Browsing Tag

love

40 Happy Thanks

Happy 40th Anniversary to my extraordinary husband, my sweetheart, my handsome man, my love who is compassionate giving strong intelligent witty quirky generous, my most dreamiest-prayer-answered man. The one I adore who loves God and family and friends with grace and humility and dignity.

1 Thank you for your love. This statement really sums up everything.  Your love has carried me, nourished me, shaped me, encouraged me, comforted me for 40 years. And every day you say it: “I love you.”

2 Thank you for your faith. You have a quiet, unshakable faith in our Lord. You love God and you follow Jesus.

3 Thank you for your wisdom to say, “Plan A is always love and prayer.”

4 Thank you for our sons. What joys, what blessings. And thank you for living by example. Whew, my heart. Infinity emojis.

5 Thank you for your affection. Those kisses! Those hugs! Swoon! And not just for me. For your children. Your grandchildren. Family!

6 Thank you for your belief in me. You never said, “You can’t be a mother. You can’t have a baby. You can’t have another baby” because of my limitations.

7 Thank you for your support.  Because when I wanted to stay at home with the children, you said “yes, you can do it.” Because when I started my business, you were my advocate and encourager.

8 Thank you for your forgiveness. Boy, I sure screw up a lot and it’s a relief that you forgive and we move on.

9 Thank you for lifting me up. Literally, when I’ve stumbled and face-planted. Spiritually, when I’ve doubted what’s next. Emotionally, when I’ve felt flattened. Always, you’re there to pick me up.

10 Thank you for being fun. Your humor. Your imagination. You are my man-kid.

11 Thank you for your brilliance. You are scary smart and I’m in awe that you know so much stuff.  You are the valedictorian of Household Bigger.

12 Thank you for your wit. Like when, just concerning the temperature of the house, I ask, “Are you hot?” Short pause. “Uh, that would be your call, wouldn’t it?” Short pause. Short chuckle.

13 Thank you for your compliments. You are quick to tell me I’m beautiful and sexy. That amazes me. I’ll put on lip gloss for you.

14 Thank you for compromising. I’m the extrovert; you’re the introvert. And yet, you’ll go with me to parties. It’s a gift to me.

15 Thank you for your respect of my individuality. See above. You let me be who God created me to be.

16 Thank you for listening. Because, mercy, I’m a talker. But never once did you say talk to the hand. And never did you say I told you so.

17 Thank you for caring. Oh my, especially during my awful morning sickness. And then there was that whole menopause thing. And now this whole getting old thing.

18 Thank you for (getting better at) communicating. Well, we have to have something to work on. Ha.

19 Thank you for your generosity. Not only do you listen and buy presents of things your family will like, you find little gifts for others, friends, co-workers, and even children of my friends. I love that you’re The Lego Man to many small people.

20 Thank you for your patience. Slowly, she turns. Step by step. Inch by inch. (Embarrassing homage!)

21 Thank you for your compassion. For considering others before yourself. Not being hyperbolic…

22 Thank you for your thoughtfulness. Your kindness. It’s there. For so many. <insert excessive punctuation>

23 Thank you for making ordinary moments into happy moments. Strolling the aisles of Target. Watching Fred Astaire films. Sharing a grilled cheese sandwich. Daily being.

24 Thank you for working things out. When we are mad and frustrated and annoyed with each other. Over big stuff. Over petty stuff. We work it out. Together.

25 Thank you for your quiet steadiness. Your guidance. My North Star.

26 Thank you for protecting me.  And I don’t just mean from spideys and all things crawly, but for protecting my heart.

27 Thank you for providing for your family. You always worked hard, and in jobs that were often challenging. But you went to work every day and rarely complained. I admire that.

28 Thank you for hot beverages. Michigan Cherry Coffee. Vanilla chai.

29 Thank you for facing problems with me. When there are events and circumstances and days that drive me to chocolate and Peeps and gluten and bacon, you held my hand and don’t let go.

30 Thank you for wiping away my tears. I am one leaky, emotional, sentimental, easily bruised, tender, mess of hormones. And you hand me tissues.

31 Thank you for accepting me just the way I am. No lie, I have issues. And you love the tattered package that is me.

32 Thank you for enjoying my company. We are all weird in some way.

33 Thank you for cheering for my teams. Well, at least the Ball State Cardinals and Indianapolis Colts. And all U.S. Olympic teams, especially curling. (And then there’s your teasing/tolerating/tormenting of my obsession with the Chicago Cubs.)

34 Thank you for smiling. And. Those. Blue. Eyes. You still melt my ice cream.

35 Thank you for going with the flow. Your mother’s advice.

36 Thank you for doing housework. It makes me the envy of my friends. High five.

37 Thank you for sanding all my rough edges. I give you a million points.

38 Thank you for your TLC, your attentiveness. Your sweetness to ask: “How can I help you?” “What do you need?”

39 Thank you that your heart is my home. Every place with you is a happy place. I love you so much my heart could explode into a bazillion pieces of joy and happiness.

40 Thank you for your true love/twue wuve. Because it’s not about how many days, months or years we’ve been together, it’s about how much we actually love each other every day.

What could I possibly give you to thank you for so many ways you’ve blessed me with your deep affection, your thoughtfulness, kindness, and praise? What could I possibly offer to thank you for all that you’ve done to brighten my life with your goodness and to make every day so much fun? There is nothing on earth I could give you that could ever be worth even part of all that you are, so what I will give you is all of the love in my heart.

This Christmas

 

May we be a kind person who makes a difference.

May we be patient with those in the hard times.

May we be quiet and thankful for all that we have.

May we be compelled to boundless gratitude.

May we be aware that God’s promise of strength has no expiration date.

May we comprehend that God extends grace greater than our hardships.

May we create space for acceptance, growth, and grace.

May the blessings we receive today be the blessings we need the most.

May our actions be of the love and acceptance we claim to stand for.

May we make every effort to do what leads to peace and encouragement.

May we let joy become a filter by which we view life.

May we choose to see the happy stuff.

May the key ingredient of our life be faith.

May we always always always speak our love.

What people need

 

What People Need . . .

Love. Forgiveness. Encouragement.

There’s so much sadness, so much sorrow. There’s so much controversy, so much contention.

In all the noise of news reports and journalism and everything social media, there are hard things. And so much rawness in all the words. And in so many ways we speak to and treat others.

What people need most to cover all this rawness is the softness of words of love and forgiveness and encouragement. How we speak, how we treat others – it matters. In all relationships.

In this softness, we become stronger.

That’s what people need most — words that make them stronger. We can overcome the noise, the loud. We can choose how we treat others; we can choose words that encourage, words that build up, and words that bring together.

Our words can either bring together or tear apart, and here in this space, and on this Facebook Page, I want to purpose my words for bringing together. For building up. Words that point the way to what people need:  Love. Forgiveness. Encouragement.

Let’s start thinking more about how we speak, how we treat people … in all our encounters, in all our relationships:

…forgiving others and moving forward

…showing kindness and respect to others

…accepting others just the way they are

…encouraging others and cheering for them

…doing something little (or big) for others every day

…letting love be our compass

 

So here are my soft strong words for April, my thoughts, the tweets, which were liked and an echo of those things that people need most…..

  • The strongest, healthiest relationships are made up of two forgivers.The strongest, healthiest relationships are made up of two forgivers.
  • Let’s tip the scale to being more positive, more encouraging, more loving.
  • Thinking good thoughts about someone isn’t enough. We need to say the encouraging words.
  • You will be amazed how much of a difference you can make by just smiling every time you talk to someone.
  • Choose encouragement, lifting others up, not putting them down.
  • Let’s offer friendships that are generous and forgiving and guilt-free.
  • Treat all the people you meet that there is something worthwhile in them.
  • Let’s allow God’s goodness to flow through us and nourish all who cross our paths. ‪
  • Love the hard people, at the hardest times, in the kindest ways.
  • The gift of pure love allows us to bless others and accept them without condition
  • Let our love for others be sincere and active, without hypocrisy.‪
  • Make intentional time to tell others specifically how they bless you.
  • Let’s be less judgmental and cultivate a sense of wonder at each person’s uniqueness. We’re all a wee bit crazy in our own way. 
  • There is powerful freedom in admitting our weakness because it allows others to love us as we truly are.
  • Make allowances for and be patient with each other, and forgive without punishing.
  • We can either harm by the selfishness of our silence or diminished praise, or we can heal by the selflessness of our encouraging words.
  • Today give others precisely what you may think they deserve least. Grace.
  • If you really fulfill this royal law: “Love your neighbor as yourself,” you’re doing well.
  • The only thing that counts is faith expressing itself through love.
  • Let our gratitude be awakened; let our love be quickened.‪
  • We all need to learn to communicate without blaming.

Above all, let’s keep loving one another earnestly, since love covers a multitude of sins. ‪

 

Pour out fear, pour in love

 

Pour out fear. Pour in love.

At the beginning of a new year, folks are all abuzz about their resolutions or some discuss their “word” for the year. Well, now we’re three months into 2016 and, although I didn’t make resolutions (too stressful! I like to make goals or plans instead), I have decided on a “word,” one that’s been floating in and out of my heart and mind nearly every day since January.

POUR

Pouring out. Pouring in.

Out and in of me. Out and in of others.

And pouring over. Like cleansing rain. Like anointing oil.

Pouring out of me: fear, doubt, pain, heartache, disappointment.

Pouring into me: love, mercy, courage, patience, hope, bravery, resiliency.

Then overflowing with all that good stuff, I pour out what’s been poured into me!

Love, gratitude, acceptance, forgiveness. God’s spirit!

Early twentieth-century Scottish evangelist and teacher, Oswald Chambers, best known for the devotional My Utmost for His Highest, wrote, “Are you willing to give and be poured out until you are used up and exhausted not seeking to be ministered to, but to minister?”

And the Bible reminds me: “More than that, we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.” (Romans 5:3-5)

God doesn’t simply splash a little love and joy and peace in my general direction. He pours into me all I need, until my arms are filled and my heart is ready to burst. He blesses me with happy day moments every day and infuses my life with an abundance of joy.

So this is what I’ll do:

Pour out that love, pour what’s poured into me. Put fear in its place.

As I tweeted this month: “Put fear in the back seat. It should look at the scenery and just be quiet. And never give it a map.”

Put fear in the back seat. It should look at the scenery and just be quiet. And never give it a map.

Then I’ll not seek to be ministered to, but to minister … as I do in one small way by sharing a Happy Day Moment …

So these are a handful of happy bits of wisdom (because I am old and can say that) that {I’m ministering to} and I’ve posted in the month of March 2016 on my Happy Day Moment Facebook Page

COMPASSION

Pursue love.

Any day can be shifted, to lift another, to make a difference.

Grace keeps reaching out, reaching for others, reaching straight across boundaries and walls and barriers.

A peaceful person is not one who’s always in a good place, but one who always has a good attitude in every place.

Each day contains moment after moment where we choose to follow love or fear. Choose love.

 

FORGIVENESS

We cannot serve God if we do not have a heart of forgiveness.

By letting go of unforgiveness, bitterness, and limiting beliefs, our hearts can be released into peace and new blessings.

Kindness and compassion not only require forgiveness, but also help us to do it.

Stop judging. Start accepting. Stop rejecting. Start embracing. Stop withholding. Start giving. 

Let’s work hard at living at peace with each other.

 

PERSEVERANCE

Pray and don’t give up.

You’re brave and brilliant and oh-so resilient…..hang in there!

Always in the midst of despair, or daily bumps, or life altering disasters, there is hope.

We can’t change yesterday, but we can do something about today. Don’t quit.

 

And then there’s this I posted that was liked/shared/commented on…………because, yeah, we need to be pouring out kindness…. 🙂

inspirationalquote of the day- (1)

Handful of happy October 2015

The easiest and the hardest thing to do every day is to live with gratitude, but it will transform our life if we can do it.

When life is hard, throws unexpected messes at us, nearly drowns us, pushes us down and down, when we struggle to breathe ~~~

How can we think about, articulate, or even believe in happy?

By understanding that every moment of every day in every life does not have to be happy.

Only ONE moment does. ONE glimpse. ONE second. ONE breath.

And choosing to find it. Choosing to hold onto it. Choosing to claim it to redeem any hard messy heartbreaking sorrowful day. It’s our choice. Being grateful. For life.

I know.

For nearly three years, there has been so much hard in my life, so much what-is-going-on!, and yet so much miraculously easy – because of this choice to live with gratitude. Transformative.

So each day I post a Happy Day Moment on my personal Facebook page, and I also post on my Twitter feed and my Happy Day Moment Facebook Page something I’ve been thinking about.

Something to encourage, uplift, inspire, energize— and perhaps transform – others. (And do the same for me!)

Here is the handful from my October posts that had the most likes, the most comments, the most shares. Seems that kindness and love are my themes for the month 🙂

  • Don’t harbor or memorize a list of all the things you think you’ve messed up. Forgive yourself and move forward. 
  • Be the one who is generous with kind words and who reminds others they are treasured and loved.
  • Don’t just love those who treat you right; that’s easy. But love those who don’t; that’s what Jesus says.
  • God is at work even when we can’t see it.
  • Never giving up; always persevering. Never surrendering; always believing.
  • Today believe for grace, love, joy, and miracles to surround you.
  • Let our hearts be ripe with kindness and helpfulness and understanding.
  • Because God so loves us, we ought to love each other.
  • Be kind because it’s who you are, not because others have to earn it.
  • There is power in a positive word, a kind gesture, a quiet gift that can change someone’s day.

Be kind. Be loving.