Begin here, begin now

Happy Memorial Day! I have to tell you that I am so excited to have this day off-- it was much needed. Thanks to all the troops out there, including in my own family. Thanks for all you do and all you have done.

Also- little shout out to my mother whose birthday is tomorrow. Greatest mom ever-- thank you, too.

So, this week was the conclusion to my young women book group at church. It was such a great experience. During our last session we ended by talking about what we feel like we have changed and what we still need to work on since being in the group. I think whenever we are confronted with this type of question, I think that our natural response is to point out the one or two things that we have put in to practice well and then a list of things we want to do better. I feel like I need to read the whole book over again (we were reading Heart to Heart-- designed for groups).

In response to this, one of the girls was talking about a sermon from a church in NY where the pastor was talking about how to take control of your life and get you to where you want to be (I'm still trying to find the exact one on the website so that I can read the whole thing. If I do- I'll post it). He gave 10 different bits of advice, saying that we ALL have a list of things that we feel we still need to improve/accomplish. The first two were "begin here" and "begin now"--basically, the short of it being that you can't go back and change anything and we are not usually in a position where there is absolutely nothing that we don't have going for us, but you do have to take that step. Life is going to keep going. It may be a small step, but then you take another.

I related to this a lot in that I feel like I go through these phases where I am ready to revamp how I prioritize my life. Usually this starts with a list and I decide that I will just "start over". I try starting eighty bajillion things all at the same time and then get frustrated when I tap out because I can't get a handle on it all. The reality is that we will never be wholly satisfied for where we are in our lives, nor should we be since we always will have room to grow to be a better person. This does not mean, however, that we haven't accomplished a lot or that improvement is out of reach (no baby and the bath water kind of thing).

So, I'm going to try to be a little more forgiving with myself (for example, I'm really proud of myself for sticking it out in a 9 month book group- yay!)and take it one improvement at a time (creating 1 or 2 more good habits- not 20) and begin right where I am, right now. That being said- I'm off to the pool for a little me time ;)-- happy day ya'll.