• Book Reviews,  Marriage

    Love and Respect: A Book Review

    November 30, 2015

    I really like to read but never really make as much time for it as I wish I did. Over the past few months though I have been reading more than I normally do and I love it! The most recent book that I finished is called Love and Respect by Emerson Eggerichs and it was amazing. I first got the idea to read it off of another blogger who suggested it and I’m really glad I did- it taught me soo much. If you are someone who is in a committed relationship leading towards marriage, engaged, or even married I highly suggest you read this book.

    The book is broken up into three different parts and I want to just recap each part for you guys to see if maybe this is a book you might be interested in. The three parts were called: The Crazy Cycle, The Energizing Cycle, and The Rewarding Cycle

    T H E  C R A Z Y  C Y C L E

    In what Emerson calls “The Crazy Cycle” he explains how men and women are very different in the way that they see the world and what they want from the world. He explains how God created men to desire respect above all else and for women to desire love. We see everything based off of these desires and whether or not we are receiving these desires. He also explained how when women are not receiving love the way they react comes off as disrespectful to a man, and when men are not receiving respect the reactions they have come across as unloving to a woman. Even if neither the man or woman mean for the reactions to come across as unloving or disrespectful, Emerson explains that these natural reactions are just picked up by the opposite gender as this way. So this is what he refers to “The Crazy Cycle” because when a wive senses her husband is being unloving, she reacts in a disrespectful way which causes her husband to react in an unloving way and it just becomes a cycle of messiness. Emerson writes about ways to identify what type of signal you might be giving off so that you can be aware and stop the crazy cycle.

    T H E  E N E R G I Z I N G  C Y C L E

    The Energizing Cycle is the part where Emerson breaks down the needs of a man and woman and specifically writes out how a husband or wife can meet these needs. He calls this the energizing cycle because this keeps the couple in harmony because each spouse is meeting each other’s deepest need. Obviously we are still sinful people so this never works perfectly but it is super helpful. I never really exactly understood how to show respect or what Tommy really needed from me until I read this book. It opened my eyes to a lot of ways I can love and support him better.

    T H E  R E W A R D I N G  C Y C L E

    The Rewarding Cycle is what makes all of this important. Emerson explains how none of this would really matter if we were just doing this for ourselves or to get what we want from our spouses. He isn’t even good enough to just do it to make our spouses happy. Emerson explains that this is all important because it is what God commands from a husband and wife. Ephesians 5:33 says “However, each one of you also must love his wife as he loves himself, and the wife must respect her husband.” Emerson explains that when we obey God in this way it gives Him the ability to work in our marriages and gives Him the most glory.

    This book I thought was going to be an easy read but ended up taking much longer than I imagined but this was because it has so much information to get from it. It’s filled with knowledge that I wanted so desperately to soak up every word of it. I lent it to Tommy to read but it is definitely a book that I will probably read over and over because it was so helpful. If you are interested in how to love your significant other better and in a way that will most naturally appeal to them then I highly suggest this book!

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  • Faith,  Life

    Thankful

    November 27, 2015

    With Thanksgiving over now, I thought it would be fitting to write a post about being thankful. Makes sense right? The things that God has done and is doing in my life over the couple of years is amazing. And not just me- my family as well. I’m so thankful that we have a God that is willing to come down and meet us where we are and not only meets us there but lifts us up out of the darkness that we so often create for ourselves.

    I have to admit though, as far along as God has brought us, sometimes I can’t help but worry about what will happen next. The path that God leads us down isn’t always easy. There have been some really hard times over the past couple of years to get us to where we are today. There were a few times where I didn’t know what was going to happen next- times where I was so scared. But what I’ve learned through those times is that God is still there and he brings us through them even when we feel like we can’t go any further.

    The other thing I’m learning about myself is that I tend to thrive in the unknown as weird as that sounds. When things are scary I tend to cling to Jesus and walk super close with him because I know that He knows what to do and I trust Him to lead me. The times I struggle is when life is going really well. I tend to forget how much I need Jesus and His direction.

    When things are going well, I tend to worry about what will happen next. What will be the next bad thing to go wrong and that’s not how Jesus wants me to live. I want to live thankful for the good days and trust in Him to hold all things together and know that He will carry me through whatever bad things to happen to come. I want to be more thankful for the easy times and less anxious.

    I’ve been thinking a lot about thankfulness lately and one thing I realized about thankfulness is just there isn’t a lack of things to be thankful for- it’s just that we forget to be thankful. Period. That’s all.

    I realized that when we go on vacations- that joy that we get usually comes from being thankful. We tend to think that it’s from just being away from our daily schedule and relaxing, and that is definitely part of it but what I realized is that when we go somewhere new or somewhere we don’t go to often we look at the area differently. We purposely look for the good. We notice the blue, sunny skies, the beautiful features in our hotel room, the delicious food that was made for us. I believe our joy on vacation is deeply rooted in that- us dwelling on the good.

    When we come back home we forget to dwell on the (mundane) good things in our lives. What about that beautiful new countertop that you put in just last year? Or your wives delicious dinners that she prepares for you? It’s so easy to focus on the bad in our daily lives because we’re so used to a certain level of goodness but I wonder what would happen if we stopped to really dwell on each good thing in our days. Because really- each good thing is a gift from God. We might just be a people known for our joy.

    Join me over the next few weeks as I try to focus only on the good in my life. Let’s give thanks to the God who blesses us so abundantly.

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  • Life

    Mondays Are Hard

    November 23, 2015

    Do you ever have those days where you woke up but didn’t really wake up? Some days I just wake up extra tired and never get to experience that alert feeling after having my morning coffee. Today is for sure one of those days. I feel like I have fog brain and I can’t really concentrate on anything. Happy Monday to me haha.

    So instead of working I’ve spent the morning doing the following:

    • Searching Craigslist for a Jeep for Tommy
    • Catching up on my Bloglovin’ feed from what I’ve missed over the weekend
    • Rereading posts from one of my favorite bloggers
    • Texted Tommy about said Craigslist searching
    • Worried about where I was going to work after March 14, if you don’t know what I’m talking about check out this post here– if you’re interested
    • Also worried what people are going to think about another decision that I will have to make soon

    I know I’m making this day sound way worse than it is haha I just wanted to share what I’ve been up to though. Overall I have no real complaints, but sometimes (most times) Mondays are just hard. Though if you ask my boyfriend he’ll say Wednesday’s are harder. No way Jose.

    This Monday may be particularly harder though because I’m coming back from such a great weekend. I shared Saturday about my awesome day and yesterday I had a long and relaxing day with Tommy. How are your Monday’s going? Are they as rough as mine? (At least we have off this week for Thanksgiving!!) 🙂

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  • Life

    Feel Your Feelings

    November 21, 2015

    Just wanted to drop in and share a little about what’s going on in my life. Today I had a GREAT day. I’ve probably gone a few months without really seeing any of my friends because we all seemed to be really busy and our schedules never seemed to match up. So I was really excited to hang out with my friends today. I had a girl’s sleep over with my cousin Nichole last night, which was great because it was just continuous girl talk. So my morning started out hanging out with her and lounging, which is always awesome in my book. Once she left, I went to the mall with my other friend Brooke and got three new shirts woohoo. Now I have a shirt to wear for thanksgiving yay. I finally got myself to the gym after and I am now relaxing after making dinner for myself and my mom. Pure bliss. Ps. I’ve been spending time in my bible in the morning for at least the past five days and I really see this day as a blessing from God. I’m really starting to see the results of how putting Him first opens the door for Him to really give back to me.

    But anyway, that’s not the real reason I wanted to write this blog post. Those things were pretty awesome though. The real thing that I wanted to share is something I realized I was doing.

    What I realized was that I tend to be very emotional sometimes and I didn’t realize that I felt some shame in that. Girls are just known to be emotional and I think that’s how God made us to be honest. We just feel things very deeply and sometimes society puts a negative connotation on this. I didn’t realize, but I wasn’t allowing myself to really feel certain feelings I had. I would think about them first and decide if I was “supposed” to be feeling this way. First of all, how crazy is that? Who decided if we are or aren’t allowed to feel any certain way. There isn’t a right or wrong way to feel. But anyway, I realized I had let something that happened come between Tommy and I because I had never allowed myself to feel the feeling and accept it and move on. Instead I buried it deep down and it caused me to act in a negative way because I never came to peace about the situation.

    I wanted to write this post to encourage anyone who maybe didn’t realize they were doing this to think about it. Make sure you aren’t telling yourself you aren’t allowed or aren’t supposed to feel a certain way. There is no right or wrong way to feel and I think it’s important that we realize that. It’s important to accept however we feel so that we can work through the feelings and come to peace with whatever it is and move on.

    Does anyone else know what I’m talking about? Have you ever felt shame in a certain feeling? Maybe because those around you weren’t feeling that way or because society made you think that the feeling wasn’t okay? I’d love to know.

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  • Faith

    But First, Jesus

    November 17, 2015

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    You guys! I actually woke up extra early today to spend time reading my bible! A true miracle if you know how much of a morning person I am not. I even started this post after I spent time reading because I was so proud of myself and wanted to share. However, my day went quickly downhill after attempting to finish that post.

    I have a confession- I thought that I was being so good waking up early to spend time with Jesus. I thought that I deserved a good day after going out of my way to really put Jesus first and I’m ashamed that I let myself think those things.

    This morning, after I almost finished typing my blog post my computer froze and wouldn’t let me post what I wrote, I thought I was going to have so much time (since I got up early) and almost was late to work, I was extra cranky from being up at an earlier time than my body is used to (and am NOT a morning person, did I mention?). I started feeling guilty for expecting a great day after spending time with Jesus first thing in the morning.

    You see I have to admit, I haven’t been spending time reading my bible like I should be or as much as I wish I was. I desire to know Jesus more but seem to always have too many things to do to really sit down and study His word. I could feel things in my life shifting because of this too and I have been meaning to make it more of a priority. I had been thinking of getting up early and spending time with Jesus first thing in the morning for about a month now but what I didn’t realize was that part of me was doing it because I wanted a better life. I heard of people saying that spending time in the Word at the start of your day sets you off in a better mood. While I am sure this is true a lot of the time- I kind of forgot that Jesus isn’t here just to make my day better. That’s not His purpose at all actually.

    I’m the one that needs Him and it’s not to make my day better, although that usually is a byproduct of spending time with Him. I need Him to reset my desires for my life- to set my heart on Him and what He wants for my life. I need Him to remind me of how much He loves me because my weak unfaithful heart forgets that more times than I’d like to admit. I need Him for so many things and if I reduce Him down to just spending time with Him to “make my day better” I’m missing out on so much else He has in store for me.

    Just because I got it wrong this morning I am not going to give up. I do desire to put Jesus first in my life and a very real way for me to do that is to pursue Him first thing in the morning- to ensure that He is the first of my priorities. But the desire isn’t going to be because I want Him to make my day better. Jesus never promised us that. He promised us exactly the opposite- that we would have troubles in this life. But spending time with Him makes those troubles seem less significant and more manageable because I am reminded of His great love for me.

    I’m interested though- do you spend time with Jesus first thing in the morning or maybe right before bed? I don’t think there’s necessarily a right or wrong time to do it but I’m curious to know what you think about this topic.

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  • Faith,  Life

    Pending Merger: APPROVED

    November 10, 2015

    I normally have some sort of idea of what I’m going to write when I start my posts but today that is not the case. I have some news that I want to share with you all but don’t really have a format on how I want to share it or what I want others to get from this post lol. As anyone who has been reading along with my blog might already know, the bank that I currently work at has been pending a merger for over three years. We just found out about a month ago that the merger was finally approved, which meant that most people in the building I work in would be losing their jobs.

    When I first heard the news back in 2012 that I would be losing my job, it wasn’t quite such a big deal because I was only working part-time anyway. I was still in school and had health insurance through being a full-time student. Then the merger was postponed and I graduated from college and moved up in the company during that time. Right now I am the Imaging Supervisor and I do enjoy what I do but I always knew that there was a strong possibility of losing my job if the merger was approved.

    So hearing that the merger was approved about a month ago wasn’t surprising to me. I had a feeling that it was going to happen anyway so I never held too tightly to this job but have stuck around because I will get a severance check if I stay till the end. I just found out yesterday that my last day is going to be March 14th, 2016 and I’m both excited and annoyed about it. Most of the rest of my floor’s last day is December 31st, 2015 and I was really expecting this to be my last day too. I was getting prepared to have to look for another job starting the beginning of next year. The other bank that is merging with us is giving us health insurance for a year after our termination so I am not too worried about that, but one of my goals is to move out next summer and if I stay until March, this gives me a lot less time to look for a job before the summer. Although I am happy about having an income until then.

    I really am unsure about what I should do honestly- stay until March to collect my severance (which would help a lot with another one of my goals) or look for a job that is permanent sooner. So this is where I am, excited but confused about the possibilities ahead. It seems silly to have waited all this time to not wait it out and collect severance. Maybe God is just calling me to trust Him a little bit more- having a shorter timeline to find a full-time job but I’m really unsure about what is the right decision but I’m glad I just do not have to make the decision now. I’m going to spend some time in prayer and really seek out what God might have me do.

    Well this post was different for me but I really enjoyed it. I think I’ll write more about just what is going on in my life lately more often- especially since those are my favorite ones to read from other bloggers.

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