The State Of Things

Greetings! It's been awhile since I've written a blog, and I felt the need to write a new one tonight. I am completely exhausted, so this is probably not the best time to try to write anything profound, but we'll give it a shot. :) Reasons for the exhaustion... Number one, I just worked 21 hours in two days. Santa arrived at the mall! He arrives on the roof of the mall, amidst much smoke and loud music and such, comes down off the roof, and then there is a parade into the mall where he "lights" a gigantic two story tree, and then he takes his place on his throne for all the little kiddies to come and visit him. Lovely, all of it. I only have a couple of issues with this. To begin with, he arrived two weeks BEFORE Thanksgiving! Can you imagine all of the kids who got to visit him thinking Christmas is soon? "Mommy, when is Santa coming? When will it be Christmas?" "Oh, not for like 48 days!!" The other issue I have with it is that as soon as Santa appears, people become grinchy. I don't know what it is about the holidays that bring out the worst in people, but they do. So as you all do whatever shopping you're going to do this year, remember this: BE NICE to the people that serve you. We have feelings too! We're also making your food and could do any number of things to it....not that we would....I'm just sayin', choose wisely whom you irritate! :) And there is NOTHING you are buying that is worth getting an attitude, hurting another person, or having a sense of entitlement. It's just stuff.

Okay, I'll get off the soapbox now. In an attempt to survive the holiday madness, I am having as much fun at work as possible. We sing Christmas songs and make up dances and quote movie lines all day. On the night of Santa's arrival, I made my entire front counter wear Santa hats, and I wore my reindeer antlers. I think it helped our cheer. :)

Reason number two for my exhaustion is when I have down time from work, I am doing schoolwork. We're getting close to the end of the semester, which is both exciting and hard to believe, but that also means that much work is due in the coming weeks. I'm trying to be very disciplined and proactive and plan ahead so that I don't leave it all to the last week where I won't be able to get it all done. With that said, I just completed one of my projects! We had to videotape ourselves counseling one of our classmates for 15 minutes. We then had to write a verbatim of the video - literally every word that each person said had to be documented. I finished the verbatim a little while ago, and while a pain to do, it was actually quite interesting.

In watching myself on video, I realized how little we get to watch ourselves. I know that I have a perception of myself and how I think I act or present myself to other people. But when you see yourself on video, you are able to see yourself as you really are. It's fascinating. For example, maybe in your mind you are being extremely expressive as you tell a story, but when you see yourself, you realize you're barely showing any emotion. I'm obviously learning so much about being a counselor through my program, but I am also learning a ton about myself. I'm learning just how God has created me, and to be okay with that and comfortable in my own skin. I'm learning how to be challenged and to grow - hopefully without taking on the expectations of how others expect me to grow, but just following how God directs me. It's an amazing process and one I am abundantly thankful for. I hope to sit down and write a much better blog about what I have learned once I get through the semester and the madness that abounds.

In the meantime, please pray for me. These next weeks are going to be insane. I don't want to miss the life going on each day in the stress of all that has to get done. Add school to working 40+ hours a week, in holiday madness, dealing with cranky people....and that's not even counting Black Friday, where I will probably work at least 14 hours on that one day. There's a lot going on, and it's a recipe for disaster if I'm not careful, so pray that I will have wisdom to balance what has to get done with relaxation and fun, and that I will take things one moment at a time.

Towards that end, I have a fun goal for this holiday season...I took this picture last holiday season and thought it was hilarious.

Yes, I have issues. You should be used to this by now. :) Anyway, I was home by myself one day and playing with the self-timer on my camera. I was out on my balcony, so imagine me trying to wrestle my mad that she had on a hat cat, hit the timer, and smile all in about 10 seconds. This was the best I could do. So my goal for this Christmas is to get a fantastic picture of me and my cat in our matching hats. Ellie is thrilled. Hahaha....you can eagerly await the results! In the meantime, have a great week!