Word of the year- 2014

Normally, this time of year is one for making a resolution, lose weight, drink more water, exercise more, etc. These are often met with vigorous enthusiasm for several weeks and then forgotten about or moved to the lower end of the priority spectrum. I recently came across the idea of a "word of the year" found here. It goes along with Willow Creek's focus for the next few weeks on the idea of getting stronger in 2014. What would happen to the church, ourselves, our relationships, if we were more proactive about becoming stronger people, wives/husbands, parents, members of society. That's the goal: see what happens when we are mindful. In this spirit, I have decided my word of 2014 is "embrace". Here are a few reasons why I am choosing to reflect and act on that word this year:

1. I've been staying at home for more than a year now, and often times days tend to blur together and I find myself creating things to do in order to feel productive. I find myself getting into the habit of just getting Emma from morning to nap time to bed time without really embracing the time in between. I want to make the most of every minute she is awake, whether that means playing at the park a little longer, doing a puzzle with her, playing "cool cars", or whatever else she is into. I want to embrace our time together and not just let it slip by.

2. I am almost done with my bachelors! I cannot believe I finally get to say that, but it is true. I have four weeks left of my current class and then one final class to wrap everything up. This has been a goal 10 years in the making, if I count all the time I spent after high school trying to figure out what I wanted to do when I grow up. It would be easy to just ride this time out trying to just "get it done" but I want to embrace and remember this time. I want to continue to try and learn whatever I can, and also remember this feeling of accomplishment. It's not every day where a goal takes so long to achieve, and it is even more rare to actually accomplish a goal that takes so long. It would have been easy to give up years ago, but I persevered. I want to embrace and remember this stubbornness, this ability to persevere. 

3. I want to embrace my "little while" friends right now. When I was younger I had a book that I loved called Orlando's Little-While Friends. I think so often I am slow to make friendships with people because we do not see a future, so to speak. I have a great group of friends from a bible study and play group, and I enjoy the times that I spend with them very much. But I know that these probably aren't "forever friends" and so it is hard for me to truly invest in those relationships. I need to be ok with the fact that people can be in my life for a short time, and that does not make them any less meaningful to my story. 

Just as these boys parents are my "little-while" friends, they are also Emma's "little-while" friends. I still want to see her be friends with them in a very real way, so I should also invest in the same way with my own friends.

Resolution #1

One of my many resolutions this year is to stop worrying about what others think of me. This is something that I have struggled with for a long, long time. I think I can trace it back to 5th grade when kids in my class called me "cow" and even went so far as to write things in my yearbook that year like "have a great summer, cow". Ouch, kids can be the worst! The reason I think this was so damaging to me was that I had so many great things going for me in my life, and I felt really good about those things. I was good at school, and I liked school. I was good at swimming, and I like swimming. I went to church, had a loving family and enjoyed all these parts of my life. I had no problem with myself, so why did they all have a beef with me (pun, funny enough, intended)?

When I put my adult glasses on I can see now that kids (and adults too) generally are intimidated by confident, happy people. Why? I have no idea, but I do know I feel that way towards happy, confident people sometimes. Now, I'm no psychologist, but I believe that when kids feel intimidated, they team up and become bullies, or participate in bully-type behavior. So my confidence and happiness was translated into something intimidating to them.

All that has lead me on a path of always worrying what others think of me. Being bullied when you feel you have no reason to be bullied puts you in a very defenseless position therefore causing me to always have my guard up. I know that bullying is a hot topic right now, and many people are bullied for far worse reasons. What it comes down to though, is that people are bullied if they are different. It's unfortunate that it's taken me so long to realize that different is good.

Which all leads me to today. Today is the day I took my first step to decide to do something without worrying what others would think. I was sitting in our hotel room that I've been sitting in just about every day for the past 5 weeks and decided to get up and go to a coffee shop to write. Here's what went though my head:

I'll have to bring Emma, should I bring her in in the stroller, or just her carseat? If I bring the stroller, will it fit around all the tables? When I bring Emma, should I get her all bundled up, will people look at me and think I didn't dress her appropriately? What if Emma starts crying, will people think I'm a bad mom for bringing a baby to a coffee shop? 


So much unnecessary worry for something so little as wanting to get out of the hotel. So much time and energy wasted on what strangers will think of me, when in actuality they may not be thinking anything besides what a cute baby :)

Now I'm sitting here, happily sipping my Northern Light Vanilla latte (resolution #2 lose weight, check!) while Emma sits happily in her carseat carrier on the chair next to me playing with her crinkle dog and babbling happily to herself. I realize that I don't care, Emma can cry and I'll leave. Big deal. Or maybe she'll fall asleep as she tends to do sometimes in places where there is a lot of ambient noise. Big deal. I'm with one of my favorite people in the world, teaching her to love the smell of coffee and the atmosphere of a coffee shop and that's all that matters to me now.

Update: She fell asleep! :)