Surround Yourself

photographer: Aaron Cox

One who isolates himself pursues selfish desires; he rebels against all sound wisdom. Proverbs 18:1

I’m an introvert. A lot of people don’t believe me when I say that (apparently I talk a lot??), but that’s because a lot of people think that introvert = shy and extrovert = not shy. But that’s not the case. Rather, an introvert gets energy from being alone (and can find it draining to be around people) and an extrovert gets energy from being around people.

Don’t get me wrong, I LOVE being around people! But that was not always the case. Years ago, I had some tough stuff happen and I found myself keeping completely to myself. “That’s okay,” I thought. “I’m an introvert. Being alone is good for me.” And I truly believed it. But the reality was that it wasn’t. Unfortunately I couldn’t see that at the time.

As I came out of those trying times and began to once again connect with my old friends, I realized how dark my life had been.

Today’s verse says that a person who isolates himself pursues selfish desires. I can totally see where I did that. My wanting to be alone was completely selfish! I thought MY life was better that way and I literally didn’t care about other people. I abandoned my friends. I purposely tried to avoid people in public. And I blamed it all on the fact that “I’m an introvert.”

The verse also says that a person who isolates himself “rebels against all sound wisdom.” How about this biblical sound wisdom:

For where two or three are gathered in my name, there am I among them.” Matthew 18:20

And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near. Hebrews 10:24-25

Therefore encourage one another and build one another up, just as you are doing. 1 Thessalonians 5:11

You see, the Bible is adamant that we surround ourselves with godly people!

My life truly blossomed once I surrounded myself with godly friends. There was more laughter, more love, more joy. But it wasn’t easy to break away from my old ways. It literally took years of baby steps. I started spending more time with friends. I’d force myself to say hi to every person on the elevator. I started going to the cashier instead of the self checkout.

All these small changes helped me to break out of my isolation. I first surrounded myself with my godly friends who helped get me out of my funk. They loved on me and showed me how to love. Then I took that love and began sharing it with everyone I come in contact with, which is what we are called to do!

Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. 1 John 4:11

This purpose of this post is to encourage you to not isolate yourself, but rather find ways to connect with godly people. Surround yourself with those people and allow their light to shine in your life, and you will find yourself shining a light into others!

If you feel like you have no godly friends, pray and ask God to send you someone. I promise He will. He’s done this for me before and for my friends as well. He wants you to have godly company and will make a way for you!

Meeting Mike the Tiger

Casey and I drove through Baton Rouge this weekend so we decided to stop off at the LSU campus. I'd never been before! We walked around and saw Mike the Tiger. He was enjoying a lazy Saturday. Unfortunately, I made the not-so-smart decision to keep my wedges on instead of swapping for sandals... my feet were killing me! Next time I'm wearing flats so we can see more of the beautiful campus!

Taking Care of My Temple (aka Self Care)

Do you not know that you are God's temple and that God's Spirit dwells in you? If anyone destroys God's temple, God will destroy him. For God's temple is holy, and you are that temple.
1 Corinthians 3:16-17

In the last few months, I've been realizing I need to take better care of myself. Self care has been a thing all over the internet lately, but sometimes I find it hard to make a point to care for myself. But my mindset changes when I realize that taking care of myself is taking care of God's temple, and I want a beautiful temple for Him to live in. Not just physically beautiful, but I believe that temple care/self care also includes the mental, emotional, and spiritual state.

I read this verse this morning and I began thinking about how I already take care of my temple and what changes I can make in the future to take even better care of my temple. I truly believe that in order to accomplish any goal, we must take baby steps, or "small wins" as my mentor likes to say. It's a lot easier to accomplish one big goal when we break it up into a lot of little ones. Plus it gives us a reason to celebrate every milestone instead of feeling like we're so far away from the big goal.

I'm working on a post about a few things I currently do to take care of my temple (aka self care), but here are some other things that will be on my baby steps list.

• Switch to clean/natural body products. I'm in the process of making this switch, but I know it will take a while. My goal is to replace my current products with clean products as I run out. I've been doing some research on clean products, and one problem is that they are more expensive! However, I know it is worth it in the long run! I will still be shopping for good prices though because I'm so frugal!
• Eat cleaner. I used to do a really good job at eating clean, but then my life turned upside down and that was not a thing I prioritized anymore. However, when I reflect, I realize that while I may have been eating healthier, my head was not in good health. I began to think I was better than everyone else who didn't eat as healthy as I did, and that is not good mental health! I'd like to eventually begin to eat cleaner again, but I want to make sure my brain "eats clean" as well.
• Spend more time in the Word. It's amazing how reading the Word of God makes my brain feel "cleaner"! This helps take care of both my spiritual and mental health! I'd love to get back to "Meditation Mondays" and sharing what I've been reading lately or reflecting on sermons I've heard.
• Drink more water. When I got my first office job out of college, I started drinking more water because refilling my water bottle gave me a reason to get up from my desk. I noticed that the frequent headaches I used to have went away! Turns out, I was dehydrated and didn't know it! I'd say I do a pretty good job at drinking water, but I think I can do even better!
• Exercise. A few months ago I stared doing yoga videos on YouTube. I've really enjoyed it! I'm not a person who enjoys most forms of exercise, but yoga is something I can do and enjoy. I also love taking walks with Casey and Oxford. I'd love to eventually incorporate more exercise as my body becomes stronger. 
• Pamper! This kind of goes along with the first one, but I want to make it a habit to enjoy taking care of myself! Maybe this means painting my nails, enjoying long baths, doing face and hair masks, etc. I want to slow down and enjoy taking care of my temple.
• Get off the phone. I'm so bad about being on my phone on Instagram or Facebook! I don't think this constant social media is good for me, but it's so hard to take a break! So I'd like to start purposefully taking time off from social media.

I definitely have lots of things I can work on! Thankfully I know I don't have to do them all at once—it would be almost impossible! I want to make sure the changes in my life are sustainable, so I will work on incorporating them slowly. How about you join me? What is one thing you can start doing to better care for your temple?

A Taste of Hammond: Blackend Brew

Casey and I love eating at local restaurants, and we're totally blessed because there are SO MANY good ones! It makes it hard to choose where to eat because they're all so yummy! So I figured I could share some of our local restaurants on the blog!

The other day was my first trip to Blackened Brew. They're known for their burgers and beer (we don't drink, though, so we just went for burgers). Normally I just prefer a plain cheeseburger, and that's what I was planning to get, until I saw the Coffee Rub Cheese Burger. It had a burger rubbed with freshly ground coffee, pecan smoked bacon, smoked Gouda, and BBQ sauce. Oh my word, it was so flavorful and delicious!

Casey went with the "You're Bacon Me Jelly" burger. It's made with freshly ground peanut butter from the local Berrytown Produce and blackberry jam. It also has cheddar cheese and pecan smoked bacon! (Fun fact, my besties' last names are Smoak, so I keep typing "smoaked" instead of "smoked.") I stole a bite (he knows that I'm always going to ask for a bite!) and was happily surprised that I liked it! I wasn't sure how PB&J on a burger would be, but it wasn't too much. Just enough to give it a unique flavor!

I also got the parmesan truffle fries. Normally I'm not a huge fan of flavored fries, but I like to at least give them a try. But these were SO GOOD. I didn't even bother to try one of Casey's normal fries because I loved mine so much.

We've decided that this one of those places where we'd love to take people who are visiting Hammond. I know we will be back when we're craving a delicious burger!

A Little Bit of Home

I've been wanting to pick up my camera more often so yesterday I snapped a few photos around the house. I love our house! We're renting a cute old house not far from downtown, which we love! The house has the original hardwood floors, and I'm pretty sure these doors are original too. There's so much character, and we're loving adding our personal style as well.

I almost didn't take this photo because the front was so nasty, but I figured I'd love to look back on our old door one day. This afternoon I finally took a rag to the door and frames and accidentally washed off some of the paint! Oops! 

The colors of the house are... interesting. Not what I would have chosen, but the lady we're renting from loves them. I do love our cute mat though! Unfortunately, the front porch is inside our gate, so it's not used. (Well, except for by the cat, since his food bowls are there.)

Casey and I are loving incorporating more green into our home and bringing in plants! We're accumulating succulents and also snagged a Majestic Palm for $8! It was in poor condition, so we got it for a steal. We accidentally overwatered it, but are trying to learn how to take proper care of it! I'll have to get a photo of it soon. (You can see it in the background of this photo.)

The yellow bathroom. Y'all, this bathroom. That yellow tile (though I love the hexagon shape). The yellow tub. And sink. And counter. But I'm truly learning to love it. The white curtain and rug from Target help break up the yellow at least a little bit. Also, I took some tips from The Home Edit and completely reorganized our bathroom cabinet using some adorable bins and boxes I scored at TJ Maxx and Target! I thought I'd really hate the bathroom when we moved in (Casey actually thought I'd give the house a "no" because of it), but it's not as bad as I thought it would be! 

Last, but certainly not least, is our coffee station! For some reason I've always wanted to have a coffee station, and I was thrilled to inherit the family Singer sewing machine which was the perfect coffee cart! One day I'd love to have my coffee mug collection displayed on the wall behind it (see my inspiration), but in the meantime my DIY scroll looks cute! I used this tutorial.

That's it for now! Hope you have a great weekend!

A New Chapter

Every time I get on here I'm like, wow! Life has changed so much! And it has! (Probably because I so rarely blog!) Obviously the biggest thing is that Casey and I are married! People ask me a lot how married life is and I tell them it feels right. I can't believe we've only been married a little over a month. It feels like we've been married for longer, and I think that's just because it feels so natural! This is how life is supposed to be!

The second thing is that I'm living in South Louisiana! (Which I mentioned in my last post.) When we started dating, I knew if we got married that I'd be the one moving. Not because we talked about it, but because I'd felt for a while that I'd eventually find myself living further south. And here I am! Though it was tough to leave home and my family and my church, I really love it here.

We live in Hammond, just a walk away from cute downtown. We love walking downtown to the many delicious restaurants! On Saturday mornings, we walk to breakfast (a lot of places have outdoor seating so Oxford comes with us!) then head to the farmers market for a few goodies. This area is known for strawberries and strawberries are my favorite, so I often get those!

Here are a few photos that I've taken on some of our walks!

Taking New Territory

So Joshua said to the people of Israel, How long will you put off going in to take possession of the land, which the Lord, the God of your fathers, has given you? Joshua 18:3

The children of Israel, y’all. Those crazy people. You’d think after all God did for them, they’d trust Him completely, no matter what. Instead they just rebel and rebel and rebel over and over again. As soon as things get bad, they forget God exists and try to take things into their own hands.

In this verse, they’re procrastinating. Raise of hands for the procrastinators? (My hand is up really high right now.) They’re putting off going into the land that God has given them.

Why? Because they were content where there were.

Where were they exactly? They were wandering. They’d been wandering a loooooonnnng time, over 40 years. They didn’t have homes or permanent structures because they moved from place to place. But now, they had land! In fact, they’d been taking some of it already! They already conquered Jericho and many other cities and people. So why not go settle down into the new land?

If you’ve ever moved before, you know it can be scary. I just moved to a new town a few weeks ago, five hours away from where I lived before. I still can’t find my way around anywhere without Maps on my iPhone. It’s new and I feel lost a lot. Here there are supermarkets I’ve never heard of and the closest Michael’s is in another town!

It was scary to move here. To move away from home and all that I knew. Truly, I just had to trust God because I knew it was His will for me to move here.

It was God’s will for them to have and live in the land. Not to just conquer it and kill all the people and then move on. But it was theirs to have! It was great land, and God provided it just for them.

And yet… they didn’t want to go into it. Because they were content in their current situation.

How often does that happen to us? That we’re content where we are when God has something better for us? Don’t get me wrong, contentment is a good thing, but sometimes it’s so easy to be so okay with where we are that we think we don’t need anything else. But God has something greater for you.

It’s easy to become content in your walk with God. To be just fine with the amount you pray or read your Bible (or don’t). (My hand is up again because I’m totally guilty of this.) God wants to go deeper with you. He wants to know you more and wants to reveal more of Himself to you as well. Maybe he wants to take you further in your ministry, but if you are so content with where you are, you have no reason to move into what He has for you.

Maybe you’re scared of what He has for you. New territory is scary! Not knowing what to expect… scary! Even the Israelites, who had seen God’s miraculous works a million times (honestly a million is hardly an exaggeration), had trouble trusting in what He had in store for them. But thankfully, we serve a God who is completely, totally trustworthy, and who has greater plans for us than we even can think or imagine.

Application:

Are you content with where you are? In your walk with God? In your ministry? Maybe in your job or home or some other area of your life. Seek God and see if He has more for you. Be willing to step outside your comfort zone. Channel strength from the Holy Spirit and take a new step. Spend a little longer in prayer time, find a new Bible study, take on more responsibilities at church. See what God will do in your life and how He will bless you even more abundantly.