What's on your heart today?

I kept thinking this morning, as I was getting ready, what am I going to blog about today?  

And as I kept trying to force my mind to come up with a brilliant idea, the only thought that kept repeating was, "what is on your heart today?"  I tried to push that idea away many times, because there isn't just one thing on my heart, there are so many...

How could I even begin to narrow down all the things on my heart and mind today? But then I thought, why narrow them down? Why not share them? Because if we are honest with ourselves, we all have a lot on our minds and hearts and mental plates everyday!

Well, here's mine....getting in a walk today (which I have challenged myself to do daily, and haven't done for four days now), promoting the upcoming motherhood anthology "I Heart Mom" that I am a featured author in, which is coming out April 1st; continuing to work on my first nonfiction book, which includes publisher proposal, one sheet, new headshots, and more completed chapters to present to the publisher.  Ugh.  

And then there's family things, like single parenting for five days (when you are not used to that, it feels like a lot), finances, a very messy house, back pain, and so much more.

Okay, enough about me.  Like I said, I feel really confident that my readers all have plenty on their hearts today (and most every day) too.  So what are we to do about the sheer volume of thoughts and plans and chores and dreams that are on our hearts at any given time?

Psalm 26:2 

Test me, LORD, and try me, examine my heart and my mind.

If I consider my overwhelming days, tests from the Lord, I tend to learn a lot from them!   I don't know about you, but I definitely need occasional reminders of what is most important in life.  Our overwhelmed schedules eventually force us to choose.  To choose what to make time for, and what to let drop.  To choose who to care for that day or week, and who can handle things on their own...

I find that these "tests" from the Lord, constantly cause me to "examine my heart and mind", and re-ground myself to the priorities that I have chosen in my life.

My priorities are things like, my children, my ministry, my church volunteering....

Take a moment to "examine your heart and mind", and refresh your priorities....... 

Those priorities are likely treasures, the true and immeasurable blessings, that God has gifted you with.

Matthew 6:21 

For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.

I believe that God wants us to search each morning, as to "What is on our hearts today"?  But then,

as we prioritize in this crazy busy life, we must constantly and continually compare what is on our hearts, with where our "Treasures" in life lie.

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The points, in that lengthy list that is weighing on our hearts, where our treasures collide with the 'lists'; those are the blessings to keep on your heart and mind today.

Let's narrow down that list, one day at a time! 

What's on your heart TODAY? 

Hugs & Blessings to you all!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Available April 1st!
A Motherhood Anthology, "I Heart Mom"

Motherhood... one word that can mean so many different things.
We have brought together 20 amazing authors who have shared their real experience with motherhood; their truth in the most honoring of ways.
Real struggles
 Real sacrifice
Real-life situations
​Get ready for the realities of realmotherhood to rock your world!

Email me to Reserve your copy today!  
frommylifetoyourheart@gmail.com

What's this all about Lord?

Have you ever had a Time in life when you know that God is trying to tell you something, but you can't define what? 

You wonder what the signs are supposed to be. Or are they even signs? 

Well, here is my odd predicament that I just can't figure out...

It has been going on for years too. 

It started about eight years ago, when my husband and I took our first trip without the kids. We planned everything to a T (in my normal, perfectionist manner) but while in Mexico, one of our lined up caregivers got pneumonia and ended up in hospital. One of my largest memories of that time in Mexico, was worrying about my children, because my plan for them did not work out. I also worried about the caregivers, that they would burn out. (cause my kids were young, and a handful! :) )

The enjoyment of the trip was definitely squashed by this inconvenience and added worry. That was the first time, and I didn't think anything of it... 

Then......wait, that is not entirely true, my husband and I did say on the way home from that trip, "maybe we are not supposed to travel without the kids." 

So, the next time that we tried, four whole years later, we left on a bus trip to an NFL game. 

Wouldn't you know it, our first night there, one of our children fell and bit through his tongue. I still remember the phone call, with the child crying and in pain, and about the blood... We had taken a bus to our destiny, so there was no running home early. So once again we sat through the remainder of our time away, worrying about the children. 

And the time away that was supposed to fill our souls on that break, was unattainable. 

Again, we said to each other once home, "we really are not supposed to go anywhere without our kids"... 

Then, I kid you not, almost exactly four years later, we bravely decided to give it a try again... 

We bought tickets for a wonderful live concert, and booked non-refundable hotel rooms.  This time, the travel was just to the other side of our state, so that we wouldn't be too far away. In case the inevitable might happen. 

Unfortunately, this 3rd try was just last weekend.  And wouldn't you know, on the day we were supposed to leave, we had a child on his 6th day in bed with influenza; on his 6th day of a high fever.  And it didn't look very promising that he would miraculously snap out of it once we left... 

So, we very reluctantly cancelled our trip. We tried everything that we could too cancel the hotel, but knew it was non-refundable when we booked it.  We also tried every method known to us to sell the expensive concert tickets, starting 48 hours before the concert, and still no luck. 

There were seats at that awesome concert with no one in them. 

Now, these things that happened, the injuries, illness, and money lost, are not that big of a deal. They certainly aren't major life events or anything.  But they were enough to dampen our trips, in different ways each time.

And what about the consistency; every four years we try again to go on a trip, and every time, something happens to decrease our enjoy-ability or to make the trip unrealistic all together. 

What is that about? I find myself on this, "third time is the charm", round, of this repeating life story....   I keep wondering, what the heck is God trying to tell me? What message am I supposed to be getting from this repetition of events? 

There's got to be something, right? Is it that I'm not supposed to leave my children behind? Is it that I'm not supposed to spend money on trips, and God wants me to stay home and give away more of my extra? 

Is it that my husband and I are supposed to learn how to reconnect and renew within our own home or our own town? 

I don't know. But I do know that it has been frustrating!

So I looked into God's word to see if I could find an answer there...

Proverbs 16:9

"In his heart a man plans his course, but the Lord determines his steps"

In Matthew 16:24, Jesus insists that if anyone has a plan to follow Him, "he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me".

Dave Keehn says in his Blog post titled When God Changes our Plans, "That is why, when God changes my plans, I must refocus my mind, asking what is God's design for this moment"

And Dave Keehn concludes, "When God changes our plans, look for His blessing of something new and unexpected.  While the pain of loss may be very real, God's grace is sufficient to carry us into His next steps for our lives."

Well, those are beautiful passages, and although they make me feel a bit better, they do not explain to me the reason why.....

But, I remain convinced, that there is a reason for these repetitive occurrences, and in God's time, He will reveal the lesson to me!   

In God's time, He will reveal the lesson to me!                                   Click to Tweet

In the meantime, at least I have developed a new level of appreciation for God's timing, and I wait, expectantly, to find out what His plan has in store for me (and my family) next!