Taking Down Christmas: Three Tricks For a New Year and New You

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Some people think it’s Scrooge-like to take down the tree and decorations the day after Christmas.  Perhaps it is.  But, for those of us who need simplicity to function, we find it a necessity. 

This year I put on some upbeat country music and told the kids “Let’s see how many songs it takes for us to take everything down, put it in totes, move it out to the cottage, and get the vacuuming and dusting done.” The only thing upbeat from that moment on was the music.

After the crowded calendars, dinner plates, and front rooms of the Christmas season, I find myself longing for open space.  I want nights to stay home, simpler meals, and space to move around the living room without knocking ornaments off the tree. 

Jon Kabat-Zinn, creator of the Stress Reduction Clinic and the Center for Mindfulness in Medicine, said “Voluntary simplicity means going fewer places in one day rather than more, seeing less so I can see more, doing less so I can do more, acquiring less so I can have more.”

Um, wow.  He just described the complete opposite of what most of our Decembers look like.  But, our lives don’t need to remain like that come January.  Here are three ways to create room for the new year and the new you of 2020. 

Adopt the Hot Lava Mindset

Don’t place anything on your flat surfaces (tables, counters, shelves) unless you find it beautiful and semi-permanent.  Think of those surfaces like hot lava that will burn up and destroy what you place there.  Instead find a true home for the item.  That could mean filing it, chucking it, putting it in a box to donate to charity or immediately returning it to where it belongs.  This habit can be practiced all day long, or at the end of each day when you see a backpack on the verge of bursting into flames on the kitchen table. 

Give Your Debit Card a Vacation

Have you ever put yourself on a spending freeze?  That means not spending anything for a week, a month, or even longer.  You could either lock up your cards and checkbook in a safe, deliver them to a friend for safe keeping, or make a pact with your spouse or best friend to stop the madness of acquiring.  If you are like me--and like to give personalities to inanimate objects--just picture the poor beleaguered card, limping and panting after the overuse of the holiday season.  Give it a vacation and time to heal.  Our spending does need to be checked, even if it’s so we can give ourselves a pat on the back for doing better this year than last. 

Picture a Rested and Renewed You 

We have all either heard of or created a vision board for the dreams we’d like to see come true.  I am a believer in the practice, as it has worked for me time and time again.  But what about creating a vision of a rested, peaceful, and delightful you?  Could we find ways to incorporate simple days, simple clothes, and simple meals into our lives?  Could we cut down on the excitement and bump up the contentment?  Could we scale back the worry and elevate the trust?  Are there words we could try to embody?  Perhaps writing and repeating a mantra that would symbolize the-new-me-in-the-new-year?  

Though I love the Christmas Season for the way the world gives at least a nod to Christ’s birth, it has been hijacked into a season that too often promotes less of what Christians believe.  We owe Him better than that.  We owe Him our best.  

Back to taking down Christmas.  I’m happy to report that five of us did it all in just four songs.  Perhaps this New Year I’ll help the family create a four-song moment for us to make room for Him again in 2020. 

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Beauty, Talent & Love

Beauty, Talent & Love

How is a girl expected to cram 50 years of influence and relationship into merely a few paragraphs?  With a lot of prayer and painful editing.

 I’ve narrowed it down to three character traits of our mom that seem to bubble up as a recurring theme in the notes from her beloved friends and relatives who have reached out to us since her passing. 

Beauty, Talent and Love.

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The View From the Porch

The View From the Porch

“Come on.  We have nothing else to do today.”  My husband begged to take the kids to look at the Horses for Sale.  He had spotted the posted sign while we were on a Memorial Day getaway.  

An hour later, the owner met us at his field where we talked horses while the kids pushed tall grasses through the fence.  They’d squeal with delight at the thrill of having the massive animal’s agile, soft lips pull the shoots from their little hands.

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Ministering for Millennials . . . and for the Rest of Us Too

Ministering for Millennials . . . and for the Rest of Us Too

Since the beginning of the year, I’ve been participating in a newly released New Testament Bible study program called “Come Follow Me.” 

To be honest, though I have loved Bible stories since childhood, as an adult I have skipped around in the Bible, (with a lot more skipping in the Old Testament if you must know) and have never made a serious effort to study its messages. 

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Bangs and Prom: How to Connect With Your Daughter

Bangs and Prom:  How to Connect With Your Daughter

“Mom?  Do you think I should cut bangs into my hair?”

“Yes, honey.  I think they’d look cute.”

“But do you think I’ll regret it?”

“For sure. But it will be fun for a little while and then you can rue the day that you did for the next five years.”

“I’m going to ask Dad.”

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Windows Into Their Worlds

Windows Into Their Worlds

Last July I casually began a little accountability group of women to help us begin or finish the books we wanted to write.   

The casual experience rapidly grew into something much more motivating and powerful than any of us had imagined.  It spawned a group name, websites, speaking events, workshops, a new book written collectively, and finally a small publishing company.  That was in a matter of six months.

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How to Measure a Life

How to Measure a Life

I stood in the back of a flatbed trailer with my sister.  We were at the county dump.   

Our parents needed us for another afternoon of dusty and tedious work. Dad was struggling with dementia and mom had her hands full with her own third bought of cancer.  They had moved from their Arizona home of 25 years, to be near their three married children in Utah. 

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Grit vs. Grace

Grit vs. Grace

Living in the Mountain West, we happily host nearly 25 million visitors per year from around the world.  Tourists use their vacations to come admire the beauty of our landscapes and wildernesses.  Boasting 5 national parks and 14 ski areas, along with scenic byways, Utah’s monumental cliffs, red rocks, canyons and mountains are some of the most unique and stunning views you’ll ever see.

 

But you know how it is.  If it’s in your own back yard, you are often guilty of not exploring it.  Like the man I met at church in Kauai, Hawaii who admitted to me that he hadn’t even been down to the beach in over 5 years!

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3 Times That Sacrifice is Actually a Gift

3 Times That Sacrifice is Actually a Gift

On a road trip with my youngest son, we were listening to the audiobook of Corrie Ten Boom’s incredible WWII memoir, The Hiding Place. One of her stories triggered a memory in me and I pushed pause on the stereo to tell my boy a story of personal sacrifice that daily affects his life.

My grandmother was single most of her life. She raised her five children while teaching elementary school, and supplemented her income by giving piano lessons after school until it was time for dinner. She would then feed her family, clean the house, do the laundry, and prepare for a repeat the next day.

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Keep Your Ear to the Ground

Keep Your Ear to the Ground

A recent yoga practice ended with me sitting on my knees, my forehead resting on the mat.

Soon I wiggled my legs out from underneath and lay on my stomach, with my ear to the ground in a corpse pose. What a relief to be done.

The family was out of the house, and I deserved a cat nap for my efforts.

I didn’t get one. Just as I started to doze, the air conditioning unit clicked on under my ear.

Then I heard a shower start up and water began trickling down the pipes. (What? I thought everyone was gone!)

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49 Lessons Learned in 49 Years

49 Lessons Learned in 49 Years

Birthdays.  I’m kind of getting over them.  There’s really nothing I need, and nothing the family needs to try to surprise me with.

So this year, I thought about this annual milestone differently. 

“Now that I’m in my 50th year, what exactly have I contributed to the world in that time? What have I learned from the world in that time?”

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We Can Borrow More Than Clothes From Our Sisters

We Can Borrow More Than Clothes From Our Sisters

God granted me one little sister.  We started out best friends.  Then I grew up and she became an annoyance.  Then I grew some more and we became best friends again.

In high school I remember being jealous of how smart she was.  She was invited to be in the gifted program, and I wasn’t even sure where the gifted kids met!

She had a sense of style and an eye for beauty.  I’d turn up my nose at some outfit she had purchased, then would sheepishly end up borrowing it every chance I got because it just had that cool factor.

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Five Ways Autopilot Promotes Sanity

Five Ways Autopilot Promotes Sanity

We’ve all seen the movie scene where a dashing airline pilot reenters the cockpit after strategizing with his crew or handling a disturbance between passengers.  He finds all is in order and the plane seems to be magically, peacefully flying itself.

I used to think… “Goodness, I wish I had a car that could do that.”  But with that being more of a reality than a Jetsons-like dream, I’ve advanced my wishing for an autopilot mode in life.

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Losing Truth and Light

Losing Truth and Light

In college one of my roommates painted a picture for me, so funny that even today I giggle each time I think of it.

She said that in one of her religion classes, the professor taught that any time we knowingly sin, or break a rule, we will lose truth and light in our lives.

One of the rules on our campus was to use the sidewalks.  We were never to cut across the lawns in our hurry to get to class. 

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Three Reasons God Gives Us a Break

Three Reasons God Gives Us a Break

School is almost out for the year.  Ah…that blessed promise of freedom.  We all rejoice in the coming recess.

My young people suddenly take on a slight lilt in their voices.  They smile more easily.  Even the rush of compiling projects, taking placement tests, and cramming for final exams doesn’t dampen their bubbling enthusiasm.

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