We're Here to Help

I met with a friend today whom I hadn't seen in months - probably close to four. His wife had a baby about eight weeks ago, and 12 weeks ago, my wife had a baby, and 16 weeks ago, my family moved a half hour away from where we used to live. It makes spending time with former friends difficult and many times, just plain unmanageable. But not today.

So his wife just had a baby; and, just like me, he's a stay-at-home dad (whatever that means). It's not the easiest road to travel, and now my friend and I can empathize with each other and those dads around the country who stay at home during the day and make less money that their wives.

We concluded our time together, our babies in hand, by me saying a few words of encouragement and praying for him. The main point I wanted to drive home was that we'd always be available to him and his wife if they needed to talk, bounce ideas off of us, hang out, pray with or for them, or otherwise agonize together as parents.

Megan and I want to be known as doers of friendship, not just lip service friends. We want you to know that if there is anything we can do for *you*, we're here to help.

When I'm Not Me

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:CrayonLogs.jpg

Over the past month, I've had conversations with two different friends about what it means to be "me" - whoever you are. We all came to the same conclusion:

One thing that makes you you is that you find special satisfaction in doing a particular type (or types) of work. You've been uniquely gifted, and if you're not regularly exercising those gifts, you're acting contrary to how you were created to act.

Those gifts could be anything: dancing, typing, editing, marketing, talking with people, building, designing, writing, punching or crunching numbers, analyzing, caring for someone, snapping a picture, digging holes, driving, teaching, learning - whatever. The thing is, sometimes your desired vocation doesn't turn out to be your occupation - at least for a particular season in life. But hang in there. I say that as one who struggles with this very thing.

Just to clarify: vocation is just one part of who we are. It isn't the whole person. It's not even the most important part of the whole. But it's a part that gets over-emphasized in countries like the USA.

Starting Over

Have you ever wished that life had a "do over" button?

When I was younger, I used to say, literally, "This is my life. No regrets. I am who I am today because of what happened yesterday. End of story."

Do I still believe it? That's a hard question to answer.

Yes, I'm a product of my past, so at least that much is true.

But do I regret any of my past? Maybe the answer is "It doesn't matter, even if you do."

As a famous meerkat once said, "You got to put your past behind you."

Tonight I've got the whole evening to work on writing new music. My wife has graciously let me out of the house (and agreed to watch the chiluns). But I'm tired and having a hard time getting inspired. So I'm blogging instead, for now.

I'm hoping this whole process will inspire me - and you - to remember that "life's a dance, you learn as you go..."

PS: Anybody else getting freaked out by these crazy "appeals" on Wikipedia?!?!

Do over button image: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KCPDB0QlqNs

P90X and Climbing

A very good friend of mine recently recommended that I try working out with the P90X home fitness video series. He was so serious about having me give it a shot that, for my birthday, he bought me a pull-up bar. Why I all that interested? Nope. Do I like home fitness videos? Definitely not? But do I want to improve my climbing ability? Absolutely.

Some of you may remember that my first post of the new year (2011) was a set of new year resolutions. You can read 'em HERE. One of those resolutions was to climb 5.11a. Basically, it's a difficulty rating system used by climbers and anything rated 5.11x is right in the middle of it - not too easy, not too hard. So all in all, I set a humble, moderate goal of being able to climb about 1/2 of all routes.

I've only done two sessions/days of P90X and, so far, it has spanked my pants off - hard. On the third day, yesterday, I went climbing at Devil's Lake. I was sore, but was able to pull off a couple of good routes fairly cleanly - a couple 5.8's and a 5.9. (Devil's Lake ratings are stiffer than anywhere else I've climbed, so a Devil's 5.8 is really at least a "real" 5.9 and a Devil's 5.9 is at least a "real" 5.10a.

A few months ago - back in May, when I was climbing more regularly (READ: before our second child was born), I was easily climbing 5.10b and was close to climbing 5.10c. (The steps from 5.10a and 5.11a are: 5.10a, 5.10b, 5.10c, 5.10d, and 5.11a.) I feel like I've taken a small step backwards, but still hope to be able to accomplish my goal by year-end.

So the hope is that P90X helps to round out my training, so that I'm not *just* climbing, which has pretty much been the case for a while now. I've been feeling like a slug, and, with the exception of a handful of runs between today and this past May, it's been all I've done.

I'll fill you in on how I'm doing in the coming weeks...