Enthusiasm and Encouragement

Enthusiasm and Encouragement Episode 428

If you lack enthusiasm and encouragement you are not alone. I believe the understatement of all time is that life is not what you planned. If you could talk to your younger self, what would you say? Are you anywhere near the person you use to be? The person that was fun, enthusiastic about life, and couldn’t wait to get up in the morning? Well, it is time to reclaim that person, and if that does not describe the younger you, no worries, the new you will be even better.

Check out my website at MediaAngels.com and MediaAngels.com/books and the products in my online store now available for shipping – and stay tuned, I will soon have information about Creation Kids Classes as well as the Creation Camp for kids I hope to offer. The notebooks are available in digital form for you to use for your own children on the website, but more is coming. If you don’t want to miss out be sure you are signed up for our mailing list where new character planners are still be created each month. This month’s topic happens to be Enthusiasm. When you miss the free planner, you can purchase it in our store.

So, back to you! Are you ready to change and before you turn off this podcast hold on…there are no twelve steps to follow or even two or three, but there is one thing and I’ll share that with you in just a minute. First, I want to talk to you about, well you. Moms especially are the ones that handle the management of a family. We are the ones who hold it together in a crisis, school the kids, and take care of the home and all that entails. In fact, we do more than most CEOs of Fortune 500 companies. And, we are supposed to do it with a smile.

When I look at the reasons I often “lost it” for lack of a better descriptive word… meaning, I yelled at my children and often was upset with the way they handled everything from school work, to helping with chores–I found that the children’s disobedience increased. It did not decrease. When I was upset they were upset and I often set the tone for what happened each day.

Moms and Dads… because they play a role too, there is no class on how to be a good wife, husband, mother, father or balance work and home. There is no one perfect and definitive guide that gives each one of us every specific thing we need to do, a box to check off in order to find that happiness and family peace we all crave. And, even if there was, how much would you really embrace. If you read twelve points there are often six that you are thinking, “You have got to be kidding me, there is no way!” One of the reasons that many self-help books do not work is because if you are a thinker, and most of my audience is — we think for ourselves, we are wired in such a way to do things as others want us to do them. We, or I anyway, want to do things my own way. Think about this, is there a book or even a friend who has tried to help you in some way.

I remember as a young mom having a wonderful mother-in-law who kept a nice clean house, cooked meals from scratch and showered and had make-up on before her husband returned from…well, wherever he was because my father-in-law was retired by the time I married my husband. I had just finished two years of teaching and was staying home to raise my son. She had plenty of well-meaning and valuable advice to give me. But I am not a regimented person. If I had to follow her schedule that meant waking up each Monday with the thought that it was vacuuming and dusting day and I probably would want to roll over and stay in bed to avoid it. I cleaned, when I saw that it needed to be cleaned, and having a tiny house back then it was easy to do within an hour when the baby slept. I remember being miserable because I had no outside interaction after years of stimulation from friends, college life and even working life. I had to realize my priorities and began to make the best of everything.

I was blessed to have a husband who was very happy to be married and have a child at home when he arrived from work. He took a job he detested just because it paid well and soon, praise you, Jesus, we had our own company, which he still works at to this day. Before we married he told me how he spent much of his middle and high school years being unhappy. Once in college he made a decision that he was going to chose to be happy and make the best of whatever happened. The person I know today is usually a very happy person and has a smile for everyone – I can not imagine him unhappy. That person he described is not at all the man I know today. And he made a decision. For him it was that easy.

Of course we know that no one can be happy all the time, but we can all figure out how to make the best of a bad situation. His one decision not only changed his life – but everyone around him. He decided to dwell not on the negative but the positive in life.

And, that is the key. If you see a glass that is filled with water to the middle line do you think it is half-full or half-empty? If you can start seeing things as half full then this philosophy will truly change your life! When is the last time you laughed without reservation or the last time you woke up excited to start the day? Where is that enthusiasm and excitement about what is planned? Well, that is going to change and it begins today.

Every single person has a list of all the things that are going wrong in their life and I’m sure if I asked you to write them all done you’d fill at least one sheet of paper, but what if I asked you to fill in a sheet of paper with all the good that is going on in your life? A friend of mine recently posted that his home is falling apart, literally. The foundation is off, the interior needs major work, the plumbing, and even electrical systems have issues and I believe he said there was mold in the home. In addition, he recently posted about a freezer full of food that just broke and the washer and dryer not working and they have quite a few children. It made me think that sometimes we confuse our problems with a loving God who does not hear us and this is very far from the truth! These things are not an issue if you have money to make these repairs or replace whatever is broken, but for those that struggle? Well, it remains an issue.

God does hear us every single time, but we tend to be putting out fires daily instead of getting a sense that we can handle what life throws us… Whatever it is you are struggling with I am sending you a virtual hug. I am at a place in my life where I am finally living a dream I had so many years ago when I had not time to talk to moms because we were all homeschooling, and park days were far and few between. Now I can talk to you – sure it is a one-way conversation, but I know many of you online and that is where we share our hearts.

What is your passion? It may not be realized this second, but again, God knows, and maybe someday you too will be able to fulfill this ideal. My main passion has always been my faith, my husband and caring for my children,, and homeschooling. Homeschooling was never my choice, it actually picked me, but I can not think of any way I could have better spent thirty or so years of my life, that my friends are the total number of years I spent homeschooling my children. God gives us one day at a time, take that one day or maybe that five-minute break in your life and find some way to be grateful.

Please know there are thousands of hours of podcasts on this network that will enrich and engage you in a way that I pray is beneficial and helps! Thanks for joining me! Find me on social media – I’d love to chat!