Gratitude

Everything in my life is filtered through GRATITUDE. It precedes every decision and follows every result.

This week was no exception.

This year, my teenagers both asked me to volunteer for the high school retreat. They told me I would love it and wanted me to experience it with them. The simple fact that they WANTED me to go was reason enough for me. A guaranteed yes.

GRATITUDE

Not only was I able to serve the HS SCA students and staff @yl_lostcanyon, but I got to do so alongside my R.O.D. partner for life @momeopathy!

Our days were full, busy, and sometimes chaotic. But in those brief windows of respite, we would take in the beauty and serenity of our surroundings. It may not have been a vacation, but time together (alone) is always time well spent.

GRATITUDE

Hero Origins

Every hero has an origin story. Likewise, every person has a back story. You know, the details of their life that predates when you met them. The back story is an intricate weaving of life experiences, social environments, family dynamics and emotional woundings that initiate a predetermined response to certain situations. What I find interesting is that sometimes we tend to enter situations unconsciously assuming none of those things exist in others.

• We may not realize a friend was bullied in middle school before telling a joke about kids teasing other kids.
• We may not understand why someone is sensitive to large crowds after being lost at an amusement park for 6 hours when they were 7 years old.
• We may even think it’s okay to drag a friend out into the ocean, laughing while ignoring their pleads and animated protesting, never asking if perhaps they nearly drowned a few years ago during a similar incident.

What makes things worse is when the ignorant and uninformed take umbrage at a person’s reaction without bothering to investigate their hypersensitivity. Sometimes we just need to exercise some restraint and compassion and perhaps get to the bottom of a matter. Perhaps then we might discover interactions that promote healing instead of hurt. Words that encourage instead of instigate. Perhaps we won’t find ourselves being unintentionally offensive.

Personally, I love hearing the back story. It gives me greater insight into a person and helps me appreciate them all the more. Who knows? It could be YOUR superhero origin. What’s your back story?

Results May Vary

You don’t know me.

And I don’t know you. I mean, not really.

You may know the things that I choose to reveal about myself. It’s usually the best parts of me (though I’ve been known to be quite transparent with the not-so-best parts of me as well) that I share. But if someone were to ask you to tell them about me, you really wouldn’t be able to rattle off much more than what I’ve listed in my profile. Sure, you could browse my blog or stalk my Facebook account, and maybe make a few guesses about what my taste in music or movies must say about me. But they would only be guesses. And more often than not, you’d be wrong.

For the longest time I’ve been rather careful about getting to know people and allowing them to get to know me. See, I have a history that includes a pretty severe wounding of the heart. So I’m not very keen on putting myself out there in a way that might reopen that wound. Unfortunately, my passions run deep and I tend to be, what one friend calls “emotionally progressive”. Rare in men, so I’m told. Among other things, this means that my heart can become vulnerable to the inconsiderate actions of others if I make an effort to get to know them. I’ve done that with very few people over the years. It amazes me how the pursuit of friendship can be liberating on one end, and weaponized on the other.

Interpersonal relationships should come with a standard label that states, “WARNING: Result may vary.”

Some of these people have become like siblings. Some of them are like my kids. And some of them are… well, something altogether different. But all of them have had an impact on me to varying degrees. My affections are at times painfully genuine. Sometimes to my own detriment. So I’ve learned to protect my heart a little bit more fiercely than I did before. It’s not that I don’t want people to know me, but sometimes I’m not entirely convinced I can afford to allow them.

I’m not a fan of heartache, confusion or misunderstandings. To avoid such calamity, it would make more sense to just keep everyone at arm’s length. It’s sad to me because many people I’ve met are deeply intriguing and I’d love to discover more about them. But this has brought me to the dispirited conclusion that the further away from them I stay, the less likely I am to get hurt if/when they implode.

I don’t know what bevy of circumstances has made them the way they are. They could’ve grown up in abject poverty, or could be the spoiled product of wealthy hands-off parents, raised by a bilingual nanny. They could be a recent parolee from a botched extortion attempt, or an as-yet-to-be-captured professional con artist. They could literally live across the street, or across the ocean. My point is that I won’t know them all that well, and they won’t know me. Unfortunately, past experiences have a tendency to make people gun shy. So I may never know them the way that I wish I could.

Hmm… I don’t even know what the point was of this post. Venting? Purging? Meh. That’s all I’ve got for today.

What’s Real

I used to wonder why people run to the scene of a car accident, or overload web search servers when the latest celebrity photo scandal breaks. But then I realized that it has more to do with the fact that we are drawn to situations that are outside of those to which we are accustomed. Car accidents happen, but they don’t happen to most people everyday. There’s a good portion of the population that are foolish, but 99% of us are not people in the public eye who decide to take naked pictures for our boy/girlfriend-of-the-week only to feign disgust when they sells them to TMZ.

Perfection should never be the goal.

What’s my point? My point is that what should be a simple 1 + 1 = 2 thought process is not computing for the masses. If our collective attention really is drawn to what is uncommon, atypical or rare (1), and people have long since mourned the demise of healthy marriages (+ 1), then why are some people uninterested (or so quick to dismiss) the discussion or promotion of successful relationship? (= 2).  We still focus on the relational train wrecks, the adulterous politicians, the bed-hopping socialites, and staged “reality” drama in the form of The Bachelor(ette)’s bevy of eligible (and some emotionally broken) men and women. Maybe it’s just a form of entertainment for people? A necessary distraction?

This is one of the reasons I purposely post stories about my marriage and my kids, because I believe that exposure to positive relationships has been completely overshadowed by recurring themes of hurt, fear, hopelessness, betrayal and despair. I do realize that we’ve all had bad experiences. Maybe it has to do with the old adage that misery loves company. Or perhaps people have such low expectations that they buy in to the belief that relationships are destined to fail.

In the past I’ve gotten private messages accusing me of making up the stories about my wife and kids. I’m like, really?? It blows me away. Honestly, I wouldn’t have the attention span to dedicate the necessary time to such an elaborate hoax. I barely manage to balance time to write here, work and invest in my family. A full time gig x3 for sure.

That being said, I am a huge proponent of promoting healthy relationships and will always encourage questions and responses on this topic. I don’t think we can have enough of them. I can’t speak for anyone else here, but I’m all about being real. REAL stories about REAL people experiencing REAL success.

As most of us have probably heard before, what you see is here is DEFINITELY what you get.

No life filters here.

Lights Out

As you can imagine with six (6) children, my wife and I are no strangers to sudden, unexpected situations. Whether it’s a flooded bathroom, the smell of burning LEGOs, or the sound of shattering glass (and subsequent crying children), it usually means that we can pretty much forget whatever plans we THOUGHT we had for the day.😏

Even so, there are still those rare occasions that surprise us. Times when something really catches us off guard.

Such was the case yesterday.

Countdown Timer

As we prepared for worship at our 5:00pm main service, there were a few technical difficulties that, while not earth shattering, caused the service to be ever so slightly delayed. With the countdown timer nearing zero, we were all on stage awaiting the familiar sound of the tempo click in our in-ear monitors that signaled the beginning of the first song.

With enthusiasm and lots of energy, the team began to sing in earnest from the top of our lungs and the bottom of our hearts! 😃

Worship Team

And then, in what seemed like an instant, everything in the building shut down with a loud “THUNK!”. All the lights, monitors, microphones, computers, and instruments went dead. It was like someone hit the breaker and cut power to the entire building. We were plunged into darkness. 😳

What happened next was nothing short of amazing and awe inspiring.

The worship leader, thinking quickly, signaled us and had the singers continue singing the current song without missing a beat. He then encouraged the congregation to join in. Before I knew it, most of the musicians had left their instruments and joined us at the front of the stage. And without instruments or amplification, we filled the room with the sound of magnified worship! It created an atmosphere of immersive praise that emanated from every part of the room! 😍

Pastor on platform.

We finished a couple more songs a cappella as the operations team sprung into action and setup flood lights through the sanctuary. Once we had a decent amount of light, our senior pastor took the stage to address the congregation. He thanked God for those who were gathered in the sanctuary, for the church staff who attended to the children, insuring all security protocols were met, and for the willingness of everyone to help where needed.🙏🏽

He then encouraged the crowd to move forward toward the stage so that everyone would be able to hear him. and with none of the usual fanfare or elaborate video introduction that typically transitioned us from worship to the sermon, he began his message.

What followed was one of the most undeniably intimate and impactful moments I’ve ever experienced at our church.

We found out later that there’d been a car accident that damaged a transformer and knocked out power to the entire area. Our pastor prayed that everyone involved was safe, and before he was halfway done with his sermone… the lights came back on. 🤩

We ended the service with an original song that was written by our pastor and one of the worship leaders, appropriately titled, “Trust In You”.