The Word of 2013

A couple of years back, I had a friend who told me that she follows a blog where the writer picks a word for the next year. I thought this sounded like a lovely idea. So I prayed on what my word for 2011 should be and SHINE kept ringing in my ears. So Shine it was and Shine I did. I graduated school. Bought a house. Got married. It was a good year.

2012 rolled around. And again I prayed for a word for that year. GRATITUDE was what kept popping up, so gratitude became my word for 2012. It was easy at first. In fact, the more you practice looking for things to be grateful for the more things you find to be thankful for. As 2012 rolled on, we hit hardship. Rough waters. Patchy times. Lots and lots of change and highly stressful situations. Looking in the rear view, I realize now that the word gratitude completely did it's job. Even in the hardest parts it became second nature to find the things to be glad about. I usually have a glass-half-full perspective, but this was different. It was deeper.

Here's 2013. Leading up to it, I had nothing. Not a word on the radar. It hit me New Year's Day. I hadn't even asked God what my word should be. Just a minor importance, I think. Schlepping across the hardwood floors in my new jammie pants and furry slippers to let the dog back in, I started the prayer asking God what my word should be for 2013. Apparently, He'd been waiting for me to ask because the  words weren't all the way out before I started getting bits and pieces of clouded code type feelings and jumbled lettering forming strange word associations in my mind. I have to confess that my receptors to the Holy Spirit have been less than in tune for some time. This is my fault. I've been stuck in "suppose to's" which makes it hard to lean into who God says you are instead of the pressures you put on yourself to be. Walking outside of who you are born to be is exhausting and has made me mean. It's also blocked too many nurturing words from the Father.

Not understand why I keep getting twinges of a house that is peaceful or words like calming clipping very shortly in my ears, I stopped by the table and said...out loud..."I think I'm seeing where You're going with this, but I can't pinpoint the word." Off to the bookshelf  I shuffled. Picking up the thesaurus, I flipped to the word peace to see what jumped out at me. Then I saw it. No. That's not it. Oooooo. Tranquil. That's a lovely, pleasant, nice to say word. I like TRANQUIL, Lord. *Nagging feeling telling me to go back to the last word* OK fine, but isn't it the same thing, really? I mean this is a thesaurus. It lists words that are similar....why don't I like this word if it means the same thing too....why don't I really want to know the answer to that question? My eyes skimmed backwards to the sort of offending word.

There blinking back at me (Oh, yes. It's alive. This word is most definitely a character. It blinks. It breathes. It haunts, just so you know.) is the word that I see elegantly scripted on coffee cups in the Christian bookstore. One plaques above it's own prayer. Oh yeah. It has it's own prayer!! It's that much a word. It's a big one. Entire philosophies hang on this ONE WORD.

S   E   R   E   N   I   T   Y 

The state of being serene, calm, and tranquil. *deeeeeeeep exhale* There is a reason He pushed me. It's to make me better. More like Him. Because He loves me enough to not leave me stuck where I am. Because He's heard me say for as much years as I could talk that the thing I wish I could change about me is that I'm a screamer. I'm a screamer because I have high anxiety and I don't slow down. In truth, I don't know HOW to slow down. My house is often in a state of high stress because I operate in a state of high stress. The only way to change this and to make it more functioning for the rest of my family (including 2 introverts who do not do well with my state of manic) is to answer my prayer. So here goes. The word of 2013 is serenity.

It's going to be an interesting year. In the past six days, I've failed miserably at being the least bit serene :)

New Year's Detox

This is how I spent my New Year's Eve. Eliminating my body of the toxins that I gorged myself on during the holiday festivities. I slathered my hair in coconut oil and tucked it up under a cheap plastic cap. I must say my hair hasn't look this luxurious since before I started coloring my hair! 

I ran a bath as hot as I could stand it (which for me is pretty darn hot). Add two cups of Epsom salt, 1 cup dead sea salts, 1/2 cup baking soda (if you have hard water) or you can just use 2 cups of Epsom salt to dissolve into the water. After you turn off the water and the salts are dissolved, but before you submerge into the water add a couple drops of essential oils. I used lavender for its calming qualities and lemon for its detoxifying effects. I have a lovely recipe for making a bath salts with basil and balsam fir essential oils for a deep detox but seeing as how I didn't have them on hand, I used what I had available. This part is most crucial, take a biiiiiiig and by big I mean SUPER HUGE glass of water with you and drink it while soaking. This will pull nastiness out of your body so use this time to put goodies back in. Plus it'll keep you from getting light headed when you get out. Set the timer on your phone for 20 minutes and relax. 

After the timer goes off resist temptation to soak a bit longer and stand up slowly. Dig some coconut oil out of the jar and slather it on while your pores are open and ready to absorb the moisture. Shower off under a cool stream of water to seal the oil into your pores. Resist the urge to suds up. Most soaps and shower gels are loaded with chemicals and as the call it "yucky stuff". Simply shower off in cool water and towel dry. 

My skin was so soft and all glowy and pink. I'm resolving to do this at least once a week!