Future?

Before I start my ramblings... Here's a little Photoshop project that I did to educate myself on the program I need to be better at for work. I'm trying really hard to broaden my skills and be able to use this program to my advantage in the long run. The only way I can do that is with practice!  I learned how to use many tools I didn't even know existed - so I guess mission accomplished! and I walk away with some nice photo's of Memphis!

Now time for me to ramble on....
         So in the midst of my counseling, I was told I need to plan for the future. Plan to live. When I was asked "Where do you see yourself in five years" I had a blank stare on my face. Completely dumbfounded I responded "I have no idea".
I don't dwell on it. I've been so focused on my mountain; on overcoming my panic attacks; on facing fears. I have been living one day at a time for such a long time now that I've stopped looking forward to things. I've stopped dreaming. And that, my friends, is a very dangerous place to be...

So last week I started looking at all of the different kennels in my area. I (filled with anxiety) click through website after website, did new searches, and looked at employment options. That was my first step of even thinking of making steps into my future. The mind games have been endless since then. "You can't even decide what to do with your life, what makes you think you can succeed at switching jobs" "you won't be able to make it financially if you try to switch jobs now" "you will fail."
Insecurity and self-doubt has been running rampant through the streets of my mind since I even attempted to look ahead to any form of future that I may have. I may be taking a few steps back here, but I decided to start a little slower at dreaming of a future. I'm still battling trusting God with my future. So if I can't imagine a future through the eyes of my Creator, (who can push me to see far beyond my own abilities) how can I even imagine a good future through my own sight?
Lets take baby steps here (So thankful that God is patient with my learning process). Lets start with one area of my life and dream of what the future may look like for that. I chose my marriage. Even that was hard. But last night Sean and I talked through a list of questions that I had found online. The questions were to help get the ball rolling with discussing goals you had for your marriage, where you're at now, and what you see that you need to work on. We only got through half, but I feel like I was able to be hopeful and look forward to something in the future for the first time in who knows how long. Needless to say, we have a lot to work on.
But instead of the daunting "5 year plan" I decided to focus on one thing first. My new family. There has been so much change in the last 6 months and I feel like I've barely caught my breath. Where will we be in 5 years? Who the heck knows! Truth is, only God knows where he will have us in five years. But as far as thinking/dreaming that far into the future, I'll get there at some point. I'll be able to dream for a great future at some point (I have a feeling it will be soon. Thank the Lord for steps forward in the battle with Fear).

  For now, I want to plant seeds now that will produce great fruit in my marriage later. I can say in 5 years, I want to have a strong relationship with my husband. So now I want to work on getting to know my husband better and REALLY enjoying the time we have with each other before we have kids of our own.

With that, I want to say to my Husband:

"Darling, lets be adventurers"

Memphis

If you've known me for a long time (at least since High school) you'd know that I used to work at a private dog kennel. That was by far my favorite out of all of the random places that I've worked. If I could make enough money doing that again I would quit my current job in a heartbeat. (don't tell my boss that!)

I had a lot of responsibilities at the dog kennel, but my favorite by far was teaching and training the dogs to do new things. Especially the new litters of puppies. I had to teach them how to walk properly on the leads, agility, and how to behave while being groomed. (Little exciting fact: One of the very last dogs I had the joy of working with before my boss moved out to California, "Sky", just recently won "Best in Show" at the 2012 National Dog Show. It's so awesome to see her success! She is a beautiful one of a kind dog and the people that have worked with her for the past few years have helped her grow into one of the very best show dogs I've ever seen! So a huge congrats to everyone that has been involved in that!)

The best thing was that part of my job was to encourage the dogs in their personalities. In other words I got to play with them. Each dog has a different personality and needs to be encouraged in good behavior and corrected in the bad. (hopefully when I have children someday I won't use the same signals to correct them as I've learned to do with dogs. haha)

I bring all of this up because even though I haven't worked at the kennel for about 3 years or so but I am putting the skills learned there to work now. A lot of people (when they find out what my old job was) ask for my advice on dog health and training. Usually it's just "should I take my dog to the vet?" or "my dog won't stop doing this. What should I do?" Well over the last couple years I've gotten a bit rusty. After I dropped out of my Vet Tech courses (Can't be a vet assistant with shaky hands and with me having a tremor that runs in my family, I couldn't continue on with the courses) I had no need to continue learning about animal behavior and health. As with any education, if you aren't putting what you learn into practice, the knowledge on the topic will begin to fade until you start using it again. So recently I started to brush up on animal behavior and the puppy training process because.....


We have a new family member!

Everyone meet Memphis!

Memphis is a mix of Blue Heeler and Red Heeler. That is why he has the kind of markings that he has. This Sunday he'll be 10 weeks old. We started potty training the second we brought him home from northern WI. He now (just about every time) runs to the back patio doors to let us know he has to go potty. Unfortunately if we don't see him at the door right away he pees right on our doormat. Seems like he's still got the toddler mentality of not realizing he has to pee until he can barely hold it any longer lol. But he has made huge steps forward very quickly when it comes to any training that we do. While Sean and I are still trying to get in the groove with our schedules we have started slow with any training. We are starting with only 5-10 minute training sessions. Mostly when he is in the middle of playing. We want him to understand that learning new tricks is very fun. By doing so, we've noticed an eagerness to learn new things! I LOVE the curiosity of a young puppy and the humor in watching him explore new things. I'm playing with the idea of training him myself to be a "helping" dog. It's something that's been on my mind since my time at the kennel and I want to see how difficult it is. I plan on sharing our experience and definitely sharing the fun things that we teach him. So here's the first of hopefully many videos! (If I keep myself in gear with actually documenting all of this, ha!)

I had Sean record this literally 3 minutes after I showed him how to "touch". After this video I started using other objects as well and asked him to touch it. He's got it down! I am so excited with how quickly he learned this trick and it makes me look forward to the more complicated things I want to teach him down the road. 

A little note: Heelers are an independent breed. They are not typical dogs to submit. They are definitely known to be dominant. So keeping that in mind we have to be very careful with how we start training him and especially with how we correct him when it comes to bad behavior. If we are not careful and consistent with showing him who is in charge and correcting him, he will later on become unruly. These dogs are also very smart and are originally bred to be cattle dogs. He WILL try to start herding people or other animals and nip at their feet if we don't teach him otherwise.  Again we have to be very consistent! 

Worn

So recently I've realized even more how "blogging" is always about a journey. The journey of organizing your home, becoming a mom, being a wife, decorating on a budget....there's so many reasons to write and share your journey. So whats mine? I'm not quite sure yet....I did just recently get married, (and yes I promise to write about that awesome day once I have some pictures to share) I did recently get a puppy, (again, expect to see the little man soon) and I've been working on going through just about everything I own to get my "life" organized.
Well I think I may just do a little bit of everything. I've always been a bit ADD anyway!


You want to know what I've been lately?

 WORN

 I've talked a little bit about my anxiety and panic attacks. Well, they are still very present in my life. So I made the choice to start counseling for it. I'm glad I started after getting married and I'm so very thankful that I have a husband that walks through each moment with me; even the very bad days. He just seems to know how to bring joy to life. I have felt blessed by who God set me up with. HE knew that I needed to spend my life with someone that will point me towards God in every moment. Someone that will talk through my fears and let me be emotional when I really need to let it out. At one point I caught myself apologizing to Sean. I told him how sorry I was that he married someone that is so broken right from the get-go. He then took my tear-drenched face in his hands and said "I wouldn't want it any other way". I said "even if I have a panic attack every day for the rest of my life?", he said "of course. I'm in this with you. I'm not going to leave you alone in this even if it means everyday for the rest of our lives". 

                 Are you starting to see why I've felt so blessed? I'm beginning to understand love at a much deeper level....

As to what I mean by feeling worn... its exhausting to battle a mental issue all day everyday. You can easily slip in and out of depression and you can very quickly become numb to everything else. Another thing I'm grateful to have my husband in my life is because he knows me well. He knows from the way I even say hello if I'm having a rough day or not. He calls me out when I'm slipping into depression. If I didn't have that I'm sure there would be many days that I would just not get out of bed....

I have hit that point where everyday I'm completely honest with God about where I'm at. I can't count the amount of times I've said "Daddy, I'm worn. I can't do today without you. I desperately need you."

I have a feeling though that that's exactly where He wants me right now.... If me being worn out by the struggle is what is finally getting me to admit I can't do this in my own strength at all, then so be it. I look forward to what God might bring out of this. It seems like it's been so dark for me, but that just means that with God on my side, the light at the end will be all the more brighter.

I'll leave you with the chorus from a new Tenth Avenue North song that put to words how I've been feeling for the last five months...

Let me see redemption win
Let me know the struggle ends
That you can mend a heart
That’s frail and torn
I wanna know a song can rise
From the ashes of a broken life
And all that’s dead inside can be reborn
Cause I’m worn