Pressing On and Making Choices

Last night I sat down to look through a my scrapbook from 2011. I wanted to see what I was doing a decade ago - in my last full year of singleness. Ryan was watching a movie, but he sat beside me and glanced over now and then to see some of my adventures. I, on the other hand, read every word of my year and giggled at the details I'd forgotten.

It was a whole other hair length and color for me. It was a whole different job. (Two of them, actually, because I changed jobs that year.) It was a whole different city, church, and even group of close friends. I love it that I still have all those dear friends in my life, but changes for them and for me mean I don't see them daily like I did a decade ago.

But what I noticed most of all as I slowly turned all the pages was the purpose and intentionality I saw within myself. I'd just come out of the worst year of my life, full of such hurt and loss. For months, I'd barely eaten, barely gone anywhere, barely done anything beyond what I had to in order to survive. When 2011 arrived, I was absolutely determined to live. I wanted to make the most of the year, even though I had no idea what the year might bring.

And so I did. I chose to spend time with friends, cook meals and invite people over, take risks, visit new places, and experience more than I ever imagined possible. I blossomed in a million little ways that year, and it was such a joy to look back at it and relive those beautiful moments.

Though I didn't say so in the scrapbook, I do remember how strange it felt at the beginning to do all these things that had been put on hold in my life for so long. I had to remember how to cook meals in such a way that everything finished at the same time. I had to relearn how to drive long and unfamiliar distances. I had to be brave and overcome fears like flying and commuting. 

But all throughout that year, I pressed on and made new choices. Living the fullest version of life wasn't going to happen if I kept napping on the living room floor and eating a dinner of lime tortilla chips. It wouldn't happen without effort. 

It's safe to say 2021 will look much different than 2011. The world in which we live is a much different place and the details won't match. They can't match. 

But the decision to press on and make choices remains, and I can be as determined in this year as I was in that one.

We talk to our tenants about this quite often. They're still learning to make life choices and learning how even small daily choices can have a long-lasting impact on life. We remind them that most of life's choices are made in small ways, not in huge decisions. But those choices are no less important just because they're small and daily.

We're a week into this year now, and I'm excited for some of those daily little choices I've been making that are adding up to good habits.

* I'm purposing to get in those full 10,000 (at least) steps each day. It's challenging in the winter, but I'm finding that if I'm creative, there are ways to make it work. Unless the weather is beyond foul, I can layer up and walk where I need to go. For the steps I need to finish inside, it turns out that those steps make for great prayer time or a mini praise-music concert. I'd gotten a little lazy, choosing movies over moving. 

* I'm purposing to be more thorough in my journaling, mostly for the discipline of writing. I'd been saving my journaling time until far too late at night and then found myself slopping through it, so now I'm choosing to do that a bit earlier so I can make the time for it that it deserves.

* I'm purposing to do a workout every day but Sunday. Ryan and I have both struggled to find a place to park our workout routines in our new schedule, but this is one thing we're choosing to make time for in the new year. This is one of the hard boundary lines we're drawing. We can't do our jobs if we aren't at our best, and we aren't at our best if we're not working out. We are making time for it. It's worth it. 

You get the idea. Meal planning. Reading books together. Using a planner. Resting. They're all little choices, but they add up to a life that is balanced and healthier. 

So we press on, purposing to do the best we can with the days the Lord gives us. We have no clue what they might look like in detail, but we are committed to showing up and giving our all to each one.