Pose I am working toward

One thing I love about yoga is the balance poses. Ultimately, I would love to do a full-blown hand stand.
For now, I'm working on the head stand and the variations thereof.
I have the standard headstand down pretty well.
It looks like this:



BTW, this is not me.








This is me:













And this is what I am trying to get to:




Doing the splits while balancing on my elbows. Piece of cake.

New cliches at work

The first church job I had, I was always astounded at how many cliches I heard. I wondered if this was a vocabulary that people learned in seminary or from the corporate world or simply from watching the movie Office Space.
I kid you not, my supervisor frequently used the phrase, "I'm gonna need you to go ahead and (FILL IN THE BLANK). So if you could go ahead and do that, that would be great. Thanks."

Here I am 10 years later, at mega-church-take-two. Only this experience is rainbows and roses compared to the prior. It is a significantly more healthy atmosphere. However, I am still intrigued by the amount of cliche action I get.

I have started a list of cliches I hear my co-workers (mostly the ones in leadership) throwing around every other hour. Terms like: "We had some misses on that" and "I'm gonna have to push back on that". Another one I enjoy hearing in meetings: "Could the two of you have that conversation OFF-LINE?"

There is a new one that brings a tear to my eye.
"Let's all stack hands on this".

I am going to keep the list going. Care to add to it??

My daughter's photography

My 6 year old daughter Whitby took all of these photos. I think she has a pretty good eye -- of course, they are all of me. HAHA

Consistency

It is funny how discipline in one area of life is an influence for other areas.

For the past week, Creighton and I have been working out everyday. We started P90X, a 90 day extreme fitness program www.beachbody.com (Stay tuned for day 1,30,60,90 photos which will be posted on this blog).

For the past few days, I have caught myself making healthier food choices. I have been drinking water way more than usual and have started taking vitamins again. I have chosen green tea over coffee since Sunday. And today I randomly picked up an apple and ate it (something I have probably only done *none* other times in my life).

Consistency from working out to eating more healthy - that's not much of a stretch. But I have also had more discipline with bible study this week - hungry for God's word.

This is a phenomenon I have experienced numerous other times in my life, yet somehow I always forget about it.

I am excited about the upcoming 90 days. Not only because of the rockin'bod I will have on June 15th, but because of the growth I expect to experience emotionally and spiritually.

Lord, I pray for a renewed commitment to you. Help me prioritize health and wholeness. I give you my body, my mind and my heart. Help me be faithful with the time you have given me.

Texas Independence Day: The Video Recap!

Doctors, hospitals, medicine and sick people

Recently I have done some self-evaluation because my son Canon (age 8) broke his foot and I did not take him to the doctor till 2 1/2 days later.

In the rear-view mirror, I see that my under-reaction is a consistent pattern. I'm fairly certain that at some point in my life, I picked up an issue with doctors, hospitals, medicine and sick people.

Could it have something to do with my dad, the rancher who 1. refuses to retain health insurance because it is a big-business racket, 2. treats the skin cancer on his leather ears with some kind of equine concoction, 3. sews his own stitches, and 4. used to pour "monkey blood" (what is that stuff anyway) on our wounds and say, "Now get your gloves back on and get back out there".

Perhaps.

Does it have anything to do with my experience in grad school as a hospital chaplain for the summer where 1. I felt fear and anxiety every time I entered a patient's room, 2. saw every kind of freak-nasty ailment a person could have, 3. became a germ-a-phobe, 4. came home everyday with irrational fears like catching spine-cancer or diabetes.

Possibly.

Or how about the more recent onset that 1. My kids seem to have no tolerance for pain, 2. ER visits are the most exasperating wastes of precious money and time imaginable, 3. sick people still come to work and school and church when they're admittedly and visibly sick, 4. my family seems to pick up every bug and sniffle that comes along.

Probably.

It drives me crazy every time my kids ask me for a band-aid. All compassion drains from my body when my husband gets sick. I disregard the effect that cold medicine or pain reliever might have - it doesn't even cross my mind until my husband inquires, "Um, have you taken anything for that??"

On one hand, this is the way I am. I don't think I am alone in this. And to some extent I think it's wise and level-headed to NOT FREAK OUT WHEN SOMEONE GETS A HANGNAIL.
On the other hand, I think there is a balance. My reaction time could use a little work. For example, let's say, YOUR SON BREAKS 3 BONES IN HIS FOOT AND YOU DON'T TAKE HIM TO THE DOCTOR FOR 2 DAYS.

So what is that balance?

Our first fracture

Canon fractured three metatarsal bones in his foot Saturday.

He and his friend were laughing and chasing each other around in the living room. I distinctly remember saying, "kids, y'all chill out because....", and right before I could finish the sentence, Canon's friend grabbed his right foot. His body came crashing down onto his left foot, breaking the tree middle bones just behind his toes.

The child screamed and cried for about an hour. I had little compassion in the situation. He has a flair for the dramatic, and I have a "get up and get back out there" attitude when it comes to injuries and pain.

I told him he was ok. We iced it, and I sent him upstairs to lay down and rest. Told him to take it easy the rest of the evening (he dutifully played star wars legos on PS2 till bedtime).

I realized it may be a sprain of some sort when he woke up Sunday morning and it was swollen like a puffer fish. I continued to ice it and encourage him to rest. But still had no intention to take him to the doctor.

Finally on Monday, Creighton urged me to take him to get an x-ray. I straight told him that was unnecessary. Here is how the conversation went:

Me: "It is a sprain, he will be fine in a couple of days"
Him: "You don't know that, it could be broken"
Me: "I bet you TEN THOUSAND DOLLARS that we are going to get there and the Doc is going to charge us $120 and send us home with some advil"
Him: "This is your son, Nikki. You need to get it checked out."
Me: "Creighton, he is going to be fine, he just needs to lay off of it for a couple of days"
Him:"Nikki, you are not a doctor, and you are going to feel terrible if it is broken"
Me: "SSSIIIIIIIGGGGGHHHHHH, Ok, I will take him"

You can imagine the humility with which I made the phonecall to inform Creighton of the news.

Him: "hello?"
Me: "hi"
Him: "Well..."
Me: You were right. I was wrong. It's broken. I'm sorry.
Him: "Aagh, that's ok. I'm just excited that I get to think of ways for you to work off that ten thousand dollars!

My friend hearts cats.