dieting or working out would become short stint things for me because I would easily become focused on the wrong things. I would feed myself lies that if I looked a certain way Ryan would love me more. I would tell myself if you can lose x amount then you will be pretty. I would become obsessed with losing weight for all the wrong reasons. I came to the realization that at least for a season I needed to not think about dieting and working out and instead focus on who I had always been and currently was in Christ.

Right before we moved here I started going to the gym and trying to eat healthier. I believe that without establishing who I was in Christ before this I would never be successful. Not long after moving here though, the whole struggle was put on the back burner for a season while I was pregnant with the twins. So now the twins are 5 months. I have been working out pretty regularly and now am starting to make a complete lifestyle change in how I eat. I want to be able to take the best care of my body. I want to be able to do everything that God asks of me. I think to be able to do that I need to be healthy.

Lets face it. As much as it hurts to say it I am obese. The important part in that statement to me is that my health is going to be limited and deteriorated by that fact. Being obese makes it hard for me to dance. It limits my ability to express what I want to express to God and to others. It also limits my ability to be a wife and a mother. I want to be able to show my children the truth about God's standards for health. I want to be a role model to them. Being the meal maker in our house I feel somewhat responsible for how Ryan eats. Though he is not overweight I know I can help him to have a healthier heart and to live a longer fuller life. I don't want my children to struggle with a mother whose life was limited because she lacked self control when she eats. I want to be able to fast and not think about whether I am losing weight. I know that sounds crazy. But fasting is a struggle for me, not because I want to eat, but more because I let the thought creep into my mind that it could be an opportunity to justify unhealthy dieting. I don't want that thought to be with me. I say that it has no place in my life. I know that even if I never get healthy that God could bless me with a miraculous healing of losing weight, but I don't think that is where He is taking me. I think He wants me to be a conqueror and an over-comer in this situation. He wants me to seek His strength to stay focused on that goal. I want to be in constant communication with God on how to be healthy and what His standard is for my health.

So pray for me. Pray that I stay focused. Pray that if I slip God will show me immediately that my focus has changed.

....God I pray that I can live a healthy life. I pray that you be the standard of my health. I pray that I never set up a standard that is not of you. I pray that you give me strength God. If you ask me to lay it all down God I will. Lord please protect me from the comments of others. Please do not let me take pride in what people say I look like. I want nothing to do with the flesh tie of another persons thoughts. Lord there is nothing for me in their thoughts of how I look whether that be them thinking I look good or look bad. Lord YOU be my standard. All I need is you...

All I need is you. All I need is you Lord, is you Lord. All I need is you...

Alli Rogers music makes me cry

So I was inspired by Alli Rogers to start blogging. I love her music. I have no clue why but it just touches the inner part of me that is a girl. A girl who cries at things that are happy and things that are sad. It made me start thinking about other ways that I am the typical girl. Like how I buy healthy cereal but in the end I eat my husband's Fruity Pebbles. The commercial on television with the little girl on it who is watching television and "absorbing" everything she sees is so true. We have to be so careful with what we daily "absorb" without even thinking about it. I was at the mall yesterday with a friend and we went past one of those kiosk people who if you make eye contact with will push you to buy something from them. When I think about it, I'm not sure I have met anyone who likes talking to those people. Someone who enjoys people trying to sell them something they don't really want. Yet I sit in front of this box daily that tries to sell me on something that not only I don't want, but something I detest. Something that I daily have to pray to be broken off of my life. Just my thoughts right now. I'll end with a video of my son giggling, because like every girl I think babies are cute.