2015! Let it Ring!

A bad habit I am going to break:

Worry! I want to surrender worry. To let go of things I can’t control (ie everything) and just let it be.

A new skill I would like to learn:

I would like to learn how to best be still. To sit in the quietness of the morning with an empty mind and open heart so that I can best be available to just listen. I want to be able to sit and take in a moment with God without my own thoughts for the day ahead, or the latest worry that I have already spent time obsessing over, trying to out shine the still small voice to I so need to hear.

A person I hope to be more like:

My Mimi. She was a woman filled with such quiet grace and so much wisdom. When my mom said to me recently “you are your Mimi's kind of Christian, must skip a generation” I thought so much about what that meant. The thought made me smile. Though she may think I am more like Mimi than her I don’t know if I am as much like Mimi as I would like to be. Quiet? Nope! Wisdom? Doubtful! Loud grace? Maybe. I want to work on the rest of it.

A good deed I am going to do:

I am not sure how much I like this one, because I would like to think that I just do them when the moment arises and that I need not think about it. However, I know that I feel short on something that had been sitting on my heart. There is a homeless man that I pass every morning on the way into work. I often try to avoid him because I have nothing for him. But that isn’t true. I can smile, I can try to arrive early so that I have time to say hello, to talk to him. I had meant to bring a little Christmas bundle with me the last week of school, a gift to give him, but also something to spark a conversation. When the last day rolled around and I walked out of the parking garage, my heart sank because I realized I hadn’t done what I had intended too. I currently have the bag packed with goodies and plan to take it on the first day back in the New Year.

A place I would like to visit:

Though I doubt I will make it this year, I would really like to go to Africa and it is something that I would like to start planning and saving for. Going to Africa is something that I have always been afraid of, for many reasons. 1.) I am not an out of my comfort zone traveler. I decided during our honeymoon trip abroad that I was a US traveler. But a trip to Costa Rica to work with Agua Viva Serves changed that perspective, at least in terms of mission work. I want to REALLY go out of that comfort zone. 2.) I can’t help but think that it will forever change my heart, my life and my perspective. And while I know that it will all be for the better, change at all, terrifies me. I want to let that go!!

And so I just want to do it. I want to let go of the fear and go, for myself and for the Still Small Voice that I hear saying, “Just go.”

A book I would like to read:

I received Unwrapping the Greatest Gift, The Family Christmas Treasury by Ann Voskamp. Next year at Christmas I hope to read through it with my family during Advent. That and the Jesus Storybook Bible, again! I know I have mentioned it in pretty much every other post, but seriously! I love it!

A letter I am going to write:

I have so often thought about this letter. I have started to form it so many times in my head. It is a letter to a girl I do not know, a friend of a friend, who wrote to me after my brother died. Her letter meant so much to me and I have never let her know. I want to do that. I want to actually finish it. I had been at such a loss of words right after and even now I am not sure how best to tell her just how much it touched my heart. But I plan to!

A new food I am going to try:

Try all the foods!! That is all!

I’m going to do better at:

Being present! Being fully enveloped in each moment. In the stillness when it’s still, in the chaos when it’s called for, in the sad moments when your heart just needs to weep or when you just need to be someone’s shoulder and in the joy when God graces my life with unbound, mouth-splitting, teeth-shining glory. Present in all the moments; big, small and in between.

Here's to 2015!! 

I would love to see your plans for 2015! 
1.)Link-up using the link below! 
2.) Use the image at the top of this post and share what you hope to have in store for the new year. Have other plans not on the list? Create your own 2015 list and share it! 
3.) Link back so that others can link-up too! 
4.) Explore all the 2015 fun!!