Moving Forward

Last year my vision for 2024 was peace, and I decided to study peace in depth and to take a year to reframe and better learn how to handle conflict. Many have expressed to me the power of words, but I can honestly say that I really have developed a new appreciation regarding the power a word can have. Within a few days into 2024, our world was turned upside down, with several personal storms entering our family the month of January. I found at the end of the month, I was in prayer, seeking spiritual guidance, counseling, and support. God shows up in times such as this to help us fine tune our spiritual walk and I quickly learned that my response to unforeseen tragedies and trials through community and prayer brought in complete miracles.  Light became possible in a very dark time because I choose to believe and trust in others. I let go and found that 12 months later, relationships grew stronger, and we are finding healing, which was only made possible through the action of peace i...

Reflecting on the Power of Gratitude for 30 Days to conclude 2024! Day 1:  Grateful for my mom, dad, and grandparents. I know that life had not been easy, that they do the best they can, and know that I was blessed to have a family that instilled a sense of service to others and faith.  Day 2:  Rest, recovery, and opportunity to start the healing process for my body in physical therapy are all things I am grateful for today. I can’t believe Thanksgiving break begins now.  Day 3: Grateful that I have been blessed with collaboration opportunities with Dartmouth, a supporting department, and our eclipse collaborative partners.  Day 4:  Grateful for time with Billy Jack, beautiful sunny weather, and memories made. Day 5 & 6:  Nolan made it to Alpine safely and so did we, time together playing games, preparing and eating great food, and for our home. Day 7:  We had so much fun putting up Christmas decorations yesterday as a family. I am so very gra...

I am so very grateful that I am learning how to recognize better approaches to self-care. I realized this morning that I began this blog in October 2024, a decade ago now. At that time, I had no idea how much growth spiritually, emotionally, and professionally I would experience these last 10 years. I remember during one of my coaching sessions around 10 years ago, I was introduced to this idea of a gratitude journal. This is when I began this blog as an outcome of that session. It is a little ironic that ten years later, I am back here again working to revisit this same idea, a gratitude reboot.  It is a way to reprogram and reboot your thinking, a mind shift if you will. I am working with a professional career coach to help me continue down a new path toward working on a few goals I have. I have experienced so much change in the last decade that I do think I need a year to really process all of these experiences, sit with the emotions of them all, reflect on what I have learned, ...

 Over the last few weeks, I have felt an immense need to write and journal my thoughts regarding my inner journey and continuous work to heal and grow toward an improved life pursuing the path of peace. This spring immediately brought about an awareness of "peace" that comes in the midst of a great storm. It was perhaps the worst 2 weeks of my life. After a decade of struggling emotionally to restore relationships with my children walking through a decade of spiritual warfare, I naively believed it was finally over. After all, we had such a peaceful and wonderful Christmas holiday. I could feel my family finally coming together. And then like a thief in the night, the darkness nearly swallowed my family whole. A year previously, my estranged oldest son asked an honest question regarding our youngest son Nolan. Apparently somewhere along the way during the last decade, a very ugly and false idea was placed on his heart that the cause for the divorce was that Nolan was not his ...

In 2019, I began the practice of annual reflection to improve my spiritual, physical, and mental health putting into practice daily journaling/gratitude morning meditation and the development of an annual vision board. In 2022, I spent the entire year studying the art of finding joy. Continuing with this study, I thought it would be important in 2023 to put daily work into learning how to choose joy or recognizing gifts presented to us by the universe daily and to focus on the act of rejoicing in small things. I can say that I am learning to practice joy through the act of rejoicing daily. While I don't always feel positive, I am learning practices and starting to see the fruit from these daily acts. Yes, life is going to be frustrating, people will let us down. At times circumstances are painful, and it is hard to keep going. I sometimes still fail at this, but I through God's help and learning to put my faith in a higher purpose, I am making progress. It is still a daily stru...

 When you are in a season of attack, as I have been,  we learn to have faith. Through seasons of attack and  experience, we develop a strong and unique testimony.  Be Still and Alert. Through stillness, we learn to listen. This is when God speaks to us and helps us process how we should react to events.  I have always loved hiking and nature. This is when I feel most at peace and where I learned to first listen to God. A recent series of events and people continue to remind  me that I need to stop, listen, and pay attention. A recent sermon online populated on my feed last week. The sermon was entitled "For Those Under Attack" and draws on 1st Peter.  In this message, the pastor quotes 1 Peter 5:9:  The devel is like a roaring lion. The roar is a warning and serves as a reminder that we will be alerted if an attack is coming. We must be alert and learn to listen. This morning my new pastor, Coleman, had no idea that I had been seeking God during t...