Book 4 of 2011

I've been horrible at writing on my blog thus far this year - I tend to forget that it is something that I am striving to do more of. I just finished reading "No Wonder They Call Him the Savior" by Max Lucado. This book focuses more on the great things that Christ did near the time of his crucifixion on the cross. It was great to see that someone was willing to forgive a man who had probably spent his entire life defying rules and engaging in thievery. People seemed to only understand who Christ was when he was nearing his death. It was a great book - another A+ from me.

As for what else is going on, my migraines are continuing to be a problem - they are continuing to be consistent, but I am trying to be optimistic about my next appointment with my neurologist coming up. As for other news, it's been extremely cold here in my neck of the woods for about the last week - right now, it's 3 degrees F out with a wind chill of -12 degrees F. Pretty darn cold. I've been doing alright with my goal for living healthier. Not doing as much exercise as I should be, as I have been slacking off for the last three days, but Monday starts another week of exercise so I've got another chance to get back in it. Food tracking has been going well - in fact, if anyone is looking for a healthy living website, or a community filled with people trying to lose weight, check out sparkpeople.com. This website is phenomenal. It doesn't cost a thing to sign up and there are tons of message boards and profiles of people who are trying to live healthier and lose weight - they offer inspiration and motivation and the whole community of people just tries to encourage and help other stay on track - this is especially helpful for someone like me who doesn't have anyone here working on this with me. Make sure you check it out.

Peace and Love

Book 3 of 2011

A couple of days ago I finished another Max Lucado book (I only have one more to read for now) called "Six Hours One Friday". It is another book focusing on the crucifixion of Jesus and offered interesting images of people asking for his forgiveness as they prepared for death (one of the thieves next to him on another cross) and offered some great images of what the atmosphere and sky were like as death drew upon them. It was almost frightening at time, but made it all the more real. It was yet another great book - definitely an A+.

On another note, I have recently signed up on a site called Sparkpeople.com. This seems to be a healthy living site where there are tons of people in a community sharing their goals of getting healthy. You can use their nutritional tool to track your foods and they take care of figuring out how much you should eat based on your age, weight, ideal weight, height, etc. You can also set your fitness goals, using their strengthening exercises plan or using your own and tracking your cardio workouts. It has been a great first week for me and I hope that things keep going in a positive direction. Although the migraines have not decreased any, and have actually gotten a tiny bit worse this last week (maybe based on the exercise that I haven't done in a long time), I am hoping that losing the weight will help me get rid of them.

Peace and Love

Book 2 of 2011

Wow -- can you believe it? I have already finished my second book of the year! You may be thinking that compared to last year, this doesn't seem possible. But this is about the normal speed with which I read, provided I don't have a horrible migraine. At this rate, I am confident that I can achieve my goal of reading 75 books this year.

I recently finished yet another Max Lucado book entitled "And the Angels Were Silent". At first, I wasn't quite sure what to expect with this book, considering the entire subject of the book is looking at the last week of Jesus' life. What I found was a better understand of everything that took place, from coming into Jerusalem on what we celebrate as Palm Sunday, to kicking people out of them temple on Monday and Tuesday, to the Last Supper celebrated on Thursday, where Jesus (of all people) washed the feet of his disciples, including the one that he knew would betray him, to Jesus praying in the Garden of Gethsemane, to Judas' betrayal in the Garden, Jesus' meeting with Pilate, and his walk to Calvary. This book was just incredible. I think my favorite chapter in this book was Chapter 26, when Max describes a trip he took to Jerusalem. He followed in Christ's footsteps in what were his final steps -- through the narrow, crowded streets of the Via Dolorosa. Where he gave his life on the cross now stands a church, a cathedral. In the church, there is a gold plated hole that is believed to have been where his cross was raised. At the suspected place of the tomb, a priest is guarding the entrance and the inside looks ornate. Luckily, Joe (the guide that Max was with) happened to know of a place within the cathedral that was more intimate and more real. It was a small (no more than 4 feet long and wide), plain, dusty, musty, rock tomb. As Max entered the tomb, Joe said something close to this: "Wouldn't it be ironic if this was the tomb where our Lord was buried?" Max sat in silence, and the idea that he could have actually be in the real tomb gave me goosebumps. It gave me a more real sense of what God did for us - what he sacrificed for us.

This book was phenomenal and I highly recommend it to EVERYONE! It gets an A+ in my book :)

Keep on reading, learning, and enjoying life. Don't forget that even when you feel like you are alone, you NEVER are alone. God is always with you.

Peace and Love

Book 1 of 2011

Yay! So I have already started on my New Year's resolutions by finishing my first book of 2011. I recently finished reading a wonderful book called "Just Like Jesus" by Max Lucado. If you follow my blog, you know that I have read a few of his books before (he has A LOT)and he just keeps on inspiring me through every book that he writes. This book doesn't need much of an explanation, as the title does a great job of describing it. But one thing that I loved about this book was that it compared the ways that Jesus was like us on Earth and how we can honor him and strive to be like him while we are here. I loved that there was a chapter on how we should spend time with him daily in prayer and reading his Word. It was incredibly comforting. I would definitely give this book an A+ for being a great book to turn to in order to learn to be like Jesus.

I highly recommend that when you read an inspiring book (or really any book for that matter), keep a notebook near you. You may come across some interesting quotes (as I so often do) that will strike you as something you want to remember. It's a great way to not only learn something from what you are reading, but something that can take you back to what you were reading when you read that quote.

More books to come!!

Peace and Love

Happy New Year!!

Happy New Year everyone! I hope you all had a fun and safe night. May God bless you all throughout 2011.

Just to give you an update, I ended up finishing the year having read 20 books. The was 55 less than my goal, so this year I am keeping that goal of reading 75 books. I try not too make too many resolutions (or goals as I like to view them) because I'm afraid that I make them too large, meaning that I force myself to do more than I know I am capable of at the present time. So this year, I have tried to make my goals/resolutions not easier, but more realistic. My New Year's Resolutions for 2011:

1. Trying to get in better shape - instead of saying that I am going to work out for so long every day, I am going to do something active every day, even if it is only for 10 minutes, just to make sure I am doing something, since I don't really exercise at all. I also begin physical therapy for my knees and back and am hoping that I can learn some exercise techniques that I can do correctly and every day. I am also hoping to possibly get the Kinect for Xbox 360 sometime this year, which I have heard provides a great workout with both the dancing games and sports games.

2. Eat healthier - instead of going out for fast food all the time, I am going to cook more meals at home and use more vegetables and fruit in my cooking. I don't consider myself to be a great cook, so most of our food comes out of a box. But even if I make rice or pasta, instead of indulging just in that, I am going to try and add vegetables to it and eat at least one to two pieces of fruit a day. I also would like to attempt to try to cook some seafood at home, since I not only love seafood, but it is healthy as well.

3. Work on my book - instead of constantly just thinking about the fact that I want to write a book someday, I am going to start brainstorming about the plot and my goal is to have the subject and basic storyline picked out by the end of the year.

4. Pay off debt - instead of ignoring calls from my school loan counselors, I am going to try and be more proactive in making payments. I say try only because at this point and time, I do not have a job, thus having no income. But I do get some money every now and then, so I would like to start paying off my loans if I can manage it.

5. Learn something new every day - I know that this goal sounds really hard, but I am confident that I can learn something new all the time. I feel that people can learn something from anyone, even if they don't agree with overall ideas or methods. It has been suggested that I bookmark the Wikipedia Random Page, which will bring up a random subject when I click on it - I'm hoping to learn some pretty interesting stuff.

6. Stop swearing so much - my household tends to swear quite a bit, and while I can't really get my boyfriend to stop doing so, I would like to try and do it less. Sometimes, I think that it sounds unnecessary and unintelligent, and while I do still swear when I feel no other word will work, I am going to try and curb how much I do it.

7. Grow in my faith - throughout the past year, I feel that my dedication to being a Christian hasn't been as strong as I would like. I feel that I haven't been as focused or as grateful for the relationship I have with God. I hope to grow in my faith, learn new things about other religions (more for understanding than anything since I am a devout Christian and don't intent to convert to any other religion), and focus more on what I am thankful for instead of the negative side of everything.

8. Complain less and show more gratitude - I know that one of my downfalls is that I complain a lot about the health issues that I have and the situation that I have been dealt. I want to try and see everything in a positive light and learn to be thankful for what I do have rather than what I do not.

9. Read 75 books in 2011 - while I set this as my goal last year, I obviously did not achieve it. I am hoping that this year, I can read all of the books I own (or at least most of them since I am pretty sure I have over 75) and learn some things that I may be able to incorporate into my own book someday.

There ya go - a long list of resolutions that I hope to accomplish. While it may be hard, I am going to try and take things one day at a time because focusing on the present is all I have control over. As I recently read in a Max Lucado book, "leave tomorrow's worries for tomorrow."

Peace and Love