I have been following wisdom from Emily P. Freeman who encourages a practice of reflecting on things learned, whether it’s for the past month or the past season. Emily writes about how this helps her to be present in her life as she pays attention to those moments and lessons that might otherwise fade away. That’s my hope too. Today I’m sharing the good things I learned in November. It’s light-hearted and deep-hearted.
Good Things I Learned in November
#1. A lovely bonfire on an autumn day is good for my soul.
We raked and blew leaves one lovely afternoon before the snow fell, piled them up for the big vacuum truck that carries them safely away — except they are buried under snow right now — and then we burned hundreds of tiny twigs that multiply like rabbits in our forested backyard. No leaf-burning but plenty of wood-burning. I love the smell, the beauty, and especially the noise. Makes me believe all is well.
#2. Too much sugar is bad for me.
Duh. I used to tell my kids this all the time, but I never really paid attention to it until last month. I wrote about slaying my sugar dragon here if you want to read that adventure. I’m happy to say I’ve revised my sugar-eating over the past six months. But over Thanksgiving, it all went POOF. Pumpkin pie, Swedish apple pie, whipped cream, sweetened cranberry relish, and so many goodies. Then I woke up one morning and my hands ached. Sugar makes them do that. So I probably shouldn’t buy those pretty red and green peanut M&Ms this month.
#3. It’s important to practice balance.
A wonderful physical therapist/friend taught me this. Put one foot in front of the other. Turn your head slowly left and right, up and down. Easy peasy. Not really, but it’s doing good things for my inner ear. We don’t do good inner-ear things like kids do, like somersaults, cartwheels, and such. Next month, I’m going to try it on one foot. Then maybe I’ll graduate to closing my eyes.
#4. Our lovely town has the largest publicly-owned snow melt system in the country.
We’ve enjoyed snow melt in the downtown Holland, Michigan streets and sidewalks for years, but I didn’t realize this was the biggest system. It’s so lovely that more than 190 miles of tubes flowing with 95 degree water will make it easy to go holiday shopping this month. If you like to geek out on stuff like this, click over here for pics and background.
#5. I love surprise sales.
I’ve been an Eddie Bauer girl for more than 30 years when I bought my first-ever down coat for cold Chicago winters. It’s pricey, yes. But they always have a sale. So a couple weeks ago, we gifted our son and his wife new coats as a welcome-to-Michigan-from-California essential. I walked into the store expecting 40% off during Black Friday weekend. It was 50% off. Nice.
#6. I’m not brave, at least not in the adventure-brave sense of the word.
My husband and I are listening to Alfred Lansing’s book Endurance: Shackleton’s Incredible Voyage. It’s an amazing real adventure story based on the 1914 exploration to the South Pole. The narrator is wonderful, and it reads like fiction. I’m reminded how not-brave I am. I could never do something like this, and I’m okay with that. I’m thankful other people are brave enough to go into the unknown. To discover and uncover and share. This book makes me especially thankful for my Eddie Bauer coat.
#7. Borrowing e-books and audio books from the library is even easier with Libby.
If you are a library patron and sometimes use Overdrive, try Libby. (I found Overdrive a little complicated.) This app is free. Looks like I better finish The One in a Million Boy. Good book, by the way.
#8. Song of Songs is a mysteriously beautiful book that points to Christ.
Really? I didn’t understand it. This book seemed not completely appropriate, all their talk about kisses and love in the gardens. But this fall, we walked through the book using Heidi Goehmann’s Altogether Beautiful study in our women’s group. I’m closer to understanding the metaphors, the beauty, the poetry. I love that I am altogether beautiful in Christ. What a lovely way to end November.
Do you reflect like this? Or some other way? I’d love to hear and encourage you to try creating your own “good thingsg I learned” list (more on that here). You can link up to lots of other list-keepers here.
