Reality and 2018 Goal Setting

It's been a long year. 

Parenting sons with ADHD, Chronic Pain, and Tourette's Syndrome is a high intensity and often thankless endurance level race with no finish line. My heart hurts (with their struggles). My head hurts (from the mental endurance and research required to navigate all of this). My spirit is in fervent and constant contact with the only Resource I know has their best interests in mind. I cling to the verse, “The Lord is near to the heartbroken…” (Ps 34:18 AMP). The joy, peace, and hope are tangible too, a lovely part of being near to the One who holds us all in capable hands with limitless options and provision.

I am working as a writer/editor and coaching people to move forward in their personal and professional lives. My husband is launching a new business (Blue Sky Ballooning) as well as maintaining his full-time day job and all that entails. And parenting. A lot of parenting. Like, have nothing else on our plate except parenting. 

Our circles of friends have shrunken like grapes into raisins due to lack of mental, emotional, physical time and opportunity. Our agreement is that there is no one and nothing more important than being present and parenting these amazing people we've been entrusted with. 

We prayed and waited for over nine years to get pregnant and live this life. We are here. Now is the time. Everything else, for the most part, is on hold or in the background. The friends that support and encourage us are kept very near and the ones who we love but don't do frequent life with, we miss. 

We give each other breaks, tag team during intense moments, and check in with each other often to know when the other needs extra support. It isn't the seamless teamwork it sounds like. It is messy. Painful. It takes long talks, sometimes tempers flare and then more talking to process our next steps. Together. Staying near to God and to each other.

We make a point to connect when we feel empty of energy and frustrated by our situation knowing that we are better together in every way, even when drained.

Our goal is to raise Mighty Men. Guys who will accept responsibility for their lives, their actions, and their responses to circumstances. We are teaching them grit and tenacity by requiring them to dig deep and do the hard things they don't want to. We are involving them in our family hot air ballooning business because there is an amazing volume of education and challenge to glean in working hard, the science, skill, team work, and communication.

We practice speaking life. To each other. To the people in our paths. Because when things are hard, encouragement always helps, whether you are giving or receiving it. The boys’ favorite song together is “Speak Life” by TobyMac. They all know all the lyrics. You should hear them sing it. It’s amazing.

As I look at my goals from 2017, I realize I made more headway than I thought I did. As I consider my goals for 2018, I realize some of them need to carry over into the coming year.

I told you all of this to encourage you, as you look forward to 2018, set your goals based on who/what is most important to you. Consider the reality of your circumstances, but don’t let it be the ultimate and only indicator of how you set your goals. 

I spent the last 18 months working with a fantastic coach named Terry Gurno (terrygurno.com) who shared this format of goal setting with me. I enjoyed it and plan to use it again.

If you would like to see a copy of what my goals were for 2017, send me an email at jennifer@livecourageouscoaching.com

I’m still praying, evaluating, and considering for 2018.

Let me know how I can help you move forward. I am available online, by phone and skype as well as locally in North Idaho and Spokane, Wa. areas.

I only take a few coaching clients at a time, so be sure to contact me if you are interested so I can let you know what time(s) I have available. 

Being Brave and Living Courageous

I’ve loved the ocean and water my whole life. It’s been a part of the metaphors of my battle with Depression and my battle with my weight. The ebb (low intensity) and flow (high intensity), high tide (eyebrow deep), low tide (all open and exposed), and rip currents (stuff you don’t see coming but if you fight it you sink and drown).

I’ve hated my body since I started puberty in 4^th grade. Yes, that young.

I’ve been much thinner, and I’ve been fatter than I am now. Regardless, the wrestling match over my body weight has felt ridiculously long and obscenely consuming.

I’m listening to Sara Bareilles sing “Brave”. The lyrics have fed my soul since I heard it for the first time – a friend sent it to me as an encouragement in a deeply tragic and painful time. I forgot how powerful it is. Therefore, I write. Honestly. Letting you in on the process.

Continuing to fight, wrestle, wrangle the weight I lose and gain and will lose again takes courage. Facing the SHAME of the decades of dieting, lifestyle changes, workout routines, planning, preparing and careful grocery shopping, and even weight rebound gains after having 85% of my stomach removed requires me to be BRAVE.

See, I know now, after doing this for my entire adult life, that I don’t hate myself, I hate the FIGHT with my body. When I back off and let my guard or my intensity down the fat rises with the predictability of the rising tide.

Shit.

I know. Potty mouth.

Then I read this blog yesterday and I found all the answers.

Anywhere I look to you or anyone else for my value or identity is going to put me on a pendulum – swinging one way or another - trying to behave/live/be a certain expected/preferred/desired way. I’ve done the big “Bird” to the world before and said I don’t care, but I do. I always do.

I can’t be the only one struggling here. We all need hope. We all need to know victory is possible. If I don’t shoot for victory will you have the courage to? Maybe. Hopefully. I hope I’m not the ONLY one you look to for complete inspiration – yikes! But we should look to each other for hope, right?

And of course, some of the spiritual ones would quote the scripture from my beloved Bible that says, 

“Such hope [in God’s promises] never disappoints us, because God’s love has been abundantly poured out within our hearts through the Holy Spirit who was given to us.” Romans 5:5 (Amplified version-one of my favorites).

But what if I AM disappointed?

I am no Bible scholar, so this is just me talking, I’ve hoped in God’s promises almost all my life. There must be nooks, crannies, hidden passages of my heart where the disappointments hide. The abundant Love washes through my heart but doesn’t penetrate the places I’ve tucked away to hide my hopelessness and disappointment.

So, what to do?

Do I invite Spirit who was given to me to pour through even those places? I have before. It’s happened. I’m not just typing. I truly KNOW it’s real. The healing Power is real. By my own doubts, I give in to the “feel”, but I don’t stand firm on the Truth I know. Again, the tide pushes forward, sometimes only splashing hard enough to shake my balance, and other times with such might that I’m leveled. Flooded. Pondering surrender to the whim of the “feel”.

There is no easy way out. No easy solution. I am what and who I am. I like me. I don’t find me ugly or disturbing. But I am SICK OF THE STRUGGLE. SICK OF THE SHAME. SICK OF THE GUILT.

In the past I would have curled up and cried and said, “I can’t” a lot. Now, I have too much to do and I’m angry that these current things are slowing me down. I’m angry about the energy it sucks from my life instead giving life.

Now, because I’ve learned to “Own It” (take FULL responsibility with no excuses) I’m focused on moving forward despite the waves crashing at my throat. I can swim in rough waters. I can hold my breath and wait to float to the surface. I can push through yet another wave - physical, mental, or emotional, to reach the oxygen and breathe, if I stay steady on Truth.

When I don’t, I go under again. Thrashing for the surface while gasping for air.

I started my company, Live Courageous Coaching because I knew I wasn’t the only one struggling, wrestling and tangling with areas where I feel like I can’t seem to get traction. Owning, running, and LIVING Courageous keeps me honest about who I am, where I’m going and how I’m getting there. One day at a time, no matter the tide.

Over My Head

For 38 days I have been dealing with a non-stop migraine. I've taken advice, been to ERs, spent the night in the hospital, shots in the butt, had full workups on my heart and head, natural medicine, acupuncture, chiropractic, massage, exercise, spiritual, psychiatric, emotional, you name it, I've done it. I still have another month to wait to see the headache specialist neurologist (yes, I'm on the cancellation list).

I couldn't see how my current situation reflected anything "courageous".
But then it occurred to me that sharing this might be:

Who I am -- Tenacious courageous woman hanging by the frayed end of the knot of my cope rope.
What I'm walking through --- Constant pain affecting every aspect of my ability to function
When - Every.single.day.
Where I am -- Desperately missing my life
Why - No one has ANY idea. There are literally thousands of thoughts, opinions and possibilities. I've heard most of them. It's too much. It will be figured out when it is. I'm working every angle and possibility that I have energy for at any given moment.

HOW am I going to deal with this?
Push through the pain.
Push away the pain medicine.
Push into hope.
Receive the help I've been given.
Receive the love provided for me.
Receive the purpose of this experience for strengthening not destruction.

To Live Courageous! is to NOT GIVE UP. To make a plan. To believe nothing awful lasts forever and even the good stuff may pass, but it will come again.

And to know that just because there is a setback, that doesn't mean you can't come back stronger, faster, smarter and better than you ever have been. I'm counting on it.