A Matter of Perspective

I can hardly believe it is almost fall! The weather this week has shocked me into that reality and I am finally embracing it. Much to the dismay of Darek, I turned the furnace on yesterday. It was 66 degrees in the house, and I was working from our basement office which is even colder! Brrr! I will add that I did wear my slippers and a sweater, and eventually wrapped a blanket around my legs to keep warm before I finally caved. My heated seat and heated steering wheel came in very handy, as I waited in the pick up line for the kids at school! The day prior, I thought I would simply use the space heater in our office and that would be sufficient for the day. It was sufficient, until it blew the circuit breaker, and I quickly decided that I was not about to do that all fall. Haha! 

ANYHOW... I spend a lot of time in thought these days. I used to let my mind run wild with so many things of no importance whatsoever. I am now working very hard to intentionally think on things that matter and are of use. Retraining our thoughts is not a quick process, but it can and (for most of us) should be done. We allow our minds to wander to places of discontentment, stress, anxiety, fear, and we sit on the what if's far too often. This is all so negative and has no place in our lives other than to bring us sickness. Countless studies show that these negative thoughts and emotions have high correlation with chronic illness, cancer and other disease. It is up to us to choose to change our thought patterns. This is exactly what I am now working on. There are neural pathways in the brain that will change if we intentionally change the pattern of our thoughts, allowing us to remain more positive and less stressed.

Here's how it works. The next time a thought pops into your head that you wish would stop, or that is bringing you stress, force yourself to think of it in a positive light, or change the thought altogether. If you fear that lightening may strike you down, every time that thought begins, think of the rainbow after the rain (or literally any other thing that makes you happy). Over time, doing this repeatedly will created a new pathway that will associate that original thought with something positive and happy, and allow your brain to heal from stress, anxiety, fear and whatever you struggle with.

I was talking with my dad the other day about his birthday, and he mentioned that he forgot he was having a birthday. Now, if you know my dad, you know that his birthday is the most celebrated holiday of the year (in our house). HAHA! He even made a song about his birthday, which he would begin singing from his half-birthday, all the way up to his actual birthday every year. I, on the other hand, began struggling with celebrating getting older after about the age of 25. Why? I am not exactly sure. Selfishly, I have SO MANY dreams that I want to realize, and I feel like with every passing year I am losing my grip on them. However, I have an entirely different perspective on birthday's now. I celebrated my 38th birthday in May, and I will celebrate 38+ more birthday's. Once you have a wake-up call like I did in March with my Stage IIIa Colon Cancer diagnosis, you begin to realize what really matters in life, and you begin to value things differently. Along side this birthday revelation, I was thinking about how so many of us question why things happen. I begin to think differently about this. Instead of questioning WHY things happen, what if we praise God for protecting us from 'who know's what' that could have happened instead. Instead of doubting God's goodness, what if we shift our perspective to thanking God for the many, many good things we have already received. Even if our current situation is SO HARD, and feels like it is consuming us, what if we looked around and noticed how incredibly blessed we have been before, during, and / or through the trials we face. It is all about the lens we choose to view life through.

I am seriously in awe how complex we are as human beings. God created us in His perfect image so we don't have to be trapped by the "things" of this world. We are not meant to live in fear. We are not meant to be sick. We are not meant to live in lack or suffering. He has given us every good and perfect thing we need, and every instruction we could ask for to live our lives in health, peace, and prosperity.

I know that I am thankful God has given me an opportunity to share His goodness, love, and saving grace with the world. I am blessed beyond measure to have a devoted, loving husband and three healthy, beautiful children who love the Lord and love their family and friends. I am so blessed to have a gigantic community of believers praying for me and for my family. I am incredibly thankful that I am able to pen word to paper that might help build people's faith, or give them hope. This is my desire!

Let's continue to work on changing our perspective. Let's be good-finders! I'm in it with you.

Until next time,

~Steph