Angela Parlin

So Much Beauty in All This Chaos

Need 10 Ways to Beat Decision Fatigue?

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decide decision fatigueI don’t actually have 10 ways to offer you, but I do have 4. It is April Fools Day.

But I wonder, do you share my decision-making disorder? Decision Fatigue. Don’t you appreciate that they’ve named it? Makes it sound Real. Diagnosed. Understandable.

Decision Fatigue “refers to the deteriorating quality of decisions made by an individual, after a long session of decision making.” (Wikipedia)

Decision Fatigue leads to making poor choices. Or not making any. But then that’s called Decision Avoidance. Maybe that’s what I have, most often.

Too many choices! I JUST CAN’T!

Truth is, I was born with it. Partly because I was born in America, but more than that, my Myers-Briggs explanation mentions it. And then there’s the DISC profile.

We took a version of the DISC which measures how decisive, interactive, steady, and cautious a person tends to be. I scored next to nil for Decisive. Ninety-something percent on the other end–Cautious.

My husband is the opposite, of course. 99% Decisive, hardly any caution. As a business owner, even Mr. Decisive experiences Decision Fatigue sometimes. It doesn’t help for me to remind him he was made for it, that even his DISC profile says so. He’s American too.

Yesterday morning, let’s see…I made the decision to sleep a little longer. To swallow a tiny pill. To let my children track old fashioned rolled oats across the kitchen. To walk downstairs and add milk and blueberries to their bowls myself. I made the decision to make my bed pretty again, to let my hair go a day without washing, to fold towels and hold my boys accountable for “forgetting” to switch the laundry. I’m only getting started.

I made the decision to shut the door, to sit in my black and white corner chair, to open the Word and open a book and enter into the secret place with Jesus.

I made the decision to review my highlights from the beginning of the book I’m working through, and that’s where I made the decision to read this line:

“This present world system is strategically designed to squeeze out your time and energy for the secret place.” ~Bob Sorge, Secrets of the Secret Place

“Hell will do everything in its power,” it says.

Later, I was just innocently going about my day, making hundreds of tiny decisions and a few big ones, when I ran into this verse:

I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Now choose life, so that you and your children may live.

The Word is full of things to decide, and decide daily.

But mostly, it’s full of encouragement to choose life, to live.

To look one way, and look the other, and don’t make the poor choice. Don’t make poor choices that will lead you back around the wrong way.

And that you may love the Lord your God, listen to His voice, and hold fast to Him. For the LORD is your life.

(Deuteronomy 30)

Hell will do everything in its power to keep you from drawing near to God. But you hold the power to decide to go to Him anyway. And that’s not even to mention the power that is ours (as believers) through Christ.

Love the Lord your God.

Listen to His voice.

Hold fast to Him.

Choose life.

That may be as far as you get, but that may also be all that’s truly needed.

Love. Listen. Hold. Choose.

Decide.

*This has been another Five Minute Friday post, with the prompt: DECIDE. Find out more about Five Minute Fridays here!

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When You Want to Lose Yourself

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alive valley Lord ShepherdI’m not sure what’s wrong with me that when I hear the word Alive, I instantly think of the dead.

Maybe it’s because a young person asked me recently if life is really worth the struggle. When you’re young and uncertain, sometimes you only see so much pain in this world and too many risks, and fears loom tall until you wonder if it’s all too hard. You wonder if it’s worth it.

I remember sitting with a friend in high school, across black marble tables in the science lab, having the same conversation. I did my best to convince him it was worth it, to live. He chose to stay. Yet it took a while before he chose to really live.

So I hear “Alive” and see the faces of a handful of friends who are not alive, not here, not anymore.

I have loved a number of people who have died young.

How do we ever make sense of it? 

I was 14 when a close friend died suddenly and out of the blue. There was no warning, no sign this was coming, although my sister and I had a feeling on our way home that night. But we didn’t figure out the feeling, and went to sleep. I woke around midnight, hearing my parents on the phone in the kitchen.

He was only 17 when we dropped red February roses over his casket.

But only after Mom and I crept down to sister’s basement bedroom to explain her best friend wasn’t breathing.

I read Psalm 23 on the funeral bulletin. And a poem about how God never promised the skies would always be blue.

It was cold and the skies were gray, and we stayed home from school the next week, and I didn’t want to ever go back.

I wanted to hole up in my bedroom and sing along with Wilson Phillips, “I don’t wanna think about it, Don’t wanna think clear, Don’t analyze What I’m doing here.”

I “Wanna be impulsive, Reckless, And lose myself In your kiss.” {“Impulsive”}

It wasn’t like me at all.

I think the song says that too. The song may have been about following your heart, about new love and being spontaneous.

But for me, it was about facing that someone I cared about, was gone.

For me, it was about dying young and how I could never make sense of it.

When we’re startled and scrambling, the truth is still–The Lord is my Shepherd, I lack nothing.

But the only thing we sometimes understand is the desire to lose ourselves in something else.

We don’t want to have to think about it.

So I told my friends, back then and also recently, that yes, life can be terrible. And life is terribly beautiful. Even in the chaos, among the fear, the disappointments, your deep sadness, and the terror.

Even in the valley. Especially in the valley.

Because no matter what, the truth is still–When I walk through the darkest valley, I will fear no evil, for You are with me.

He is with me. He is with us. Even in the valley He is faithful.

And yes, it’s worth it to be alive.

 

*This post is part of Five-Minute Fridays with Kate Motaung, where the writing prompt this week is ALIVE. You are welcome to join us. 🙂 Find out more here!

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Hallway of Possibility {Curious Faith} Book Review

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wilderness hope Curious FaithHave you ever felt like the pieces of your life were falling apart?

I read a book recently that had me remembering a time when I felt that way. There were so many losses, all at once, followed by a season of grief and unmet expectations, and one of the hardest parts?

I felt really alone.

Sometimes I wondered if things would ever get better. Things did get better, but I remember the doubt and diminished hope.

Over the last few months, I’ve been blessed to be part of a book launch team for Logan Wolfram. Her first book, Curious Faith: Rediscovering Hope in the God of Possibility, releases March 1, and today I’m giving you a sneak peek.

One of my favorite chapters in Curious Faith is about re-examining those times we spend in the wilderness. I love the way Logan defines the wilderness. Because it can look a lot of different ways.

She tells about a time when she and her husband had suffered through a miscarriage, and then God led them out of the church community they knew and loved. A few broken relationships and lots of job stress later, and they felt like the pieces of their lives were falling apart.

They felt alone, and that’s often what the wilderness feels like.

The wilderness may be a season of unmet expectations, hopelessness, disappointment, and discouragement. It could be packed with life changes, or loss.

What’s important, according to Logan, is that when we’re there, we don’t waste our wilderness.

live

“In the wilderness, when we are lost, discouraged, and can’t find our way, the only thing we are supposed to find is The Way.” ~Logan Wolfram, Curious Faith

Logan’s encouragement is to see our wilderness as a hallway of possibility. There’s no need to live in defeat during those seasons. Instead, let’s open our eyes and see the beauty of God sustaining us through our difficulties.

Let’s look up and see “the pillar of the Lord’s presence hovering and illuminating the way.”

What incredibly hopeful perspective! This is a way of seeing, which all of us need. Because even if we’ve come through some wilderness, there will be another. In this world we will have many troubles. But we can face those troubles with hope, in the God of possibility.

Behold, I am doing a new thing; now it springs forth, do you not perceive it? I will make a way in the wilderness and rivers in the desert. Isaiah 43:19

curious faith

Curious Faith is about getting to the end of ourselves, and beginning to really live.

It’s about trusting God through great loss and inevitable disappointments.

It’s about knowing who God says we are and living as if it’s true.

It’s about unmet expectations, and finding the way when we’re lost.

It’s about walking in wild obedience and discovering the place of greatest possibility.

It’s about a God who is good and is for us, who is worthy of our trust. A God who takes what’s behind us and makes it new–who pulls us from the pit to make us rise again.

I recommend this book to anyone whose hope has ever been dimmed by hardship, anyone who’s ready to follow after God with a curious faith.

Order your copy here: Curious Faith

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Do You See the Beauty?

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see beauty thanks contentment

The way we view our lives changes things.

I’m beginning to believe that the way we choose to see the circumstances of our lives is the big point.

Sometimes my vision is clouded with things I don’t enjoy about my current situation. When I’m focused on the problems I face, there’s little room in my heart to see the good. Instead, I’m chronically unhappy with the way things are.

Can you relate?

Other times, my eyes are full of what I think I need to improve upon everywhere I look, and then I fall into perpetual striving. I seek to make my life something better, and I miss the beauty of what’s already in front of me.

I’m talking about contentment, a way of seeing our lives with thankful eyes.

The way we see determines how we’ll experience our days. So how is your vision today? How do you choose to see?

Years ago, I named my blog, So Much Beauty in All This Chaos. God was teaching me then that His beauty is always around me. Even in the chaos that sometimes happens at home with the kids, even in the trials, even in my disappointment, He has planted so much beauty.

My job is to choose to see the beauty. My part is to call it out and thank Him.

I’ve struggled many times to see the beauty in my life when chaos crowds it out, and so I started naming the beauty whenever I could see it. I started to look for it.

~The way God met me there in that trial, the way He comforted me.

~The beauty inside the people He placed in my life for me to love, and the ways they love me back.

~The truth He speaks straight to my heart from His Word day after day.

~The sky and the birds and the rest of His incredibly gorgeous world which surrounds me.

I’ve learned the beauty goes on and on and on.

I’ve learned there’s always more, because I find it whenever I choose to look.

But sometimes I still return to my critical eyes, to my critical heart. Sometimes the details of life overwhelm me, and I find myself right back in that ugly, bitter place, where I have a really hard time seeing the good. Sometimes I wake up and it’s cold and I’m tired of doing the same old things another day, and maybe it’s just that I woke on the wrong side of the bed, but I’m just not happy with the way things are. I’m just not satisfied.

I don’t know about you, but I desperately need God’s vision–to see great things He’s already done.

To see all the beauty He’s planted between the rows of my chaos, in the middle of every day.

Where will you choose to see the beauty God has planted in your life today?

Satisfy us in the morning with your unfailing love, that we may sing for joy and be glad all our days. Psalm 90:14

Read this post also at PurposefulFaith.com.

 

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What Keeps You From Drawing Near to God?

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throne of grace draw nearDraw near to the Throne of Grace in every time of need, and do not be hindered by your own failures.

This is the encouragement of Hebrews 4:16 (see last post), where God invites us to come to Him boldly, confidently, and without fear.

Let us then approach God’s throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need. Hebrews 4:16, NIV

Sometimes our failures (our sins) interfere with our faith, and our actions (or reactions) keep us from entering God’s presence. We feel guilty. We forget His endless supply of mercy covers over our failures. Sometimes we don’t feel ready to own and confess our sins. So we hide.

But I wonder what else keeps us from the Throne of Grace? I’ve been thinking about this for a few days, probably because I needed to.

What keeps us from the Throne of Grace, from entering God’s omnipresent Presence?

What an incredible gift we have been given! We may walk boldly and directly into God’s Presence, anytime, anywhere. He hears us. He sees us. He cares about every one of our concerns. He invites us to come to Him, to drop off our fears and worries at His feet and leave them there. He invites us to ask Him to do more than we can imagine.

The very act of coming to Him is an act of trust.

Maybe that’s the biggest reason we ever fail to come to God in prayer. It’s an issue of trust.

It always comes down to trust, doesn’t it? If we could simply SAY we trust Him, I’d have this whole thing down. But trust is proven by our actions.

When I try to handle things on my own, without the Lord’s help, I’m not trusting in Him.

When I’m self-sufficient, rather than God-dependent, I’m trusting in me.

But that’s not the only time I’m trusting in me. When my failures keep me from coming to God (as I wrote about in the last post), in whom do I trust? Myself! Right? Then I’m trusting in my own goodness instead of trusting fully in His.

What about chaos? My reaction to too much chaos keeps me from God. When life swirls chaos around me and I feel unsettled, what I need most is time with the Lord. I need moments in the quiet of His presence. But often I just keep running through my days, as if I could outrun the crazy if I try hard enough.

Chaos and Busyness are BFFs. In my life, busyness has kept me from better things more often than I know. When things get too crazy, I tend to look to other little “saviors” to help me—hello coffee, TV, music, research/finding the “right” answers, friends, and venting my unforgiveness toward my kids… {Please note: I’m not saying any of these are wrong—except the last one, of course—but could I be wrong when I look to them to “save me”, instead of looking to the Lord?}

You could probably add reasons to my list, but I have a feeling they would also boil down to misplaced trust in ourselves.

If you will, spend some time thinking about it.

What keeps you from drawing near to God?

 

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