Twinkle Lights. Or why I have Christmas lights up in my house all year.

“When we reach out and share ourselves–our fears, hopes, struggles, and joy–we create small sparks of connection.  Our shared vulnerability creates light in normally dark places.  My metaphor for this is twinkle lights (I keep them in my house year-round as a reminder).  
There’s something magical about the idea of twinkle lights shining in dark and difficult places.  The lights are small, and a single light is not very special, but an entire strand of sparkling lights is sheer beauty.  It’s the connectivity that makes them beautiful.  When it comes to vulnerability, connectivity means sharing our stories with people who have earned the right to hear them…”
                                                                                                   Brene Brown, Daring Greatly

(image from Internet)


I loved Brene Brown’s story about twinkle lights.

I know sometimes I don’t share my stories, or my “light” for various reasons.  Sometimes out of embarrassment, or fear, or sometimes because I don’t even recognize the stories as important.  It’s not something I’m proud of, it’s just truth.

But I have found when I share my light and my stories, when I stay true to me, and embrace what I have to give the world, I feel more whole.  Brene calls it “wholehearted”.  I live and love with my WHOLE heart.  And when I allow my light to shine, I in turn encourage others to do the same.  And though my light alone isn’t strong enough to light the way, when we all combine our lights together, we change the world.

Books that inspire better, more meaningful living.

My parents did hundreds of things right.  But one of their greatest accomplishments, in my opinion, is ALL 6 of their children are avid readers.  We read.  A lot.

I don’t know how they did it.  I don’t remember being forced to read as a kid, nor do I recall them reading to me (I’m sure they did, but I’ve forgotten most of my childhood).


But somehow, they instilled in each of their children a need to read.  Maybe it was simply from growing up and watching our mom read (and my dad, on vacations, when he could keep his eyes open long enough).  And the walls in our home lined with bookshelves full of books.


“I would be most content if my children grew up to be the kind of people who think decorating consists mostly of building enough bookshelves.” —Anna Quindlen


I teased my brother one day (who has been in and out of jail numerous times for troubles with addiction) through the glass separating us at the county jail, how unfair it was he was able to spend the entire day reading (I was kidding, of course, because that’s a pretty awful place to be reading).  My mom used to buy books from Barnes and Noble and donate them directly to the jail (because they wouldn’t allow you to just bring books to the jail and donate them–you could figure out a way to smuggle stuff in that way, like a shank).  He would then get first dibs on those book to read and then contribute them to the jail library.  That’s mom love for you.  And a lot of inmates at the Salt Lake County jail benefited from my brothers love to read and my mothers never ending desire to nurture that.  
People often ask me how I have time to read.  And I always hear people say “I don’t have time to read”.  My response, how do you NOT have time to read?  Reading is a huge priority for me.  So I make sure there’s time.  I have a Kindle app on my phone, and on my ipad, and whenever I get a few minutes during the day, I read.  5-10 minutes at a time.  And then I always read before bed.  No matter how tired I am.
“Just the knowledge that a good book is awaiting one at the end of a long day makes that day happier.” –Kathleen Norris
I so hope my children will also learn to love reading.  To need to read.  As much as they need anything else.  Because reading changes my life.  And makes me a better person.  Good books, and the people who read them with a desire to act truly change the world.
And with that, I give you some suggestions of things I have read recently that are inspiring and motivating to live a better life.  With a quote or two I loved from the book.  Definitely worth your time.
{You can also see a list of some of my favorite memoirs I’ve read recently here that also inspire intentional living}
bookspin
(You can pin that image by hovering it over it and clicking “pin it” so you can remember these books)
1.  “A million miles in a thousand years: How I learned to live a better story” By Donald Miller
A Million Miles in a Thousand Years: How I Learned to Live a Better Story
 
Easily in my Top Five best books of all time.  I. Love. This. Book.  It is one of the reasons I started this blog.  You can read about that here.


“The truth is, if what we choose to do with our lives won’t make a story meaningful, it won’t make a life meaningful either.”


“Nobody really remembers easy stories.  Characters have to face their greatest fears with courage.  That’s what makes a story good.  If you think about the stories you like most, they probably have lots of conflict.”


“The experience is so slow you could easily come to believe life isn’t that big of a deal, that life isn’t staggering.  What I’m saying is I think life is staggering and we’re just used to it.  We all are like spoiled children no longer impressed with the gifts we’re given–it’s just another sunset, just another rainstorm moving in over the mountain, just another child being born, just another funeral.”




2.  “Love Does” by Bob Goff

Love Does Study Guide: Discover a Secretly Incredible Life in an Ordinary World


“There is only one invitation it would kill me to refuse, yet I’m tempted to turn it down all the time. I get the invitation every morning when I wake up to actually live a life of complete engagement, a life of whimsy, a life where love does. It doesn’t come in an envelope. It’s ushered in by a sunrise, the sound of a bird, or the smell of coffee drifting lazily from the kitchen. It’s the invitation to actually live, to fully participate in this amazing life for one more day. Nobody turns down an invitation to the White House, but I’ve seen plenty of people turn down an invitation to fully live.”


“I once heard somebody say that God had closed a door on an opportunity they had hoped for. But I’ve always wondered if, when we want to do something that we know is right and good, God places that desire deep in our hearts because He wants it for us and it honors Him. Maybe there are times when we think a door has been closed and, instead of misinterpreting the circumstances, God wants us to kick it down. Or perhaps just sit outside of it long enough until somebody tells us we can come in.”


“To me, Jesus sounded like an ordinary guy who was utterly amazing. He helped people. He figured out what they really needed and tried to point them toward that. He healed people who were hurting. He spent time with the kinds of people most of us spend our lives avoiding. It didn’t seem to matter to Jesus who these people were because He was all about engagement.”


“God doesn’t think any less of us when things don’t go right. Actually, I think He plans on it. What He doesn’t plan on is us putting a fake version of ourselves out there to take the hit.”


“You’re here and I’m here. God decided to have us intersect history, not at just any time, but at this time. He made us to be good at a few things and bad at a couple others. He made us to love some things and not like others. Most of all, He made us to dream. We were meant to dream a lot. We’re not just a cosmic biology experiment that ended up working. We’re part of God’s much bigger plan for the whole world.”


3.  “Born to Run: A Hidden Tribe, Superathletes, and the Greatest Race the World Has Never Seen” by Christopher McDougall

Born to Run


“If I really wanted to understand the Raramuri, I should have been there when this ninety-five-year-old man came hiking twenty-five miles over the mountain.  Know why he could do it?  Because no one ever told him he couldn’t.  No one ever told him he oughta be off dying somewhere in an old age home.  You live up to your own expectations, man.”


“Perhaps all our troubles–all the violence, obesity, illness, depression, and greed we can’t overcome–began when we stopped living as Running People.  Deny your nature, and it will erupt in some other, uglier way.”


“Beyond the very extreme of fatigue and distress, we may find amounts of ease and power we never dreamed ourselves to own; sources of strength never taxed at all because we never push through the obstruction.”




4.  “Margin: Restoring Emotional, Physical, Financial, And Time Reserves to Overloaded Lives” by Richard Swenson

Margin: Restoring Emotional, Physical, Financial, and Time Reserves to Overloaded Lives with Bonus Content


“Margin has been stolen away, and progress was the thief.”


“We must have some room to breathe.  We need freedom to think and permission to heal.  Our relationships are being starved to death by velocity.  No one has the time to listen, let alone love.  our children lay wounded on the ground, run over by our high-speed good intentions.  Is God now pro-exhausion?  Doesn’t He lead people beside the still waters anymore?  Who plundered those wide-open spaces of the past, and how can we get them back?  There are no fallow lands for our emotions to lie down and rest in.  We miss them more than we suspect.”



5.  “Daring Greatly” by Brene Brown

Daring Greatly: How the Courage to Be Vulnerable Transforms the Way We Live, Love, Parent, and Lead

 

“…numbing vulnerability is especially debilitating because it doesn’t just deaden the pain of our difficult experiences; numbing vulnerability also dulls our experiences of love, joy, belonging, creativity, and empathy. We can’t selectively numb emotion. Numb the dark and you numb the light.”
 
“…the level to which we protect ourselves from being vulnerable is a measure of our fear and disconnection.”
 
“Connection is why we’re here. We are hardwired to connect with others, it’s what gives purpose and meaning to our lives”
 
“To feel is to be vulnerable”

“To foreclose on our emotional life out of a fear that the costs will be too high is to walk away from the very thing that gives purpose and meaning to living.”
 
“vulnerability is the path and courage is the light. To set down those lists of what we’re supposed to be is brave. To love ourselves and support each other in the process of becoming real is perhaps the greatest single act of daring greatly.”
 


6.  “Left to Tell: Discovering God Amidst the Rwandan Holocaust” by Immaculee Ilibagiza

Left To Tell: Discovering God Amidst the Rwandan Holocaust


“God never shows us something we aren’t ready to understand. Instead, He lets us see what we need to see, when we need to see it. He’ll wait until our eyes and hearts are open to Him, and then when we’re ready, He will plant our feet on the path that’s best for us . . . but it’s up to us to do the walking.”


“In God’s eyes, the killers were part of His family, deserving of love and forgiveness. I knew that I couldn’t ask God to love me if I were unwilling to love His children.”



7.  “Carry On, Warrior: Thoughts on Life Unarmed” by Glennon Doyle Melton
Carry On, Warrior: Thoughts on Life Unarmed


“even the bush that looks withered and brittle and lifeless can bloom, if given enough time, enough tending, enough love. A new season will come. There is always hope. What looks like the end might just be the beginning. She said that Sunday might be right around the corner, but there is no fast forwarding through Friday and Saturday. The cross has to come before the resurrection. It’s the way of the world. And unless you bear witness to the truth, unless you face it head on and choose to open your heart to the pain, you won’t bear witness to the miracle either. If you run away from the crucifixion, you just might miss the resurrection.”


“So when it comes to how my kids are doing at school, I don’t worry about academics. I worry about social things. I worry about their time at lunch, at recess, and on the bus. Mostly children learn to read and add and sit still eventually. But not everybody learns that he and others deserve to be treated with respect. Not everybody learns that he is OKAY and loved and precious and that it’s all right to feel hurt and all right to hurt others, as long as he apologizes and tries to fix what he broke. Not everybody learns that different is beautiful. And not everybody learns to stand up for himself and others, even when it’s scary.”


“Let’s be Atticus Finch in To Kill a Mockingbird. Atticus’s children, Scout and Jem, carefully watch their father’s behavior as the house next door to theirs burns to the ground. As the fire creeps closer and closer to the Finches’ home, Atticus appears so calm that Scout and Jem finally decide that “it ain’t time to worry yet.” We need to be Atticus. Hands in our pockets. Calm. Believing. So that our children will look at us and even with a fire raging in front of them, they’ll say, “Huh. Guess it’s not time to worry yet.”



8.  “The Power of Starting Something Stupid” by Richie Norton and Natalie Norton

The Power of Starting Something Stupid: How to Crush Fear, Make Dreams Happen, and Live without Regret


“Maybe the smartest people in the world know something we don’t. Maybe they know that in order to be smart, in order to make significant contributions to the world, and in order to spur significant change in their own lives, they sometimes have to act on ideas that others might initially perceive as stupid.”


“Time will always be hard to find. So the way I see it, you can start now and reach for your dreams, or you can wait for later and hope that “later” doesn’t prove to be too late.”


“Authentic people trust themselves, not in a prideful or self-centered way; rather they simply understand and appreciate their inherent worth. Authentic people have developed a sense of purpose”



9.  “Same Kind of Different As Me”

Same Kind of Different As Me: A Modern-Day Slave, an International Art Dealer, and the Unlikely Woman Who Bound Them Together


“Sometimes it’s drinkin or druggin that lands a man on the streets. And if he ain’t drinkin or druggin already, most fellas like me start in once we get there. It ain’t to have fun. It’s to have less misery.”


“When you is precious to God, you become important to Satan.”


“But Miss Debbie was different—she seen me behind them bars and reached way down in her pocket and pulled out the keys God gave her and used one to unlock the prison door and set me free.”


“But I found out everybody’s different— the same kind of different as me. We’re all just regular folks walkin down the road God done set in front of us. The truth about it is, whether we is rich or poor or somethin in between, this earth ain’t no final restin place. So in a way, we is all homeless—just workin our way toward home”


10.  “More or Less: Choosing a lifestyle of excessive generosity” by Jeff Shinabarger

More or Less: Choosing a Lifestyle of Excessive Generosity


“Many of us don’t want our stories to end with just an understanding that we have been given much. We want to do more with what we have; we just don’t know how to combat a culture that defines so much of what we think we need.”


“We give lip service to the idea that people are supremely important. But what does our 

use of time say is important?”

“Success will tell you that your enough is not enough, and it will keep you on a treadmill of your own design, but a treadmill nonetheless. Instead of chasing enough, you have to define it. If you chase it you’ll never catch it. Enough is incredibly quick. Much like perfection, it seems to remain out of reach.”



11.  “The Happiness Project” by Gretchen Rubin

The Happiness Project: Or, Why I Spent a Year Trying to Sing in the Morning, Clean My Closets, Fight Right, Read Aristotle, and Generally Have More Fun


I didn’t highlight this book when I read it, but if nothing else, this book will encourage you to think about the idea of happiness and how we all individually obtain it.  Definitely worth the read.


12.  “My Grandfather’s Blessings: Stories of Strength, Refuge, and Belonging” by Rachel Naomi Remen

My Grandfather’s Blessings: Stories of Strength, Refuge, and Belonging


“When God says, ‘LET THERE BE LIGHT,’ he is speaking to us personally…He is telling us what is possible, how we might choose to live.  But one candles does not do much in the darkness.  God has not only given us the chance to carry the light, he has made it possible for us to kindle and strengthen the light in one another, passing the light along.  This is the way that God’s light will shine forever in this world.

After many years I have round that often we discover the place in us that carries the light only after it has become dark.  Sometimes it is only in the dark that we know the value of this place.  But there is a place in everyone that can carry the light.  This is true.”

“Should I live to be very old, I expect that I will not remember the times when I was “cool” but will be warmed only by the times when I cared passionately, risked everything to make a difference, and knew who I was.”


13.  “Creating a Charmed Life” by Victoria Moran

Creating a Charmed Life

 

 

“Although it has aspects as mundane as making the bed, the basis for living splendidly is a growing conviction that you are here for a reason, a purpose.  What we’re calling a charmed life is the life you were meant to live, the one in which it is perfectly acceptable to want the moon, as long as you’re willing to get over your fear of flying.”

“Even if your busyness tells you that you can’t afford to take quiet time, know that you can’t afford not to.”  (Something very similar to this is in just about every “self help”/motivational/be happier book I have ever read)


“You are the definitive authority on your own life.  Listen.  What is your next indicated thing to do?  A part of you always knows.”


“An unhurried woman is willing to include some emptiness in her day.  That way, when you ask if she’s got time for you, she almost always does.”



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These books are all worth your time!
Happy Reading!!
“We read to know we are not alone”  CS Lewis
“A reader lives a thousand lives before he dies…The man who never reads lives only one.”  George Martin
“The more that you read, the more things you will know.  The more you learn, the more places you’ll go.”  Dr. Seuss
{This post contains “affiliate-links” which means Amazon gives me about a penny for buying the book through that link.  You pay nothing extra 🙂  Thanks for your support}

“Reality is my problem”

I am in no way a Russell Brand fan.  But this article is an honest look into the mind of an addict.  Honest and haunting.  Well written.  Thoughtful.  And painful.

If you know someone who is an addict, and even more, if you love someone who is an addict (Brother, Sister, Wife, Husband, Father, Son, Daughter, etc.), you “get” this.  You understand this world.

“Drugs and alcohol are not my problem, reality is my problem, drugs and alcohol are my solution.”
REALITY is my problem. Addicts are merely people in pain. People trying to dull the pain for whatever reason. People who chose a pretty damaging coping mechanism to deal with their pain. OR, people with mental illness who don’t have any resources but to “self-medicate”.
But they’re just like everyone else. Trying to navigate their way through life.

“I cannot accurately convey to you the efficiency of heroin in neutralising pain. It transforms a tight, white fist into a gentle, brown wave. From my first inhalation 15 years ago, it fumigated my private hell and lay me down in its hazy pastures and a bathroom floor in Hackney embraced me like a womb.”

The truth is, reality is ALL of our problems. And we all have different ways of coping. Some people use drugs and alcohol to dull the pain. Some people use food. I see no difference in the addictions (which will probably get me in trouble with some people). One chooses drugs, one chooses food. Both can lead to some pretty awful consequences including death.

Yet the drug addict (or alcoholic) is often seen as “bad” or “scum” or “worthless” while the food addict may be seen as “lazy” “un-disciplined” or have a “lack of self-control”.

The truth is, both groups are just trying to dull pain.

The part that stuck out to me the most:

“It is difficult to feel sympathy for these people. It is difficult to regard some bawdy drunk and see them as sick and powerless. It is difficult to suffer the selfishness of a drug addict who will lie to you and steal from you and forgive them and offer them help. Can there be any other disease that renders its victims so unappealing?…..my belief that if you regard alcoholics and drug addicts not as bad people but as sick people then we can help them to get better. By we, I mean other people who have the same problem but have found a way to live drug-and-alcohol-free lives.”

Alcoholics/Addicts are NOT bad people. They’re sick people. They have worth. God loves them, just as much as he loves anyone. That is truth.

“If you regard alcoholics and drug addicts not as bad people but as sick people then we can help them to get better”

Well said, Russell. Well said.

 

on vulnerability

I have felt compelled to start this blog for several months.  But I’ve been resisting.  Really resisting.  Partly out of silly fears that irritate me but are nonetheless real.  But even more so, because I read the book “Daring Greatly” by Brene Brown.  And the book spoke so much truth to me yet nearly induced full blown panic attacks.  Because though I agreed with the theory behind her arguments, I realized I was going to have to make big, BIG changes in order to follow them.

Do you see what that says on the book title?  “How the courage to be vulnerable transforms the way we live, love, parent, and lead”  I’m sorry.  Did you say vulnerable?  As in, open myself up to the possibility of getting hurt?  Talk about how I really think and feel?  Hmmm….yea, I don’t do that.
The idea of being vulnerable, and exposing myself to a world that can be so hateful and mean sounds about as appealing as lighting my entire body on fire.
But after several weeks of self discovery (which isn’t always super fun and at times can be really, really hard–just a forewarning for anyone willing to go through it), I realized things needed to change around here.
I discovered I use one of the vulnerability shields Brown refers to as “numbing”.
“…numbing vulnerability is especially debilitating because it doesn’t just deaden the pain of our difficult experiences; numbing vulnerability also dulls our experiences of love, joy, belonging, creativity, and empathy. We can’t selectively numb emotion. Numb the dark and you numb the light.”
That last sentence hit me in a way I never expected.  Numb the dark and you numb the light”  The big problem there, for me, is God lives in the light.  So while I’ve tried to numb the dark, protect myself from the hurt, and often shy away from being really real in the sense that I’m willing to talk about emotion, and feelings, and fears, I’m also numbing the light.  And my connection to God.  And dulling my ability to fully experience love and joy with my family and humankind.  Wow.  And wow.

Here are some other thoughts Brown shared that really made me think.  And re-evaluate how I want to live my life and who I want to be.  And made me a little sick to my stomach to think of how hard this will be and how far I have to go.  But we have to start somewhere.  And action is the key.  Do something.  Anything.  So I blog.

“…the level to which we protect ourselves from being vulnerable is a measure of our fear and disconnection.”


“Connection is why we’re here. We are hardwired to connect with others, it’s what gives purpose and meaning to our lives”

“To feel is to be vulnerable”

“To foreclose on our emotional life out of a fear that the costs will be too high is to walk away from the very thing that gives purpose and meaning to living.”

“vulnerability is the path and courage is the light. To set down those lists of what we’re supposed to be is brave. To love ourselves and support each other in the process of becoming real is perhaps the greatest single act of daring greatly.”

So that’s what I’m doing.  Trying to feel.  And be real.  And spread truth.  And hope in a world that so desperately needs it.

I honestly have no idea how I’m going to do it.  Or how I can change my heart and my actions.  But I’m trying with all my might to not just believe in God, but to actually believe God.  And take things one step at a time.  And get up every morning with a resolve that day to be present, be engaged, connect with others, and love my husband and kids with my whole heart.

“Fear thou not; for I am with thee: be not dismayed; for I am thy God: I will strengthen thee; yea, I will help thee: yea, I will uphold thee…”
Isaiah 41:10

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