choosing the good life.

It's late, actually 2 am early.
I've spent the last few hours tinkering around on my blog and I got stuck reading old blogs I've written.

Wow.
This has been a tough year for our family.
Bed rest, near-death experience, a move across the country, a new baby, continuing health problems, a new job for the professor, new schools for the kids, new neighbors, new church friends, an all around new normal.

It has been a trek.

I am amazed at the power my husband has been blessed with as he truly does my job and his.

I am amazed at how resilient kids are.

I am amazed at how kind people are.

I am amazed at life and the "great plan of happiness" that this life is an essential part of.

We are still in the midst of our trial and it is stretching.  I struggle to describe my real life to you without dwelling on the hard parts myself.
Really- my life is still very, very different from what it was.
My health is compromised and that affects everything.  We aren't back to normal yet... but, normal is coming.
I don't even want to focus on the hard stuff, because right now I am overwhelmed with the good stuff.

Can I just THANK YOU?!!
Thank you for reading this silly blog of mine.
I actually take pride in my awful grammar and blurry pictures.  

Sorry about that.
I always try to be real, so that you know that real is GOOD and BEAUTIFUL.

Honestly, I lay here tonight and my soul is overflowing with gratitude for the years we were in school and didn't have much money.
Because I KNOW that money isn't everything.  In fact, money isn't much of anything.
Family is everything.

I'm grateful for my health issues-- because I learned that our mental attitude is completely separate from our circumstances.
We CAN be happy and find joy in crummy circumstances.
Do you know why?  Because people are good.   We are surrounded by so many good people that we can always find something to laugh at or be grateful for.
Thank you for being my good during my hard.

I learned that FAITH is a CHOICE.
If I looked for miracles, I could always see miracles.
If I wanted to SEE God blessing me, I could see Him.
If I wanted to feel sorry for myself, blame God and feel alone, I could do that too.
Gratitude changed my reality.  

Faith is a literal choice I make daily.

I choose to believe in God.

I choose to be grateful.

I choose to SEE or focus on the good in my life in the midst of hard.

And, I have been blessed.

So, so blessed.

As I read my older posts, I felt the love I had for my little ones oozing through my poor punctuation.
When you don't feel good, kids are harder, more draining, work instead of play.

A mother's soul is a choice also.
We choose to love, even when we are tired, cranky and overwhelmed.
We mother because we love and we we love because we mother.
I know that you CAN choose to see the sweetness in a crying baby, even as you feel the weight of your constant responsibility.  

You can let yourself LOVE in the midst of the stretching.
Being a good mother is not instinctual-- it can be chosen.

Falling in love, true happiness in marriage, that is also a choice.
Years ago I learned the power in cleaving unto my spouse.
Why does the natural ebb and flow of life drag two partners apart?
I don't know.  

But, I do know that deliberate, purposeful, effort is required to seal two souls together.
LOVE is a choice.  Feelings follow actions. 

I am head over heels, blushingly, completely in love with a man that is just as imperfect as I am.
I am in love with him because I choose him, I pray to love him and to see him like God sees him.

I am loved by him because I LET HIM LOVE ME- even when I don't love myself.
He loves me when I'm hurting, he loves me when I'm scared, he loves me when I'm ugly... and I let him love me.

Loving is a choice, an investment.
Loving is physical and emotional and spiritual and mental.  It takes TIME.  It takes EFFORT.  It is so important.
We should love more.

Tonight, I am humbly grateful for the choices I have made.
Grateful I chose to keep this baby who was hard to get here.
I'm grateful I chose to SEE God in my life.
Because I am loved and blessed, we all are.  

Faith preceded so many miracles in my life.
I'm grateful that I loved my children.
I'm grateful for a marriage that is beautiful and strong and eternal.
I had NO IDEA how hard a really beautiful, blessed life could be.

In society today we focus SO MUCH on who we are.  We spend years analyzing our past, our DNA, diagnosing our problems, searching for a magic pill that can make us happy or smart or sexual.
We think bigger boobs, smaller thighs, better clothes, new furniture, more "me-time",a green smoothie, another self-help book is going to make life easy.
I just don't think so.

I think EFFORT is part of the equation.  Thorns, wrinkles, tired mothers, laundry, to do lists, health problems, money limitations, headaches these are ALL part of the plan.

We have to CHOOSE faith, choose to love, choose to cleave together in our nakedness...

We have the power to choose our destiny despite our journey.
Choice is a beautiful gift.
I am pro choosing.  Can I tell you how good it feels to SEE that I chose LIFE and it was a beautiful, good, VERY HARD, worthwhile choice?
Choose wisely my friends.
You are not alone.

(I've given you an iPhone picture glimpse into my real life.  Precious moments mixed with mountains of laundry, a messy counter top, spilled green smoothie and a garage awaiting order.  I'm not embarrassed to show you my real- because I believe life is a beautiful reality.)

I'm OFF the computer and ready to finish my laundry and clean my messy counter.
(Honestly, I already cleaned my counter yesterday after this picture was taken... my garage is still a mess.)
Life really is good, if we CHOOSE to see the good.

PS- If you have any desire to hear Eve "making music" as she discovers how to blow bubbles in her green smoothie, or hear her counting seven finger on her left hand, FRIEND me on FACEBOOK.
I posted a couple cute videos there and one of my long-time cyber friends said it was the first time she had never heard my voice before.  Go ahead, friend me.  I let you see my cut up stomach and my messy counter.  So, we really are friends anyway.