Tag Archives: decisions

Book Review: Pelican Point, A Hope Harbor Novel

11 Sunday Nov 2018

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I received a copy of Pelican Point by Irene Hannon from Revell in exchange for a review.

Reading Pelican Point gave me the uplifting book boost I sought after reading and watching a few heavier stories. This sweet small town romance provides a fun story and encouragement for moving through life’s tougher situations. Though this book comes as the fourth in the Hope Harbor series, it makes sense as a stand alone novel. I fell right into step with the residents in town as I followed army doctor Ben there as he returned for his grandfather’s funeral. He and the other characters each face decisions on how to best move forward after loss, moves, and career changes. As they forge friendships and open themselves to possibilities, they find themselves improving their situations and relationships.

As many of us cue up the feel good Hallmark Christmas movies, I equate this with a similar style story. This does not involve Christmas, but it does end with a November wedding. So I say the timing for my reading could not have been better. Like the characters, I face decisions of how to move forward with my career, school and long term living situation. This story reminds me we all face difficult decisions but don’t have to do so alone. In this case, everyone gains confidence as they work together to save a lighthouse. The town coming together as a community to save a community landmark emphasizes the importance of a support network and connection to the world around you. With a little extra encouragement, we can pursue our potential. Sometimes what we need stands within our reach and we simply need to get out and open ourselves to the possibility.

 

This is my first Irene Hannon book, but it definitely won’t be the last. I’d like to go back and read the others in this series and look forward to the fifth releasing next year. As a Missouri native, I enjoyed the tid bit about her attending universities in Missouri and living there. I also found it interesting she chose a town in Oregon not far from where my brother lives and included a character transplanted from Texas, my last state residence. I look forward to returning to Hope Harbor to visit these characters again.

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A Winsome Woman’s Wisdom: Anna Fitzgerald, Sister Keeper

31 Wednesday Oct 2018

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The girls in Mean Girls wear pink on Wednesdays. Though we think we leave drama and teenage angst behind when we graduate high school, the world continues to hand us lemons. We still struggle with maintaining a firm foundation of our values, discovering our identity, pursuing our purpose, developing relationships and more. The teenage angst lives on; therefore, we can still learn from young adults as they come of age. Let’s take a look at some ladies as they’ve forged their way into adulthood.

 

Anna Fitzgerald exists because her parents specifically created her embryo as a donor match for her older sister Kate in Jodi Picoult’s bestselling novel My Sister’s Keeper. The story follows Anna’s attempts to make donor decisions herself by filing a lawsuit against her parents. Her whole life has involved huge procedures all chosen for her; those also make it difficult for her to live life normally, almost as though she had leukemia too. Like most 13-year-olds, she feels unsure as she navigates making choices for herself, especially when tension arises due to her parents not agreeing.

In some ways, we all can relate to Anna in our desire for approval. We all seek approval from our parents, our peers, our friends even as adults. Yet we forget that we need not live by their standards. Even Queen Elizabeth I points this out to her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II in The Crown when she asserts that her job requires her to make decisions based on God’s approval rather than the general public. In most cases, this would follow the wiser direction anyway considering the unapproving parties tend to not have expertise in the field they project their opinion. Mrs. Fitzgerald unquestionably cares about her daughters, but she doesn’t have the expertise to understand what will happen to Kate or Anna if they follow through with a kidney donation. In fact, the doctor said Kate had passed the point in renal failure where it would benefit her. Anna seeks counsel and help from experts, despite not having her mother’s approval.

While we want to live at peace with those around us, it serves us all to stand on our proper foundations to make our decisions rather than sway to gain temporary approval. It also does us well to seek counsel from multiple sources. Chrystal Evans Hurst wisely encourages readers to gather multiple types of people for your support team in She’s Still There, including a mentor figure ahead of you on the same career path and a friend who cheers you on by your side. Having a firm foundation and a support team makes it easier to keep moving forward and stay focused on your purpose.

Desiring approval comes naturally. So does the angst felt when we don’t get it. However, we can continue forward with strength and purpose and do better than if we allowed ourselves to waver. We have support around us to give us the guidance and encouragement we need to make progress. Making decisions doesn’t necessarily get easier, but we can rest assured knowing we base them on truth.

Recognize Potential Growth and Ask for Specific Help Achieving It

30 Tuesday Oct 2018

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In my post yesterday, I mentioned the importance of specifics that included requests for help. Today I’d like to share specific ways someone may ask for help. Whether combatting obstacles of mental illness or not, we all need community and personal growth tools. Recognizing those needs and voicing them creates opportunities to deepen relationships and fuel progress on goals. Consider asking a trusted friend specific questions like these.

 

Five Ways to Ask for Help

  1. Could I have more time? Especially with depression, motivation seems lackluster at best. It takes longer than usual to do routine tasks just to get to the rest of the to-do list. Letting someone know you work to complete the task lets them know you have not quit. It also gives them a chance to offer to collaborate.
  2. Would you look at this list with me? I’ve been exploring options for graduate school. After passing on an opportunity to attend for free years ago and recently passing after almost agreeing to go $20,000 further in debt simply because that was the convenient option rather than wait, I want to make an informed decision and one that doesn’t inadvertently create a greater stress (like a greater debt than I already have). My best friend periodically asks how my progress looks. I’ve created a document with information on the schools I consider and shared it with her. This keeps me on track and allows me to bounce ideas as well as collect more perspective. If you have a goal to pursue a new career or add to your exercise routine, ask someone to look at your options with you.
  3. Would you go to this place with me? Sometimes we hesitate to go somewhere to avoid the discomfort. Having a friend for moral support can help. If it makes it possible for you to make a necessary appointment or to try a new group to gain community, get someone to go with you.
  4. Could I tell you something? Voicing a concern makes it real, thus makes it possible to face it. Ask a trusted friend if you can share your hesitations. Then you can start exploring ways to overcome your doubt. It also gives the person a way to give you support and encouragement. Again, my friend who asks me about my school progress also reminds me of my capabilities and intellect when I share my hesitations and doubts. It helps me keep the truth push me forward rather than let the doubt hold me in place.
  5. Can I confess something? This continues the concept of voicing an emotion or struggle to deal with it rather than let it fester. When we feel angry, avoiding the emotion allows us to bury it and grow roots of bitterness. Voicing the emotion in prayer or to a trusted friend puts it in the light to expose it to truth and let it go. The same thing happens when we confess a wrong we’ve done.

Emerging From The Sea

19 Sunday Jan 2014

Posted by in Poetry/Lyrics

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Just because you don’t see

The sails I’ve drawn for me

Doesn’t mean I don’t cross my T

It’s up to me to choose to be

 

I’ve made a world you don’t see

Where my thoughts spin free

Bouncing to and fro just to be

still part of one like waves at sea

 

But just because you don’t see

The tide turning the sea

Don’t make you free

To be captain for me

 

Step back, let me be

If you want to see

An open sea grow as a tree

To let all the fruit free

Room For Faith

20 Sunday Oct 2013

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I have been reading The Case for Faith lately. In it, Lee Strobel, a journalist who used to be an atheist explores questions of faith relating to creation v evolution, suffering, and more. One of the last areas in which he delves involves doubts. Lynn Anderson, the man he interviews in the chapter “I Can’t Doubt and Be A Christian,” points out a common difficulty with time that influences people’s doubt when prompted to share influences on people’s doubt to which they may not usually be aware. He says,

 

’Seasons of life can make a big difference,’ he replied. ‘Sometimes people are great believers while in college, but when they’re young parents with their second baby and they’re working sixty or eighty hours a week and their wife’s sick all the time and the boss is on their back—they simply don’t have time to reflect. And I don’t think faith can develop without some contemplative time. If they don’t make room for that, their faith is not going to grow and doubts will creep in.’

 

It seems like this fits many season’s in people’s lives, including my own.

My stage in life does not include my own family yet, but I am young. My career is just beginning. I am deciding where I would like to live and what I would like to be doing. Yet I find it hard to find time to reflect or contemplate.

Routine has a high priority in my life. My specific routine has been tweaked to near perfection over the years. Exercise has profound importance for all the health benefits, and I made sure I woke up at 6am during my time at college so I could work out first thing. Then I finished preparing for the day, including having a devotional time before I got started on my other tasks like homework and cleaning. Throughout those years and now, the specific routine has been tweaked to fit my schedule, but the priorities have stayed the same. I know I want to take care of all areas of my health, especially spiritual. That includes having time to reflect on my faith as well as life in general.

A regular prayer time helps this a lot. As I mentioned before, I set aside time every day in college. This keeps my focus on God. Faith implies a perspective on the world shaped by God; regularly spending time with Him keeps my perspective closer to His. I also shared that I rely heavily on my routine to get all my needed and wanted daily tasks accomplished. It has been harder for me the last couple years because of my work schedule. I have enjoyed working two jobs and am relieved to work one now, but I still don’t have a regular work week or schedule. This probably shakes me more than it should. I continually adapt it to each day. In theory I have the same amount of time. Yet I haven’t found my good contemplative times. In college, I would spend a couple hours before each semester reflecting on my goals for the coming semester. First I would go through the more surface level items like the organizations in which I had a role and decided in which ones I would continue to play a part and which I would leave. Then I would make a second list of more broad ideas involving important concepts to me. This involved how I reflected God to other people, how I invested in my relationships, how I shaped my perspective, how I used my gifts. That always reminded me of the bigger picture of God’s purpose for my life during that period. It helped me maintain peace and progress my studies during that time so I could prepare for the next stage.

Here I am now in another busy season. Again, I don’t quite have all the same details as the example mentioned in The Case for Faith. Yet experiencing this uncertainty at all levels has made me organize my life in a way different than my preferred method. I just have to keep going back to what’s important to keep progressing. I want to progress my career and have to make some decisions regarding that because I want to keep developing. The same applies to my faith. Without that contemplation, neither will progress. As Anderson points out, if we don’t make room for it, it won’t happen.

Braided Efforts

10 Thursday Oct 2013

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Today I braided my hair; I figured it was about time I learn how to pull my hair in a decent braid. Hairstyles never really came easy to me. Yet I hadn’t ever put much effort into developing any skill. In middle school, my best friend and I got ready for dances together, and she curled or flipped out my hair. I maintained a pretty plain hairstyle, relying on the cut and simple maintenance to provide an adequate look. During my first summer after college, I finally felt like I successfully curled my hair. It still hasn’t turned out exactly with the curls I desired, but I learned how to change the style to an extent. Today I decided I would progress my braiding skills so I could have another way to pull my hair back besides a ponytail. It just takes a decision, practice, and evaluation.

No one started out knowing how to braid hair; no one began a career with all the necessary skills, let alone at the desired level. Some aspects had to be learned during the course of action. Girls learned how to braid their hair by braiding their dolls’ hair, their friends’ hair, their own hair. The first attempts may have included stray hairs, loose braids, unproportioned sections. Yet each attempt provided practice that led to better looking braids, even if some never progressed much beyond what looked similar to others’ early attempts.

I didn’t braid my dolls’ or friends’ hair much as a kid. That led to the current level of inexperience. Yet I began concentrated efforts to change that, at least in terms of braiding. Hair never was my forte and probably never will be. Yet I can learn how to attain a couple basic looks if I desire. I just have to practice. The basic procedure for creating a braid has stayed with me. My hair hasn’t been braided in years, but I’m changing that. Now that I have long hair again, I desire to wear more styles.

The same idea applies to other skills, some of which may be better suited for me. I have other talents, ones I’ve already advanced and others I haven’t developed much yet, I’d like to bolster. I just have to decide my goal, take action, evaluate my efforts. This includes making tangible writing goals like a regular blogging schedule and tasks to ultimately complete my novel and publish articles and includes determining my career aspirations and mapping the steps to attain them. I noticed with the braids that it’s easier to make something happen when you start with a small, basic step. All I had to do was braid my hair this morning. I ended up with some loose strands on one side; I lovingly named it my messy braid. I gained the knowledge to start the braid a little higher next time. I took action, practiced, and evaluated. I can adjust my next attempt. I can braid my hair.

Waiting Ten Days, Then Ten More

09 Wednesday Oct 2013

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My mom’s getting married in ten days. Her wedding starts my fall events and holiday season. Yet I’m not ready for any of them. I have my dress and accessories to be my mom’s bride’s maid. I have the weekend off work. Yet I don’t have a gift, and I haven’t penned a toast. Like in other aspects of my life, it seems like I’m waiting for a clear sign that will never appear; I need to make some decisions based on the information I do hold.

I know the wedding is rapidly approaching. For the most part, I have an idea of the course of events during the course of the weekend for the small bridal shower (at the spa), reception dinner, ceremony, and reception. It may be a small, casual affair, but it’s a wedding nonetheless. I want it to be special for my mom even if it seems like she doesn’t want a lot of attention drawn to her and the wedding. This marriage, I have the opportunity to serve my mom and bestow gifts accordingly. I just need to get over the uncertainty I see and decide to do what I can to make it special. Who says I can’t share a meaningful toast even if I’m the only one who stands to speak with a glass of champagne in hand?

The same stands true for my career aspirations. I can’t tell you which company will hire me and for what position. Another fog of uncertainty stands in front of me in that realm. Sometimes it feels like I’m grabbing at air as I reach forward, but as I keep extending my arm I will eventually find something in my hand. Again, I may need to make a decision with the knowledge I do possess. In this situation, I have to evaluate my priorities to determine what will put me in the best environment to meet my needs and desires. Certainly, this entails me moving back to a city. My decision may just have to result from contemplating the potential despite not having definitive plans yet. Either way, they will unfold in time. I just must decide what action to take.

The time to decide starts now. With the wedding rapidly approaching, the final countdown has begun. I must pick an appropriate gift and purchase it. A talk with my brother can determine if we can organize a joint toast or presentation of sorts during the reception. After that my career clock still ticks. While I may not have a tangible date like I do for the wedding, I don’t want the main attraction to pass me because I stood too long in the fog without moving forward. As I keep reaching, I can adjust my angle by making decisions to boost my potential for success.