Attitude is Everything

Okay, life is hard. I know it. To be honest I've lived through a house fire (lost everything), then a tornado (practically lost everything) and then at age 41 I lost my husband. In other words, he died. Life is going to throw you a lot of curve balls. It does it to everyone; their own unique trials and tribulations. Some people say being strong is the way to handle these situations. I differ on that aspect.

I believe the way to get through all the messes in life is to alter your attitude. Let's face it; attitude is everything. I'd much rather be around a person who has a positive outlook on life than the pessimist. Pessimists zap your energy and leave you feeling much worse than when you found them. Now I don't believe people should fake it and be little miss sunshine when chatting with someone in a real crisis. Don't be a phony. But looking at the bright side has always been my choice over whining or delving in self pity. I suppose I like to keep the tears at home.

I cried when I lost my home twice. I bawled like a baby. But that can only last so long. I guess I'm more grateful for the giving souls who came along to help. I live in a great part of the country where people will come out of nowhere to help when the bad times arrive. That's a wonderful blessing and can easily change a person's outlook. But when my homes were gone, I still had my husband and sons. That made it easy to be appreciative and I had help to get through those times. Losing a husband is a different story.

I was completely lost when my husband had a tractor accident. I got up, went to work and never saw him again. It's an amazingly painful thing to go through. And to top it off, I had no real confidant. I had friends, family, neighbors, but I lost the most important person in my life. Since then I've met many others who have gone through the same situation. There's nothing easy about it.

The first year alone was definitely the worse. I had to do everything by myself. I learned to mow, drive long distances alone, make new friends... The list goes on and on.  What I didn't realize as I was going through that rough year was that God had my back. He was helping me become the person I was to be. It was a horrifying time, but I did it. I'm still doing it. Life goes on. And what helped me the most was attitude.

I sit here today and enjoy having freedom to make my own choices. I still know my decisions can have repercussions, but I've accepted that responsibility. And I know I'm responsible for how I respond to others. I know I can help build them up or be part of tearing them down. Honestly, I'd rather be a builder. It comes back to attitude. How am I going to respond when I have the option? I am still working on it, but I want to be a builder. How about you?

Life is like making rolls

I have been talking with my aunt lately about food and things we eat. I've also done some research of my own. I read that real food is better for you than eating processed food. My aunt agrees. She talks about the evils of high fructose corn syrup and specific types of artificial sweeteners in sodas. She makes a good point. I've read items that talk about the same thing.

Really, I am going somewhere with this. Lately, I've been making a real effort to make my own food. Many things aren't hard. I'd rather make biscuits from scratch than buy them. To me it's easier and tastes better. I do the same with cornbread, spaghetti and chili. Have I noticed a difference? Maybe. That's the best answer I can give. Does it stop my pursuit? No.

Yesterday, I saw some yeast at the grocery store and thought it would be easy to make some bread, pizza crusts, something. Today, I started a roast in the slow cooker. After one time of cooking it on low for many, many hours and tasting it; I told myself I'd never cook it on high again. It was so tender and delicious. I decided it was time to put my yeast to good use.

Now let me explain that I have made homemade bread before, but that was many years ago and I was much younger. I found a good recipe for "Old Plantation Rolls". The photos looked good and the directions, not too hard. I pulled out the ingredients noting that I was getting low on sugar. Real low. I mean I scrapped at the bottom of my canister to get enough. So I just followed the recipe doing this and adding that. My clean kitchen became a mess of flour and dough parts, but that's just part of the fun, right?

And I sort of patiently waited through the rising process. Yeast is so finicky. When I got to the kneading process I started with gusto. I mean I wasn't a newbie when it comes to kneading. Four minutes of effort and my arms start aching. I mean I was feeling it good. I chalked it up to being old and out of practice. But I'm supposed to do this for 8 whole minutes. Crap! Surely those other bakers don't work as hard as I do. I did as much in 4 minutes as they do in 8. Nonetheless, I kept going. After that rising and rising.

As I'm typing right now half of my rolls are in the oven while the other half is waiting in the freezer until the day I decide to break them out. Will my rolls be good? Yes! What have I learned? Well, our lives are like making rolls. There's planning, preparation, just the right temperature, but the most important part is just plain hard work. So what are you going to do with your life? Are you putting in the effort to become the beautiful final product you were destined to be? Or is it too much work? Everyone has problems. Are you giving them to God to work out and concentrating on what you can change? I'm slowly learning many new things, but the most important one is to worry about what I can change and that's my attitude. God be with you!

Frame your words with kindness or at least objectivity

Lesson 1:

I began Lent with what I thought was a good plan to give up unnecessary criticism of people. It sounds proper and better than giving up some type of food or beverage item. What I didn’t realize at the time was how ingrained I was to put down people for fun. It’s a terrible revelation to admit, but it’s true.

Now as a teacher, I have to give feedback and prevent misbehavior, but there’s a productive way to do that and a destructive way to go about that.  It’s so easy to be mean, but hard to be thoughtful. What has happened? How did I let myself get pulled into hateful comments just so I could get laughs? I’m not a comedian. And it’s not the best way to joke.

As I take this journey, I want to share some of my insights and probably shortcomings in the hopes of being a kinder, gentler person. My first problem came when I was discussing a former coworker. And I can be vicious about other teachers. And before I knew it, a mean comment came right out of my mouth. How does that happen? I think through practice. As a teacher, I know my students have to practice problems over and over to get it right. And I’ve been practicing bad behaviors and boy, do I know how to get them right. And I’m fast, too. It came out of my mouth before I even had time to think.

I left the situation and went out and prayed. And yes, God spoke to me. “Go and sin no more.” I came back and said something nice about that person. Actually, I just changed the way I said my previous statement. That’s all it took; an attitude adjustment. It was how I said my statement as much as the statement itself. 

Check back for more insights as I work through Lent 2013.

And thanks for checking me out!