Pouring a little Coffee for Your Heart

Grab a cup and come sit with me!  What better way to start a New Year, or really any given (Wednes)day than to pick a pretty mug and fill it with something warm, and sip on a little truth as we awake to what lies ahead...

I am joining in and linking up with Holley Gerth as we pour out a little Coffee for Your Heart this year!  We are sharing a bit of encouragement on a Wednesday morning because - well, mostly because we all need to hear some encouraging words and by mid-week, we all need to hear them again!

So Holley is inviting us over for something yummy, so we can share our hearts and our 'homes' and speak life and remind each other and ourselves of what we need to know... of what we already know but oh so often forget!

So today, this is what I really want you to know... to hear... and mostly, to feel as we lean in - no, dive in to 2014:

I feel like I am preaching to the choir here. I mean - after all, you stop by and visit me enough and you know my love for coffee and chatting... for counting gifts and speaking life.  Last year, when God spoke those three little things that are to be my focus - they sounded familiar but I had no idea how long He'd been leading me to live my life out day by day like this.  He would whisper soft and sing low and He would pull me close and hold me tight and over and over and over again, when I would share part of our story - He would remind me of what I knew.  Because, really - we can know a thing... and we can know it well.  But it is something entirely different to live it out loud, consistently, on purpose.  

I am an encourager... I give Him praise and glory when I say He - over the years - supernaturally changed my bent. I am now a positive faith girl and I almost always see first the Coffee half Full!  The enemy now has to work hard to cause my perspective and hope to shift to the negative, the lack, the less than.  Oh - I can go there - but I choose not to.

I have learned the secret.

And it has been reminded to me again and again, through the Word of God ("Death and life are in the power of the tongue..." Prov 18:21), through Ann's counting of One Thousand Gifts (...the more I look for blessings, the more I find them!), through trial and error and simply knowing firsthand how I feel when my obvious mistake is pointed out vs. someone calling out the Gold in me.

I have written all over this blog about all of those things but what I want you most to hear and see and 'get' today is this... let's focus on what we are doing RIGHT!  . (I don't know about you, but I am already well versed in what I do wrong!) The secret is not really a secret at all... it is a choice.  

I know. I know... it's nearly a week in to the New Year.  Some of those Resolutions are already forgotten. Some of that excitement on January 1st has already wained and given way to 'realistic' and 'compromise' but let's warm up your cup together.

Each of us can sit down and talk about how we've blown it; how we failed, or feared even trying.  We can pull out our long list of Should Have's and What If's.  We can come in agreement with our shortcomings because that is easy and we all have them.

But this year... this year, still fresh and only days in, let's purpose to acknowledge a few things each day that you have done RIGHT.  What are you doing well?  What have you found focus and follow through with so far that is stirring up hope?  

Share with me in the comments below 3 things that you are doing well! 

They can be new things, or they can be ongoing great habits or choices that you are making.  Sometimes, we can remember to Speak Life... to Be Love... and to Shine On for everyone else, but I believe the call is to live that way always... and that includes a call to be kind to yourself... to fill up before you pour out!

(Did ya see what I did there?)



Linking up with the ever-encouraging Holley Gerth for Coffee for Your Heart

I am also joining in with Jennifer Dukes Lee for #TellHisStory

OK - I'll go first...

Here are mine:

Three Things I am Doing Well:

1. Morning(ish) Devotional/Bible Reading

2. I am participating in a 30Day Green Smoothie Challenge and so far, so YUM!

3. Getting back to regular exercise (whether it's 10minutes here and there, or braving the cold and going for a long walk!)

"Now... it's your turn!" she says as she refills her cup and leans back into the cozy couch...