Let the Journey Begin

Journal note #1

Before starting my quest to work on areas in my life that need improving I kneel before the Lord. I have found out the hard way over the years the best way to start and finish all my expeditions is to do so on my knees. Doing so as I call upon the Lord to travel with me, to not only be my guide but to be my companion as well.

The beauty about prayer is it doesn’t require physical knees to bow upon what is required is a spirit willing to bow humbly before the Lord. We can do it in a chair, from our bed, or walking down the street. We just need to do it.

Its funny how when we find something wrong with our car we instantly get it into a shop for service but we seldom do that for ourselves. When I came down with cancer I had several people tell me I needed to stop thinking about caring for others and start caring for myself.

Although I don’t plan to stop caring for other people I will try my best to care about myself. I have several paths of improvement I want to take and learning to control my eating is one of them. I love food, I love to eat, I love the taste, I love to munch. Like my puppy dog I seem to always need to have something in my mouth. Over the years I have lost weight only to gain it immediately back. I’ve probably have lost over 150 pounds over the years only to gain it back three, four, five pounds at a time.

Thinking of what Hebrews 12:1 said about throwing off everything that hinders us I need to throw off the need to eat when my head tells me to eat and not my stomach. I need to throw off the desire to not hurt anyone’s feelings by not saying “No” to their offers of food I don’t need to be eating on. I need to throw off being lazy and not exercising like I should.

At work today I was doing okay. When people offered me candy I took it but didn’t eat it. However, when it came to the special cheese someone had I never hesitated to eat a slice of it. Going along with the crowd hinders me and it is something that needs to be thrown off as well.

Another path of improvement is my house cleaning skills. I’m good at cleaning my house when I take the time to do it. Being a packrat, or someone who likes to hang on to stuff just strictly because, hinders my ability to improve in this area. What is a person suppose to do when they go into a room with a black garbage bag to throw things away but yet can’t find anything they would throw away. Anyone else who came into the same room would have found multiple things to toss in the trash.

A third area I want to work on at the same time is the vicinity of handling my money well. For too long now I have allowed it to control me instead of me controlling it. It’s time to start telling it where to go instead of it dictating my life.

Another area I want to discipline myself in doesn’t necessarily need “improvement” but I want to do better just the same. That is the area of writing out my journal notes on a daily basis. With a notebook full of half written notes again I’m reminded of my need to finish what I start. So daily I have made it my discipline to finish one handwritten note a day.

Last but not least my biggest path of improvement ties the pavement of all these paths together and that is improving in the area of doing something all the way to the end, to finish what I start.

So here to the diet that only lasts a week, here to the money who dictates too quickly, here to my packrat tendencies that clutters my life. I’m on the path to improvement in a race I intend to finish to the glory of God and the benefit of myself.

Let the journey begin!