Month: April 2016

I have always been intrigued by others. Who they are. What made them who they are. Are they really showing who they really are. etc….

Again, don’t judge me, but when my husband and I go out, I like to profile people. Guess who they are, where they came from, what the relationships around them look like.

For me, it is fun as God created me to be observant. When I was a little girl I remember telling my mom our priest had angry eyebrows one day and I wanted to know why because usually they were happy eyebrows.

Some people wear their emotions on their face, others have become skilled at tucking them away.

Which are you?

I walked in to a conversation today of 2 people talking about the “grouchy lady at the Del Taco drive-thru”. She has been labeled grouchy. When I asked if they asked if she was okay, they replied NO. Their response was to be overly happy back to her, to maybe push her in to realizing how she was behaving. Sadly, that didn’t work. It’s something that I have tried, too. Let me try and “show you” how to respond. Or give you a good example of how I think you should be acting at this moment…

I am not proud of that. I just REALLY like good customer service.

I suggested asking if she was having a bad day. That of course could go over just as poorly, but I have learned a couple of reasons they might look grouchy are they-

1. Don’t think they are seen
2. Don’t realize their emotions are on their face

Sure their could be 1,000s of other reasons, but lets play with these two. 🙂

Believe it or not, not everyone was brought up in a loving and encouraging home. Some people are in horrible situations. Some people are made to feel as though they are invisible. Some people NEED to be seen. Look at them and ask how they are. They matter! If you are aware of someone acting “off” ASK THEM HOW THEY ARE. Don’t just push it aside or talk about them, talk TO them. You could change their life!

Sometimes people just don’t realize they are letting their emotions show or they have the permanent “not nice” face that we talked about before. Let them know by asking how their day is going, then LISTENING to the response. PUSH IN. I have a friend who has her eyebrows waxed and she never knew that the way she styles them makes her look angry…all the time. Where she is from, that is how they are worn. She had never even thought about how the style was probably started to look intimidating. CRAZY right? It took someone asking her, to help her realize that the look DID intimidate people, but it was the ones she was trying to attract as friends.

How can you show grace to someone that is irritating you? How can you remind yourself that you have NO IDEA what someone else might be going through.

How can you remember to push in…even if someone is always smiling, and ask how they are doing…then stop to LISTEN to what they say.

What I learned today…I am not always the best and pushing in. God expects me to. Not to become best friends with everyone, but to show that others are seen and heard.

 

Have you ever seen someone you know and smiled at them, or waited for them to acknowledge you…and they don’t? You feel like a crazy person or wonder why they would be so rude to you? How DARE they not say hello! Did I do something to upset them?

This happens to me ALL the time, but I am the one that isn’t saying hello, or ignoring you, or not saying anything…I can’t say I don’t smile as generally 80% of the time I am smiling. My problem is the other 20% of the time I have resting…lets call it “wench” face.

You know, that face that Scarlett O’Hara had in Gone With The Wind?

The look that is 1/2 smirk and 1/2 reallllly?  I don’t mean to, I really don’t. Most of the time, 50,000 things are going through my brain at one time and I am not even recognizing that I am looking at someone. I am usually looking through them.

BAD ON ME.

The other part of the time is I truly have no memory. I’m like an amplified Dory from Nemo. I can meet someone and within seconds totally forget everything that was just said. Luckily, my son found that I have “fibro fog“. Being diagnosed with Fibromyalsia, I am learning more and more what that means. He was excited because when I have asked him the same question 5 times within 5 minutes and have no recollection that he responded, it can get frustrating.

Well, I’m sure it gets frustrating for those I have met as well! I can meet someone, have a great conversation with them, here their story and truly be touched…and then days later not recognize their face.

If I have done this to you, I apologize. Because I don’t remember to put the face with the story, doesn’t mean our time together wasn’t impact-ful because it was. I just truly can’t put a name to a face or to there where and when we had the discussion.

If someone has done this to you, show a bit of grace and forgive them. Start conversations with them that remind them when and where you talked last. Hopefully this will jog their memory. If not, you can be old friends AND new friends at the same time! (Get it? 🙂 )

What I learned today…God will bring to mind things I NEED to remember. The rest of the time I have to pray for others to be merciful with me and for God to help me remember as much as I can to honor those around me. Also, I need to stop and really look around me more. I need to SEE the people God is putting in my way, not just look through them.

 

So I know I have been fairly open and authentic with you. At times, I have gone a bit silent as there are points in our lives that need to be lived before shared, and I am in the middle of one of those.

Today I want to share about strategy. Intend AND unintended. This will upset both feminists and whatever the opposite to feminists are.

I am okay with that, in honor of just being honest and truthful in my own brokenness.

As a leader in business I never had to worry about offending a man. I consistently led in the way I was built to lead. Strong, fast and hard. Someone’s sex or age didn’t bother me as I didn’t worry about emotions or feelings or caring about others. I worried about more money and more power not caring on who I had to step on.

After giving my life to Christ, I have shared about how I thought the traditional Christian women was to be seen not heard. Pushing past that as I grew in my own walk with Jesus, it still has not been a completely overcome issue it is a journey as I find my place in His church.

As a passionate person, I tend to build and blow. I’m not much at keeping things in, but have learned, over time and a LOT of prayer to only “blow” when God says, “Go for it, sweetie!”.  In a male-led church I haven’t felt comfortable in truly letting my anger and frustration show. Please don’t get me wrong, I absolutely love my job and church, but in LIFE we don’t agree with everything that happens. It happens in the church as well.

When I have gotten upset, I have used the word tantrum. I would say I am throwing a tantrum as it is a word that men would associate with an angry woman. (I know that some of you will not continue reading out of shear anger at reading that. That is fine.) While being upset, I tears would be shed. OH NO, you think. NOT TEARS!!!! That shows weakness!!! They won’t take you seriously!!!

I hear you. HOWEVER, my heart IS hurt when God’s people are hurting. My heart IS hurt when their is injustice. The tears I shed weren’t to be humiliating, but a release of pent up emotion. I would share that I needed to throw a tantrum AND cry. I know… you might feel that has set us back, but it hasn’t. It is what God had me do, until the culture was strong enough for me to change.

And it has.

With time and being tested, both by God and His church, I felt a shift. I felt the shift yesterday in a discussion with one of the pastors. I was fed up, hurt, frustrated and teary. He let me “throw a tantrum”, paused and then told me to, “Grow up”.

He has no idea that in that moment their was a shift. Without even knowing it, he was the catalyst that had the Holy Spirit put a hand on me and say, You got this.

I now hear God whispering, that I can be who He made me to be. I don’t need to “throw tantrums” anymore. I can stand firm knowing that I love Jesus and I love my church…but I will get mad at times. I will get frustrated and need to share my frustration and anger…and the people over me are strong enough to take it, hear it and not hold it against me, but help me walk through it with change or understanding.

We all have moments like this. Where God has us walking in one direction because He needs us to be obedient for either our benefit or for the benefit of others around us. They aren’t always easy times, but God will change the direction. It won’t always be hard. You won’t always have to fight to be heard. Lead with your actions, the ability to share the words will come.

As long as you are doing it all for Jesus, allow yourself to be humbled to the point of being difficult to handle, and then watch the growth that can happen when you are low enough to see that He is in everything. He is in all directions, you just have to see Him and follow His lead.

What I learned today…We have to trust the people around us to be strong enough to feel our anger over situations, but not hold it against us. We also have to have a solution to every problem or injustice we see, we can’t just get angry and not give direction. That is whining.