Read the fine print.

Not too long ago I was cruising around my favorite store looking for deals.  I had a coupon that I was sure would take care of my retail dreams.  As I approached the register with a smile the sales lady returned the favor.  The total popped onto the screen and I handed her my coupon beaming with pride.  Maybe this would be one of those extreme couponing moments where bells and whistles went off.  The smiling sales woman scanned the coupon.  Nothing.  No decent on the price escalator.  It was stuck.  Hmmm.  That's too bad they are having computer problems I thought still confident that my big savings moment would happen.  The smiling sales woman, who at this point had lost her smile, turned to me and said, "I'm sorry, it says here in the fine print that this item is excluded from the sale and now you haven't spent enough to qualify for the discount and also, this coupon isn't actually good until next week."  Be. still. my. heart.  I am pretty sure the earth stopped moving at that very second.  I must have looked as exasperated as I felt because the woman began trying to pick up the pieces of my retail train wreck.  I did end up getting the deal eventually, but I would have been saved some coupon heartache had I paid attention to the fine print....

My store experience has me thinking lately about how many things I wish actually did come with fine print information...mainly the people in my life.  I want to read the fine print and know why some days there is a cool, confident swagger about this one particular person, yet on other days it seems as if the rug has been ripped from under them.  Some might say, ugh, not again, get over it! But I say....read the fine print.  I want to know why my one friend will not look me in the eye.  Something has happened in her life so  she does not trust enough to exchange this kind of vulnerable contact.  What does her fine print say?  I want to be able to understand why someone holds on so tight to the people in their life that its damaging to the relationships in the end.  What is in the fine print there?  What makes someone snap or get insecure by a simple joke?  It's all in the fine print hidden somewhere inside.

I guess, in all this fine print talk, what I am really reminding myself is that in order to read the fine print in people's lives it will actually mean I make a commitment to looking beyond the surface and sticking with them long enough to get there...to get to the fine print or just understand that its there.  This means my life will be colored with compassion.  When Jesus walked our Earth he had compassion on everyone he came into contact with.  Not just the ones with easier to read fine print.  With everyone, and that means everyone.  On the day of my shopping extravaganza, I could have just ripped up the coupon, got angry and ran out of the store.  I could have and I might have been tempted to.  Shhh.  But, I remained in that moment with the sales woman as she processed the fine print with me.  I think that's what I need with everyone in my life, a little less run away power and a lot more staying power.  It's easy to run harder than to hang on until we get a glimpse of the fine print.

This has taught me again....and I'll probably have to be reminded again and even again....that everyone needs a little fine print love.  Less of my impatience, more of my acceptance.  More of my understanding and less of my judgment.  I'm not saying that fine print gives anyone an excuse to mistreat.  I'm only saying that there is deep down a fine print reason for their behavior.

So the next time you get completely beside yourself with frustration.  Read the fine print. We've all got it.

"Finally, all of you, be likeminded, be sympathetic, love one another, be compassionate and humble"
1 Peter 3:8

Breaking up is hard to do....

Will you be my Valentine?  Don't you love that feeling of your heart beating fast...your head tilts to the left and you get all giddy.  Well I am here to break your valentine's bubble.  Love is not in the air this Valentine's day.  I am breaking up....and honey that is hard to do.  Like the time that this one guy I was swooning over decided I wasn't swoonable (a new word I know)..... and I didn't think life would go on.  I cried, reread emails, talked to others about it constantly, replayed conversations over and over in my mind, listened to songs that reminded me of love, cried some more.  I concluded that I would never marry because surely there would be no other man.  Just me, some knitting needles and a rocking chair....for life.  Ok, well you all know THAT didn't happen.

But lately I have had to break up with another love affair that has felt quite the same.  My heart got giddy and my emotions over took me when in its presence.  I would think about this love all day long and couldn't wait to see it.  Have you guessed yet?  Well, if you read my last blog post you might know....I am ending my love affair with....food.  Much like any other relationship food has been there for me through thick and not so thin.  When I needed a friend to turn to.....hello pizza.  When I had a bad day at work and life was just plain not fair...hand me the cookies and nobody gets my wrath.  Even during happy times it was my bff.  It's the end of the week, I made it...woo hooo chimichangas all around!!! It's my birthday why don't we celebrate every day in October... well and since the anniversary is in that month too.... let's do double trouble.  To some of you this may sound like crazy talk, but to others you know right where I am coming from.  Want to know the hardest thing about having to end a love affair with food?  I can't delete it.  I can't send it away.  I can't take it's picture out of my frames or its number from my cell phone.

I have to come face to face with it a few times every day and learn to love it in a different way.  So, I have decided that instead of calling it my break up with food, I am going to call it my food restoration.  Food and I have been in a bad place so we need some rebuilding.  I am pretty much putting myself and food into my own little counseling sessions held by yours truly.  Sigh.  We are in couples therapy.  Anything that's broken can be fixed.  I truly believe my "love" relationship that currently exists with food can be transformed into a much healthier one.  Like any other relationship that is in trouble there is always hope.  When I look at my food issues in this light it brings me hope.  I don't have to cut out food all together, reminisce the good times, the ways it makes me feel good, etc.  I just have to treat it differently.  Learn new ways of interacting that is better for the both of us.  It's not the ice cream's fault that I gained weight, it's mine.  So, instead of coming home after a long day and expecting food to wipe it all away I turn to something that was meant to make a day better.  I can pray or talk to my hubby....I could even workout.  I don't really have a good relationship with exercise either, but hey that's another blog.  This couples therapy has stretched me so and I pray that I shrink back healed.  God has been revealing to me many ways that I hold food to a level that I shouldn't.  My peace will never come from food.  My joy was never meant to be found inside the wrapper of a twinkie.  Maybe you don't look for love in all the wrong chocolate places like me.  Whatever your love affair is right now that might not be the healthiest...might I suggest some couples therapy?

"Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength." Mark 12:30