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  • We WILL Reap What We Sow…Why That’s Encouraging to Us

    We WILL Reap What We Sow…Why That’s Encouraging to Us

    Do we reap what we sow? I saw this on Facebook today and thought…hmmmm….do I agree with this?

    “One day all the hard work will pay off.”

    First of all, I think there are so many things wrong with this. If it’s not paying off today, I will not stick with it. How does keeping my lines bright pay off daily?

    1. It is paying off today in life change.
    2. It is paying off today in healing.
    3. It is paying off today in freedom.
    4. It is paying off today in integrity.
    5. It is paying off today in healthy eating.
    6. It is paying off today in peace.
    7. It is paying off today in automaticity.

    Wow!

    Automaticity, Peace, Integrity, Healthy Eating, Healing, Freedom, Life Change

    There are amazing daily rewards but, let’s be honest, we also want the scale to keep going down over time. That’s evidence that we’re making the right choices daily.

    We Reap What We Sow

    Galatians 6:7-9 says…

    “Do not be deceived, God is not mocked; for whatever a man sows, this he will also reap.

    “For the one who sows to his own flesh will from the flesh reap corruption, but the one who sows to the Spirit will from the Spirit reap eternal life.

    “Let us not lose heart in doing good for in due time, we will reap what we sow.”

    It’s the Both/And of We Reap What We Sow

    One day at a time…

    One meal at a time…

    God calls me to faithfulness to the law of His harvest.

    Sow daily.

    Reap in season.

    All of nature teaches us this. God will not be mocked.

  • Stop Comparison With Other Dieters

    Stop Comparison With Other Dieters

    We must stop comparison to have hearts full of joy and gratitude. But comparison is a companion to vanity. From our childhoods, we’ve heard this line and it’s insidious.

    “Mirror, mirror on the wall,

    Who’s the fairest of them all.”

    Comparison gets us nowhere. Comparison is one of the top joy thieves when we’re on a weight loss journey (and perhaps all the time). We look at our results and find that we are left wanting when whatever we’ve lost may not be as much as someone else’s loss. 

    And the results that we’ve had lose their satisfaction. We cannot be grateful. We are left wanting. Rather than operating from a full heart of gratitude, we feel like a child who isn’t getting her way. 

    Famously, Theodore Roosevelt said: “Comparison is the thief of joy.” 

    More importantly, the Bible says “We do not dare to classify or compare ourselves with some who commend themselves. When they measure themselves by themselves and compare themselves with themselves, they are not wise” (2 Corinthians 10:12).

    They are not wise! We are not wise to compare ourselves with others. We need to stop comparison. God has called us to our journey of integrity and self-control. (For me it’s Bright Line Eating). 

    The results will come. They really will. But it does no good to look at others and pine for their results.

    One day at a time. One meal at a time. One ounce at a time.

    Stop Comparison and Do This

    What’s the antidote to comparison? We come to a place of gratitude for what God is doing in our lives and in others’ lives. We “rejoice with those who rejoice; mourn with those who mourn” (Romans 12:15).

    “The more beauty we find in someone else’s journey, the less we’ll want to compare it to our own.” Bob Goff

    Prayer for Today: Dear God, thank You that your timing is perfect. Please help me rejoice with others instead of comparing myself to them. 

  • Shadow Family…Life in Our Step Family

    Shadow Family…Life in Our Step Family

    Our step family is a shadow of what once was. It is a specter of what could be. It is a reminder of broken shards of the families that could have been.

    Our step family is holidays with half our hearts. It is reunions with absent guests.

    Our step family is an imitation of what we think could have been. What should have been. It is an unreal comparison to perfection. It is a dim reflection of what we dream family should be.

    It is pain. It is grief. It is a cyclical reminder that we are not whole.

    Our children want what they once had. My kids want their father. They want their children’s grandfather. His children want their family before it imploded.

    And if we’re completely honest, we want the same thing.

    As much as we love and want each other, we long for wholeness. We want the dream…as though there is such a thing. We want what was intact before death and divorce shattered it.

    We want one holiday that is not a reminder of the separateness of the two sides of our family. We want one holiday that we manage without the awkwardness of relationships that were forged in the fire of loss.

    Grief is our guest at every family gathering because the people who should be here are not. We try. We ache. We grieve.

    We do our best. It is all we have.