Tag: reflections

The Year in Review

11/365

Jim Gray (Beaconhill NW) offered up a great list of introspective questions for closing out 2009.

I shared my answers on his blog (whether he was looking for that or not :-)) and thought I’d share them here as well.

1. What are the 2-3 themes that personally defined 2009 for me?
grace. patience. love wins.

2. What people, books, accomplishments, or special moments created highlights in 2009?
publishing my first novel in Dec., working through the foster care process to get certified as foster parents, our first cruise with friends in February and our second cruise with family in July

3. Give yourself a grade from 1-10 in the following areas of focus for 2009:
vocationally – 6
spiritually – 6
family – 6
relationally – 7
emotionally – 8
financially – 6 – this one always worries more than it probably should
physically – 7
recreationally – 6

4. What am i working on that is BIG?
I don’t know that anything I’m doing would be considered “BIG”. I’d like to think of the things I’m doing as small but having impacts on individuals – such as our podcast, my novel, laundry love, and our community groups.

5. As I move into 2010, is a majority of my energy being spent on things that drain me or things that energize me?
It’s a mixture. From 8-4:30 much of my time ends up spent on things that drain me. My evenings and weekends I try and focus on things that excite me but I’m also trying to re-prioritize some things and find more balance among the things that excite me.

6. How am I preparing for 10 years from now? 20 years from now?
Probably not very well. I’m more focused on the next 6 months than anything beyond that.

7. What 2-3 things have I been putting off that I need to execute on before the end of the year?
I hope to be doing some video/audio production work during my week off as well as some projects for our tribe – including building an online solution for tracking our “members” as well as preparing for some training for our community group facilitators.

What about you? How would you respond to these questions?

Open mic

Sun Studios Microphone

From time to time I like to check in and find out who my readers are and why they come to my little spot on the Interwebs.

So its open mic blog.

Tell me a little bit about yourself. Who are you? What do you like doing?

Mic check – one two, one two.

This is your chance to tell the world whatever you so choose… express yourself, share a passion, plug your band, etc.
Continue reading Open mic

Tuesday Briefs

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Late Tuesday edition…

highlight(s) of the week:
We had a great time helping host Fresha Peppa Cafe with Aaron and Keri this past Friday night. Laurie and I joined them and Tracy to host a “fancy” dinner for the Brian and Heather Treadaway. We had a lot of fun as Laurie was the paparazzi, Aaron was waiter Fredrico, I was Tiny the bus boy, Tracy was the local bar fly and Keri did most (if not all of the cooking). Lots

books i’m reading:
Still working on Gardening Eden by Michael Abbate’. So far its great! Need to get it finished so I can move on to several others waiting in the wings.

things that are annoying me:
Follower counts on Twitter. Like several others have suggested this week – I’d be totally cool if Twitter chose to remove the follower counts on the site. I could care less that you’re a movie star and have 1 million followers – and I could care less if you have 1,000 followers or 5,000 followers or however many. I’d like to think that Twitter’s not about a popularity contest. But of course if I had 1,000 followers too – who knows – I might catch myself braggin’ about it as well. 🙂

things I’m not looking forward to:
Laurie’s going to be spending some time out of town the next week or so for work. It might seem a little silly but we’ve never spent a full day apart since we’ve been married – two years next week. She’ll be gone tomorrow morning till Friday evening and then again two days next week – including our anniversary.

Of course I’m glad she’s getting these opportunities. She’s really thriving in her new job and I’m super proud and excited for her.

things I’m looking forward to:
Making sushi at home. While Laurie’s gone this week I’m going to console myself by trying my hand at making sushi. She’s definitely not a fan and not interested in trying it – so I’m going to try out my new “sushi for two” kit that I bought from Half Price Books last week.

Tuesday Briefs

tuesdaybriefs

The late Tuesday edition…

Seems I’m getting later and later with this each week. Before long we may have to call it the Wednesday briefs. But then if I keep it up we might make it full circle and get back to the Monday briefs eventually :-). I guess we can only hope.

I was trying to find the motivation to do this yesterday, as well as today but I guess writing about my week doesn’t seem near as interesting to me as it might to someone else. I’d much rather tell someone else’s story than my own.

highlight(s) of the week:
On Monday morning I took the day off of work and attending an adoption ceremony for my friends Todd and Monja’s new daughter. It was a small ceremony with candle’s lit in honor of those who made the day possible. Reminded me how valuable and important each and every person – and child – really are.

I was glad they invited us to attend and glad that I was able to take some time off of work to be there. It’s been a lot of fun getting to know Todd and Monja over the last year or so at encounter and even more so over the last six months or so as they’ve been a part of our Saturday night group. Their new daughter will be well taken care of and spoiled by the entire family I’m sure!

quote(s) i’m digging:
“People of faith claim to know the Artist but lack any compunction for protecting the artwork.”
“The closer we are walking with the Creator, the more beauty we will see in life.” – Michael Abbate’ in Gardening Eden

books i’m reading:
I’ve put The New Conspirators on hold for a bit while I try out some new books. Tom Sine’s book is great, its just taking me a long time to read for some reason. So I’m currently (as you might have guessed) reading Gardening Eden by Michael Abbate’. So far its great! Really enjoying what he’s saying and how he’s saying it. So far some great reasons for being good stewards of creation that I think any right-wing-republican-conservative-evangelical person should be able to agree with (or at least find very little to argue about) — it just makes sense.

job update:
Well, I was turned down for the job I applied for. It was a bit of a bummer but when they told me they really wanted someone with great copy editing skills and they told me one of the applicants had worked as a copy editor for 20 years at the local paper – I figured they made the best decision. I’ll be the first to admit that copy editing is not my forte’ or something I strive to excell in.

However, the good news is that they’re still really interested in bringing me on to their team and my current boss is still happy to see me advance in my career so they’re trying a few things to see if they can bring me on in a similar position as the one I applied for. It might be a few months down the road still, so I’m not expecting anything soon but if it happens – wonderful – if not, no biggie.

things you should be listening to:
Our last two podcasts (with Adele Sakler) have added some fuel for the fire of some (or so they think) but that’s OK. Don’t let them (or us) tell you what to think. Listen to the show and think for yourself. As Flobots say, “There’s a war going on for your mind – if you’re thinking – you’re winning.” Listen to Adele’s story, chew on it, think about how you typically respond, how you would want someone to respond to you and then how you think Jesus would respond. And then share your thougths with us and others.

things I’m looking forward to:
I don’t think I’ve read an entire book this whole year yet. Geeze! I’m looking forward to checking at least one off my list. Don’t know how much longer it will be – but I’ll be glad when it comes.

Monday Briefs

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highlight(s) of the week ::
We paid off our credit card debt this week! WOOT WOOT! Thanks to Uncle Sam for saving some of our money this year. We made our annual withdrawal and put it towards closing out our credit card balance as well as paying off a CT scan. Now we just need to finish paying off the rest of our medical and parental debt and we’ll have met our goal. We’re thinking we can get there in 10 months or less (maybe a lot sooner if folks want to have more freelance web work done or folks will start buying stuff from our Amazon store! :-)).

Friday night we made a trip to Frisco to see Baby Ben. Had a great time with his mom, dad and big sister.

Also, last night we had a planning meeting to discuss JustOneDallas – a very cool initiative that I’m looking forward to being a part of (I’ll write more soon). But just for now, save the date :: May 16. That’s the scheduled launch/kick-off date for the Dallas hub. And for a little more background you can check out our podcast chat with Max Fincher.

music i’m digging ::
In between listening to U2’s No Line On The Horizon, I’ve also been digging The Damnwells’ album “One Last Century.” Downloaded the album for free last week and hope to feature some of the tracks on some upcoming podcasts.
And two weeks later, I still can’t get enough of U2’s No Line On The Horizon
right now. Having them on Letterman all week probably didn’t help matters either.

podcast i’m digging ::
I finally took the time to listen to the Mars Hill 10th anniversary podcast this morning. Good stuff. Encouraging stuff as well.

new web hack/trick ::
I figured out how to build a “table” using unordered lists in HTML and CSS. Boy did that make updating the CWF bio page a breeze. Was worried I’d have to rebuild the whole table to insert seven new bios.

freelance work ::
Part of filling our our withdrawal from Uncle Sam this year (aka our IRS taxes) meant filing the income I’ve made from freelance work this year. I think this is the first year I’ve had anything over $100 or so. Once I totaled it all up, I made just over $2,000 doing freelance work this year. That’s just a mere drop in the bucket of most people – but it makes that $100 seem like even more of a drop in the bucket. I’m trying to do what I can to move away from “freebies” for folks and only doing work I can bill out. Not that money is “everything” but it sure makes doing the work that much more enjoyable when you know the client’s really appreciate your work enough to pay you for it.

misc ::
I bought a new webcam this week with birthday money (thanks mom, dad, dan and martha). So I’ve been enjoying using video chat via Skype and Tokbox. If you’ve got a webcam look me up (jdblundell as always) and lets chat.

looking forward to ::
I get a day off of work on the 20th for “Spring Break.” Sure wish I got the whole week, but one day is better than no days.