Michelle DeRusha

Every Day Faith. Faith Every Day.

gratitude

How to Replace a Bad Habit with a Better One

By

“You complain all the time,” she said, turning around from the passenger seat to look me in the eye as I sat squashed between our two sons. “You are relentlessly negative.”

Only a sister could make such a declaration and live to tell about it.

My first reaction was defensiveness. “I am not relentlessly negative,” I shot back, emphatically shaking my head. “And I definitely do not complain all the time.”

My sister didn’t press the issue. She simply looked at me a beat too long, eyebrows raised, as if to say, “Oh really?” before turning around to face forward again.

The conversation in the car shifted to another topic. I wasn’t angry, and I didn’t hold my sister’s accusation against her. We DeRushas tend to speak forthrightly to one another – blame it on our no-nonsense Puritan sensibilities. But I also dismissed her declaration, refusing to even consider that there might be some truth in it.

Later, though, I couldn’t get Jeanine’s comments out of my head. I argued with her in my mind, continuing to defend myself. But the more I tried to insist to myself that she was wrong, the more I realized she was right.

The truth is, I do complain. A lot.

I’m cold. I have a headache. My elbow hurts. I’m tired. The kids are bugging me. My work is boring. I have ennui. I’m sick of walking the dog. Why do I always have to be the one to empty the dishwasher? Who left their dirty socks in the middle of the living room floor? How come we never do anything fun? Is this all there is to life?

I complain for a lot of reasons: to get attention; to elevate myself; to garner sympathy and compassion; to be seen and heard.

But we don’t have to dig deeply into my psyche to identify the number one reason I complain. It’s actually quite simple: I complain because it’s a habit. Half the time I don’t even realize I’m doing it. Near-constant complaining has become my mindless modus operandi.

In her book Better than Before, Gretchen Rubin advises that we should “choose habits mindfully.” Choosing mindfully, it turns out, is the key not only to establishing a good habit, but also to breaking a bad one.

On January 1, my sister’s accusation still ringing in my ears, I resolved to break my habit of mindless complaining and relentless negativity. The challenge, I knew, was that I needed to do more than simply state my good intentions. I knew, as Rubin said, that I would need to mindfully choose a good habit that would, over time, help me begin to pave a new neural pathway in my brain.

Enter the daily gratitude journal.

Or, I should say, re-enter the gratitude journal.

Eight years ago, inspired by Ann Voskamp’s bestselling book One Thousand Gifts, I bought a cheap journal, laid it open on the kitchen counter between the coffee maker and the fruit bowl, picked up a pen, and began to list the everyday, ordinary moments that brought me joy. In total my kids and I and occasionally Brad listed 1,955 gifts over a three-year period.

The first gift listed was “spring song of the chickadee.” The last was penned by Brad, evidently on our anniversary: “18 years with my love.”

That was more than four years ago. Truthfully I don’t remember why I quit the gratitude journal. I don’t even remember when I closed the cover over its wrinkled pages and tucked the notebook into a cabinet, where it still lives today.

I keep my new gratitude journal – a beautiful notebook with a richly vibrant cover, a gift from a dear friend – on my nightstand. Every night before I click off the light, I think back over my day and pen three things for which I am grateful. Sometimes I list more than my three; occasionally it’s a challenge to come up with the bare minimum.

The truth is, I inherently lean toward glass-half-empty. My default is pessimism. Because it doesn’t come naturally to me, I need to choose optimism consciously, and one of the ways I’m trying to do that is to choose gratitude every day.

As with my prior journal, the things I’ve listed so far are ordinary, even mundane – coffee with a friend; glimpse of a sleek fox trotting across the golf course; January sun after a string of gray days. And yet I know that in some ways, it’s their very ordinariness that makes these gifts special.

Today I’m taking my “everyday, ordinary life – my sleeping, eating, going-to-work and walking-around life – and placing it before God as an offering.”

Today I’m mindfully choosing praise over complaint.

Today I’m choosing a new habit mindfully and beginning to repave a well-worn habit of complaint and negativity with one of gratitude.

:

So tell me, do you keep a gratitude journal? And have you ever tried to quit a bad habit by replacing it with a better one? 

How Doxology Can Change Everything

By

Recently I talked to a friend who was having a hard day. It was nothing catastrophic; simply that the mounting demands of her work had taken their toll, and anxiety had gotten the best of her, leaving her feeling overwhelmed and stressed.

My advice to her was twofold. One: get outside; and two: practice doxology.

A few years ago I learned about a Japanese practice called shinrin-yoku, which roughly translates as “forest-bathing.” In Japan, whole forests are set apart for the sole purpose of inviting visitors to be present to the sights, sounds and scents of nature.

Studies show that spending even a few minutes outside each day in any kind of natural space – forested or otherwise — can have a profound impact on our physical health by lowering blood pressure, decreasing cortisol levels and increasing immune function.

But I’ve also found that “forest bathing” – or what we Nebraskans might more accurately call “plains bathing” – can also have a dramatic effect on our spiritual life and the state of our souls, especially when combined with doxology.

Earlier this summer I attended a women’s supper at a local Lutheran church, and at the close of the event, the host suggested we all sing the doxology together before going our separate ways.

“Huh? The what-ology?” I thought to myself, as the women around me began to sing:

“Praise God from whom all blessings flow. Praise him all creatures here below. Praise him above ye heavenly host. Praise Father, Son and Holy Ghost.”

After fake lip-syncing my way through the unfamiliar hymn that evening, I later learned that the word “doxology” comes from the Greek doxa, translated as “glory,” and logia, translated as “saying.” There are a number of different iterations, but in short, doxology is a fancy word for the simple practice of giving praise.

Since learning about the doxology, I now often sing it quietly to myself while I walk my dog (lucky for me, Josie makes sure I get my daily shinrin-yoku in). As we meander along the path, I notice and give thanks to God for the vibrant black-eyed Susans dotting the meadow, for the melodious call of the Oriole hidden amid the oak leaves, for the sleek fox I spot darting into the underbrush across the ravine.

Giving thanks to God while immersed in his creation not only settles my racing mind and brings me a measure of peace, it also offers much-needed perspective.

Photo by Noah Johnson

There is something deeply comforting in acknowledging and accepting my smallness in the face of nature’s breadth and depth. Noticing the intricate design of the blossoming Queen Anne’s lace at my feet and the vastness of the sky over my head reminds me of how fleeting and inconsequential most of my anxieties and concerns really are.

Singing the Christian doxology while I practice the Japanese shinrin-yoku under the wide Nebraska sky is a somewhat strange and unlikely spiritual discipline, but it’s become a favorite, near-daily personal routine. I’m always amazed that two simple practices – noticing and giving thanks – can make such a profound difference in my mental, physical and spiritual health.

Turns out, shinrin-yoku doxology worked for my friend too. A few hours after I’d talked to her, she reported back that she’d taken my advice. After a quiet walk around the lake and a few minutes spent gratefully cuddling a newborn kitten in the barn, she had returned to her desk with a lighter heart, a less frantic mind and a replenished soul.

This post first appeared in the Lincoln Journal Star on September 8, 2018.

: :

If you are visiting and enjoyed this post, you might consider signing up to receive my weekly blog posts in your in-box (or, if you’d prefer, my monthly newsletter, The Back Patio — a casual chat about books, podcasts, and fun, everyday life kinds of things). You can sign up over HERE, and as a gift for subscribing, I’ll also send you my free e-book, Learning to Listen to Your Soul: 5 Tips for Beginning a Daily Practice of Intentional Rest. 

Think Twice Before Saying, “I’m Blessed”

By

I’ve said it myself, time and time again: “I’m blessed with good health.” “I’m blessed with a beautiful family.” “I’m so blessed to live in this house.” “God has blessed me with so much.”

And it’s true. I do feel blessed when I think about my life. I have everything I need and more.

My refrigerator and cabinets are stocked full of food. My health is good, and when it’s not, I have insurance to cover the cost of doctor’s visits and prescriptions. I live in a comfortable, spacious home in a safe, welcoming neighborhood. I can afford to pay all my bills and have money left over for entertainment. My closet brims with clothing and shoes. I have a college degree and a fulfilling job. My children attend good schools. I could go on and on.

I am so blessed.

Or is it that I am simply lucky?

I’ve been thinking a lot about an interview I heard recently with Father Greg Boyle, a Jesuit priest who has dedicated his life to working with former gang members in Los Angeles.

“I’m lucky,” Father Boyle said. “I won all the lotteries – the parent lottery, the sibling lottery, the zip code lottery, the educational lottery.”

Hearing Father Boyle use the word “lucky” to describe his upbringing and life circumstances stopped me short, especially because I don’t think I’ve ever heard a person of faith call himself lucky instead of blessed. I admit, there are times I hesitate to wish someone “good luck,” because I am afraid it sounds superstitious and un-Christian.

Yet the more I think about it, the more I understand Father Boyle’s word choice. Citing our material circumstances – the home we live in, the food on our table, the vacations we enjoy, our health and the health of our family, the status of our bank account – as evidence of our blessedness implies that, at the same time God has chosen to bless us with these gifts, he has chosen not to bless others in the same way.

If I say I am blessed because I own a lovely home in a safe neighborhood, or blessed because I have a good job with a substantial income and health insurance, or blessed because I have a bountiful feast spread out on my dining room table, what does that say about the single mother living in the inner-city tenement apartment, the man standing in the unemployment benefits line, and the family starving in some distant land?

Are they not blessed? Has God chosen me, but not them?

Jesus, in fact, said the opposite of what many Christians profess. I suspect those who sat at his feet when he preached his Sermon on the Mount did not expect him to define the blessed as those who mourn, those who are persecuted, those who are meek and those who are poor in spirit.

But Jesus knew what we so often forget. We are not blessed by what we have – a beautiful home, a luxurious vacation, and delicious food (though we are grateful for these things, to be sure) – but by what we lack. We are not blessed by all that we do, but in where we fall short.

It is in our brokenness, in our failings and shortcomings, in our grief and hardship, that we are most aware of God’s compassion and love.

God does indeed lavish blessings upon us, but not in the way most of us like to think. We are blessed by who we have – a God who is always with each and every one of us. We are blessed by who we are — beloved children of God, loved always and forever.

This post originally ran in the Lincoln Journal Star on February 3, 2018.

Stopping in a Grove of Pear Trees on a Spring Evening

By

more pear trees

On Monday and Wednesday evenings I walk Josie around the circumference of the fields and the park while Rowan has soccer practice. This twice-weekly walk is my spring and fall ritual, a welcome break from our normal neighborhood route.

Josie is part beagle, which means she’s sniffy. That girl can snuff out a single Goldfish cracker half buried in the grass from twenty feet away. It used to irritate me that she stopped to smell so much. I considered our walks a chance to burn some calories after sitting at my desk for five or six hours straight. I aimed to break a sweat, or at the very least, elevate my heart rate.

Josie, on the other hand, partakes in our evening constitutional for one reason only: to explore the smorgasbord of smells. Scent is how she sees and experiences the world. It’s her delight. Once I realized smelling was the highlight of Josie’s day, I gave in. I let her nose dictate our path. Now I stop when and where she stops. I walk again when she has had her fill of a particular scent.

Last Thursday, Josie’s nose led us into a grove of Bradford pear trees on the far side of the park, and while she stopped to digest a particularly intriguing scent, I admired the white blossoms above my head. Pear blossoms stink, you should know – to my nose, like an unseemly combination of manure and decaying animal, although others suggest they smell like dead fish. My son Noah guesses that the stink attracts flies, which then buzz off with a generous dollop of pollen on their hairy bodies. It’s the species’ ingenuous though putrid way of ensuring its survival. Though the smell is unpleasant, as long as you don’t breathe through your nose, it doesn’t diminish the beauty of the trees, their lush blossoms so dense that from a distance they look like newly fallen snow clumped on limbs and branches.

pear trees 4

 

Pear limbs

As I stood in the cool shade beneath the canopy of blooms, something caught my eye – a tiny, colorful tag twirling and spinning in the breeze. Once I spotted this tag, I immediately began to see others. Dozens of them in primary colors clung to string which draped the pears’ lower boughs like Christmas garland, all the way around the entire circumference of the grove.

I stepped closer, tugging Josie along with me. On each tag, in black Sharpie cursive, were words — Love. Thank You. Life. Love you. And names – Sarah. Jennifer. Ryan. Dave. All around the trees, these simple words of gratitude and celebration, these names of people I didn’t know, clung to the branches, hidden, pirouetting in the dappled sunlight. You would never see them just walking by on the path. You had to step into the dim grove and stop with your face nearly immersed in the petals.

red tag

tag garland2

pear grove

pears from a distance2

I followed the string like a trail through the grove. It seemed the garland had been there awhile. It broke off here and there, leaving gaps, the end of the string fluttering, then resumed again a few branches later. As I read the tags I wondered about the story. There was a story there for sure, perhaps many stories behind those names and sentiments written in delicate black ink. Hands had written those words, threaded the tags onto the string, strung those words around the lowest boughs of the pear trees. Perhaps the garland had been threaded through blossoms and branches as a celebration, perhaps as a memorial. Perhaps both.

Josie grew bored with my garland marveling, and I finally gave in to her tugging. As we stepped out of the grove and into the bright sunlight, I felt a sense of awe and gratitude wash over me. I had stumbled upon a secret garden, a sacred place, and received a message. I had stood still, recited the names of people I don’t know, and gratefully accepted it all as a mysterious and unexpected gift.

A Thanksgiving Thank You

By

tea cup

Happy, happy Thanksgiving, friends! This day is one of my favorites, hands-down. The aroma of a roasting turkey always brings me back to Thanksgiving Day at my grandparents’ house. My papa was the cook, apron and all, and every time I smell the rich scent of turkey, I think of him and my nana, too, who always let my sister and me use the silver and her very best porcelain tea cups. Nana taught me how to set a proper table, how to use the miniature silver tongs to drop sugar cubes delicately into my cup without splashing and how to sip tea with my pinkie finger raised in the air just so.

My parents are in town visiting this week, and it’s so, so good to have plentiful quality time with them. As much as I have grown to love Nebraska, the one thing I deeply miss is my family. I try not to complain about it too much, because frankly, I can’t change the situation, but I miss my parents and my sister in the day-to-day, ordinary comings and goings of life.

I wanted to tell you, too, that I won’t be around the blog quite as much from now through the end of the year. Last year I took a holiday hiatus from Thanksgiving until the New Year, and I have to say, it was lovely. Our to-do list tends to increase exponentially during the holidays, what with shopping and wrapping and decorating and baking and all, and it just makes sense to scale back on the writing in order to accommodate the extra responsibilities, and, more importantly, to soak up the bounty of the season. I hope you’ll find some ways to do that, too — as my pastor has said in the past, “Give presence over presents.” I love that – here’s to 2015 as the Season of Presence.

piecrust

pies

Before I sign off to go scrounge bits of dough from Brad’s pie-making extravaganza, I just want to say thank you for your presence here all year long. Your comments, emails, tweets and shares mean so much to me, and even if you don’t say a word, just knowing you are quietly reading makes me feel so profoundly grateful. So thank you. Not a day goes by that I don’t appreciate you.

May the Lord bless you and keep you on this Thanksgiving and always, friends.

Peace and Love,
Michelle