There it was, 15 feet up, stuck on a tree limb. My grandson’s favorite stuffed animal hanging and lodged by a single leg now out of his hands and his control. In his five-year-old mind it seemed permanent, so he cried and cried. He imagined it gone from his life forever and thus the emotion. We held him to console him and then said, “There’s no need to cry. Let’s work on a solution to the problem.” When asking him what we could do about the problem he shrugged his shoulders and whimpered, “I don’t know.” We asked him if crying could be part of the solution and he managed to shake his head no.
He just couldn’t seem to muster up any viable solution so Mimi (grandma) abruptly retrieved a long-handled broom and asked him if this could help. He looked at the broom and then the stuffed animal in the tree and said, “Maybe.” Having no other ideas coming from our grandson, grandma began to whack the tree in order to loosen the lodged friend. He found the exercise funny and began to laugh as the stuffed toy now hung by one arm. Eventually “Nigel” fell to the ground and was quickly grabbed by his owner.
I just know we’ll have something “stuck up in a tree” today and it will take a solution. Or, we could just cry about it. Why is it that we tend to have an emotional response first? Our initial response is truly up to us, be it tears, anger or silence, but in the end, like my grandson, we’ll need a solution.
My wife and I have been practicing debt-free living for years now.* I say practicing because it takes discipline to reach and discipline to maintain. So here are eight encouragements or benefits that we have discovered when it comes to debt-free living.
This is the week that America sets aside as a time of giving thanks. Why is that? Two past presidents of the United States made very specific declarations.
How much energy do you spend thinking about or trying to correct dead relationships? Perhaps you have a failed relationship from the past, a really bad break-up or even a divorce. In so many of these cases there is simply not a way to relieve the guilt or the false guilt one may feel. We can find ourselves playing mental gymnastics in order to somehow convince ourselves it will possibly one day work out.
Begin by praying about how you can better care for your friend. Put energy and thought into how to better love the person you are married to. Try daydreaming and fantasizing about your wife or your husband. To allow past, dead relationships your precious time just might be robbing, stealing in fact, from your present friendship or marriage relationship. And that might be considered cheating.
What is your marriage story? How did you meet and how did you know when you fell in love? What were the things that brought you together? As you identify your marriage story and what brought you together, you can also identify the things that will keep you together.
Does it sound odd to say or admit that our marriage has a relationship with money? There is this amazing verse in the Bible that says, “But godliness with contentment is great gain.” Most couples believe that if they had more money they would be more content. From that juncture, we can find ourselves fighting and arguing over money all too often. But money in and of itself doesn’t bring contentment
I would be devastated, overwhelmed and heart-broken if my daughter suffered any kind of abuse from anyone in any fashion. I would give my life to make sure that did not happen. Further, I would be equally broken and horrified if one of my sons was falsely accused of abusing another. Having raised my children with very clear values and boundaries, I would believe them if they told me abuse occurred or did not occur.
In these times we are hard pressed to find any moral guidance coming from Washington DC, even as governmental leaders call for morality. And Hollywood continually puts out sexually provocative films and then expects morality among its ranks. You cannot have it both ways…sorry.
Don and Samantha were new acquaintances. My wife and I were reaching out and getting to know them a bit better when Samantha blurted out her list. “We will NEVER get married; we will NEVER have children and we will certainly NEVER become Christians, not in this lifetime!” Don agreed.
My grandson often asks me, “Papaw, did you see me _________?” You can fill in the blank with almost anything he does or desires to be noticed doing. It can be really small, but he still wants to be observed. He longs for that voice of approval and praise. It’s a child thing, right?
Have you ever felt as though you were unraveling?
Steve Prokopchak 