Moving Day

I do not want to move.

I hate to move.

Packing up all your crap in boxes, ADD-Me coming out of hiding and reading the newspaper we use to wrap our fragile items.  thowing away treasures that you haven't touched in years, but that you know you'll need the moment the garbage man is gone.  checking the house for the 17th time before you close and lock the door one last time.

Moving a blog is like that too.  The big things, the words, they move easily.  They stack well in boxes, and unpack in order in the new place.  The photos, the memories, not so much.

But as with moving house, sometimes moving the blog is a necessary investment in the future, providing extra bedrooms and a finished basement--room to fix it up and to grow.

Once you've found the right house and closed the deal, you choose a strategic time to move--a time when your closest friends are around to help you carry the heaviest stuff, and then everyone helps you settle in with a big old housewarming party.

My blog is moving.  Come to my blogwarming party!!  Open house all day.  Come by, check it out, leave a comment, help our new house feel like home.

riverofthoughts.com

Seven Things to Learn From Losing Big

62-7 is a pretty awful way to lose.  

One of the worst losses in the modern NFL.

Rough on the guys playing.  Rough on the fans that stayed up until the end to experience the full and amazing glory of losing big.  

Especially rough at 5 the next morning.

But we can learn a lot from the 2011 Colts.

1. Circumstances can take us from high to low in the blink of an eye.
2. Losses happen. Big ones. Even in the pros.
3. When you're losing, you have the freedom to try a different approach.
4. Every man (or woman, or child) on a team matters.  a lot.
5. Busting our butts doesn't always result in a win, but not trying will guarantee a loss.
6. Some people will leave our sides or get really mean when things get hard.
7. Others will stick around and cheer us on anyway.  These are the people that are worth investing in.

Oh...one last thing that I might still need to learn....Screaming at the TV will not get a ref's attention.  Especially when it's on the TiVo.

How To Dougie

As anyone mesmerized by The Evolution of Dance knows, dance has changed over the years. Different moods characterize different eras such as social change in the sixties, technology revolution in the eighties; the dance of the time clearly reflects those moods. (Wow, can you tell i've been helping with way too many high school English papers??)

So now there's this thing called Dougie. Apparently, it's so popular and engrained in teen culture that it morphed from nothing to a verb practically overnight.

I asked my daughter recently what characterized Dougie. Was it a specific move, like the Moonwalk? or a unique rhythm, like a waltz? or more an reflection of something tangible, like the Robot?

No, Mom. It's dougie.

Is it named after a guy named Doug? I know a guy named Doug. Maybe if I try to move like he does, that's Dougie? Although I think maybe he wouldn't appreciate being called Dougie as if he was 5 again. But then maybe he wouldn't have to go to work every day and support his family and wash the car and mow the lawn...so maybe he would want to be Dougie again....but I digress.

So, as I now do anytime I am curious about absolutely anything, I turned to The Tube of You for an answer.

More accurately, my daughter turned to the Tube of You while I sat curled up in a blanket in a nearly recliner. It's getting cold out, you know.....

After watching the song that started it all, and videos of people dougieing (that word looks even weirder than it sounds), and following along with an instructive video (admittedly still wrapped in a blanket in my chair), I am not much closer to understanding Dougie As An Art Form.

I don't think i'll be seeing signs proclaiming "The American Ballet Theater Presents The Dougie Nutcracker."

But who knows? Maybe it will become this generation's Chicken Dance?

Together for Adoption Chicago

Designed for anyone who is called to love and care for the orphan, the Together for Adoption Chicago conference is coming up next month. 

Registration is only $15 for a full-day conference, and includes lunch!  Register now at www.chicagoadoption.org

Do something

According to the UN World Food Programme and UNICEF, almost 18,000 children die every day from hunger.

For the third year, Pathway Community Church opened its doors to Feed My Starving Children, an organization that harnesses the power of community to, well, feed starving children. Members of LifeBridge, Pathway, and a number of community groups volunteered in 2-hour shifts beginning on Thursday, and together, packed 404,568 meals this weekend. That will feed 1,108 kids for a year.

If you do the math, you'll find that statistic is based on one meal a day.  

One meal a day.

One.

Even though i've had times in my life where I cruised the grocery store with a calculator, I've always had food.  I suspect most of us have.  I get pretty cranky if i don't get my regular supply of potato chips.  And somehow, 10PM is The Oreo Hour.  

Actually growing on one meal a day is simply beyond my comprehension.

Today, it's easier than ever to be heard.  Take a look at Charlie Sheen and quickly see the ridiculousness that millions are willing to listen to.  But the Internet also provides access to be heard for good.  to connect people who are like-minded in their willingness to take action.  to influence lives for the better.  to make a dent in poverty.

There are many many many important causes, missions, needs out in the world.  God has created us to be helpers to one another....but he made many of us so that one doesn't have to do it all.  

I challenge you, over the next days or weeks, to take a good look at your life.  Look at what you're doing for others.

It could be simple things you're short-term helps like packing meals for FMSC, raking leaves for an elderly neighbor, or taking a casserole to a family with a new child. Maybe you've made strategic commitments like sponsoring a child who would otherwise go hungry, supporting a transitional home or a missionary or a long-term medical service worker, or going on a mission or service trip and then staying in touch and continuing the investment...

If you're already doing some of these things, great!  Look at your life and ask yourself if you can do more? Do you have extra time that you can invest to tutor an immigrant kid?  Can you brew your coffee at home instead of buying it at Starbucks every day (like I do)?  Can you take 30 seconds to post a link to a humanitarian help group to your Facebook page to increase awareness and encourage your 973 Facebook friends to take a step our of their own comfort?

There's so much to be done....do *something*.

Post in the comments below what you will do TODAY to help someone in need.

I Will Follow

I visited New York with my brother recently.

Buried with work stress, I told him, "You're in charge.  I need a break from decisions and timelines; I will just follow you." We even agreed on a trip theme:  Meander.  We had no real schedule, no commitments.  Eat when we get hungry.  Stop when we are tired.  Watch people.

How did that go?  Not so well.

For three days, my brother set the pace, soaked in the city, and waited patiently for me to discover I was half a block ahead of him.  For three days, each time the gap between us increased, I heard "Meander!"  I don't know how he didn't just throw me off the top of 30 Rock.

I'm Type A.  I'm high-strung.  I'm accustomed to being at the front of the line.  I walk with purpose.  I know where I'm heading and I typically try to get there as efficiently as possible.  I am horrible to travel with.

If I had been with Moses in the desert, I would have been one of the complainers.  I would have been their leader.  "Um, Moses, dude?  Hand over the map.  There's no map?  What do you mean there's no map?  Where the *&^% are you taking us, then?"

It would not have been pretty.

Leadership is both a gift and a curse.  Underdeveloped or overapplied, it becomes a dichotomy.  It actually impedes progress.  Especially when I'm not the one that's supposed to be in charge.

The weekend in New York ended well.  I settled down enough to relax, look around, even fall behind a couple times myself.

And my brother didn't kill me.  Bonus!

Where You go, I'll go.  Where you stay, I'll stay.  
When you move, I'll move.  I will follow.
Who You love, I'll love.  How You serve, I'll serve. 
If this live I lose, I will follow You.

Our Small Group Rocks!

I hope everyone will indulge me for today......I have to brag on my precious friends in our small group.  This weekend, we put on a fundraiser for Bill and Sara.  Totally done, idea-to-event, in under three weeks.

Now, when I say "we," I mean the collective we of our small group....I can't take credit for much of anything, because, well, I didn't really do much.

In contrast, Tess O'Day is my new heroine.  Not that she wasn't before, but over the past couple of weeks, I've remembered that impossible is simply not in this girl's vocabulary.  She rises to a challenge.  She gets stuff done.  She inspires others to help her get stuff done.

When Sara and Bill shared with us that they had been chosen by a birth mother who was due the end of October, we were all happy and rejoiced with them and prayed with them....  But when they asked for prayer about the fees that were coming due, Tess immediately launched into Fundraiser Event Planner mode.

In three weeks, Tess and the rest of our small group arranged:

• a great venue to donate space
• an amazingly popular local band to play free-of-charge and invite all their followers
• almost forty pieces of art for silent auction
• raffle donations and art valued at over $1,000

Everyone in the small group really pitched in to help arrange, solicit donations, and run the fundraiser.  Because of their efforts and Tess' leadership, Bill and Sara have raised $1,500 toward their adoption.  Further, Bill and Sara received a matching grant, so everything raised for them will be matched dollar-for-dollar by Pathway Community Church, through our program with Lifesong for Orphans.

The event was amazing, and Bill and Sara ended the night with $3,000 more toward their adoption costs than they had that morning.  They still have more to go....but God is a big God, and He always provides for that which is in His plan.

So my Monday thought is to find inspiration through the people around you.  If the people around you don't inspire you, try to look at them in a new light and find their strengths.  If that doesn't work, get around new people. Seriously....life is too short to be weighed down.

Also, please join me in praying for Bill and Sara as they get close to their baby's due date?

A House On Fire

I recently came across a very brief post from Seth Godin that crystallized the past month of my life:  You can't watch your parade if the house is on fire.

These days, I do feel like the house is on fire.

I am an introvert.  I need quiet time away from people and activity to recharge.  When my batteries get low, I fall into bad habits.  I see problems as overwhelming and impossible to solve.  I see myself as impotent, powerless.  I retreat.  I miss the parade.

I need to contain the fire in a controlled space, and then just leave it to burn itself out.  Maybe I'll even throw some of the extra crap in my life on it...the stuff that I'd be better off without.  The stuff that my family and friends would be better off if I didn't hang onto.

so............no more barriers.  no more fires in the way.  the decision is made.  back to blogging.  back to writing.  write.  daily.  and watch the parade.  and roast marshmallows by the fire as it burns.

Stuff

It's been said that the fire extinguisher should be the only uni-tasker in your kitchen.

I saw a "watermelon knife" on a morning TV segment the other day.  It purportedly removes the seeds from the watermelon as it cuts.  For $25.  The way the knife is designed, there is no other thing this knife could possibly do besides cut watermelon.  Poorly, if i were to guess.

This watermelon knife symbolizes consumerism gone awry.  Of the need to buy more and more and more.  To measure your life based on the "stuff" you own. Just turn on an episode of "Mission: Organization" or "Hoarders" to see how extreme this can be.

In contrast, I found a great blog the other day where the guy posts photos and counts of every item he and his family own.  They traveled the world with a one-year-old.  With backpacks.

We can't see out the back of the SUV when we go away for a weekend.

True confession time.....we have a lot of stuff.  More than we ought to have. We have storage spaces overflowing with crap.  The closet is crammed tight with clothes we seldom wear.  The path through the attic is narrow and treacherous.

We keep stuff out of fear (that we might need it in the future, that it might cost us more later, that we might forget where we came from), I mean, right now we have an extra CAR because of exactly that.  So yeah, we have some cleaning out to do.

Anybody want to buy a 1999 Grand Cherokee?  Low miles.  Runs great.  :)

The Hitchhiker

Me:

Another one.

Hiding amongst the hairy clumps holding together tighter than velcro, he cautiously reaches with one leg, then slowly another, then pauses.

Movement is his enemy. What he doesn't understand: so is stillness. I easily pluck the hitchhiker from the dog's fur.

But then what? Do I squash him? End his time, return him to the ground, earth, landfill, buried in a pile of burrs and fur? Do I release him back to the woods to begin his immigration plans anew? To find a new leaf on which to wait for the dog's return and a new opportunity to sneak in? Next flight departing at 9:30 PM?

I don't know what this bug is. He is grasshopper-meets-praying-mantis, who then meets Rick Moranis. He is fragile. Even a gentle puff of air would wrest his clinging arms from a leaf. His chartreuse body is too small for any variation in color, legs stretch out like the bright green hairs of a 70's punk poseur.



* * *

Him:

the sudden turmoil. the dog brushes past my resting spot, the protected underbelly of a leaf. my world isn't the same. i hang on with all my strength, hide beneath a large boulder, cling to soft white branches the size of my arms.

this place is warm. different from the warmth of the sun; it feels like the rock in late afternoon; the sun is gone, but i feel its warmth gradually releasing. but different yet than that. this warmth stinks, too. and i'm moving far faster than i ever dreamed was possible. away from my leaf. from my family, from the territory i was born.

i bounce along, into the sun, no longer brushed by branches and leaves, the wind rushes through the soft white branches where i hide. a jolt, i'm flung down against the hot, pink ground and then back up into the air and it seems to land on a hard surface and screech to a stop with a thundering, deafening sound. sharp sounds shake the beast in twos and threes, and shortly is moves again.

not far this time, but the air changes. becomes cold and dry. unnatural. the light is strange now, the color is wrong, it comes from the wrong direction. Everything here is wrong, and it occurs to me that this may be the end. this is not where i am meant to be.

the dog takes me deeper into my doom; i realize that the farther he goes, my chances of getting out diminish. i need a plan.

* * *

Note: After extensive pre-dawn research, the hitchiker appears to be a katydid, although I'm still not entirely sure. There are no words to describe the creep-factor that now crawls up and down my spine from the various bug photos and websites that I've seen. Like a pastor says to a teenaged boy about porn...you can't un-see that. Seriously, guys, don't surf the web for bugs.

Quitter, Unpacked

Well, it's a bit of an overstatement to actually say it's unpacked. Perhaps the title should actually be "Follow My Process of Unpacking The Quitter Conference Through The Overwhelming Sense of Being Slammed in the Face With a Firehose of Wisdom and Practical Advice." But I don't think too many people would read that. Which is OK since I'm posting this for me anyway.

About a month ago, I attended Jon Acuff's Quitter Conference in Nashville. One of the coolest things (and easiest) that Jon advised was to compile a Quitter Soundtrack....YAY! Day 1: DONE!!

1. Catchafire - TobyMac
2. Starry-Eyed Surprise - Paul Oakenfold
3. Lift Me Up - Moby

OK, I have a soundtrack. Now I'm a real writer. Right?

Well, no, but.....as Jon says, "not only does a soundtrack pick you up, and energize, inspire, and encourage, but relating to song lyrics really can connect you in a visceral way to other creatives (unless you choose Milli Vanilli for your soundtrack. I don't know what that would say about you). Someone else sat in their own hustle-time and wrote that song. They felt those lyrics. And when the lyrics connect with exactly what I'm feeling, that's deep, man. Deep."

Over the past month, I've been gradually unpacking the conference in my head. So much content, so much value:

• The truthy things, like dreams take hard work, long hours, and sacrifice.


• The "what can I do RIGHT NOW" things, like make a soundtrack and spew words every day, good or bad, from my fingers into little dots of colored light. Scheduling daily time to hustle--put in the hard work and start producing.


• The tactical things, like scheduling posts and finding the *right* level of planning...somewhere between "stepping out in faith" (like Philip and the Ethiopian) and building a 72-step project plan with triple critical paths (like, uh, me).


• The "business-ey" things, like advice about building a platform and an amazing discussion by Ben Arment about hitting the Sweet Spot in the middle of passion, gifts, platform, and demand.


• The creative and inspirational things, like stories about how Jon got fired from the carnival where he didn't even really work, and discussion about the support that each of us needs to be the best that we can be....

As I fished back through 23 pages of notes, and a 40-page workbook, I realized I could spend another three months of "hustle-time" just unpacking each section, pulling out writing prompts and action items and inspiring quotes to stencil on my office wall.

But then I realized that's not what hustle-time is really for; those things are all a trap set for me by that bully, fear. They are distractions.

"Match the right energy level to the right activity" means that when I try to pick through notes or fix itunes or listen to the dog begging to go out for the ninetyseventh time, I'm falling prey to the fear of producing. That's just me.

My morning hustletime MUST be about writing. Ink on paper. Pixels on a screen. Watch the word count and keep the fingers moving until it hits 550. (i do really love you, wordpress....)

Because if I don't produce, I'm not a writer.

"Dreamers are a dime a dozen; do-ers are rare." I will be a do-er.

(and i need four more words...)

Thin is in

I saw this photo recently and just wanted to throw up. (Ironic, huh?)

My girls have a unique balance of confidence and insecurity. I'm incredibly proud of both of them and of how often they manage to stand firm on their convictions, whether their peers agree or not. But other times, they are just as sucked in as everyone else. Thin sucks them in.

My girls have known what it's like to not have enough food.

We've been lucky. Neither of the girls has food-hoarding issues that so often come from years of living without. But it took quite a while for either of them to realize that as long as they ate dinner, they could pretty much eat whatever they wanted, whenever they wanted.

We keep well-stocked with reasonably healthy snacks and foods, plus the occasional bag of chips or cookies. Given the opportunity, of course, they would eat through a bag of chips like a pack of wild dogs...but in the absence, they don't complain, they just crank open a can of tuna.

So when Masha started eating half-portions of things, and Lena started complaining "I'm fat," I was a little surprised. More than a little. And despite doctors' assertions that they are both a perfectly healthy weight, both girls now battle with the insecurity that photos like this one shove in their faces.

The desire for "thin" has endured for too long. I don't think I've spoken to one person that thinks this is OK...so why the canyon between what we know to be right and what the media feeds us?

Are we that susceptible to the very marketers that prey on our insecurities? Seems that the fashion and the diet industries both profit, while our girls (and guys too) suffer and sometimes even die. How is that OK?

I have no illusion that I and the 12 readers of this blog can stomp into the Office of the Minister of High Fashion Marketing and say "stop this" and they will stop. Greater writers on much greater platforms than this have spoken out against this. News outlets around the world have done pieces. Everyone is informed.

Yet we still buy skinny jeans for our kids, Mattel still manufactures a Barbie with anatomically impossible proportions, Gap still stands up mannequins that couldn't stand up by themselves if they were live people.

Do you think the mother and her baby starving in Somalia think this is fashionable?