Day 11: MASTERPIECE (+ Being Content With What I DO Have)
Start Here:
- How It Works (via Bullet Points & Videos!)
- Day 1: LOVED (+ 2 Vital Questions to Ask NOW)
- Day 2: CHOSEN – Making Right Holiday Choices
- Day 3: COMPLETE (+ 5 Gift-Giving Questions)
- Day 4: PURE (+ Goodbye, Ghosts of Christmas Past)
- Day 5: RIGHTEOUS (+ Rituals vs. Relationships)
- Day 6: FORGIVEN (+ The Story I Choose to Tell)
- Day 7: FREE (+ 14+ Ways to Enjoy “Free” Holy-Days!)
- Day 8: VICTORIOUS (+ Heading Off Holiday Hurts)
- Day 9: NEW (+ The Power to Get or to Give?)
- Day 10: CONFIDENT (+ 10 Ways to Keep Christ in Christmas)
I was planning to blog about how easy it is to focus on the externals during the holidays:
- Decorating our homes.
- Wrapping the gifts.
- Dressing our children and ourselves for special events
And I was going to admit that I really don’t like decorating my home for the holidays…but I didn’t really know why!
Then a couple of catalogs with holiday-themed covers showed up in the mail, and immediately I had my answer:
When I decorate for the holidays, I focus on what I don’t have rather than what I do have!
This realization sparked today’s 2-part vlog:
Part 1 talks about the artificial sense of “you need this!” that invades our homes and thoughts during the holiday season.
Part 2 discusses how each of the four PURSE-onalities can switch her focus from discontent to contentment during the holidays.
(Don’t see Part 1 of the video? Access A Holiday-Ready Heart Day 11: MASTERPIECE, Part 1 via YouTube!)
(Don’t see Part 2 of the video? Access A Holiday-Ready Heart Day 11: MASTERPIECE, Part 2 via YouTube!)
For we are God’s masterpiece.He has created us anew in Christ Jesus,so we can do the good things He planned for us long ago.Ephesians 2:10 (NLT)
I can focus on what I do have because I don’t need anything to make me a master chef (or decorator or dresser or…)
I am already God’s masterpiece! (Click to Tweet this.)
Your Turn!
- How well do you focus on what you do have, rather that what you don’t have, in general? At the holidays?
- How do the holidays usually impact your contentment: increase it or decrease it? Why?
- What do you find tends to cause you an out-of-the-blue sense of “I need this!”?
- Anything else on your heart!
I created the binder last year, but would love a copy of the book!
We’re giving away a copy a day ’til the end of the month! 🙂
I have to CONCENTRATE to really like my Christmas stuff. Mine is pretty eclectic, not ‘classy’; I get a little embarrassed. When I talked of redoing all the kids’ stockings, even the married ones protested because these were part of their childhood memories. Good reminders for this mama.
kmama — “eclectic” sounds great to me! I grew up with classy-beyond-classy, and that standard of perfection has kept me from developing my own style to enjoy.
GREAT reminder not to meddle with things the children remember and love…as I go thru my Christmas stuff, I’ll run any give-aways by my kids!
I call decorating my house for the holidays “Joy in a Box” (and I’ve blogged about it extensively) because for me, it’s the OLD stuff that brings all the joy. Vintage ornaments my mom made as a newlywed, the goofy Santa marionette I picked out as a 5 year old on Pier 39…each one wrapped in memories. My holiday-house isn’t new or stylish, but I love it for what the memories contain.
Adelle —
Okay, I have GOT to find your blogs on this topic! I LOVE the idea of “Joy in a Box” — totally foreign to me, but I can learn!
This must be part of my problem: almost none of my Christmas decor holds any meaning to me. Right after we got married, we had credit at a gift store, and in September, some left-over Christmas trinketry was on sale. So I bought a bunch because it was such a great savings, but there was no story to any of it.
I’ve got a few very old ornaments, but they are in danger of falling completely apart, so I need to find a way to preserve them in a way that they can still be displayed.
I think it’s time for me to pull down my Christmas bins and go through them once again. Last year, Annemarie and I were ruthless in giving away several boxes of truly meaningless Christmas “stuff.” But if I go thru my remaining bins with an eye for what does and doesn’t have a story/memory attached to it, I think I can get down to some bare basics…and then slowly add from there!