I'm not alone!!!!!!!!

I know this happens with everyone right?  Life piles up on you and all of a sudden you are drowning in everything, and everything feels like you are failing, no good, hopeless... well maybe not that bad, but close...  It's times like that that I can look back and see that I was letting certain parts of my life go a little (or a lot) lax.  I still try to convince myself that I am doing my best, but continue to neglect the certain simple things that would bring me more happiness and not "aloneness."


“Gently Up the Stream” – © 2003 by Linda J Curley Christensen
I found that instead of keeping myself in check and making sure I was strengthening myself spiritually, I was judging and worrying more about what "others" weren't doing to strengthen themselves.  This picture was one that I found around a year ago and even though it is pretty cheesy it holds deep significance for me.  James and I are represented in this and even though we think that we should be paddling together in the same canoe (that uses our energy and strength more efficiently right?) we start depending too much on each other's strengths and letting our weaknesses go because the other picks up the slack.  I found that this is not incredibly healthy in a relationship or in life in general.  The two canoers have the same goal, head up stream towards the nice landscape, they are together, encouraging each other, working together.  Each is responsible for their own progress and cannot blame the other for falling behind because the minute they start doing that they themselves start to remove their focus on the goal and begin loosing their ability to strengthen weakness.
That being said... it is remarkable how when I make a sincere effort to read my scriptures (or at least something uplifting), pray fervently and specifically and focus on what I can do for others, than I all of a sudden am in my own canoe paddling consistently enjoying the scenery and being with my husband and not terrified that we are going over the waterfall to our doom.
I also know that when I have this switch in mentality I begin to see the tender mercies in my life even stronger and in more light.  For example:  (here comes the list of tender mercies that I've been putting off for some time now)
- Getting kidnapped and forced to go see a movie with a good friend because she wanted to make sure that I got out and was happy.
- Coming home to another friend who volunteered to come to my house to watch my kids so I could go grocery shopping and then coming home to her having cleaned my house (even started in on my bathrooms...eeck)
- The immense pain in my shoulder/chest that was supposed to be a blood clot or heart problem... was just gas.  (My diaghram was actually pushed all the way up to the middle of my chest with so much pressure.)
- My purse that was stolen from my car, was found behind my neighbor's garage.  Most everything intact.
- A friend dropped off a fresh loaf of bread that I had been craving.
- My visiting teachers came to see me!
- My oven that quit working... was a simple fix and we get to keep it!  (It was made in 1969 or 1972... I can't remember)
- We were able to get a new car that saves us on gas! and I love it.
- We are having a little girl!  Which means I get to have more fun with cute little frilly pinks.  (funny how things change... I never would have said that when Annie was born.  HAHAHAHA)
- Our tax refund paid off our credit cards from our "mishaps" from this past fall... whew.
- I have a renewed testimony of fervent praying, loving the death out of your husband no matter what his choices, and looking for opportunities to help others.
- I was able to make it all but the last week of reffing basketball prego.  Not bad for 22 weeks prego.  I only started t'ing up the coaches the last week of reffing for me.  :)

In short, life is good. I just got to keep on paddling my canoe and supporting and loving my hubby.  The blessings are there and I am not so alone!