It's been a while...

2 of the 3 Boys.  Not teenagers yet - but might be by the time I do my next entry. 

The other boy still acts like a teenager sometimes - does that count?

Well, my hopes of keeping up with this blog were quickly shattered as I came to finally do an entry and I was completely unable to even remember how to log in and begin to blog. After finally achieving that great feat (I won't tell you how long it took), I was feeling a bit better about myself and I noticed a comment on one of my past blogs from my college roomie welcoming me to the blogger world and asking me if she could be a 'follower'. (Love you Kim!) Now, this normally would have made me feel pretty good had I not noticed the date she sent it to me. May. She commented in May. Not this past May...2 Mays ago! May 2011. This, my friends, is NOVEMBER 2012! Just in case you forgot. And so my journey of never ending flawed self-realization continues. Otherwise known as...

Perfectionism. What a funny yet fully loaded word. And by funny, I mean the kind of funny that everyone laughs but is really feeling incredibly sorry for you kind of funny. I am pretty upfront with others about the fact that I am not perfect. None of us are...which makes me feel a bit better about myself. But when perfection collides with failure - now that is dangerous.

When one has the idea of precision in one's head, yet does not perceive to even come close to said perfectness in a part of one's life - failure is perceived as a very real viewpoint. This is propelled into the third realm of interesting by the fact that one never ever thought it was going so perfectly bad in the first place. Now, go ahead and clean off your screen - because boy howdy, that was a lot of 'P's'!

I never saw this more real in my own life as with a situation that happened to me within this past year. It had all the juicy components: betrayed trust, blatant betrayal from perceived friends, the loss of something so important to someone that it sends this person out of control in a fit of failure - only catapulted further by one's perfectionistic self. Oh ya, Days of our Lives has got nothin' on this story! But enough of my bon bon eating, soap opera watching afternoons... the plot awaits!

And by plot, I mean point. Someday, I will be ready to share the plot with you all. But, on my road to healing - I don't think I'm at that stop sign yet. But I will say this. God is BIG. Ok, ok... you're wondering how in the world is this crazy woman throwing God into her perfectionistic, ADHD, failure laden rant you ask? Because that is exactly why He loves us so much. Because we do just that. We fail. We lose hope. We sin. He, my friends, does not. If we were like Him, we wouldn't need Him.

To this I cling. To this, you can cling too.

Now before you go on and feel badly for 'poor Shari' and send me messages asking how you can help me thru this hard time.... please stop (unless you want to offer to bring meals in - I'm always up for that). Please know that much of my writing is laced in humor. I have begun to coin it, "Inspirationomedy". Don't use it - or I will go all trademark on you.  I promise.  For reals on that.  I'm here to offer my struggles, joys and much more to those who will endure it to listen. It's doing life together, blogger style. And to those of you who have read this entire entry and not laughed once - I apologize - just take the 'omedy' out of 'inspiration' if you must. If you need to remove the 'inspiration' too - then you might need to message me and see how you can help. However, if you do that - you will FOR sure be bringing me a meal. Just a warning.

Stay tuned...I will share the plot someday. And, there will be just as many 'P's' in that story. As well as sword fights, damsels in distress and gnomes bounding in to save the day. Yes, gnomes people - I said gnomes. You can now put that 'omedy' back in that you took out earlier. And when I do share (after my therapist tells me I'm ready) God will still be BIG and I will still be a Saint in His eyes, PPPPPPerfectionism and all. So thankful for that.



 

It's Time...

Here I am...you've seen me on facebook - so you know I haven't left the planet. It's been a long while, and I've come to accept that I'm a 'once in a while' blogger. Ok, ok, maybe a 'once every nine months' blogger - but again, I've accepted it. I encourage you to do the same. Let go....just let go.... Control - what a strange thing we all think we have. I absolutely love to disillusion myself with the feeling of having control. Maybe 'love' is the wrong word - 'plaqued for life with this annoying sinful nature' might be a better one. But, anywhooo, it's this fake control that I continue to push against on the journey I'm on, here are just a few examples...

Kids are the ultimate, 'you are not in control' frequency meters.  I am fortunate enough to have the two age groups represented in my house that are the greatest contributors to the 'out of control' category.  A 5th grader and a pre-schooler.  5th Grade...that nasty spot between I'm a little kid and I'm the big kid now.  The countless eye rolls and talk back comments I get in a day could compete on the level of the political debates we've been enduring lately.  In addition to this, homework has now reached above my grade level.  Yes, I have a college degree, but for some reason 5th grade math has been completely deleted from my memory bank.  This makes for interesting evenings at our house.  On the other hand, I have a lippy, don't make me eat that, I think I'm really a 16 year old in a pre-schooler body that also lives here.  Between the two of them, any hopes of control I had have quickly flown out the unopened window in my kitchen that has two days worth of dishes in the sink.  The one flint of a controlled looking situation I do have is that I am still able to help with my pre-schoolers homework; unfortunately because he is really 16, he wants to do it all on his own.

There are so many more things that would make my life easier if only I could control them...people, work, finances, income, past mistakes, future mistakes that need to teach me a lesson, the fact that Sonic happy hour is only from 2-5, when really it should be an all day thing.  The list could go on and on.  I am challenged daily with the notion that forgiveness is the key to letting go of the control.  Forgiving myself, accepting God's forgiveness as well as others. Resting in the fact that things aren't perfect and if they are done differently than I would do them, it doesn't make them wrong.  I could probably have suggested a better way...but again, it doesn't make them wrong.  :)

So, I am thankful.  Thankful that I have the computer and a calculator to make me look like 5th grade math is really my 'speciality'.  Thankful that I have a house to clean, children to love, dogs to pet (only when they look really pathetically at me) and a husband who loves me despite my controlling tendencies - and in fact loves me more because of them.  He says that, I'm not really sure I believe him.  Thankful that I am able to see that controlling myself is really the one thing I can control, and that God hasn't given up on me in my effort to do so.  And mostly thankful for the God that is in control.  Without that security - there would be no reason to be thankful. 

And to those of you who have been involved with me as I was having one of my fits of need to control, I am truly sorry.  If you haven't been, I can't promise that you won't be.  But, I do know that admitting is one of the first steps of solving it - so just be gentle.  One thing that I will respond to is for you to begin singing Janet Jackson's 'Control' to me softly...I'll get the picture.  I will be laughing hysterically, but I will get the picture.  For my fellow 'control freaks' - you know who you are.  No matter how big the problem is for you, God is bigger.  He loves you, and me - controlling nature and all.