so little change

I have been out of work now for 13 months...and there is no change in my life. Still searching for that next chapter in my life, my next job, my next love, my next something!!!

We go and go searching for the perfect in everything, but can't we just be happy with what we have? I have heard several sermons at church about us wanting to go back to the garden, the Garden of Eden where things were simpler and easy until we started to want more.

I need to learn to be content with what I have, and be content with who I am and stop searching for the next. I have to learn to let God direct me to that next, I have to learn to trust that He has not forgotten me and that He loves me and wants me to be happy.

I also have to accept that change does not happen over night.....just like the caterpillar becoming a butterfly....it takes time to change.

Selfie

One of the areas of my life I have been trying to work on is....loving me! Loving myself just the way I am...overweight but happy, unhappy but hopeful, hopeful but doubtful...see full of uncertainty but optimistic of the work God is doing inside of me.

So, I have decided that I need to start taking selfies to see myself for who and what I am.....

 



This is Klondike and I after one of our hikes (he wouldn't smile for the camera). Part of trying to love myself is to lose some much needed weight, trying to walk/hike 15 miles a week. Which is not much but I hope to increase the amount as time goes on. I have lost 2 pounds since we have started this. Not a lot but it is a start. Klondike is a great motivator, he knows at 9:00pm it is time for a walk and will whine until he gets one. Its pretty annoying so I have to give in.

I love being out in the trails and seeing what beauty God has created for us. Looking at how perfectly He designed everything. From the birds in the trees, the bugs on the ground to the green grass that grows all around. Wow, he thought of everything. He designed me to love His creations.

I love, love being anywhere near the ocean!! After I took this picture, I was walking back to my car when a punk ass kid yelled 'go fatty' at me. A few years that would have made me cry and beat myself up mentally. This time I let it roll off of my back. That punk knows nothing about me, he does not know the struggles I have with losing weight.

When I look at this picture of me, I see someone who is starting to be content with who she is, someone that does not see value in what others think of her. Of course I want everyone to love me, but I know that is not going to always happen. And that is ok, my feeling is that if you don't want to take the time to know me then it is one you not me. I am a great person with a lot of love to give.

One more near my favorite place...the ocean!! Specifically Sunset Cliffs in Point Loma. This has to be the most beautiful place in San Diego!! God really did some overtime on this place!! He keeps crafting it when the waves crash against the cliffs to reshape them. I love how strong the ocean is, how unpredictable it is.

Have to say I love this picture of me, I see a content person and my true smile is there (but of course I hate my nose and neck in it, but I am learning to let that go). God is really starting to put me back together and remaking me into the women he wants me to be and I cannot wait for the finished product!

If I learned anything in the last 11 months of being out of work, is that it is necessary for me to go to my favorite places, to enjoy nature and all that God has created. To stop and look at the beauty and give thanks for it. And I have to start learning to love myself despite the flaws I see because more than likely no one else sees them. God does not see them.....so why should I? I was made in His image and He is not flawed!!

Kiddy Fit

I just want to throw on of those major kiddy fits we all use to throw when we were kids!!!

I don't want to look for another job that I will not get....I don't I don't I don't!!! I want to sit hear and fold my arms and stomp me feet so someone can send me to my room!!!

I am so tired of applying for jobs non stop!! To date I have applied to 225 positions in your name in area of work. I just want a job...something...anything...

The reason I want to stomp my feet is that I have to do 20+ hours of job searching weekly and log it just right and submit them to the welfare office by the 5th of each month and I hate to do them!! I hate going there, to be told by a 20 something year old that I need to redo them, that I need to come and sit in their computer lab to job search (when I am more than capable of doing that on my own in my own space) and that I need to be willing to take a minimum wage job.

AHHHHH!!!! Stomp....Stomp....Over it!!! Can I be sent to my room??

Caterpillars

The past few days have been quite challenging to say the least! I have cried in public places, I have beat myself up mentally and have given up on the idea of Hope.

Then I went here....

 This is about a five minute drive from my house, and next to being near the ocean it is my favorite place (especially when it is green). During my walk there were caterpillars all over the place. I cheer them on and pray they have a chance to make it, a chance to become who God intended them to be.

Seeing them me think....am I a caterpillar? I am changing? Am I going through a Metamorphosis? But into what? I want so much to be a changed women, someone who shows happiness, someone who shows the love and power of Jesus....is that what is happening? But isn't that happening to all of us? We are all changing and evolving into something then we were. I know I don't want to be the same person a year from now.  

I keep trying to wrap my brain around the idea of why I have been out of work so long. The idea of changing keep coming to mind. There is some kind of work being done inside of me. Something that is going to bring me out of this season changed, reformed, made into something else.



Poor Klondike had to be told over and over again not to step, eat, pee on or sniff the caterpillars. (This is the look he gave me after the all of the reminders).....We all need a chance to grow and thrive and people just need to allow us and encourage us just like I do with the caterpillars

 



Why I believe in God

Tyler has been going on and on about the Bill Nye the Science Guy and a Professor of Creation, and that Bill Nye kept shooting down all of the creationist ideas. He asked why I believe in God. He and I have had many conversations about religion in the past few years and he has never bought into the idea of religion.

This is what I told him, I told him about how in the deepest, darkest days what pulled me out, got me out of bed and kept me moving was the belief that there was something more then this, something more after this life.

I shared with him the people who came into my life by chance. My Fay Mom, who was just a neighbor who came into my life to change the course of my life. My in laws, who loved me and still love me as their own when they could have turned their backs on me. Tony and Susan who sit next to me every Sunday in church, they pray for me and give me support. Tony sneaks a twenty into my purse every Sunday since my unemployment benefits stopped. His Aunt Lisa, who from the age of 8 until now has been the most important person in my life. She has stood with me through thick and thin has never left my side when most of my friends have vanished. A man named Derek who read an newspaper article that I was quoted in about unemployment benefits who offered to send me a gift card at any store of my choice to help my family.

These are just some of the people who came into my life by chance, I asked him if he thought it was by chance or by design/destiny? I gave him many other examples that have happened in my life where something happened to me that changes everything.

We talked about how things just happen and why. Especially when there is no logical reason for them to happen.

I believe there is something more to this life, something that comes and takes my burdens. I believe in Hope...Hope for more then this heartache I have each day.

Leap of Fatih...week one

I attend a pretty amazing church named Journey Community Church, I have been attending there about 5 years and I am proud to call that church home.

About once a year we do a church wide study, this year we are doing a Leap of Faith. 40 days through the Book of Mark.

Part of this study is to boldly stand before God and ask a risky prayer. Being I like to get more than asked I have decided on three bold prayers.

One, to get a position that will being me personal satisfaction and a decent salary. This is something I have been praying for at least 8 months. Being out of work this long as really taken a toll on me.

Two, for help to lost this much needed weight. I know that my weight does not define me as a women it does has a lot to do with my overall health and well being.

And third, for a life partner someone who loves me for me. Someone that can make be laugh on a daily bases, someone to help me feel safe. I have resisted dating for so long and I think it is time for me to have someone.

In church today, I was thinking of my three prayers and asking myself if I was asking for to much. But then it hit me....the three prayers at some level involve my happiness. Real happiness, to the core of my being happiness the kind of happiness that keeps a smile on your face.

For so many years I haven't smiled. I do smile but not from the deep parts of my soul smiles.

Boldly I pray for my happiness....not my families happiness, not my friends happiness, not the churches happiness but for MY HAPPINESS!!! Heck I deserve it! To be able to be a Christ follower and follow what Jesus was telling everyone I need that happiness. That happiness will bring joy to others when I am able to share that.

What have I lost out in?

I think because I was so scared when I was younger I missed out on so much! Don't get me wrong I had some great adventures when I was younger and a few battle scars from them but I have the achy feeling that I have lost some kind of chunk of my life.

Could it be the chunk of meeting my future husband at the age of 19 and was with him until we divorced (that was close to 20 years of being together). I lost a huge chunk of time with someone that really didn't love me, someone who didn't think of forever and someone who didn't think twice of taking that time away from me.

There is so much I could have done....traveled, went to more parties, met more people.

Don't get me wrong, we did have a great relationship until things in our life changed. I have two amazing sons from the marriage and an amazing extended family because of it....but I do regret not getting out sooner, and moving home when it didn't seem he wanted to marry me.

I wonder what life would have been like if I didn't meet the 'man of my dreams' at 19. Where would I be? What would I have? Would I be happy?

I don't like living life in the 'should of, could of' world....I guess I have the next 40 or so years to really reclaim that time....