Chris and I are on our way back from a trip to New York. It wasn’t exactly a quiet vacation, but it was new and involved lots of eating and exploring and fluffy beds.

Most importantly, we both unplugged from work. The brain break that comes with that was exactly what I needed to solidify some decisions I’ve decided to make – some for the next month, and some for good.

One of the biggest changes I’m making is my diet.

I LOVE TO EAT.

Seriously. Look at half my TwitPics and you will see it’s usually food.

Fortunately, I still have a little bit of a metabolism, but I realize that at the ripe age of almost-30, it’s a lot easier for me to get stuck at numbers I’m not so fond of seeing on a scale. For those of you who are new around here, several years ago, I documented my forty pound weight loss and I don’t want to go back there.

The changes to my diet are for the next 30 days. Maybe longer. Who knows? I seriously have no discipline and don’t want to overwhelm myself with a goal that is too big for me. So for now, one month at a time…

Here they are.

DIET:

• No meat (I typically only eat bacon, anyway – this one is not going to be difficult).
• No dessert (This includes anything except tea in bag form from Starbucks).
• No alcohol (I don’t drink much anyway, but if I do, it’s usually more sugar than anything else).
• No snacking (Three to five small meals a day).
• Drink 6-8 glasses of water every day (Basic I know, but I suck at drinking water).
• No sodas.

EXERCISE:
I’ve already established a bit of a workout routine, and plan on keeping this (and adding to it) indefinitely.

• Run 2-3 times a week (Using the Cool Runnings Couch to 5k program. It’s a nine week program, but I am stretching it out to 18 weeks because of the heart surgery. I’m about to head into the third interval).
• Walk around our neighborhood 2-3 times a week (When I’m home, anyway).

OTHER CHANGES:

• Chris and I are changing from A Big Corporate Bank to a local credit union.
• We’ll be shopping from our Farmers’ Market and local markets and stores (food & otherwise) as much as possible.

I’m excited about some of these changes. I know they’ll be difficult – especially since I am traveling every single gosh darn week in the month of October. How can one survive with that kind of diet when you’re eating airport food or driving, eating sometimes whatever is catered into an event? It’s going to take a lot more preparation and a lot less convenience (which for us, is the point).

Why share these things?

I want to see if you can jump in. You don’t have to do everything, nor do I assume that everyone needs to do everything, or even anything. But I’d love to try some of this with you guys, together. I’ll update maybe every week or so with how things are going.

What do you think? Anything new you can try, or old that you can give up for a month?

The first half of 2009 has been incredible! Never in my wildest dreams would I have imagined I’d get to travel and meet so many of you face to face. It has been AWESOME!

I thought I’d take a moment and share some places I will be either speaking at or hanging out at for the rest of the year and hope if you are attending or are around these events that we’ll get a chance to say hi! Let me know if you’ll be around!

August 1-2, 2009

Oak Leaf Church Weekend Services
Cartersville, GA
Saturday at 6 pm
Sunday at 9:30 & 11:15 am
*(This is a make up visit from the one I had to cancel in May due to an illness!)

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September 11-12, 2009

CWC/2009
Los Angeles, CA
Biola University
*(A great web & social media conference that is oh-so-inexpensive!)

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September 17, 2009

Healing Place Church
Baton Rouge, LA
The Hub (20somethings/college) Service
@ The Annex – 8 pm

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October 7-9, 2009

Catalyst Atlanta
Atlanta, GA
Wednesday, October 7 – Catalyst Lab
Thursday & Friday – Hosting Catalyst Backstage

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October 27-29

Story
Chicago, IL
*(Behind the Scenes Stuff)

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November 5, 2009

National Outreach Convention
San Diego, CA
Mad Church Disease Discussion & Book Signing

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November 6-7, 2009

Lead Now/Fusion Conference
Dallas, TX
with Donald Miller, Francis Chan, George Barna, Mark Batterson, Catherine Rohr & others

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November 10-11, 2009

Dirt Conference
Little Rock, AR
New Life Church
*(This is going to be an amazing conference for creative people. Practical but encouraging and down-to-earth!)

I’ll be speaking this weekend in the Dallas area at The Oaks Fellowship (the Red Oak Campus). They’re ending the series called “I Want an Answer” and I’ll be on a panel with Dr. Len Sweet and Oaks Pastor Scott Wilson to discuss the most frequently asked questions in regard to Social Justice.

JULY 12, 2009
The Oaks Fellowship (Sunday at 9 & 11 am)
777 S I-35E
Red Oak, TX 75154
P: 214.376.8208

THEN….

On August 1 & 2, I’ll be speaking at Oak Leaf Church in Cartersville, GA. This is rescheduled from a few weeks ago when I got sick, but I am more excited about it than ever.

AUGUST 1 & 2, 2009
Oak Leaf Church (Saturday at 6 pm, Sunday at 9:30 and 11:15 am)
245 S Tennessee St,
Cartersville, GA 30121
P: 678.721.2377

I am SUPER EXCITED because my husband Chris is traveling with me on both weekends! It is rare his schedule and mine line up but after a year of doing this, he finally gets to come along!

Hope to meet some of you in person soon!

The Hubs says I look drunk in this video. I’m not. I promise.

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Anyway, so there you have it. A little surgery for this little heart problem. August 14.

I’d appreciate the prayers, and any other reposting of this video to get your readers praying too.

Much love.

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It was the best of phones, it was the worst of phones.

Let me begin by saying I am not a technically apt person. I understand how to use a smart phone. I understand how to even set up a smart phone. Heck, on this journey, I learned (after a painstaking four hours) how to jailbreak a smart phone. But if you’re looking for an in depth review of a very technical side of a Palm Pre, an iPhone, or a Blackberry, you’ll probably be disappointed.

However, if you’d just like an ordinary girl’s opinion on three popular smart phones, you’ve come to the right place.

BEGINNINGS AND HISTORY….

You should know: I don’t like a lot of frills – Email, text, an actual phone, GPS of some kind, a little internet here and there, and of course…the illustrious Twitter – that’s all I really need. I’m not a “must have the latest gadget” kind of girl either.

I’ve been a Blackberry Pearl user on AT&T from the beginning. For several years. Once I finally learned how to type on the darn thing, it was actually a very easy phone to use. It was constructed terribly; I went through THREE replacements in one year, usually as a result of the trackball falling out, sticking, or the A/S key not working but that’s what insurance is for, right?

I found AT&T quick and helpful in replacing it. The battery life on it was spectacular. I could use it heavily for a couple of days without needing a recharge.

IPHONE TEMPTATIONS…

Then one day last summer, my friend upgraded to the iPhone 3G. He asked if I wanted to have his old iPhone (1G). I said sure. And so the iPhone and I became friends. Aside from it’s width and me dropping it all the time (it was hard for me to grasp and I have pretty long fingers!), it wasn’t too much larger than my Pearl. Typing on it was fairly easy after a few days (although the auto-correct feature got me in trouble on more than one occasion…). And it was fun. The email fetching and resulting hangups/reboots were a little annoying, especially when email is such a large part of my life but overall, it wasn’t too bad.

As I began to travel, I noticed my battery life would be drained extremely fast with moderate usage and honestly, the AT&T signal isn’t the best in the parts of Nashville I frequent the most. It’s not good in SoCal. Or Texas. Traveling with my iPhone became frustrating.

Then it broke.

Out of nowhere, the phone stopped receiving a signal altogether, although it took me a day to realize it. I just assumed AT&T didn’t reach Wichita Falls, where I was when it stopped working.

I went to the Apple Store, and they replaced it (even though it was out of warranty) for no charge. I thought maybe I’d get a better reception with the new phone, but was let down.

FRUSTRATED AND SPRINTING…

So, several months into traveling regularly, I talked to my husband, who just happens to manage a Sprint store (and managers don’t make commission.) I learned that Sprint not only uses Sprint towers, but they also ping off of Verizon towers when roaming. Double the signal? Hmmm. His phone sure had a signal wherever we went. So, I decided to sell the iPhone to get out of my AT&T contract and move on over and return to my first love, the Blackberry. A Curve this time. The data plan was $20 a month cheaper, too. I jailbroke my iPhone for a friend in South Africa and sent it on her merry way.

A week before I made the jump, the Palm Pre confirmed it’s release. The Hubs, fully knowing my deep rooted affection for all things Blackberry, told me to hold off. He went through some training with the Pre and kind of compared it to a iPhone/Blackberry Hybrid. It looked cool, it had a keyboard, and it was on Sprint. I was a new customer and could get a good rebate on it. So I decided to wait.

PRE EXCITEMENT. POST DISAPPOINTMENT…

I got the Pre and for the first couple of days, I LOVED it. Sure, it had a few nuances that annoyed me – no auto correct spelling at ALL on the phone, no way to change the notification for a text message or an email, and some counter-intuitive user interface bugs, but I’m sure enough people would complain about these basic features that they would be fixed in the first update. However, even though the Google Syncing features were incredible…even though the screen quality was incredible…even though the font smoothing was incredible…with moderate use, my battery would be gone in under 8 hours.

Unacceptable.

The battery thing ruined it for me. Sure, there are some other random bugs which i know will get worked out (email syncing was unpredictable, and switching between applications was slower than I’d hoped for) but the combination of these inconsistencies plus no battery life took me right back to the Sprint store today, only a few days later.

BRINGING BLACKBERRY BACK…

Thank you, Sprint, for having a 30-day money back guarantee.

I traded in my Pre today for a (much cheaper) Blackberry Curve.

It’s the smart phone equivalent to being with a soulmate. There’s a spark of newness, yet there’s familiarity. Sure, it’s not the best looking guy in the place, and not even the most fun, but it’s stable. It’s loyal. It’s consistent. It’s reliable.

OVERALL…

If you get good AT&T reception and like to have fun, get an iPhone. If you could care less about the fun stuff on your phone and simply want it to be functional, the Blackberry is for you. And if you find yourself in the middle and don’t mind waiting until the Pre gets its bugs worked out (especially the battery life), The Pre might be worth the wait.

Might.

what is something you feel you can’t say in church, or around other christians?

for example…mine would be, “sometimes i feel like i can’t share how i really feel inside.”

funny, serious, whatever…what’s yours?

This weekend, I have the privilege of speaking at Oak Leaf Church in Cartersville, GA. I have admired Michael and what the people at OLC are doing in their community for the last couple years. I’ll be speaking about God’s plan for poverty and the people of Oak Leaf will have a chance to sponsor children through Compassion after each service. (Service times are Saturday at 6 pm, Sunday at 9 and 11 am).

A few prayer requests:

• Please pray for me…I have spoken multiple times on multiple days before, but not like this. I’m excited, but think it has got to feel really weird to say the same thing three times! I just want to show up and let God do His best through me.
• Please pray for the people at OLC…that they will see and understand God’s heart for the poor, their role in his plan for poverty, and that they will take whatever the next step is on their faith journey…whether it is believing for the first time, or deciding to take a big leap of faith and do something crazy!!

Your turn. How can we pray for you this weekend?

This summer I have the opportunity to meet some amazing people in some amazing places. If you’re near any of these churches, come out and say hi! I’d love to connect. And leave me a comment to let me know you’ll be there!

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May 30-31, 2009

Oak Leaf Church Weekend Services
Cartersville, GA
Saturday at 6 pm
Sunday at 9:30 & 11:15 am

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June 4, 2009

Radio Interview with Chris Fabry
Moody Radio
2:00 pm CST – Listen LIVE HERE

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July 5, 2009

Turning Point Community Church Weekend Services
Lubbock, TX
9 am & 10:30 am

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July 12

The Oaks Church Weekend Services
Red Oak (Dallas), TX
9 am & 11 am
Panel on Social Justice with Len Sweet & Pastor Scott Wilson

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By the way, I’m not speaking, but my friend Tony Morgan’s Killing Cockroaches tour will be stopping by my digs, Cross Point Church in Nashville, on July 17. I’ll be there soaking in his brillance and hope you’ll be there too!

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During Lent, I said “until next time…” to some of my online habits, including Facebook.

It’s been a struggle and a season of readjusting since returning.

I’ve been a member of Facebook for a while now – probably close to three years or so. It’s been a great place to reconnect with old friends from former lives, and to interact with people and ideas that were interesting and remarkable.

Over the last several weeks I’ve been seriously debating shutting it down completely. I’ve sat on the idea for a while, consulting friends and my own soul. As I was drawing closer to my conclusion, I never felt convicted by shutting it down…yet I tried every reason I could to justify leaving it open.

As of Sunday, my Facebook account is deleted. Not just deactivated. Deleted. Gone.

And I have no doubt this was the right thing for me to do.

Call me a purist, but I’ve lost my own innocence in it. And as such, I must retreat.

I’ll leave you with these words from Nouwen’s Inner Voice of Love. Words from a meditation in his journal upon which I am reflecting almost every day.

I pray they challenge you in the way they have challenged me. Wherever your old country, or your new country, may be.

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You have an idea of what the new country looks like. Still, you are very much at home, although not truly at peace, in the old country. You know the ways of the old country, its joys and pains, its happy and sad moments. You have spent most of your days there. Even though you know that you have not found there what your heart most desires, you remain quite attached to it. It has become part of your very bones.

Now you have come to realize that you must leave it and enter the new country, where your Beloved dwells. You know that what helped and guided you in the old country no longer works, but what else do you have to go by? You are being asked to trust that you will find what you need in the new country. That requires death of what has become so precious to you: influence, success, yes, even affection and praise.

Trust is so hard, since you have nothing to fall back on . Still, trust is what is essential. The new country is where you are called to go, and the only way to go there is naked and vulnerable.

It seems that you keep crossing and recrossing the border. For a while, you experience a real joy in the new country. But then you feel afraid and start longing again for all you left behind, so you go back to the old country. To your dismay, you discover that the old country has lost its charm. Risk a few more steps into the new country, trusting that each time you enter it, you will feel more comfortable and be able to stay longer.

–Henri Nouwen

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You know the whole picture of having an angel on one shoudler and a devil on the other?

Is it just me, or does that really seem to happen a lot?

Most of the time, the devil stays pretty quiet and the angel and I have some good conversations.

But every once in a while, the devil scoots his blazing little behind closer and closer to my head, and then he latches on with some really wicked claws to my ear.

He’ll start screaming stuff like,

“You’re not good enough for this!”

“If they only knew the real you, nobody would listen!”

“You might as well just give up now because your time is up – you’re useless!”

“You’re dreaming to do what?? YEAH. RIGHT.”

Lately he has been yelling those things constantly. And no matter how loudly I turn up my iPod, my car stereo or my TV, he just keeps getting louder.

Aside from checking myself into an institution, I’m not quite sure what to do but to keep walking in spite of the negative voices.

Does it still affect me? Sure.

But I refuse to let him get an inch.

How do you shut him up?

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