Author: Anne Marie Miller

“Never look for justice, but never cease to give it.” – Oswald Chambers

Chicken little?

Hmmm. Maybe not.

My friend Shane sent me this photo from his phone at lunch today. If you can’t tell, it’s a chicken sandwich. And I must say, one of the biggest chicken sandwiches I’ve ever seen. It was so absurdly large, I felt the need to post a photo for you to see. And enjoy. And maybe even throw up a little bit.

Earlier last week, I won some tickets to see the Shaolin Kung Fu Monks. This is a performance troupe of about 20 Buddhist monks who travel around and showcase the art of Shaolin Kung Fu. I invited my friend Kim to tag along.

The monks spend 8 hours a day training in their art, in addition to farming for a living & meditating on Buddhist scripture. Their discipline is evident as they have perfected some of the most amazing weapons choreography and mind-blowing feats no human should be able to do…like eating glass (after chewing it up, of course), balancing perched atop of four sharpened spears, throwing a needle through a pane of glass, breaking blocks of cement over their heads and my personal favorite, something I shall call the “triple layer monks, machetes & boards with nails” sandwich topped with “let’s add some concrete & a sledgehammer.” A photo of a similar accomplishment is below, however for the performance today, they added another layer of monk and another board of nails. All in all, it was a fine mixture of art in color, dance, and anticipation.

Getting to hang out with Kim is nice. We work together – she’s another designer in my department – but she’s just awesome to be around. There is always something crazy going on in her life and she has the best way of cracking everyone up when she shares it. Plus she lives in an interesting neighborhood…with really interesting neighbors.

After Kim & the Kung Fu monks, I met Christina for a 2.5 hour coffee date. Christina is another one of my favorite people in the world. She is ALWAYS smiling and always has the right words of wisdom to say no matter what’s going on…we can talk about anything from tornadoes to whirlwind shopping sprees…as well as serious life-stuff. After hanging out with Christina, you can’t help but to leave smiling.

I realized how lucky I am to have a whole lot of positive people in my path right now…yet it also made me wonder what to do with those…not so positive people.

Everyone has them. The people that just kind of rub you the wrong way or flat out ooooze negativity every time you’re around them. Granted (and thankfully), I don’t have very many people in my life that do that, but what do you do in the seasons where you seem surrounded by the naysayers?

Personally, I try and live a life of loving people. I don’t care who you are or where you’ve been. I hope somehow I can brighten your day and connect with you. I loooovvvee people.

But loving everyone doesn’t always come easily – in fact, most of the time it proves to be a challenge, especially around those not-so-nice people. And if you spend a lot of time around these negative people, sometimes they can bring you down a lot faster than you can build them up.

They say boundaries are healthy…but what are the boundaries for being around negative people? Do you try and encourage them (and if so, how long do you try?) Is there ever a time where you need to cut them out of your life and end your relationship with them?

Here’s to a good week…

Hmm…I need you guys to pray for me. Or leave some tidbits of wisdom. Or both.

There have been some opportunities presented to me in the last couple of weeks (don’t worry, it has NOTHING to do with working or leaving Lake Pointe – I love it there, and I’m not leaving – Just wanted to clear that up!)…anyway, these opportunities are really cool, but I’m not sure how to answer them yet.

If you know me, you know I am terrified of public speaking. In small groups or one-on-one, I’m fine, but once you put more than a dozen beady little eyes on me, I sweat more than I do when I exercise. Some of these are public speaking…some of these things are contributing to videos as a speaker. Anyway, before I moved here, God and I had a talk where I said “If you open the door to speak, I’ll walk through it” but now that it’s here, I’m being a little cry baby about it and wanting to hide under the bed.

I know the answer is clear…I just need a good swift kick.

Kick me, please.

Be daring, be different, be impractical, be anything that will assert integrity of purpose and imaginative vision against the play-it-safers, the creatures of the commonplace, the slaves of the ordinary.
~ Cecil Beaton