April 9th, 2010 Day 3

We are now on day 3. Last night while I was at work I passed this picture that you see posted here. The funny thing though is that I have probably passed this picture a hundred times already, and have never stopped to look at it. However, after I noticed how drawn in I was to the first picture I posted, lately I have probably stopped at every single frame of art on the wall. I will be the first to admit, I am not an artist in that way. I personally do not see myself as having a talent for drawing or painting. Writing and art in my oppinion are very similar. Are they the same? I do not know if they are or not. When it comes to art, I'm what I would call an 'art observer.' I think if I tried to, I might be able to learn 'how' to draw a little. The reason why I wouldn't try to look into that is because my love is for writing.

So here is some good news for ya. I have noticed some good already coming from what I'm trying to do. Since I started doing this a few days ago, I have followed through with everything I have decided to do. I have written in the blog every day since day one. I have written in the book I'm working on. I have read quite a bit in the novel I'm reading. Also, one other thing. You may not be religious in any way, but I am. I try my hardest to follow his commandments and do the right things. I have been trying to think positively about life, and be thankful to God for the positive changes that I know are coming.

For me, and maybe this doesn't go for everybody, but being positive is not easy at all. As a matter of fact, I personally always have found it way too easy to think negative about things than to think positive. Can I change that? You bet I can! And I have in the past! When I was married to my first wife, not only were things bad financially the entire way through, but the marriage it self was one big load of stress with a large spoon full of headache on top. This may be a mini lesson in itself, but the way I tried to change my negative thinking is like this. During the day, when people would ask me "Hey! How are ya doing!" I would respond with "I'm really good! How are you?" It was not the truth very often at first. I still felt negative inside. However, the more I went through the motions of it, the feelings came. They say that about loving someone also. Even if things are stressful, tense, or just hard in a way, if you tell them how much you love them and love them to the fullest, the feelings will follow. Sometimes we have to go through the motions of believing and being positive just to get us by until it becomes reality. I have noticed the change in how I feel since I have made the decision to stick to my year long plan. It is a slight difference, but light has started to pierce the darkness. I'm thankful that God is with me and my family as I go through this. Without Him I know this would be so much harder.

The very first night, Wednesday night at work, I read, I wrote in my book, I wrote my blog, and when I got off at 6 am and came home, by that afternoon when I woke up and had gotten back from working out at the Y, I felt different. I felt more peace than I had felt almost in a month. If you ask my friend Melissa, I was texting with her while I was out on parking lot patrol. She and I are both pretty busy, so there are days when we have not been able to really chat hardly at all. I expressed to her all the issues I was having, and that I really needed to be able to talk to my best friend. Thankfully she has always been there for me, and she listened to me that night. It helped a lot, and I'm thankful for her. She is now one of my following friends on this blog and I have requested to befriend her on here also. If any of you would like to connect with her, follow the links. So there you have it. Keeping up with my plan for the year, and I have already seen a difference. Is it still hard? Sure, but I'm at the beginning of all this, and so I still have a long way to go.

When it comes to being God fearing and honest, I am speaking about myself in the literal sense. From personal experience, I can say without out the shadow of a doubt that when you try to live by how God wants you to live, you will live a happier and healthier life. I'm not perfect in any way. I am human after all. What I mean is this. Temptation is always out there. It could be temptation in the form of drinking. Perhaps reading this, you are one of those people whom comes home from work and wants nothing more than to drink yourself silly.

It could be the temptation of things like gambling. I bought my fair share of lottery tickets, so I am not any less guilty than the next. Even at the wanting to come home and drink myself silly. I have done that in the past because of debt and harrassing phone calls from debt collectors. Perhaps you have a girlfriend/boyfriend, or a wife/husband. There is the temptation to lust after other men or women. Am I guilty of this? Yes unfortunately I am. Am I ashamed about it? I would say yes and no. I am not proud of it, but I have done it. My first marriage was a marriage of many sins and mistakes, for lack of a better description. Thankfully things have changed since then. Now I'm in a new erra of stress, tension, and temptation. In a pit you could say. The purpose for me through this blog is to show everything I will be doing to pull myself out. As I do, I will be figuratively building a deck of concrete beneath me so as to hopefully never fall down there again.

Even with sticking to the plan I have set in motion, today for some reason did not feel as good and stress free as last night. I don't know what about it was different. There was more tension at home. Moderate amounts, but still there. I was on the phone getting information about life insurance for both Erin and I. I'm researching it and have not made any plans yet. The lady I was talking to wanted to schedule someone to come do a medical evaluation to make sure we would be approved. I just did not have the greatest feeling about moving forward with it at this point in the game and told her I would need to talk it over with Erin and call her back. I mentioned it to Erin, and I didn't get the best vibe from her. Maybe thinking of insurance that covers both us parents just in case the unthinkable happens is a touchy subject, but it is still a subject of great importance. Eventually I'm sure we will decide on who to go through. For now I'm sure we will just keep researching and see what we can find. Get the best coverage for our money so to speak.

On top of that, while I was on the phone our girls were being loud and distracting. Was first on the phone in the TV room while Ally and Zoe were watching Muppets. It was loud in there, so I went into the kitchen. Well they both followed me in there, and wrestled on the floor yelling. I first scolded them, telling them to please be quiet, that I was on the phone. Then Ally came over and was tapping me on the shoulder. "Dad? Dad? Dad?" "What?!" I said barely any louder than a hiss. "Zoe and I are going to go outside." I was like "No, you will go in the other room and sit quietly until I'm done." I try not to blow up and scream at them. I know that would never do any good. No matter how upset I might be about something, I try to not raise my voice at all if I can help it. Nobody wins in a shouting match. Better to keep your cool and try to talk about it calmly. Both sides will walk away feeling better usually.

So about the picture you see above. It is hard to tell on the computer. But it is a picture showing lots of plants and outdoor wildlife. Very beautiful colors all around. If you look closely you can see all the layers of beauty mixed in. You can go so very deep, its amazing. I am still keeping my eye out for any other pictures that might draw me in but most of them are pretty 2D and don't really capture my attention like these kinds do. You might be sitting there wondering "What is the deal with him posting these random picture?" Maybe as you read that quote just now, you thought to yourself "Yeah! I was just wondering that!" Did I just take the words right out of your mouth?

So for today, the lesson I will leave you with is this. Honesty. I heard a saying once recently. "If you are not honest with yourself, you will not be honest with everyone else." That is so true! If you tell yourself a lie often enough, eventually you will grow to believe that it is true. Living an honest life will slowly lift you up. When I say living honest, I mean that: 1) don't take that which does not belong to you. If it costs money and you don't have enough? Leave and come back if/when you can afford it. When you live an honest life and wait to have the things you want, eventually you will get to where you want to be and it will be so worth it.

Erin and I attended a Financial Peace class with Dave Ramsey. If you have financial troubles, don't have money saved, and are not really all too good with handling money, you should read his books and get into this class. It helps. He has a saying when it comes to living cheaply and saving money. If you live like nobody else today by only spending money on necessities, putting money into savings, paying off debt, then later on in life you will have more money than you will know what to do with and you can live like nobody else. Erin and I are working on that right now. In fact, money in savings and some debt knocked off are some of my goals to have a big dent in when my 365th posting comes along.

So there you have it readers. Lesson for the day is honesty. Honesty with yourself, your wife, friends, employer, and most importantly, God, who knows and owns it all.

I was not sure how much I would have to write about today. So I'm surprised at how much I ended up with. I'm glad. It has been a pleasure writing for you again today. I will talk to you again tomorrow.

Thanks for being here.

CB