Lessons Learned from Sickness

A Handful of Things I Learned Whilst I Was Sick

1. You can easily drop eight to ten pounds in two days with a steady diet of gatorade, a carrot stick, and what-seemed-to-be-the-stomach-flu.

2. It doesn't matter if the air is on or off, the heat is on or off, the sheets are on or off… you're bound to wake up blazing hot. or freezing cold. or sometimes, half and half. at the same time.

3. If you google the symptoms for "stomach flu" and "food poisoning," they come out exactly the same. In the end, it doesn't really matter what labeling you have. You'll feel like death the entire time anyway.

4. The things you think about when you are sick are what matters the most to you. Seriously.

5. You can never pay your roommate enough for the loot of  lemon-lime Gatorade she brings home for you. It's a life saver. (which reminds me, Katie, how much do I owe you?!?!)

6. Make-up is not a daily necessity. It's a first-world problem. I started to appreciate myself more when I didn't bother with getting "all dolled up" for days.

7. The more you sleep, the better you'll be. Even if that means sleeping 20+ hours a day, go for it. Your body will thank you shortly.

8. "The Love of the Lord Endures" on endless repeat truly does uplift the soul. YouTube it.

9. To quote the girl at the drive-thru at Chik-Fil-A, "There's healing powers in our chicken soup." She's so right.

10. Saltines crackers aren't just for old people. or birds. (wait, can you feed saltines to birds?! hmmmph.) They're actually pretty tasty.

11. It doesn't matter how old you get, you should always have someone to take care of you and "baby" you when you're sick (like your momma used to do when you were sick as a kid).

12. If something is "bad" for you to eat when you're sick, wouldn't it also be "bad" for you to eat when you're healthy? I'm going to reconsider many food choices. Many.

13. Real, Godly friends who pray for you and check-up on you aren't a dime-a-dozen…. but I've got a good pocketful of them in my life. I'm oh-so-thankful to God for each of you!

14. Sickness causes crazy dreams at night and some hallucinations during the day. (and I didn't even take any medication)

15. I'm thankful God made me Who He made me to be. And I'm thankful He's given me back the energy to be exactly that… I've already been singing around the house and smiling my face off today. It's good to be back to "normal"! :-)

Faithful Wounds

Tonight as I was randomly baking cupcakes in my kitchen, God placed this verse in my mind and wouldn't let it get out of my head. (I didn't know the reference… so I googled it…)

Proverbs 27:6 - "Faithful are the wounds of a friend, but the kisses of an enemy are deceitful."

This thought led me on to think several things, actually.

One, I thought… do I have friendships that run so deep and friends that care so much for me that they will reach out and short-term wound me in order to long-term better me?? Though I only have one story to validate this is true, I would like to believe so about all of my close friendships. The hardest truths are oftentimes delivered by those that love us the most. Or at least they should be. 

Two, I thought… am I the kind of friend that this proverb calls for? The kind that would be willing to wound a friend by speaking truth into his/her life out of the love stored up in my heart for them. [No. matter. what. the. consequences.] Because I want to be. And I long to be. Though, I oftentimes feel and know that I fail to be.

Three, I thought… why do we run away from friends that wound and fall straight into the kisses of enemies? Seems kinda backwards, right? Crazy, even. But it's comfortable. Oh-so-comfortable. Scarily, complacently, comfortable. It's an easy place to live, but even after all of the justifications have been ironed out in our minds, we must reckon with the fact that it's dangerous.

Friends long for us to be at our best - even if it cost them something. Enemies long to make themselves their best - even when it costs us something. And sometimes, honestly, the lines between the two are so blurred that we can't even maintain 20/20 vision of situations and relationships right in front of our eyes. I've been there. We all have at some point or another in life.

After all that consideration, I ask of you to take action on a few points: 

Take a hard, long look at your life and inventory of your "friends." 

Who are the givers?

Who are the takers? 

Who are the faithful wound-ers, and who are the deceitful kiss-ers?

Be careful of those you write off due to wounds they've caused in your life. They may very well have been/are doing it out of the sheer love they have stored up in their hearts for you. [Granted, some people just hurt others because they themselves are hurting… but that's another situation completely.]

But more than that, be careful of those you keep ever-so-close to your life simply because it's comfortable.

To my dear friends who are reading this, I give you full permission to speak truth into my life. Speak the hard truths. Say the things that everyone is thinking, but no one is saying. Pray to God that my heart hears what your heart is communicating. After all, that's what I'm going to start doing more with the people God's entrusted into my life, as God leads.

At the end of the day, I simply want to be a better person, friend, and woman in the Lord. And this is just one small way we all can spur each other on to becoming better for God's ultimate glory, not to mention our own ultimate good.

And to think… all that introspection… just from a batch of cupcakes.

and a God that loves me too much to let even the 22 minutes of baking time go to waste. :-)

The Age-Old Question: "What did you do at school today?"

"What did you do at school today?"

Not only do I love that a majority of my students get asked that question on a rotating, regular basis from their parents. 

I love the natural responses kids give to their parents.

After teachers (much like my myself) have poured their blood, sweat, and tears into creative lesson plans, what message do children carry home with them?

Typically, one of two major reposes:

"Oh, nothing."

-or-

"The same stuff we always do."

While it's somewhat humorous, it's also kind of sad at the same time.

Humorous, because kids just make me smile.

And sad, because sometimes they're not equipped to see the long-term effects of daily lessons or practices. They just see the here-and-now.

Which reminds me….

I oh-so-oftentimes am taught spiritual truths not only by the Holy Spirit, but through the children God's placed in my life. And of course, I find that these two responses children give are very, very, very similar to the ones we sometimes convey to others about the days God gives us here on the earth.

Life is our classroom, if you will; and each day contains various creative lessons, trials, reviews, temptations, tests, etc. (you get the idea)

God literally gave us His all in the form of His Son upon the cross, so that we may even have life and  live it out abundantly…

We may not realize it at the time, but nothing is ever wasted in our lives. God uses all the lessons, trials, reviews, temptations, and tests for our ultimate good and His ultimate glory. Keep that in mind when you're telling others what (God helped) you learn today.

It's not nothing.

And it's not just the same old stuff on an endless cycle of repeats. (God's far too precise to waste the details of your life on meaninglessness.)

It's building up something inside of you.

Just wait.

One day, you'll need to use what you're learning now. (imagine that said in a teacher voice... you're welcome :-) )

And when that day comes near, you'll know exactly why.

I wonder….What did you do ("at school") today?

Safe.

Safe.

Sometimes, I like to keyword search songs in my iTunes collection.

Today, I decided to do so with the word "safe."

When I keyword-searched this, I came up with two surprisingly different songs…

The first was Safe and Sound (from the Hunger Games) by Taylor Swift and the Civil Wars, and the second was Safe by Phil Whickham.

If you haven't heard either, I highly recommend both. (Also, I recommend reading all of the Hunger Game series…. interesting reads, for sure.)

Though they're completely different artists and genres, I found it interesting that they both speak to the effect of running into someone else's arms in order to be safe.

To trust someone or something other than oneself.

There's no doubt that there's safety in numbers. and comfort in dependence.

And, might I add, there should be discretion in the choosing of such.

I just wonder...what/who are you banking on this year to make you feel safe?