SISTER WISDOM : build a better life

Obstacles Welcome: Turn Adversity to Advantage in Business and Life

by Ralph de la Vega, President and CEO of AT&T Mobility and Consumer Markets.

4 out of 5 stars

How does a book about being a successful business executive translate into something helpful for a Mom, writer, and homemaker? Read the rest of this entry »

What's Your Fatal Flaw?

(Not to be confused with the alternate title I considered, "How to Be a Femme Fatale." Toooootally different.)

Why You Should Be Friends With Your Opposite

So my sister-in-law and I were talking today. We're great friends, and we're basically complete opposites. (Not surprising, perhaps, our husbands - the brothers - are also basically complete opposites.)

Our friendship has some great advantages. We help each other understand what our spouses are thinking. And we help each other understand what might (possibly, as if we could ever be irritating) irritate the living himini-jiminies out of our spouses. Plus we also just LIKE each other. And our daughters are best friends.

But I digress.

Transparency Vs. Clamshell-ency

My sister-in-law is a transparent person. If she feels it, you know it. I, on the other hand, am like a clam in a very tight shell. If I feel it, you will never know it unless I decide that I want you to know it and I will only decide that I want you to know it after I think about it. For a long, long time.

Both of our, er, communication styles have their good points. She's honest. She doesn't let an offense go unattended, so resentment doesn't build up. And when she's overwhelmed, she lets her husband know.
And me, well, I'm good at keeping confidences. I choose my words carefully, and thus it's rare that I hurt someone's feelings by what I say. Since I think before I speak, I usually calm myself down so I'm not super-emotional when I do talk.

Annie on the Halfshell

But then there are the bad points. I'll just elaborate on my own: here's the difference between me and a clam. When a clam gets an irritant in its tightly locked up little shell, it makes a beautiful pearl. When I get an irritant, I just get irritated. But I keep it stuffed in. I push it further down. I get more irritated. I get overwhelmed. I get upset. I talk myself out of being upset. Then I get more irritated, more overwhelmed, and more upset. By that time, the only thing I can do is talk, i.e., mutter half-sentences about "I'm just so tired...." and "But I don't know what's wrong....!" in between bouts of weeping.  Poor Joe.

My Fatal Flaw

My fatal flaw is that I'm not so good at communicating myself to others. I'm super at listening, but I'm also super at changing the subject when it comes around to what's going on in my head and heart.

I'm not good at being vulnerable. I'm not good at just saying what is important to me. I despise asking for help.

"So I Told Him..."

My sister-in-law/opposite friend is the one who helped me discover my fatal flaw. No, she didn't walk up and say, "Hey, clamshell, you need to talk more!" I just noticed something in our conversation, a repeated phrase: "So I told him," "then I told him," "after I told him..." and so on. You get it. She was talking to me about talking to her husband.

And that's when I got it. Her husband knew every single thing about her because she (gasp) told him. He did not have to read her mind. He did not have to guess. She said, "I want." She said, "I feel." She said, "I need help." She said, "I'm upset." She said, "I'm happy."

Talk about making your husband's life easier! Meanwhile, here's Joe, having to go read my blog to find out what I'm thinking about... (I love you, honey!)

The Hopeful Part

The first step is admitting you have a problem. After that, it's not nearly as much of a problem as it used to be.

When I think about the times I've just been down, way way down, or the times when Joe and I have just felt like we were missing each other, I can pin almost all of them on a point when I didn't communicate.

Now that I know what my tendency is, I can watch for it. It's not always a bad thing, don't get me wrong. Being able to listen and think has served me well in many instances. But when I'm unaware of how it can affect me, when it isolates me, when it undermines my relationships, then it is a bad thing. And that's when I pull out my "Fatal-Flaw-Busting-Light-Saber" and do my little Darth Vader dance. (Minus the mask and asthmatic breathing.)

Find Your Fatal Flaw and Vanquish It!

Here's a quick and easy way:
1. Grab your best friend. Chances are, you're personality opposites.
2. What's her "strongest" personality trait?
3. What's the opposite of that?
4. Bingo! Your fatal flaw!
5. Now that you know, keep an eye on it. Use your light saber appropriately.

Original image courtesy of Mr TGT. Totally awesome photo editing job - all me.

I Always Feel Like I Am Compromising

If I focus on writing, working, I feel the lack (dreadfully) in what I am as a mother.
If I focus on being Mommy, making a home, I feel something in my soul begin to scream. Too long at that, it grows silent and still. Too still. In-the-throes-of-death silent (though, now that I think of it, "throes" don't seem that silent).

Joe comes home and asks, "How was your day?" and I laugh a crazy little laugh of desperation and answer: "Oh, great, you know, changing diapers, doing laundry, the usual. Yours?"
And I have nothing else to say.

Average or Exceptional

I listened to a podcast yesterday and in it this is what caught me, this small instruction: Read the rest of this entry »

I didn't know much about Eleanor Roosevelt before I read this book, but here's what I learned: if I can be like anyone when I grow up, I hope I can be like her.

I can't give you a timeline of her life, because that's not what this book is about. It's not a biography or a memoir; it's more like one of the best self-help, personal growth instruction manuals written, long before self-help and personal growth were the blitzes they are now. Read the rest of this entry »

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I ♥ Resolutions

Okay, I love New Year's. It's my favorite holiday. (I just realized that this year so I'm broadcasting it in hopes that the people I love will recognize and support me in my favoritism by buying me gifts for New Year's, too. I mean, it's the least they could do, really.)

I love making resolutions. I come up with a long list every year. Some years I decide not to go overboard, and I limit myself to something reasonable: 10 or, okay, 11 if I just can't help it.

And yeah, I don't keep them all. At all. Hardly ever. I goof, I fail, I mess up, I quit, I weaken, I have no willpower.

Except for this year. This is the year.
Right?

Making Progress? Really? (Or Is That Heartburn?)

I've noticed a disturbing trend, lately, despite my habitual resolution making and breaking: I'm actually making progress. I guess the endless repetition is finally getting to me. My resolutions are generally far bigger than can be accomplished in one year, anyway. (For example, #11 from 2005, "Prove global warming is a myth" and #6 from 2007, "If not a myth, figure out how to solve global warming." That just takes some time, I don't care who you are.)

I'm making progress. Don't ask me how, exactly. I still do a lot of the same stupid stuff in the same stupid way (i.e., get mad at Joe for not reading my mind, expect my kids to get along with each other, stay up too late, eat too much, forget to work out, forget to call, forget to write, forget my name, find myself on the Amtrak headed to Toronto in early spring... oh wait, sorry, I just lapsed into a Mommy-escape fantasy there. Back to what I was saying.)

I still do the same stupid stuff, but I don't do it quite as often. I still do the same stupid stuff, but I get over it quicker. And I'm happier. And maybe this has nothing to do with New Year's and making resolutions at all. Maybe this is just me and where I am in life, and I just happen to be reflecting on it all as 2009 goes out and 2010 comes in.

The last 5 years have been a rollercoaster. More ups than downs, and crazy fun, but intense.

A Recap

2004:
January - Joe and I start courting. (And yes, I said courting not dating and I'll go into that some other time but not here, goshdarnit, so just keep reading and don't get bogged down in those little details.)
May - Joe and I get engaged.
September - Joe and I get married. I move to St. Louis, since, being married and all, we kind of want to be together.
2005:
Jan - September - We adjust to married life, we work together in the family business, we have fun, I miss my family a lot, I want to have a baby, I start worrying that I can't get pregnant (no birth control! Hello!), I start writing more.
October - We're pregnant!
December - We buy a house and move in!
2006:
Jan - June - Pregnancy and home ownership.
July - Mara is born on July 11. We have a wonderful home birth. She is beautiful. She is an easy baby.
2007:
Feb - We decide that Mara is so easy, we should have another. We're pregnant!
May - I spend the entire month in MS to be with my Mom, who is not going to get better. It is the strangest experience I have ever had. Our emotions are as strung out as possible. I miss my husband.
June - My mom dies. I go back home. I am numb.
November - Robbie is born. Our son. I start getting unnumb.
December - We spend Christmas in Colorado. I think I was supposed to be born there, and live there, and we start plotting how we will move there.

2008:
April - My Dad gets married and my sister gets married, within a week of each other.
August - We haven't figured out what causes this. We're pregnant! My dad says, "You've got to be kidding me!" I alternate between "YAY" and fits of "ohmygoodness-howcouldyoudothistome-whydidwethinkthiswasagoodidea-wearegoingtobeinsane-weareinsane-ican'tdothis-aaaaaaaaaah."
2009:
April - Zeke is born. I think, "Third birth at home, nooo problem. It'll be easy." Haha, Andrea, haha. But he is beautiful, our little Ezekiel.
May - July - Our house, when did it start shrinking?
August - From out of nowhere  comes a new place to live. We move into "the parsonage." It's big. It has a huge stone fireplace and a sunroom and is on the 10 acres of church property, woods and fields and flowers and deer. I am in heaven. We rent out our house.

End Recap.

And here we are.
2010.
I think this is what I'm defining as progress, this feeling that I finally know who I am and am comfortable in that.

But don't think for a minute I'll stop making resolutions.  I've gotten way too good at it to quit.

Image courtesy of Sara. Nel.

Maybe these will be helpful. If you know of other good ones, please share in the comments... or just be selfish and keep it all to yourself, that's fine too...

Inner Growth

Bible Reading Plans: Choose from 13 different Bible reading plans, sign up in one click, and get your daily reading mailed to you. I just started the "Read the New Testament Letters 3 Times in a Year" plan.
Blue Letter Bible: A great resource for Bible reading and study. You can click on words and phrases within the passage to read their definitions from Strong's, read commentaries, or do searches. Lots of translations.
Bible Study Tools: A flashier version of Blue Letter Bible, same basic stuff. I prefer the simpler Blue Letter site for basic study, but Bible Study Tools also has a large library of related books.

Health

The Green Smoothie Challenge: A former editor of mine started this site; you can join the world-wide challenge beginning on January 5th, 2010, or conduct your own challenge. It's a great way to kick start a diet or lose a few holiday pounds.
The Rosedale Diet: Joe and I are starting this diet on Monday, January 4th. It's not ground-breaking, persay, in the eating plan: cut out carbs and sugars, eat lean meat, eat a lot of vegetables. A twist is his take on fat; Dr. Rosedale recommends eating more good fat, snacking on nuts and the like, in order to reset your metabolism to burn fat instead of sugar. More on the diet and our experience with it later. For now, here are some links if you're interested:

• Articles by Dr. Rosedale
• The book: "The Rosedale Diet" from Amazon.com
• Dr. Rosedale's official Website
• Review of Rosedale's book from CurledUp
• Aside: I could not find a good source of Rosedale Diet-compatible recipes online. Maybe I will start posting some... The book itself has a hefty recipe section in the back, but some of them are a bit out of my food budget (Lobster Salad, oh dear Lobster Salad).

About.com's Walking Site List of Walking Programs: I generally find About.com sites to be thorough, well-stocked, and good for related recommendations. This list is of walking challenges and programs online that can serve as a guide for your walking.
2010 Fitness Challenge with MommyMandy: I'm all about group participation, accountability, encouragement, and challenges. Mom blogger Amanda Acuna is kicking of a 2010 Fitness Challenge with weekly updates, giveaways, and more. I'm in.

Writing/Blogging

Roy Peter Clark's Writing Tools: one of the best books on writing I've ever read also resides (in summarized form) on a website as quick posts or listens (2-minute podcast). Every writer should go through this series.
National Blog Posting Month: NaBloPoMo is actually every month now; you can sign up for the current month and get on the list of participants. It's also a great way to find new blogs to stalk... (not that I would do that).

There Is Always More

Resources, especially the online type, are infinite. I still think the best is the simplest, though: just brag up your resolution and then let your own sense of shame and fear of embarrassment keep you from goofing. Hey, if we can't quite get over our need to impress people we might as well use it to improve our lives.

I took a walk this morning, and was so proud for making myself get up and go around the block. In that glow of self-satisfaction (how little it takes for me to get there...), I stepped around the corner and saw our house, our yard, our patio, our garage, our overgrown garden area, our junk, our toys, our mess. The glow turned gray. I walked around and around, I tried to make a plan for making it all disappear.

Pride wants to make a presentation.

I don't like the clutter. I don't like the junk. I don't like the mess and the weeds and the lack and I don't want to be represented by it.
But you know what?

Read the rest of this entry »

The Lord takes pleasure in the prosperity of His servant.

Commit to your own success.

Shoot for the highest possible goal.

Take yourself seriously.

Get rid of the physical irritations: do it.
Face the fear of success: overcome it.

Let go of things that don't belong to you.

Be enthusiastic! Overzealous! Passionate! Annoying! Go for it!
You're not just like everybody else.

You're not a cynic; you're a dreamer.

Dream without reservation.
Write without hearing the critic's voice.
Act without questioning your ability.
Be true and real and honest.
If it isn't working, kill it.

Start over. Commit.

Dream. Speak your dreams.
Believe. Reach. Don't stop.
Failure is not inevitable. Obstacles are part of the process.

With diligence, success IS inevitable.

Image courtesy of Shoes on Wire.

1. Learn that God wants you to succeed.

Journal entry, 18 October 2007:
I keep thinking of that verse in Psalms: "The Lord takes pleasure in the prosperity of His servant." I guess for some reason I've thought You preferred me to fail, or, at the most, to be mediocre. I saw failure as some kind of test or character-building experience, and though there's certain truth there, I no longer think You're the one instigating the failure. I am. You're the one saying, "Come on, try again, you can do it." You're the one hoping this time I have enough character to get past that failure point. You're the one who takes pleasure in the prosperity of Your servant. Somehow I felt almost obligated to fail before now. Was I sabotaging myself? I guess somehow along the way, I picked up this idea that the passionate pursuit of a goal is an insult to You, a sin, idolatry. Strange, and not true. Col. 3:23: "And whatsoever you do, do it heartily, as to the Lord, and not unto men..."

~ What good is it for God if I fail? What does he gain from my failure?

2. Learn that you can't succeed at everything all at once.

If your vision of success is perfection in every area of your life, you're in trouble. First, perfection isn't success. Secondly, success in particular areas may require some letting go in others. I'm after success as a mother to three young children right now; that means I'm not going to hit "success" in having a fantastically clean house most of the time, or in keeping stains out of my shirts, or in going to hear more local bands, or in staying up past, say, 9:30 with any mental capability.

You have to choose what you're going to focus on right now, pick your goal, and be okay with letting some other things slide by on a minimum for a while. Set your level of acceptability for the routines of life, for the areas you're not focused on, and then get yourself on auto-pilot in those areas so you can focus on the one or two or three things you are striving for.

3. Learn to define what you mean by success.

You can't reach a goal if you don't know what the goal is. And though there's something to be said for setting high goals, shooting for the moon, blah-di-blah-di-blah, there's also much wisdom in defining success as something real, measurable, and reachable.

My mother-in-law (a very wise woman) and I were talking about this the other day. She's very strong at setting big goals and then breaking them down into smaller, reachable goals. It's success in stages.

Both my husband and I tend to set big goals. He's a very big-picture person, a visionary. It took me a while to realize that I am, too. My big-pictures still tend to be smaller than his, so in comparison I thought I was setting goals that were pretty realistic. (Yet another reason why comparison is not a helpful tool.) Whatever the scale, if your success isn't defined in a goal you can understand, measure, and realistically see yourself achieving, then you've just guaranteed your own failure.

So aim big. But break the big aim down into smaller pieces, then break it down again, and then focus on one of those pieces at a time. Success breeds success! Once you get rolling, you'll be unstoppable.

4. Wait and percolate.

Journal entry, 04 November 2007:
I don't know why, in all these areas like fixing up the basement and starting a business and gaining financial freedom, we have these times of lag. I think things are happening, preparatory, unseen things, and we have to hold on, wait, be diligent, trust, keep working in the meantime. Right now I'm feeling a sense of excitement, anticipation, hope, as if we are quickly reaching the point of progress and change. Situations seem impossible to overcome to me, but they aren't. Circumstances change in what seems like an instant but it's really a matter of long, slow, hard, faithful, small effort. "Suddenly" the wall falls down. "Suddenly" the business pours in. "Suddenly" to us because we don't look beneath the surface; we miss the depth of preparation taking place even within us.

5. Plan for the obstacles.

The world is full of obstacles. The only way to avoid them is to have no aim, to simply flow where you are pushed. You know people like this. We call them victims. They are needy, hurting, unfulfilled, whiney people. We should pity them, but we should not become them.
The world is full of obstacles. We spend too much time avoiding them. Challenges make us alive. Challenges open our eyes to what we can actually handle.
"Anytime you set a significant or meaningful goal for yourself, you'll have a feeling of inadequacy. That's part of the process of living instead of merely existing..." ( Treat, 23-4).

6. Make a Yes list and a No list.

Spend some time studying yourself and you will start to see patterns. When do you get cranky and depressed? For me, it's almost always a result of fatigue. I'm not saying I'm an eternally happy, peppy person. I'm not. I have normal ups and downs and off days and so on. But when I get that horrible sinking feeling, when I can't get myself excited about the things I love to do, when I want to cry for no apparent reason, the real reason is usually very simple. So simple I almost miss it: I need rest. Usually a good night's sleep does more for me than anything else. So here's something on my No List: don't try to have deep, heart-to-heart, burden-sharing conversations with my husband when I'm at that point at the end of the day. Every time I have broken my own rule, I have regretted it. I'm too spent to have a profitable conversation. It just ends up with wailing and gnashing of teeth.
A few more examples, from my NO list: I don't babysit on the weekends (now that my husband's day off is Saturday, I keep that time sacred for our family). I don't answer the phone during work hours (housework or writing work). I don't let myself feel guilty when Joe offers to keep the kids so I can go to the grocery store alone. I don't plan so much (I tend to overplan and then overwhelm myself; it's better if I just start doing and take time to plan as I go).

From my YES list: I make myself say YES when someone asks if I need help (because my auto-response is No and that's usually not accurate; I do need help). I get up early to read my Bible, plan the day, write in my journal because my day goes a thousand times better when I do this. I try to read aloud with the kids every day, even if it is just for five minutes. I stick to a naptime regimen: our schedule and routine stay the same as much as possible.

Those are kind of general examples. The idea is, though, whether it's to help yourself in reaching a specific goal or just to help yourself overcome some common problems, to think about what helps and what hurts. Then give yourself some rules and live by them for a few weeks. See if it makes a difference. Different seasons and different goals will call for changes to your Yes and No lists. Get your husband's input if you're clueless. He can probably point out some things you do out of obligation, guilt, tradition, or whatnot that you could pop onto your No list and free yourself (and your family) from.

Go for it.

Image courtesy of craigCloutier on Flickr.