Settling for mudpies

I found this C.S. Lewis quote today which really summarizes my feelings in doing this challenge/fast...

"It would seem that Our Lord finds our desires not too strong, but too weak. We are half-hearted creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea. We are far too easily pleased."

My desires have become sidetracked from infinite joy and glory towards clothes... And food... And following people's pictures... Mere mudpies. I have become entertained by something far less glorious and given it my time, money, energy, etc.

Tomorrow is the first day I will repeat a dress in the same week at work, and you know what? I'm pretty sure no one will notice or care! Ha. The annoying part is making sure things stay clean, but besides that the limited selection has been kind of soothing.  The bigger issue is still my caring what people think of my clothes, not the clothes themselves.

Post camping

It's been awhile because for the most part things have been going pretty smoothly. The lack of selection is nice in some ways... easy to make choices. The main issue was waiting for clothes to dry earlier this week so I had something to wear. Especially because I need to wash my clothes after mowing the lawn so I don't smell like an engine but the rest were dirty too. 

I camped this weekend and let me tell you, packing my clothes was a breeeeeeze! And you know what, I wore the same thing all weekend. With the exception of switching​ my jeans and sweatpants when I wanted to look fancier for my town appearances. It's great... I smell a little smokey, but no one cares. So that's been pretty nice. The whole point of my trip was to take some time to figure out what I am doing with my life, you know, a light undertaking. Nbd. Still working on that...

Hokies!!

We won! Virginia Tech beat West Virginia after years of not playing one another. It was a close game, back and forth, very exciting!

All that is to say, today I realized how much I use clothing to "speak" something about me in certain situations. I wore a different t-shirt earlier today as part of what we wear working with the kids at church. It "speaks", 'I work with your children and have been screened and am approved to be back here'.  Since this isn't a war against the system, I let that slide.

The shirt is an orange staff shirt and I was SO TEMPTED to wear it tonight for the game so people would always know I'm a Hokie! But no... Everything I had was blue or black... Ugh.

It's definitely been an interesting two days realizing how much more I use and value clothing choices than I was previously aware of....

Day 2. Clothes

Wow! Today kind of blew my mind. I woke up for outside yoga and it was very chilly and overcast with light rain. It was frustrating to not be able to grab a hoodie or long sleeved shirt and plan accordingly like I usually would. I rocked my sweatpants, shorts, t shirt and jacket. The drive over made me realize how that is a struggle the homeless or poor face everyday... Not having the luxury of picking the right clothing for the day. You wear what you have, and you make it work... Cold and wet or not! Whether they are dirty and smell a little isn't important because you gotta wear something.

Afterwards I was grabbing a warm breakfast to have some coffee and quiet time but the place was so crowded. When a man in the corner left, myself and another lady were going for the table. She saw I had been looking at it and offered to share until her friend came and another table cleared up. Well we started talking and it was great! The three of us sat and ate together and then just kept talking. It would be so cool if that happened more often, not being in a rush and able to slow down for those sweet moments.

They were such a blessing helping me start the process of thinking through my future... What this whole seven was partially about. Including working through a lot of different thought areas I was spinning my wheels on. They had great ideas and challenged me to visit some places over the next several months. How kind of them to spend their breakfast helping me! And they want updates from each month and the progress I am making :) This lined up perfectly with seven and brought confirmation to some thoughts I was having. Amazing how quickly God met me!

Month One- Clothing

So I have already realized how I do my fast will not be like Jen and her family, and that is okay.  It is between God and myself- not replicating what she needed to do, but doing what I need to do.  And it is definitely still going to be difficult.  I thought this would be an easy area for me, but it is the end of Day One with a long weekend coming and I am like, crap, what am I going to wear all weekend?! 

So for this month, I have divided it into two areas... 1. Work and 2. Not Work.  For each of these areas my very kind, patient, and way more fashion-conscious friend Janine and myself have narrowed down my wardrobe to seven items.  The struggle for me is I love comfy relaxing clothes, I like to do activities and exercise.  I do not dress how I need to dress for work in regular life... and I am not trying to get fired for wearing the same t-shirt and shorts to work 3 days a week.  Similar to how Jen did it- undergarments do not count.  I am however selecting one jacket to wear overall, not included as part of the seven. So here are my selections:

Work- 
1. Plain black dress
2. Plain Blue dress
3. Black with kind of polka dots dress
4. Mustard colored cardigan
5. Gray cardigan (with sweet elbow patches I just added since I had work holes in BOTH elbows... this was a debate with Janine as to whether I should have a patterned cardigan or not since I am going to look kind of boring. and plain with dull colors.. but I don't want too many obvious things so people won't realize I have worn the same thing twice that week)
6. Field long-sleeved shirt
7. Field work jeans

Not work-
1. Royal blue broomball t-shirt
2. Carribean blue ron jon t-shirt  (my parents got my this as a gift and its very soft an comfy... I would have picked other t-shirts but they were gray or black and everything else is already plain- so I couldn't do it)
3. Summer's Best Two Weeks mesh shorts
4. Sweatpants!
5. Dark cropped jeans
6. Fitted black plain short-sleeved shirt
7. Blue Buffalo Plaid Flannel

I am planning to go camping this month.. I have been going to a Barre class (which is legit if you have never tried it- my goodness)... I need to look professional... And mow the lawn... and be warm as it gets cooler... but not be really hot on those hot September days... we looked up the typical weather temperatures for the month...there was a long talk in which a hoodie was cut for a second t-shirt.  

After day one, I am very interested to how this month will go.  I am looking forward to the easy choices on work mornings, but not looking forward to not having choices and variety. I felt like I was having a break-up with my closet last night, "It isn't you, it's me... I will be back in a month!" But when October comes, will I purge a lot of them, realizing how truly over abundantly I have been living? I will keep ya posted.

Seven Begins...

Earlier this summer as our church was starting our study on the book of Revelation, specifically the message on Chapter 3, we heard about the Church of Laodicea, which was addressed in the scroll as being a church that was "rich". 

vv 17-18- "You say, ‘I am rich; I have acquired wealth and do not need a thing.’ But you           do not realize that you are wretched, pitiful, poor, blind and naked. 18 I counsel you to buy from me gold refined in the fire, so you can become rich; and white clothes to wear, so you can cover your shameful nakedness; and salve to put on your eyes, so you can see."

The conviction was on my heart that I am most certainly very rich compared to the world, even if I don't always feel that way. That I often rely on my own ability to meet my needs instead of relying on God, and a lot of the things that I often purchase are not even needs, they are wants. At which point I realized I needed to do something, to snap me out of "rich but still poor" mentality, and to focus on how amazingly blessed I am. I don't want to be pitiful, poor, blind, and naked as a result of my "richness". 

It brought me back to a family who I distantly knew way back in 2010 who went through this "Seven" challenge.  I knew a little bit about it, but not too much.   So remembering how she was talking about only wearing seven clothes or something like that, I looked up Seven when I got home.  It is now a book, written by Jen Hatmaker. I found the description which seemed perfect to deal with my richness-

"7 is the true story of how Jen (along with her husband and her children to varying degrees) took seven months, identified seven areas of excess, and made seven simple choices to fight back against the modern-day diseases of greed, materialism, and overindulgence."

...and it was perfect! So I found a cheap used copy to learn more. It is a cool idea- she picked seven areas of excess and intentionally focussed on one per month- you can see them below on the book cover:

So I started reading and knew I needed to do this- I needed to intentionally do a seven month fast of these things that distract me and numb me to my actual need for God.  I think some areas will definitely be easier than others, and truthfully, I just want to be able to share the lesson I think I will learn from that month and not have to do it. Mainly food... I love food... I love different flavors and tastes and recipes...  Feel sorry for those around me during food month...

Sometimes I think I can distract myself from the real issues I need to deal with by relying on some of these areas instead of going to God.  So I begin- excited but unsure of what is going to be overturned. 

So it is September and I will begin- it will lead me on a journey back to God and my need for Him.  It will culminate around my 30th birthday- eek!  So I can't think of a better way to wrap up a decade and intentionally begin the next. My hope is that it will destroy some these walls and this numbness that has grown around and in my heart.  I hope it will open my eyes to the things I have taken for granted and the many ways I am blessed in daily routines that have become that, a routine instead of opportunities for gratitude.   

...Here we go!

Wrestling

How do we reconcile Romans 14:13-23:

13Therefore let us not pass judgment on one another any longer, but rather decide never to put a stumbling block or hindrance in the way of a brother. 14I know and am persuaded in the Lord Jesus that nothing is unclean in itself, but it is unclean for anyone who thinks it unclean. 15For if your brother is grieved by what you eat, you are no longer walking in love. By what you eat, do not destroy the one for whom Christ died. 16So do not let what you regard as good be spoken of as evil. 17For the kingdom of God is not a matter of eating and drinking but of righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit. 18Whoever thus serves Christ is acceptable to God and approved by men. 19So then let us pursue what makes for peace and for mutual upbuilding. 20Do not, for the sake of food, destroy the work of God. Everything is indeed clean, but it is wrong for anyone to make another stumble by what he eats. 21It is good not to eat meat or drink wine or do anything that causes your brother to stumble.[c] 22The faith that you have, keep between yourself and God. Blessed is the one who has no reason to pass judgment on himself for what he approves. 23But whoever has doubts is condemned if he eats, because the eating is not from faith. For whatever does not proceed from faith is sin.


in a world where so many people are grieved by so much... As we think about our nation's past and the civil war. Yet not let what is good be spoken of as evil as it says in verse 16. When I see men like Robert E. Lee who is considered "evil" in many eyes, yet taught his slaves to read and freed them, giving them worth and dignity ... While Lincoln whom we revere said "I will say then that I am not, nor ever have been, in favor of bringing about in any way the social and political equality of the white and black races, —that I am not nor ever have been in favor of making voters or jurors of negroes, nor of qualifying them to hold office, nor to intermarry with white people; and I will say in addition to this that there is a physical difference between the white and black races which I believe will forever forbid the two races living together on terms of social and political equality. And inasmuch as they cannot so live, while they do remain together there must be the position of superior and inferior, and I as much as any other man am in favor of having the superior position assigned to the white race" in the Lincoln-Douglas debates. 

Both of whom did amazing things for our country either in the engineering or battlefields or from the public office. So the thing it seems is someone can do the right things for the wrong reasons, and be considered a good person in the eyes of men; yet someone can do the wrong things for the right reasons and be considered bad by man. Which I guess is the reason we can find peace and justice in the fact and hope that God judges the heart and man judges the outward appearances.