Tag: try again

Fail, Repent, Try Again

At the beginning of the school year, my 8th grade daughter had an assignment where she had to describe each person in her family with one adjective. She was telling me the words she used for each of her siblings and it was really fun. Then she told me that she chose the word “Perseverance” for me. Since I have never thought of that as one of my defining traits, I asked her why. She said it was because I kept starting new diets and new exercise plans. I didn’t give up. I kept trying. 

That flabbergasted me. I would tell you that my inability to stick to a healthy diet and exercise plan is one of my biggest failures in life. But through my daughter’s eyes of grace she saw it as perseverance. Mom never gives up. She keeps trying. 

I see my relationship with diet and exercise kind of like that Greek mythological guy who gets cursed to roll a large boulder up a mountain, and every time he almost reaches the top, the boulder rolls back down and he has to start all over again. I don’t see this as a battle I am ever going to win. But at the same time, I’d rather spend my life pushing the boulder up the mountain, then sitting at the bottom and giving up. So I tell my kids, once again..Ok, nobody offer me chocolate or ice cream or anything that tastes great, cause I’m going off sugar again. Who wants to go walking in the park with me? I’m trying to walk every day…again. And the kids just nod and accept it. They’ve seen it before. 

But apparently, while I thought I was modeling “how to fail repeatedly”, at least one of them saw me modeling Perseverance instead. 

I’ve had quite a few people tell me I should write a book. Maybe about parenting? And that sounds like a horrible idea to me. I’ve sat and thought about it before. What advice would I give newer parents? I can’t come up with much. Love your kids. Do unto others as you’d have them do unto you. I feel like my parenting journey has been fully rooted in the verse, “My grace is sufficient for you..” I’ve made silly mistakes and I’ve made mistakes that have caused horrible damage. I have some deep regrets. But, God has been faithful. He has been kind enough to show us what we are doing wrong and given us the opportunity to ask forgiveness and repent and try to turn to a different path. He has been gracious to my children and put other people in their lives who have helped them overcome some of the wounds I have inevitably caused. And somehow he has allowed all of us to walk a path where all of my older children still like talking to me and spending time with me, even when they now have the freedom to choose otherwise. That is God’s favor on our lives. 

I would say that my parenting style has been a constant pattern of fail, repent, try again. I guess I could say our marriage is kind of like that too. In fact.. Maybe this is a pattern for life? Fail, repent, try again? And somehow God works through all of that and instead of calling it failure, he calls it perseverance. And he gives us grace to try again, and somehow takes all the messy debris from all our mistakes, and turns them into good. And while I hope that I will see some victories in this life, the good news is that, unlike the Greek guy who is cursed forever, I know that one day I will be with Jesus and all the battles will be over and I will be fully victorious. And until then, with the grace of God, I will persevere.

Shame

I haven’t written in a while and I’ve been trying to decide whether I even want to start writing again. It has been easier to not write. Easier to not think about things too deeply. Easier to not expose all my faults and weaknesses to the world. 

Yesterday, things came to a head mentally, when I finally put a name to what I was feeling and what has been hindering me in many aspects of life. 

Shame.  

I have been thinking about trying to expand my piano teaching next school year. I sat down and was trying to figure out  how to write a flier of what I am offering. On a whim, I looked up some other piano teachers in the area to see how they advertised and what they offered. And as I read through some of their qualifications and expertise and experience and all that they had to offer, I found myself shutting down. What am I doing? I don’t have all those qualifications. I don’t have that kind of experience. Do I even have a right to call myself a teacher? Am I just being pretentious to think I can do this? And I closed my computer and walked away from my project. Overwhelmed with a yucky feeling of shame. Who am I? I’m nothing. 

I’ve been thinking about my blog this week. Mostly because three different people who I don’t think even read my blog that much, said something specific to me about how important it was that I was writing. And my thoughts immediately went to the realm of shame. Who am I to write a blog? I don’t have anything to say. I’ve already said whatever I had to offer, now I’m done, and writing more is just boring people. Who am I? I’m nothing. 

This morning I was catching up on the reading plan our church is doing. I was about a week behind, so I was settled in to read a good size chunk. I got to Acts 10 and the story of Peter having a vision where a big sheet descends from heaven, full of all kinds of animals, birds, reptiles etc, that the Jews were forbidden to eat in their law because they were unclean. And a voice from heaven tells Peter to kill and eat. Peter responds, “By no means Lord; for I have never eaten anything that is common or unclean.” Then the voice from heaven responds “What God has made clean, do not call common.” As the story progresses, we learn that this vision was to prepare Peter for the fact that the Gospel was for the Gentiles too, not just the Jews. Which, as  Gentile myself, is a pretty significant and wonderful event. 

But as I was reading, I found myself stopped abruptly, like running into a wall, when I read those words, “What God has made clean, do not call common.” Because this is what I am doing. God has said one thing about me and I’m saying the total opposite. 

I’m in a women’s Bible study right now and we are doing a study on Ephesians. We are only halfway through chapter three at the moment. But I’d like to make a non-comprehensive list of all the things God says that I am, that I’ve found just in the first couple chapters. 

I am blessed in Christ.

I am chosen in Him.

I am holy and blameless before him.

I have redemption through his blood and the forgiveness of my trespasses.

His grace is lavished on me.

I have obtained an inheritance.

I have been predestined to be to the praise of his glory.

I am sealed with the Holy Spirit.

I have been raised up with him and seated in the heavenly places.

I have been created in Christ Jesus for good works which God prepared beforehand.

I have been brought near by the blood of Christ.

I have been reconciled to God through the cross.

I have access to the Father.

I am a fellow citizen with the saints and a member of the household of God.

God says I have made you clean. Don’t call yourself common. 

And so I am trying. Again. To have faith (Lord strengthen my faith!). To believe I am who God says I am. 

I have adult children. I say these things to them all the time. You learn by making mistakes. Nobody expects you to be perfect, just keep trying. Of course you don’t have experience. You’re just getting started. It will come with time. Don’t worry about other people’s expectations. Just do your best. And if you fail, get up and try again. And I can say all these things to my children, because they are my kids and I know them, and I know that they are wonderful and gifted and I have all confidence that their lives are important and the things that they do, no matter how small, are all part of a bigger picture of who they are becoming and what they will do over the course of their lifetimes. 

And how much more does God see about me and who I am in Him. And he says, “What God has made clean, do not call common.” 

Who am I? In the worlds’ eyes, I don’t measure up to a lot. In my own eyes, I don’t measure up to a lot. But God. He has something different to say. 

So, I’m going to keep trying to become a better piano teacher as I gain experience over time and learn from my mistakes and keep working at improving. And I’m going to try to write more. Because it’s something God has given me to do. And I’ll trust that he knows what he is doing. 

Fat Fridays: Growth Mindset

This week has been a challenge on the dieting front. My son’s birthday was Monday and he requested Elidio’s pizza (local, family owned, amazing pizza) and Dunkin Donuts. I had to drive to Dunkin Donuts in the morning, which was when I had time, get two dozen assorted donuts and then have them sit in my house all day until after supper, and then supervise handing out two donuts per person. At supper I had eaten a big salad and decided I was going to allow myself to eat one piece of pizza. But then ended up eating a little more. And then I started handing out donuts, and by the time everyone had picked what they wanted, there was this little plain, unfrosted, baked donut. And so I ate it. And then there was one more glazed donut. And I ate that. And then I was really full. 

And felt very guilty. 

Uggh. 

I stuck to my plan though and recorded everything I ate and sent it to my trainer. And then we talked about it the next day. 

Whenever I mess up, my instant default thought pattern is, I’ve blown it, all is ruined now, despair, despair, despair. 

So, it was a little unnerving to have the trainer say stuff like, “Taking a break and eating pizza every once in a while is fine. How can you plan to have a treat in the future without over-doing it?” Like, she wanted me to actually just move on with life and try and learn for the next time…What kind of adulting is this??? 

It happened again today when I reported that last night, when meeting someone at a Mexican Restaurant, I ate more chips and salsa than I had originally planned on doing. Her attitude was, Ok, what strategies can we think of that will help you next time you are in the same situation? 

And I’m sitting over here telling my “failure and despair” voice to be quiet, cause I’m trying to hear this good advice someone is giving me. 

It occurred to me today that what my trainer is trying to do is inspire a Growth Mindset in me. 

I found this article that gave some good examples of what a growth mindset is. 

18 Fixed Mindset vs Growth Mindset Examples

The example that stood out to me was:

Fixed Mindset: Failure is the limit of my abilities.

Growth Mindset: Failure is just an opportunity to grow.

I definitely struggle with this. I fail at something and instantly feel like it’s GAME OVER. Which is especially unhelpful when you are on a weight loss journey. Yes, I’ve messed up. That doesn’t mean that I just throw the diet out the window and go back to my unhealthy ways. Instead, I can study my failure, figure out what went wrong, and make strategies for how to do better. 

The next family birthday (which is actually this Saturday), I plan on cooking myself a special treat (I’m thinking baked green plantain with just a touch of spray olive oil and salt and maybe some grilled chicken) and then I am going to have canned peaches while everyone else eats cake. (I happen to think canned peaches are a treat.) Next time I end up at a Mexican Restaurant, I’m just going to ask the waitress/waiter to not bring out chips or, better yet, I’m going to avoid Mexican Restaurants until my self-control is stronger. 

So, hurray for my trainer and all the new things she is teaching me!

Fat Fridays: Week 10 If At First You Don’t Succeed…

Here we are in week 10. I’ve had my first real setback this week. I haven’t exercised in two days, I came off of 9 days without sugar and blew it with pancakes and syrup yesterday and then donuts this morning. I’m finding that my setbacks are really tied to my bouts of depression. I hit a real low this week and I find that trying to keep myself moving and keep doing the right thing is really difficult when I’m feeling so low I don’t want to move.

Frankly, I’m getting pretty tired of this depression. A while back I went through about two years of deep depression. Now it’s every month I just have a couple days when it’s hard to cope. The problem is that while I’m in the midst of it, I feel like it’s all my fault. I am a horrible person. I’m a failure. I’m lazy. And then slowly the fog lifts and I get back to normal and I realize that I had been fighting off depression like it was a giant cloud that had settled around my body. This seems to be a cyclic thing. Some new, bizarre form of PMS? I don’t know. I think I’m going to start keeping a simple diary and see if I can track a pattern of which days I feel depressed, see if if there is any rhyme or reason to it.

I am at the point where I’m ready to start researching diets that lift depression. Right now if someone told me that eating a Keto diet (my personal version of hell) would take away my depression, I would be like, OK, sign me up.

So, here I am. I’ve been doing really well these past 10 weeks. Exercising, being more thoughtful about what I eat, trying to significantly reduce sugar. And then I fall off the wagon. This is where the real challenge lies. What am I going to do about it? Am I going to shrug my shoulders and think, Well, I’ve never been able to do anything long-term, might as well just give up and have a nice binge. Or am I going to accept the fact that this is how life works. It’s impossible to be “good” all the time. You mess up. Acknowledge it and then get back to work. Start exercising again. Cut back on the sugar again. Try to be mindful of what and why you are eating again.

I need to give myself this pep talk. You are not perfect Esther. No one expects you to be perfect all the time. One mistake does not make you a failure. You can do this. Have grace for yourself.  Don’t give up. Try again.

So, this is the plan for this week. Research diet and depression. Stop beating myself up for falling off the wagon. Climb back up onto the wagon. Keep going. And remember to be kind to myself.

Here’s to Trying Again.