Getting to Humility

Oh, sigh. I haven't kept up with this dang ol' blog like I said I would. I said I'd use Facebook less and write here more and I haven't. Can I have a do-over? I want to try to work on this more in the new year.

A friend of mine said this today on and about Facebook, "So what's the long-term plan here? Do we keep posting updates, witticisms, and links to videos for the next 60 years?"

He usually has very thoughtful, out of the blue remarks like this that make you think. It made me think. I guess technology makes anyone think about how long it can really endure. The thing with this social media stuff is that everyone wants to be important, and it's so easy to be the center of attention... for the duration of time until more people also want their center of attention and it pushes your precious news away. Thing is, there's only one center  :•)  and we can't all have it. I think I've discovered that Facebook makes people too self reflective and self centered, the ones that use it too much like myself. I think it's better to have humility. Facebook makes it almost impossible to be humble. 

The other thing is, do we ALL really need to be so connected? I think about who I actually chat, phone, or visit in person the most. Do these people matter or mean more than everyone else? It's a good question, and it's hard to feel like you're being exclusive. If I were to answer that though, I would say Yes, those people do mean more to me, because they reciprocate the closer connection initiative. New people can join the initiative too, of course.

Anyway here is my honest attempt, people. I'm going to start thinking and writing about my life rather than segmenting it in short meaningless instances that drown amongst other people's cries for attention. I won't remove myself totally from the Face of the book. Only big news, I think, will be re-shared there.. and I'll keep up my one•little•m page, because that helps business for me :•)

Okay now! I wrote this down, so now it has to happen. Lemme just go tell Facebook I'm going on hiatus ha. Baby steps...

Might Need Notecards..

This Friday we are taking the day off to go to the Financial Peace University HQ in Franklin, TN to do our debt free scream live on the Dave Ramsey radio show. You can listen for us from the website here. I don't know what time we'll be on air, but you might just get something from listening to the entire show as you wait for our cue, *wink, wink*.

So of course ~ I'm nervous! Jon will do most of the talking, because he's good at that. Usually Dave asks the wife "What was the hardest part about getting out of debt?" So I've been pondering this question for about a month or so. I want to give a good answer (so I'm writing this post as a sort of practice run).

On the surface, getting out of debt wasn't really that hard for me. I've been used to living frugally and giving up things to save a buck here and there. Initially it was hard for me to accept that we wouldn't be moving from our little apartment after we got married into something larger and more centrally located. But we chose to use those funds to achieve Freedom sooner. Cable was a piece of cake to give up. We realized quickly how rich our time together was without it. My drive to work, well. It's still kind of intolerable. I guess it's been hard for me to step out the door every morning without whining about the drive. But I realize sometimes the space between events on a busy day is nice. The drive is a forced detachment from the rest of the day.

So those are the things I've dealt through without much difficulty. The difficult thing was more in relating to others... And not just in the sense of turning them down to go out to eat or something. For me it was feeling like being viewed as limited and unable, in a perceived state of living like poor college students for some unspecified or forever amount of time. People focus on what seems from the outside : that we can't afford things, that somehow we're in need of aid. We are not in need of aid, and we CHOOSE not to afford certain things in order for that money to make a bigger difference in an area that matters more.

Why care what others think? Usually I don't. But for this I care that they don't understand us, and that I'm discouraged by their close-mindedness to new ideas that could change their lives as well. I'm discouraged by their disinterest in helping themselves.

It's almost like being in a rocket headed for amazing blessings and success, and watching the other people pass by, amazed maybe, but not along for such a fun ride. I want them all to experience the fun ride!

So that's been the difficult thing for me. Struggling with misunderstanding, trying to be an example while still amongst our mess.. until the payoff  :•)  So I really want our being debt free to encourage others to know it's possible for them personally.



Annnnd, I have no idea how to say all that in person! Maybe I should just read my blog on air haha. Or just be like.. "umm, something.. understanding.. abstract, thingamabob... Back to you Jon!" Just kidding. I'll figure it out. But I'm definitely bringing a note card!

Grandmother's Rose

My talented sister took this photo of Jon and I in Coolidge Park during her visit with my family over Labor Day weekend. The necklace I'm wearing belonged to my grandmother, who passed shortly after Mother's Day this year. I feel very blessed to have received such a lovely gift! It has to be my most favorite (pre-) birthday present ever. I remember her wearing this necklace a lot and I always loved it. It's not very visible here (which I hope to remedy with a detail shot soon) but it's a dainty little rose carved into pearl, hanging on a very delicate chain.

I really miss my grandmother. Since her death I've had dreams about her regularly ~ once a week it seems... All very wonderful where the both of us (sometimes with my grandfather) are sitting together, just talking. I feel as though I have more time to be with her now than I had while she was living during her later years, with our distance between Missouri and Tennessee. 

I don't think we can really control our dreams, but I'm thankful for these and I hope they continue. It's very special to me. 

Freedom!

We finally made it! We are 100% completely DEBT FREE, as of August 8, 2011!!  It's been a long road - but through sacrifice, communication, determination and taking on as much extra work as we possibly could, we paid off about $52,000 in 26 months!!

I've been thinking about how I want to summarize this experience ~ but my husband did such a great job doing so on his new blog so I'll let you read his. But I will say, I am very much looking forward to finally moving on in life, and always doing so while applying the principals we've learned from Financial Peace University, which has immensely affected our lives, and I hope it shows.

What's also exciting to me is the ability to share our achievement, that hopefully it will encourage others that it can be done in a very real and effective way, no matter how big the numbers may seem. Living the way our society tells us to live in many financial aspects is really kind of a scam, that most of us are unaware of unless you actually assess the numbers associated with it.

"Be not conformed to the traditions of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind." Rom 12:2

"Owe nothing to anyone, except for your obligation to love one another." Rom 13:8

I'm very excited to employ these ideas into my life, and I can't wait to see how much fun it will be :•)

Jumbled

Wow. It's incredible the things you don't remember about yourself sometimes as you get older. I was just looking through the old blog I used to keep at xanga.com/melllisssima. I used to write about the most pointless of pointless things. Mixed in with some point-ful things ~ such as the day my husband first found me there, on September 8, 2006.

Back then I wrote a lot about stress, school, funny things with friends, and weird things that somehow came to my mind while I was bored. I had so much fun with it though.

This current blog definitely has less of that feeling to me. And I don't post to it as often as I did with my old one. I don't seem to CARE as much. Am I less inspired by things? Are new ideas and concepts that much farther in between now?

Sometimes I feel I've become more cynical about things. I'm not sure of the cause. What if it's Facebook? I read a status posted by Chris Maier there that really made me think. He asked:

"is there more or less emotional responses to be experienced now that a large amount of time is spent communicating through technology. Let's say we were talking in person and different things like body language......, atmosphere, surroundings, etc. subconsciously factor into that experience of conversing. In a text or email, the only thing that exists is the text and what we try to read into it. Will there be less options for us to react by due to this simplification of our communication?"

I definitely think this media and other technologies has slowly been taking over something within our souls lately. It's become so all-consuming and "necessary" for communication. But it's cheap communication. As Chris mentioned, while in a group with folks when a question is posed, someone instantly will whip out a smart phone and locate the definite answer right away - leaving no room for a healthy, human discussion on the matter.

What have we done to ourselves?

I believe I'm being affected by it too. Not via smartphone, as I refuse to be THAT connected as the person with their face in a tiny screen all the time. If I'm seeing you in person, I don't want to see your face being illuminated by the deathly glow of a device. If I could ever have a large group party at my future home one day, I would have a basket as people come in that says "drop your device here, or go outside to use it" ha.
 
Perhaps I need to feel more loneliness. In the past I have often taken to writing when I felt alone. I was still writing online where others may see it, but I wasn't surrounded by hundreds of other folks doing the same in a briefly thought-out statement about what they were feeling at any particular time. I take too much of my empty time to be online: checking up on other people and trying to maintain certain (shallow) relationships through the Facebook medium.

How do you keep up with a lot of relationships at once though? Facebook makes that so easy. I've struggled with relationships in general a little lately though. I've written about how friends moving on to other life stages beyond the one I'm in has taken a toll on how closely I can relate to them anymore. It has become very shallow trying to be everyone's friend, too. I've lived in Chattanooga for nearly 4 years now. If you asked me who my "best" friend is (other than my husband) I couldn't tell you. 

When I think of a best friend I think of someone who calls you out of the blue just to talk about nothing, or to ask if we can get together one on one. Who will drive 30 minutes to your place to hang out with you on a regular basis without complaining about the drive. I don't have a best friend anymore, but I used to. Erin McGuire was my best friend through college. I really miss being in her town sometimes.

Maybe I shouldn't worry about relationships so much. Maybe it's okay to only have shallow relationships with people; that I'm just not accustomed to it as I've always had either a best friend or a sister actually present to share things with.

This post feels really jumbled to me. I think it's an indication of how I feel about it all.

A Sight for Four Eyes

I have to blog about my dear husband getting contacts yesterday. Somehow it feels momentous! I mean, when I got them in the eighth grade I thought "This is the best thing everrrr!" When you're older I guess it doesn't tend to weigh as much. But I think it does  :•)

I went in for my exam, without my contacts in, which is very dissociating talking to the doctor without being able to see his face, heh. My vision is like a weird dream that looks like a Monet painting. It's incredibly poor. - 7 in each eye now, which apparently was the worst the optometrist had all day! Most people are between 3 and 4, he said.

Anyway. I get my new contacts in and wait in the waiting room while Jon goes in. I hear him chatting away with the assistant as she measures his eyes, takes retina photos and does the ever-annoying pressure test. He comes out after the full exam and we (Jon, the assistant and I) cram into the little side room where he tries putting contacts in for the first time. *Flashback to eighth grade trying to get a hang of this feat right before graduation, strongly desiring to make it work so I didn't have to wear my ugly glasses while being all dressed up for the occasion.*

But I had forgotten how difficult it was to get these things in! The finesse it takes has become almost innate to me now. Long eyelashes and eyelids that don't want to stay open worked against Jon's first few attempts. The whole time I was thinking "I wonder if it would help if I tried?" Then the assistant suggested I do haha.

For some reason this scenario seemed very comical to me. By this point the assistant and the optometrist are standing there watching me pry my husband's eye open to get the lens in. I'm sure it was the most entertaining thing they'd seen all day.

Surprisingly, popping them into someone else's eye wasn't difficult at all for me. (At first I thought I'd have a problem with it, because when I got them, through the many attempts at sticking things in my eyes, I had started to feel faint about it all). I can't say I've ever touched someone else's eyeball before - but there's a first time for everything!

I think Jon is enjoying them though. In-focus peripheral vision is a totally new thing with contacts. And I imagine that being able to drive with sunglasses + contacts now would be a definite benefit (no weird glares and such with the sun). He may still need reading glasses though, which to me is just as inconvenient as sunglasses, so no big deal. But I'm really enjoying his appliance-free face, and seeing those big brown eyes staring back at me without a reflection in front of them :•)

Fourth Time's A Charm!

We started our fourth Financial Peace University session last night, with our biggest group yet.. probably almost 30 folks! This time the class meets in the computer lab at Tyner Middle Academy (which is also our new building for Sunday services, held in the cafeteria of the school), so everyone is getting used to setting up in a different space.

The start of a new class and meeting new people is always very interesting and exciting to me. This may sound weird, but I like the dynamic of people coming in not really knowing what to expect, and often being skeptical that this material can actually help their personal situation, later to find a much different opinion as they really dig into the material.

During the video section, Dave Ramsey talks about the first "baby step", which is getting $1,000 in the bank as soon as possible to establish your emergency fund. When he said "Baby step one is the easiest step, and it's the hardest step. It's the easiest because it's only $1,000...." and I heard a guy in the back go "psh!" ha. I know how he feels: "$1,000 is a ton of money! There's no way that's happening any time soon!" I'm excited to see how further classes and discussions will change his perception of his ability to do this. Usually learning to budget does the trick pretty easily ;•)

Many people have similar stories to share about their finances, but I'm always very interested to hear everyone's unique perspective. From a high school kid "just trying to keep some gas money" to folks having been through bankruptcy. The range is wide, but there are tidbits of every discussion that are helpful to everyone there.

I'm really excited about people getting excited on their own about this! It's funny - I feel like initially to get them there at all, requires excitement and redundant promotion from myself as a coordinator pumping them up to realize how much they want and need this. It's really fun when doing so turns into a genuine realization of that on their own.

Side note, I love listening to my husband tell our story about getting out of debt. He tells it so passionately, and not without some emotional reaction. It's very touching! I love how much this has come to mean to him, and to me.

The Green Beef

I just did an experiment on Facebook ratting on green living a little. It's funny who and what gets commented on those things, but it is kind of entertaining to ruffle people's feathers.

I'm going to state my real opinion, or rather my "beef" about "Green Living" here, so that my opinion is clear, and not misunderstood. I consistently feel the desire to go on sporadic rants about the things that bother me about this topic.. but they haven't always been well presented in the past. And for some reason I'll feel better if I can well-present it and get rid of it lingering in my mind :•)


Beef #1: This is the biggest thing that upsets me about "living green" : When "Greenies" (hopefully unknowingly) give off an "I'm better than you because I do things the right way and you don't, but you really should because it makes you and everything better" vibe. That vibe is condescending and kind of rude. We all have our ways to live, and this idea is in my opinion a form of prejudice.

Beef #2: Yes the environment needs some help (although I think sometimes people underestimate how powerful nature is in the first place). Yes if we do things to help the environment, it will improve the environment. Eating organic food or putting a wind turbine in your yard isn't going to change the world. It might change your own world some, but isn't that a little selfish?

The scale of what we do is what will actually get things done about it. Yes grouping together may get it done.. but how many Greenies actually combine forces intentionally, go the government or wherever.. and try to actively improve things on a worldwide scale? 

Beef #3: Constantly ratting on all the everyday objects/foods that are going to "kill" us because they're not greenishly safe is like elderly-ailment-complaining for twenty somethings.

Beef #4: Greenies striving to be "green" in every possible aspect of life. *Not Attainable slash Impractical!* How many Greenies own a car? hybrid or otherwise... how many of them use roads to get places? Trees had to be killed to put those roads down, good Lord! Gotta walk or bike I suppose, sucks for those who work 25 miles from home too.. do they make safe rubber bicycle tires? Better make sure. Also for bikers, Share The Road goes both ways.

Beef #5: I wholeheartedly support healthy eating! While I agree that healthy foods should be affordable and available to everyone, I just cannot bring myself to support a struggling-income family paying extra for organic or specialty items. Maybe you can get coupons for these, but often there are cheaper options than that. I also hate when people bash cheap grocery sources for not having healthy foods. Walmart sells organic. They also sell fresh fruits and vegetables that are totally healthy for anyone's consumption.

Also: Chicken, beef, pork and fish are not our "friends". I personally don't eat beef or pork because they tend to be fatty and I just don't prefer them. Here's the Bible: "One man's faith allows him to eat everything, but another man, whose faith is weak, eats only vegetables. The man who eats everything must not look down on him who does not, and the man who does not eat everything must not condemn the man who does, for God has accepted him."

Eating meat in general isn't a bad thing. Even certain processed meats. Maybe if you eat like 10 lbs of it a day, yeah some issues may arise.

Beef #6: "Organic” does not necessarily mean “healthier.” The USDA makes no claim that organically
produced food is safer or more nutritious than conventionally produced food. It's also good to note that everything in moderation is okay. Let your kid have a cupcake on their birthday without worrying about what kind of sugar is in it, for crying out loud.

Melission

A conversation with a friend yesterday reminded me of my college days when I would note how many of my friends had decided to enter the mission field, whether temporarily for a trip or to plan to make it a lifestyle one day. I used to feel like doing a "mission trip" was something I had to do or should do some day, but I never really felt called to it.

Then I learned about finding my "gifts" .. those God-given traits you possess for the purpose of carrying out His plan through your life. I wondered what my gifts could be. I knew I had to find out one day because otherwise I'd feel like I'd be wasting my life without knowing what to do with it. The obvious one was something creative, but I never really found a way to use that to directly and personally connect with people in a spiritual way.

However in the past couple years as Jon and I have been leading the Financial Peace course, I believe I have found my "mission from God" *Blues Brothers voice*. Helping people learn about finances and how to change their life by it - I never thought I'd be into that. I'm not a numbers person! I'm still not incredibly a numbers person. But my faults don't matter. What matters to me (and I think what matters to God, through me) is communicating the truth (about the subject, and essentially about life itself) to people, and helping them realize that changing certain habits is what God wants for them. This is HARD sometimes to reveal to folks, and the hardest to reveal to folks who need it the most! But this is good for my mission. It keeps me having something to work on and be challenged by. Right now in the form of learning how to talk to people about it.

I'm not very comfortable being in front of a huge group of people by myself in a classroom setting, but I've realized that I can help people one on one quite well and quite naturally. I'm pretty excited about this.

It might seem weird helping people come to God through money. That's what it sounds like. But if you open the Book you'll find it's quite an important thing to achieve in life, in God's eyes. If you don't know God or don't want to, you at least have to recognize that being good with money is something desired in life. It's also about living right, communication and doing good for others too.

I've never been one for "Christianese" speak (ie using language that makes you sound like a Bible beater) because I was once (and still am!) quite annoyed by it. I hope that my choice to discuss things not in that manner is a means for me to connect to and help anyone and everyone willing to open their mind to the best things God has for them in life.

Onward, I say.

Snow Me Impressed

I am very, very sad to say that my hand was not involved in making any of these amazing creations.. however some folks over at Southern Adventist University (whose campus we live on the backside of) are incredibly creative and know how to make a stranger smile as they drive by.

I had to go over to the campus today to take some photos.

 Check out this HUGE snow man!! The base has to be 6 or 7 feet wide. It has melted down some since my first contact with it, as did the mini snow man to it's side. The juxtaposition of the 2 snowman sizes next to each other was pretty comical though.

I'm not sure exactly what the creative direction is on this one, but it looks like a cool curving road going up the side of a cliff where a small snowman resides on top, ha! The blocky shapes make it look like an odd modern sculpture of some sort.


And this next one is the coolest most awesome ever !! ...

Someone made an igloo!! A real-life, adult-can-fit-inside igloo!

Here's the doorway looking in and the floor of the inside.. perfectly carved out.. I can only imagine how long and how many folks this took to accomplish...

Here's the view of the inside from the doorway.. you can see the block structure they used, I couldn't quite tell if they used actual blocks or if they mounded the whole thing and carved out he inside and then reinforced the exterior with more snow. AMAZEING. It really is incredibly impressive. And it's big! It could probably sit 5-6 adults inside.

These works make me jealous that I didn't create them, but it makes me happy how it attracts strangers to come discover it, and leaves them driving away with a huge smile on their face like it did to me.
Truly inspiring.