What to do when you mess up…

Grazing...nom nom nom...

Grazing…nom nom nom…

Last week, I created the Fire the Desire 3-Day Challenge form (did you download it on Tuesday?) in response to a request from one of my coaching clients that we “shake things up” to stimulate a change. I wanted to partner along with her, so I decided to take the challenge myself. Silly me. The first day I had stars in every box. WOOT! WOOT! YAY! I had an early breakfast 0 to 5 on the second day…off to a rousing start. Then, my daughter, recently returned from her first international trip, announced her desire to go to IN-n-Out. Hubby, Michaela and I headed off and, since I wasn’t hungry, I just got a diet soda. How about that! I would guess that was about when pride set in.

Next, I persevered through some tennis drills with hubby, still sustained by my breakfast. But after that? Well, I have no idea what happened. Something…I think when I got home I started “grazing” maybe because nothing sounded really good even though I was hungry (or was I?). So suddenly, my Fire the Desire 3-Day Challenge form had a big circle for one of the hours instead of a star! GASP!!!

THIS WAS NOT OK WITH ME! (Perfectionism rears its ugly head…it is not our friend!)

So, I did the mature thing…I crumpled it up (a tantrum, basically) and threw it in the trash. I printed out another chart so I could pretend to be perfect after all.

STOP!

Please tell me you won’t do this (or haven’t done this)!!!

And if you aren’t doing the challenge, I know you can relate even generally to applying yourself to eating 0 to 5, right?

Here is what I propose: If we have an hour when we feel hard pressed to put our star or favorite mark in the box (or experience victory if you aren’t doing the challenge with the chart), let’s circle the box, sure. Then, in the space below the grid, jot down an observation and correction. Prayerfully answer these questions: What happened to cause me to eat outside of my boundaries of 0 and 5 (or to drink sweetened beverages or not to have time praising the Lord at all during the day, etc)? What can I do differently next time so I won’t give in to whatever it was that got me during this hour?

Once you have answered these questions, you can consider the hour that is circled on your grid (or the choice you made to “mess up”) REDEEMED! You have allowed God to take your misstep (or, if you want to be really hard on yourself, a “failure”) and turn it into a victory where you have learned something to do differently when a similar situation presents itself the next time. THAT is a victory! This is what the Hallidays mean when they say failure can be a teacher, a coach, rather than your undertaker.

So, don’t do what I did and act like none of those starred boxes matter just because one of them didn’t have a star in it. Don’t assume that all the time you have made choices to honor God and to stay within your boundaries don’t matter just because of a mess up! Instead, observe and correct and praise God for the opportunity to learn.

In fact, let’s celebrate those boxes with stars in them. Let’s rejoice over the many moments we have made God-honoring choices!

But, of course, let’s have godly balance here…if you have more boxes that are circled than you do ones with stars in them, there is a problem–you may not be committed. But one hour out of 24–an hour where you were willing to observe (confess) and correct (repent) and make a plan for next time doesn’t a rotten day make!

How About You?

How are you doing on the challenge? Sure, you can start over from scratch if you want to, but why not observe and correct and press on now? This is the way life is. It is rarely perfect!

Three Things to Do When You Mess Up…

Image Courtesy of iStockPhoto

Image Courtesy of iStockPhoto

A day in the life…

The day begins with hot tea and the warmth of a personal encounter with Jesus. Blessings and truth gush like a fountain off the pages of the Bible and saturate your heart as you are in awe of how intimate and personal His presence is to you. You have carved out this time first thing in the morning and it is richly rewarding!

In fact, you don’t think about food until a gnawing sensation in your stomach overcomes all other thoughts. Wow! I haven’t eaten since last night’s dinner! I am at a zero! Your quiet time was so satisfying and fulfilling and your heart so satiated with the goodness of God that it wasn’t until you were truly hungry that you gave a thought to breakfast. You thankfully relish a modest portion of a thoroughly satisfying meal.

As the day continues, you are prayerful, joy-filled, aware that Jesus walks with you.

Lunch is another “I-can’t-believe-I-am-actually-hungry” eating experience as you enjoy a lunch out with a favorite co-worker. You readily stop eating when you are no longer hungry. This is what it is like to “whether you eat or drink, do it all to the glory of God” as spoken of in 1 Corinthians 10:31!

Upon returning from lunch, however, demanding clients and a disgruntled boss cause the afternoon to lose it’s luster somewhat.  By  day’s end, the warm glow of the morning’s embers has been pretty well snuffed out. Tired, you saunter to your car considering the late afternoon commute. Your heart falls–overwhelmed–at what you know waits for you at home. Barring a miracle, the kids will be squabbling and messes will be everywhere. By the time you emerge through the thick traffic–made worse by a fender-bender in the slow lane–you are famished…you deserve some joy in your life. You enter the house and, sure enough, no one else thought to clean up the sink which now demands attention before you can even think about dinner preparation. Why is this always left to me?

You plug in the electric skillet with ingredients of what will not-soon-enough be a delicious meal and, as you reach for the cumin in the cupboard, the chocolate chips sitting right next to the spice rack grab you by the arm and threaten that you had better eat them! Ha! Not really, but you would think so! Before you give it any thought, let alone a prayer, you dive in. You finish your dinner preparation as you continue to revisit the bag of chocolate chips and by the time dinner is ready, you have inhaled enough chocolate chips to populate two batches of cookies. You aren’t hungry for dinner but feel the need to eat to “balance your blood sugar” since you know you will crash and burn later when you do get hungry after eating so much sugar. Besides, you don’t want the family to ask why you aren’t eating. That would be even worse than having eaten the chocolate chips!

By the time you go to bed, you are miserable…not just from having overeaten, but from the overwhelming sense of “failure.” Why can’t I ever have ONE good day of eating 0 to 5 all day long? The club of condemnation comes out and you start beating yourself up.

Can you relate to this scenario or one sort of like it? Are you frustrated that you can begin the day so well, but by the day’s end you have steamrollered right over your 0 to 5 eating boundaries?

What can you do when this happens?

In my personal experience and through the one-on-one coaching I have been doing for the past few months, I have seen this scenario or one like it play out numerous times. What we choose to do with our “failure” determines how “successful” we will be with our Thin Within program and the release of weight we hope to experience.

It isn’t the slip up that will keep us from releasing weight–not usually. It is allowing a mis-step to define what the next meal will be like, what the next hour will look like, what the next day, week, and month will look like.

This is why we have to, have to, have to be willing to go from merely “observing” (and condemning) our behavior to planning a correction immediately. That way, the next time–and there WILL be a next time–we will have a plan of action to ensure success! We can take the proverbial bull by the horns and bring him down!

What do I mean by observation and correction? For those of you new or not yet experienced with the Thin Within book or workbook, this is a tool we use to help us see where we strayed from behavior and thoughts that didn’t correspond or support our godly goals. This is the “easy” part. It is the part that says, “I ate all those chocolate chips and then ate dinner when I wasn’t hungry and now I am stuffed!” In Thin Within, though, we try to observe dispassionately. We  look at what happened and declare what action or thought was the culprit that derailed our godly intentions. We don’t judge. We don’t pull out the club of condemnation. This is the FIRST thing we do. You can add more power to this step by confessing it to the Lord in prayer.

Secondly, we want to plan a “correction”–what will we do differently the next time we are in the exact–or similar–situation? This is, simply, repentance. Choosing and planning a new behavior for the next time this situation arises. In our example, I would want to make a plan for when I am tired, frustrated, famished, and get little (if any) help at home after a long day. What could I *do* to change things around so that once I land at home the chocolate chips don’t assault me out of the blue? One suggestion for the woman in our example is that she could use her CD/mp3 player for the drive home to refocus her thoughts so that the commute time is spent renewing her mind about the rest of the day. Praise music can make a huge difference! Alternatively, downloading and using the audio files that I have made available to you might be helpful for the stressful commute. You can download the bible as mp3 or iTunes files, too! The journey home from work (or wherever) can actually become a sanctified “Holy of Holies” of sorts–land that you capture for the Lord. And if, when you do finally get home, you are famished you can have a prepared-in-advance baggie with a small snack designed for just such an occasion–to shave the 0 off just a tad. Like three Ritz crackers or one Oreo cookie–enough to get you through the dinner preparation without inhaling the chocolate chips!

Third thing you want to do after you have messed up is REJOICE! What? Did she actually say “Rejoice!”? Yes! You see, you are sensitive to the Lord and to the boundaries he has asked you to live within. That is why you have an awareness of the situation as a “Mess Up!” It means that you are tender-hearted. You haven’t become calloused to sin or to living outside of boundaries. It is a wonderful thing to realize! So, thank the Lord that he has given you a heart to obey him and that while you aren’t doing it “perfectly,” you are growing in godliness with each day. THIS time is different than any that may have come before as you are learning to do the struggle well.

Bringing it home:

Step 1: ObservationConsider the last 3 “mess ups” you have experienced. What did you think or do that worked against your godly goals?

Step 2: Correction. What will you do to structure life for success so that the next time you are in a similar situation you maintain your commitment to your boundaries?

Step 3: REJOICE! Can you thank God right now that he has given you a heart tender to him? You are here reading about this, aren’t you? That says a lot! LOL! 😀

Share your three steps below for one of your “Mess Ups.” You might give others that read your ideas some strategies for dealing with their own struggles! Let’s win some for the LORD!

Steps and Blessings of Repentance

In my quiet time this morning, I was led to a passage in Job. The passage is Job 22:21-26 and says:

21 “Submit to God and be at peace with him; in this way prosperity will come to you. 22 Accept instruction from his mouth and lay up his words in your heart. 23 If you return to the Almighty, you will be restored: If you remove wickedness far from your tent 24 and assign your nuggets to the dust, your gold of Ophir to the rocks in the ravines, 25 then the Almighty will be your gold, the choicest silver for you. 26 Surely then you will find delight in the Almighty and will lift up your face to God. Job 22:21-26 (NIV)

The study asked me to extrapolate from this the steps to repentance. I found this to be really illuminating. From this passage, I got the following…

Steps to repentance:

1. Submit to God
2. Be at peace with hiim
3. Accept instruction from his mouth
4. Lay up his words in my heart
5. Return to the Almighty
6. Remove wickedness from my home

The study had me look further in this short passage for the blessings and benefits of repentance. This is what I found…

Blessings and Benefits of Repentance:

1. Being at peace–I believe that when I choose to quit striving with God–in effect make *my* peace with him–then he causes the peace that surpasses all understanding to guard my heart and mind. It is something I do and then something He does in me as well…so it is both an action of repentance and a benefit of repentance

2. Prosperity–not necessarily the way the world defines it

3. Restoration (praise God!!!)

4. The Lord Almighty will be my precious treasure–I will delight in Him and, with a clear conscience, be able to lift my face up to Him…

Now I don’t know about you, but this is definitely motivating! The point of the lesson was that in repentance we can experience glorifying God afresh. When we habitually sin and refuse to repent, God’s glory is squelched. We may not lose our salvation, but it is like one friend said to me, God’s glory is hidden by the muddy, miry, torn, frayed, tattered rag of a coat I insist on wearing…it is the coat of habitual sin, shame, and the self-life. If I toss that coat off, God’s glory can shine forth and no longer be hindered…

Another thought about “repentance,” though is that God’s KINDNESS leads us to repentance (Romans 2:4). It isn’t fostered by condemnation.

In Thin Within, we call confession “observation” and repentance is called “correction”–those steps to do what *God* wants…to choose with an act of my will to go His direction and get off the Path of My Performance and back on to the Path of God’s Provision.

All for now!