Celebrating Life

”Celebration when your plan is working? Anyone can do that. But when you realize that the story of your life could be told a thousand different ways, that you could tell it over and over as a tragedy, but you choose to call it an epic, that’s when you start to learn what celebration is. When what you see in front of you is so far outside of what you dreamed, but you have the belief, the boldness, the courage to call it beautiful instead of calling it wrong, that’s celebration.” [Shauna Niequist]

Celebrating life when times are good and fun and everything is going my way – I can do that easy – no problem. But celebrating my life when I am ready for a change, bored with my job, and wanting a puppy so badly now that is a challenge for me. I can slip into a dark place so easily. Things aren’t going as planned so my, what I like to call ‘sulky heart’ has set in. Now I’ve had roughly two bad days because of my sulky heart – sulky heart NO MORE!

1. Today is warm and breezy and I can take a walk and breath in the wisps of the spring air. It’s rejuvenating and let’s my mind take a break in the middle of my busy day.

2. I have a husband who loves me despite my crazy ‘dark place-ness’. He sat on the floor with my yesterday and calmed me down, held my hands, and reminded me that God has a plan. Who made me breakfast this morning when I almost cried when I didn’t have enough cereal to eat (thanks to gluten-free my breakfast choices are very limited). Yes, he is amazing and most definitely my best friend and the lover of who I am (even when I’m a crazy person)

3. I’m thankful for chocolate frozen yogurt and lots and lots of sprinkles at the airport when we were feeling so blue. It definitely helps sooth the soul and the little kids that live inside us. Multi-colored sprinkles can still make my day much better

4. Most of all – I celebrate that I have a God who love me enough to die for me. To take on my sin and the sins of the world so that I can be made right with him. We no longer have to sacrifice lambs twice a day and talk to a priest – you have a direct line to the Creator of the Universe – the lover of our souls – and the sacrificial Lamb Jesus Christ. It blows my mind to think about the sacrifice that He made for me!

5. I have family that I can talk to about everything – when so many people have bad relationships with their parents, brothers, and sisters I have the best family in the world. With family like this life doesn’t seem like such a large mountain to scale. (Of course, I normally am the one making a mountain out of a mole hill)

6. My elephant scrubby brush – how could you not celebrate this amazing cuteness?

I have so much to celebrate – so I’m going to beat my ‘sulky heart’ but celebrating all the blessings I have been given! What are you celebrating today?