A big part of our philosophy at emotionally married is living in the present, being here and now…being accessible and emotionally responsive. What better day to that then on this extra day. Many of my students are throwing a huge party today. Their reason, “it only happens once every four years, so you might at well have fun when it is here.” Sure that might be classic thinking of a college student, but I think it is great advice for all of us. We can all say we don’t have enough time to take care of ourselves, or do to the things that matter most but are easily put off. Not today…it’s leap day. The boys were trying to make sense of it by asking how a girl in their class is only turning two today? Since you have today, February 29^th, what is something you can do to live in the present…to be able to say you enjoyed the day? How can you find time today or this evening to be more accessible and emotionally responsive? In counseling when I would ask my clients to do something for themselves they would usually respond, “I don’t have time.” So I would say, “You have right now…you are already here and we have 20 minutes before our session is over.” The key is to knock down our excuses and work with what we have. Sure many of us would like to say we spent this extra day on a beach, the ski slope, or hidden away in a sleepy cabin. Most of us don’t have that opportunity today, but we do have a few minutes.
I know I’m not finished celebrating Leap Day or capturing this moment, but here is one simple thing I did this morning. As I headed to work this morning I heard that McDonalds was celebrating Leap Day by giving out a free breakfast burrito with a purchase of a drink. I never go out to breakfast, so I stopped in and bought one. For $1.40, I was able to say I did something special today that was for me!
Let us know what you are doing today to live in the present. Click on our comment link, and share with others. Happy Leap Day!

Life is busy. Life is complicated. Life can be overwhelming. It was a week ago that I was on my emotional roller coaster. Now today our family is on a coaster ride that we all want off….we have sick kids. I feel bad when going to work is a “break,” but this morning is one of those days. We’ve had two different sick bugs taking turns picking on the kids. When we have days or weeks like this it can be too easy to allow ourselves to become occupied with the LOUD things in our lives. After having two sets of twins, Cami and I realize that we easily fall victim to the moto, “Whoever cries the loudest gets fed first.” This week it hasn’t been hungry screaming kids, it has been tired, sick, clinging kids.
What moments are worth capturing in the middle of a sick week? If we allow ourselves to look beyond the noise, the mess, and the pure dread of another sleepless night, we can see simple beauties that warm the soul. In the middle of the night we have Preslie (our two year old) yelling at the top of the stairs, “mommy where are you?” This morning as Braunson and Beaudry were getting ready for school (yes, they are finally feeling better), Preslie said, “me go to school,” and as we walked out the door she clung to each of our legs and yelled, “daddy home.”
After dropping the boys off I felt like “I was finally alone,” and thought about getting “lost” on my way to work. I felt tired and overwhelmed and could tell I wanted a break. I pictured Cami who has a much more difficult job than I as she has the sick kids all day, so I decided it would be better to get to work and try to get back home early rather than get lost.
So hear I am….it’s quiet, no noise, no screaming, no one climbing on my lap…no nose to wipe. This is a moment to capture, a moment to enjoy. If someone was to see me they would think that this was any ordinary Thursday morning…and it is.
Yet, I’m in the moment…living in the present…enjoying these moments of freedom, I might even say bliss, as I am happy! It only takes a minute to capture the moment.  Above is Cami’s scrapbook page about capturing Preslie in one of those moments (you can read the journaling at the end of the blog)

 So Stacy Julian (http://stacysbigpicture.typepad.com/) tagged me on her blog and gave me these rules to follow. The rules: Link to your tagger and post these 3 rules on your blog.

• Share 7 facts about yourself on your blog, some random, some weird.
• Tag 7 people at the end of your post by leaving their names as well as links to their blogs.
• Let them know they are tagged by leaving a comment on their blog.

Here are my 7 facts:

1. I married my high school sweet heart and we met on the last day of 6^th grade.
2. I consider day dreaming my #1 hobby.
3. My three favorite TV channels are The Food Network, The Travel Channel, and ESPN.
4. I can cook a killer rack of ribs!
5. Our family spends our summer vacation living out of a pop-up trailer.
6. I don’t know how to “Tag.”
7. I only read one other blog and that is Stacy’s. In fact I might be one of the few men who read her blog on a regular basis and it is from following her that I/we decided to start our own, Thanks Stacy! Since she tagged me and I only read her blog, I guess my end of the tag line is finished. Sorry.

For those who followed Stacy’s tag to our site, I hope you like what you’ve found and that you’ll stick around. 

 Journaling: “Smile inside and Out”

It’s times like these I am reinforced to have camera with me at all times.  A Sunday afternoon in our front yard and I captured it.  Preslie your eyes and smile say it all…innocence and joy for living in the moment.  It was a simple tree swing that lit your face up today, but this expresion of yours comes out often.  I wish I could bottle it up and save it so I will never forget it… but I have a feeling these expressions are just you, and will last a lifetime.  I love you and appriciate the simple moments we have together.  Things get too busy and sometime I forget to have fun and just be happy.  Thanks for slowing me down and seeing how fun life really can be.

If you have followed my blog then you know I place a lot of importance on our perceptions. Perceptions are a combination of fact and feeling…we may say something like, “I know Beaudry is a helpful kid.” We have facts that I call ‘evidence’ that prove to us that he is helpful and we have the emotions we have felt when we saw him being helpful that add to the stack of evidence that our perception is true. Perceptions are also powerful because they can serve as a filter…filtering out things that do not fit and helping us focus on events that confirm our perception. I’ve also written about the influence our perceptions have on our expectations. If I perceive Beaudry to be a helpful kid then I will have expectations that reflect how I see him. I might expect, “when his little sister needs something he will give of himself to help out,” or “he will help his brother get a tissue when he has a bloody nose.” Our perceptions and expectations influence our interactions. If I perceive Beaudry to be a helpful kid, I will expect him to do helpful things, and so when I see him getting a tissue for Braunson I will see his interactions as meeting my expectation of him. When our expectations are met by the interaction or behavior then our perceptions are confirmed and strenghtened. It becomes a circular pattern of perceptions, expectations and interactions. Our perceptions influence our expectations which influence our interactions. When the interaction meets the expectation then it confirms our perception and it can become an automatic or self-fulfilling pattern.
 I know these pictures are a little blurry, but I wanted to show them as they serve as part of my stack of evidence that “Beaudry is a helpful kid.” Here he is helping Preslie play air hockey at Chuck E Cheese.

So last night as part of my ‘perceptions, expectations, and interaction’ cycle, I saw Beaudry heading to the bathroom and I asked him what he was doing. He said that Braunson had a bloody nose so he was getting him some tissue. This is where my percpetion “Beaudry is a helpful kid” lead me to expect that he was getting tissue because he was being helpful and I saw his interaction/behavior as a confirmation of the perception. I felt great and was happy that he was so helpful.
A second time he was heading to the bathroom to get more tissue because Braunson’s bloody nose had started up again (another confirmation of my perception to add to my stack of evidence). Later I was with Braunson trying to offer him some comfort because he has been sick for a few days and I thought his bloody nose was part of it. As we were talking I asked if he knew what caused his bloody nose. His answer was simple. “Sure, Beaudry hit me in the nose with his knee when we were wrestling.”
           

For Valentine’s Day, Cami made me a box of “love notes” which contained pictures of each of the kids and what they love about me.
                                
As you can see the scrapbooking work is amazing, but the concept is something each of us can do. A simple, yet often neglected, act of sharing appreciation can do so much for building relationships and strengthening self-worth. Too often we focus on what isn’t working or what hasn’t been done. We neglect what IS working and ALL that has been done.
I knew a person who wanted me to help her in dealing with her husband. She said he was a “15 minute Dad,” meaning she was lucky to get 15 minutes of support in any given day. She had stacks of evidence that proved to herself that this was true. She was very hurt and felt neglected and abandoned. As I comforted her in her pain, I worked to see how this impacted her relationship and how she interacted with her husband. She told me that she felt so hurt and upset that by the time he would get home she would be so upset and mad at him that he would often leave or walk away. This only reinforced her view of him as a 15 minute dad.
My research says that our perceptions influence what we expect and our expectations influence how we interact. Her pattern became this: I see him as a 15 minute dad. I expect him to not help or just to leave. I either raise my voice when I talk to him or I give him the cold shoulder. Can you see the pattern?
When I worked with her, I knew that her perception started her on a pattern that was hurting herself and hurting the relationship so I wanted to make sure her perception was accurate. I asked her to keep track of the exact minutes each day that her husband engaged. She was reluctant because she felt she already knew the answer.
When she saw me the following week she claimed I set her up and that I called her husband. She gave me the report: the shortest amount of time was 30 minutes and most days were a couple of hours….she realized her perception was not correct. Sure she wanted more and I’m sure she deserved more, but her incorrect perception was setting up a hurtful pattern of expectations and interactions. As she changed her perception she started to change her expectations and then her interactions. Eventually she found herself open and welcoming when he came home rather than upset and cold.
What can we learn from this and Cami’s love notes? We need to focus on the good, the positive, and what IS working. Find simple ways to first see what is good, positive and what works within yourself. Next, start challenging yourself to see the good in those around you…and then find ways to share it in little love notes.

No this isn’t Cami writing, it me….and I do love scrapbooking. Cami had a scrapbook night with some friends so I thought I would write about my love for scrapbooking. From time to time I have people ask if I like the fact that Cami likes scrapbooking so much.  My answer is always something very positive and supportive. I do like the pages she creates and the fact that our kids have this great history of their lives. I love the fact that at any time we can sit down and remember special events, family trips, or just silly simple days around the house. I think the key to why I love her scrapbooking so much is because she journals her feelings in the moment and we have that captured along with the pictures.

Why am I telling you this? Because there is another reason that I love scrapbooking, and this is it: When she scrapbooks it sends a very strong and clear message that she is important. How we spend our time and where we direct our attention and energy sends a message that those people are important. Children and husbands are constantly reinforced that they matter and they are important because their mother/spouse sends many messages each day to them as she works to serve them, take care of them, and make sure their needs are met. But we don’t always do a very good job of returning the messages. Sure kids are sweet and cute, but they don’t always send a clear message of “mom I’m sure glad you pick up all my messes, feed me day after day, are there when ever I need you even if it is the middle of the night when I’m half asleep kicking you in the ribs as I try to climb in your bed or when I’m sick and vomiting.” They forget that messages at the dinner table like “this is gross, I’m not eating this, why did you fix this, do I have to eat this, can I be done already” don’t send the most positive and supportive messages. So day after day moms may start feeling (believing) that they are not important or that they are only important when they serve as the maid, house keeper, secretary, or chauffer.
When Cami scrapbooks she is none of these things, instead she is Cami. She is creative, an artist, a friend, a photographer….a real person who has needs. I’ve always been supportive of scrapbooking because it is another way I try to tell her that she is important, that she has needs and they are important, and that there is more to her life than house work.
Messages we send and messages we receive can be key to our happiness. The great thing about serving others (sending them messages that they are important) is that the server can feel good about their ability to help others and their ability to build up others (which can be a positive message we send to ourself). Hopefully as we serve others we find others serving us and sending us the message that we matter and that we are important. It is also important to find simple ways to send yourself a message that you are important, that you have needs, and that you matter. What do you do to send these positive messages to yourself?

Yesterday I rode one of those emotional roller coasters. I was up at 4:00 am the day before because I couldn’t sleep and yesterday I was up at 5:00 am because I wanted to get into work early. I had a big presentation that was causing me a lot of stress. It went great, actually I went from feeling nervous to feeling excitement, joy and then relief. As I was driving home on my 40 minute commute I could feel my body letting go and I could tell my turn on the roller coaster was over. I had a few other things I had to do last night, so it wasn’t until 8:30 that I finally was DONE! On my way home I was driving on one of my favorite roads in Spokane as it twists and turns along a river through a thick forest of trees. As I was making sure I didn’t hit any deer, I was listening to a song by Taylor Swift and it really struck what I’ve been feeling the past few days. It’s from her song “tied together with a smile,” and the first verse spoke to me. 
Seems the only one who doesn’t see your beauty
Is the face in the mirror looking back at you
You walk around here thinking you’re not pretty
But that’s not true, cause I know you…
                                    –Taylor Swift
Here is someone’s video of the song on youtube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xp5bDGyBuNo
Maybe I’m alone in this, but it seems like I can fall into a pattern where I don’t see my own beauty…what I’m good at or who I really am. As I left for work yesterday morning Cami had left me a note wishing me good luck on my presentation and in the note she said, “Let yourself be you. Show them the ‘whole package.”
So as I’ve spent some time last night and this morning trying to embrace my ‘beauty’ I’ve thought about those who might read this. Do you recognize who you are and all that is in you? It is too easy to discount who we are and the gifts and talents that we have. Our perceptions serve as a filter so if we don’t see our beauty then we will filter out was is good and what is great.

We had a great day this week at Chuck-e-cheese celebrating Maci and Cooper’s 5^th Birthday (we stayed there for 5 hours, what fun!).  Here are my thoughts on them getting a little older, of course in the format of a scrapbook page because that’s how my brain works.

The saddest mistake you can make in life is to let it pass you by: When raising you two the days seem long but the years go fast. ..oh so true.  I look at these pictures of your first few months and marvel at the innocence and purity in your face.  I would love to hold you again knowing your whole body would fit in the length of my arm.  As you approach your 5^th  birthday I wonder where all the time has gone.  I made a promise to myself when I found out I was expecting you two that I would truly enjoy each and every day.  With your brothers I spent much of their early days “just enduring.”  I don’t want you to think that life has been all roses raising you thus far, but I have enjoyed it; the good and the bad.  Still most nights I put you to bed and feel drained having little energy and only feeling like sacking out in front of the T.V.  However your Dad has taught me about living “in the present” instead of living in the future or the past.  I do my best to live each day knowing I can never have it back.  It helps me to quit stressing out about minor things. Some days I get discouraged thinking you are too little to remember all the work I do for you, all the hours I spend playing with you, feeding and taking care of you.  But in my heart I know that it is helping you to feel loved and secure.  Hopefully this love will sustain you through the tough times in life.  Knowing I will always be here for you.  I am still in shock that you are growing up so fast.  I’ll try to get use to the idea but you might stay my little “babes” for a while longer.  Love Mom

Last night was the 2^nd grade music program. The kids each had different parts as they sang and danced to patriotic and folk songs. Beaudry was a narrator and Braunson square danced “with a girl.” Talking with the boys after the program they shared how extremely nervous they felt before and during the night. I asked if they ever felt good or happy or if the nervousness ever went away (who says 8 year olds are not aware of how they feel?) They mentioned moments when they were “1% happy and 99% nervous,” or a time when “at first I was nervous, but then I just felt good because I knew my part.”
As I reflect on the music program and each of us as we engage in activities that cause the nerves to go crazy, it leads me to a discussion about self-worth….where does it come from. From Attachment Theory, we know that self-worth is knowing that you matter in someone else’s mind. Our view of self is built in relation to others or through feedback from key others like our parents or spouse. As all the 2^nd graders took the stage, they all had time to wave to their families. You could see all their eyes searching as if they were thinking, “Where is someone who believes in me….where is someone who can give me hope as I’m scared to death right now.” And then you would see it…that moment when the child met the eyes of his or her parent and that look of fear would turn into a huge smile and an even bigger wave.
So a big part of our self-confidence comes from others and the messages they send. When key others respond to us they tell us, “You matter.” And if you think I matter and you are someone I deem important, then it helps me believe that I must matter. What about within ourselves, is there a way to build self-worth or are we solely dependent on others for this?
When it comes to ourselves, self-worth is built when we keep our word. Self-confidence was built in those 2^nd graders when they felt others were saying they did well. Just as important as the message they receive from others is the message they received from themselves about their performance. When we keep our word we send a message that says, “I’m in control of me. I can do what I as I am going to do. I can believe in myself.”
If the 2^nd grader can look back on his performance and say, “I did a good job,” or as Beaudry put it, “I didn’t mess up,” then they know they kept their word in doing what they said they would do. We need to know that others believe in us, and just as important is our personal belief in ourselves. We build up the way we see ourselves and this belief that “I’m good enough” or “I’m okay,” when we keep our word.
           

Here is how the siblings veiwed the show…. nice and comfortable

A while back I wrote about the relationship dance and how we each play a role in our relationship in our own attempts to feel secure. Some of us are the pursuer while others are the withdrawers. When it comes to our dance we can get into patterns of interacting that become our habitual ways of being. I remember so many times when I was working with couples and after outlining their pattern they would say, “Neither one of us want this pattern but we just don’t seem to be able to break it.” It was like they were watching themselves knowing they wanted something different in their relationship and yet were slow to change.
Friday night I gained some insight into this struggle as Cami and I joined some of our friends for a Valentine’s dance. We enjoyed a great meal and then headed to the dance floor. I dance almost daily at home with Preslie as we jam to either High School Musical II or her latest hit, Hair Spray. Since I dance all the time at home I thought I’d slide right back into my high school days of dancing and we would have a fun night. I didn’t have a problem getting on the dance floor, but once I was there my body didn’t remember how to communicate. My top half was moving (hopefully to the beat) while my legs just stood there. It was like my feet were stuck to the floor and I couldn’t get them to move. I kept trying but the more I tried the more my top half just moved faster. It was so weird….but I just couldn’t dance.
Maybe this is a stretch but I really thought back to some of the people I’ve worked with and how they wanted to change their relationship dance and once they started trying they found parts of them slow to adjust. I think it was the song “La Bamba” that finally did it for me, but man it was tough to realize that I couldn’t dance. So if you are like me and you find yourself struggling to break out of your patterns or old habits, put on a fun up beat song, turn it up loud, and ask your dance partner to keep dancing and soon you’ll start moving!
                   

We live in such a busy world where it can be so difficult to slow down enough to enjoy the moment. Yesterday was Valentine’s Day and I hope you found yourself in a moment that you didn’t want to leave. Hopefully you captured the attention of your spouse in a way that sent the message that she was the most important person in your life and what mattered most at that moment. Capture it. Now try to keep it. The goal of Valentine’s Day should not be to have one day where we share our feelings with those around us and then run away in the days to come. Instead, we should try to stay engaged just as we were last night or yesterday. Remember I mentioned that sharing how we felt can feel vulnerable…some what like taking down a part of our wall. Well as long as the wall is down, try to keep it down for a little while longer. Couples need to engage emotionally and then learn to keep the closeness.
Here is my second “deep thought” about enjoying the moment: One tradition we do in our home is Cami rings the door bell and then runs away. The kids open the door and find a bag with one of their names on it. Inside are some goodies. The kids all knew this was coming and kept wanting to “play” by the front door. They even thought they caught Cami running away from the door. Still, even with them knowing this was part of our day, there was still a moment that was special. There was still the excitement of finding the bag that had your name on it and opening it to find the surprise. Maci even made a valentine’s gift for Cooper and rang the door bell. Cooper beamed with delight to know that she had made him something special.
We need to learn how to enjoy the moments when they come. Learn to be in the present, forgetting the past and not worrying about the future. Try to hold on to the moment and enjoy every part of it. The more you can learn to be in the moment the better you’ll be at being accessible and emotionally responsive to those around you.
Cami has asked me on a date to a Valentine’s dance….our first dance since she was at Ricks College. Should be fun. I’ll see how I can enjoy the moment and report back!