Ant Beds Don’t Make Themselves

If you want something, sitting around wishing for it, lamenting or complaining about how it’s not working out will keep you in that spot forever.

Make up for your lack of experience or ability with hard work and determination. You don’t see the ants laid out complaining or homeless because the humans and dogs can move dirt faster. Nope! They’re lined up by the thousands with a single spec just getting it done because they adjusted their plan to their resources. Apply this principle to every facet of your life and be pleasantly surprised with the results!

“You lazy fool, look at an ant. Watch it closely; let it teach you a thing or two. Nobody has to tell it what to do. All summer it stores up food; at harvest it stockpiles provisions. So how long are you going to laze around doing nothing? How long before you get out of bed? A nap here, a nap there, a day off here, a day off there, sit back, take it easy—do you know what comes next? Just this: You can look forward to a dirt-poor life, poverty your permanent houseguest!” Proverbs 6:10-9 MSG (haha that’ll preach)

All Pretty Things Need Work

“If you’ve got a pretty house & a pretty yard, somebody’s done work in it,” my grandmother, Betty Creel White. And when you stop taking care of it, weeds start to grow and the shutters fall off.

It’s not surprising that the same thing happens in our relationships when we quit working on them. Don’t ever think you’re too good to try or that your efforts should be motivated by how you feel.

“So let’s not get tired of doing what is good. At just the right time we will reap a harvest of blessing if we don’t give up.” Galatians 6:9 NLT

2013 memory reshared.

BJ & Alex, 11.10.21

Highest & Best Use

A legacy to me isn’t money. It’s when the three areas of community, talents, and values intersect to create an environment where we’re maximizing our best potential.

In real estate, it’s called highest and best use.

“the reasonably probable and legal use of vacant land or improved property, which is physically possible, appropriately supported, financially feasible, and that results in the highest value.”

It’s safe to assume we all want the highest value possible for our own lives. So knowing the ways we can get the most from the time God gives us to realize it makes a big difference in how, where, and with whom we spend it. And that information is equally as important as the desire to do it.

…prevent anyone from dying with the difference only they can make still inside them.

Legacy isn’t what you leave behind. It’s the difference you’re making today.

Scott Perry, Creative on Purpose

Even Baby Birds Learn to Fly

It’s an odd moment the minute you accept the child you raised from a helpless baby is spreading their wings to fly away. But if all mama birds kept their babies in the nest, there’d be no more birds.

The best way to love an adult child is to speak positivity into them, encourage them to chase their dreams, love them through their mistakes, and ask them the right questions that lead to self correction. It’s not to enable their poor decisions, smother and control them or make excuses for them, but be their biggest fan and be proud that they don’t need you to survive on their own.

To all the adult children out there…you’re an adult. You file your own tax return and have your own car insurance. What you say and how you act may embarrass your parents to an extent, but you’re ultimately building a reputation for your own self that will directly affect you for the rest of your life. Write your own story, set your own goals, and live in a way that is designed to achieve them.

Passive Aggressive vs Openly Aggressive

Which are you? Do you mumble things under your breath as you turn around juuuuuust loud enough for you to feel like you said it to the person it was meant for or do you look them in the eye and have the guts to say it?

A passive aggressive person is not my favorite kind of person. The person who says “I was just joking” is the person who isn’t convicted in their own words and shouldn’t be saying them to start with. The person who says “I was talking to myself” when it was clearly meant for you to hear is the kind of person who lacks confidence.

Say what you mean and mean what you say. Let your yes mean yes and your no mean no. And if you intend to hide behind selling your own words as a joke or offering up a manipulative apology WHEN the things you say can’t be defended by your own thoughts, maybe just don’t say them.

If you are going to be any kind of aggressive, think it through, be willing to defend it, and formulate it with open conviction.

Link vs Kink

A chain is made up of many links, it’s what makes it strong, and adding more to it is what makes it long. A kink in a chain interrupts that process, weakens it, makes it unpredictable, and sometimes makes us throw that chain away or at minimum cut the bad part out.

Information flows the same way. Information is either passed as a whole link with truth or room for truth, or it’s passed as fractured or manufactured truth with a spin to control the narrative. When we bind our communications with others to weak information, the relationship gets weak and unreliable just like a kinked chain.

So if given the choice, we can cut out the kink or do our due diligence in being a link at all. We can have personal responsibility before we add to a bad chain. It may mean digging for truth before we weld our link and it may mean refusing to align at all.

Loyalty to truth and the duty to trust but verify our part in any chain before we’re a part of it is what keeps chains strong, reliable, and integrous.

Parenting Nuggets

Sometimes being a mama means giving your child the info, providing them with the perspective of the bigger picture that comes from your wisdom through experience, and letting them earn their OWN wisdom through experience.

The life lessons I’ve learned the most from are the ones I experienced on my own with the guidance of those who love me and a little/lot of trial and error.

A few nuggets I hope my children take on as their own are:

  1. Look at & smell things before you eat them. There could be something nasty in there.
  2. People will spend your money if you let them. Don’t let them.
  3. Telling someone what they want to hear might shut them up, but if it’s not true it also makes you a liar. Don’t be a liar.
  4. “Love” is a choice, keep that in mind when the one who “loves you” doesn’t choose you. Not cool.
  5. God is always teaching you something very important when you’re in a struggle. Be patient and pay attention and you’ll figure it out.
  6. Always wear sunscreen. Always. Nobody is exempt from cancer.
  7. Not everyone is going to be happy if you’re successful. Don’t feel bad about that.
  8. Invest in a good bra & a good mattress. You spend at least 35%- 65%of your life in both. Be comfortable.
  9. Not all insurance policies are the same. Read them before you choose the cheaper premium.
  10. Bible verses should not be used as weapons. Or accepted as them, either. Use them to lovingly teach and lift up.

Effort is Loving

Have you ever received something that had so much thought put into it, that the effort was more valuable than the thing?

It’s why my grandmother kept this awkwardly shaped Alabama pottery I made as a 3rd grader for over 30 years and why looking at this orchid every day makes me so happy. It’s why these handmade masks, this beautiful card with a kind note dropped in the mail, and this Christmas ornament designed with my heart in mind make me smile so big when I see them. And as a result of these efforts, each of these people are special to me.

Effort is loving. Consideration is loving. Selflessness is loving. An orchid is delicate, but it can survive on 3 ice cubes on Thursdays and keep its vibrance. That requires very little effort on my part but is critical for its blooms. It just doesn’t take much to brighten someone’s day or to be loving.

If you knew you could spend a few minutes or a few hours on someone but the product of that was multiple days or even years of good feels, would you do it?

Turning a Slip into a Faceplant

Ignoring guilt that leads to correction is turning a slip into a fall. We must realize our actions have a ripple effect because we don’t sin in a vacuum & a “whatever” attitude will cause us to fall short in our relationships.

It’s healthy to imagine how our actions will impact others & react accordingly, but walking around shameless & cold hearted is an immediate sign of something very wrong. Listen to the people who love you, consider the possibility that they see something in your blind spot so you can avoid the face plant that’s much harder to recover from.

“So be careful how you live. Don’t live like fools, but like those who are wise. Make the most of every opportunity in these evil days. Don’t act thoughtlessly, but understand what the Lord wants you to do.” Ephesians 5:15-17 NLT

My Favorite Plot Twist

My favorite plot twist. 18 years old, married to a guy I wasn’t in love with, carrying the boy I’d love forever, dreaming of the daughter I’d make his sister, and getting ready to take my real estate exam because lawschool no longer made sense. And it all worked out juuuuuuust fine.

Proof that God’s plan is bigger and you can do very little to mess with it once you turn your life over to Him. He always makes things good for us.

“Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways submit to him, and he will make your paths straight.” Proverbs 3:5-6