Below you'll find a list of all posts that have been categorized as “choices”
I wake up several times each night. I know I’m not alone in this repeated I’m-asleep-now-I’m-awake middle of the night routine. The first thing I do when I wake up is glance at the alarm clock on my bedside table. It’s an illuminated model with oversize red digital numbers I purchased several years ago for my mother-in-law who battled …
@bethvogt Listening, truly listening to another person, is both simple and hard work. I’ve focused on listening to others for the past 18 months, ever since choosing “Listen” as my One Word in 2020 and then again in 2021. The one lesson I’m going to remember when 2022 arrives and I move onto a new One Word is that …
@bethvogt I’ve been in an ongoing tug-of-war with stress … and right now stress is winning. I stared at that sentence and considered deleting it, one letter at a time. Choosing another topic for today’s blog. But I’ll go with the reality that, despite my best efforts to “Go placidly amid the noise and haste” … well, I’m not. I’m …
@bethvogt My youngest daughter Christa is having ankle surgery today. Surgery and rehabbing her ankle were not part of her original plan for the summer. I talked about how her Plan A fell apart in my blog post “Why Can We Be Hopeful When Our Plans Fall Apart?” Christa got through the last weeks of her spring semester at Bethel …
@bethvogt It’s time to take down our Christmas tree. I know, I know, some of you are thinking, “It’s long past time to take that tree down, Beth!” After Christmas, my husband Rob decided we needed light in our lives. Keeping our Christmas tree up was a perfect way to accomplish that. We also left our Christmas star up outside …
Life often seems so much about doing, doesn’t it? We make our To Do lists, either before we go to bed at night or first thing in the morning. Maybe you like S.M.A.R.T. goals or a bullet planner or a yellow legal pad to organize all that you have to accomplish. Then there are the seasons of waiting. Waiting for …
@bethvogt I love it when a plan comes together, don’t you? (Yes, an obvious nod to the A-Team.) And when a plan doesn’t? I scramble to scoop up all the falling apart pieces into my hands. Wanting to find a way to make my original plan work. It was a good plan – or so I thought. I’m not wrong. …
@bethvogt I’ve had a wind chime hanging in my office for years. I know, I know – wind chimes belong outside, not inside. I found this wind chime at a craft show, fascinated by the crafter’s display. Two copper tubes, along with a thin piece of agate, are suspended from a piece of burnt wood retrieved from one of Colorado’s …
@bethvogt When I was a child and had trouble falling asleep because I’d had a bad dream, my mom would sit beside my bed and comfort me by telling me to think nice thoughts. I’d remember swimming in the lake in Vermont during a family vacation. Or winning the class spelling bee. Or playing outside in the rain with the …
@bethvogt I’m determined to choose hope even as I struggle to comprehend another senseless act of violence, this time in Boulder, Colorado. Is there an act of violence that ever makes sense? My husband Rob and I spent a long weekend in Minnesota, visiting our youngest daughter whose spring break morphed into a volleyball pre-season. Good days. Good conversations. Lots …
