We all experience challenges now and again. It’s a part of life.

I used to expend much energy trying to avoid challenges because to me it just meant more difficulty. With difficulty, pain undoubtedly followed with misery tagging along. I didn’t want misery … so avoid challenges. It made sense to me.

The interesting thing was as I avoided challenges that came my way, I experienced pain continually, life was difficult and I was very miserable. Avoidance didn’t work.

It took a while, but finally I realized the problem wasn’t in the challenge, but in my response to it. As I shifted my focus and faced challenges as they came, I discovered more of my own character and those areas I needed to improve upon.

I heard the author, Jerry Jenkins, say one time that who we are depends only 5% on what we experience, but 95% on how we respond to it. That really stuck with me. It’s true! All of us encounter trials, strain, stress, and change. However, we each respond differently.

I think as parents, the profound piece in our responses is our children watch and learn by our reactions to difficulty. What kind of example are we to our children?

Rather than be consumed by the 5% we don’t want to experience, let’s focus on the 95%. After all, that is what truly matters!

Life’s challenges are not supposed to paralyze you, they’re supposed to help you discover who you are. –Bernice Johnson Reagon

Last week I returned from a wonderful vacation to see my close friend, Sue, in North Carolina. We had never met each others families given we’ve lived on opposite ends of the country much of the time since college. So a few weeks ago, I headed to the East coast. The day before I left for my trip, we spent nearly an hour talking on the phone. Her husband said in the background, “You guys won’t have anything to talk about when she gets here.” We burst out laughing.

That’s one difference between men and women — women don’t run out of things to say! We teased him throughout the trip asking him to give us conversational ideas in case we ran out of things to talk about. But we never needed his ideas. That’s the beauty of our friendship — we pick up right where our last conversation was, or from our last email. When we spend time together, it’s always a reminder to me that miles cannot separate our close friendship. She is a treasure to me. I don’t know what I’d do without her dear friendship.

It was such an absolute joy to be able to meet her family and actually see in front of me her husband and two boys that I’ve grown to know and love by photographs. She has such a delightful family, and a home filled with joy and laughter. I adored them all.

She and I spent a few days by ourselves in Myrtle Beach celebrating her birthday. We spent time on the beach, thoroughly canvassed the outlet malls, spent umpteen hours talking, ate terrific food, and even closed down a seafood restaurant one night as we sat engrossed in our conversations for hours at our table. It was such a great time!

Then we headed back to her house and I spent a few more days spending time with their family. I didn’t realize all the new things I’d experience traveling nearly 2,000 miles away from home. Having just a girl, I discovered playing with boys is much different. Boys make noises — deep and low sounds — or noises that sound like the cars that race down our road at times. I got to crash cars, careen monster trucks over pillows, be a law enforcer in a game of cops and robbers and bring in backup reinforcements from the army men and fire trucks. At one point, her five-year old boy laughed at me … I wasn’t sure if it was because he was shocked I made the noises, or if I did it wrong. Either way, I continued.

The other thing I had forgotten is what a little one-year old can get into. Anything and everything went into her youngest son’s mouth. Plastic hanger? Yummy. Books? Delicious! Paper? What roughage! Then I’d look at his big brown eyes and fantastic smile … and I melted. I also forgot how quickly a small child can scoot on their hands and knees. There should be an Olympic sport for that!

At the beach, I also experienced a few things like the East coast fishermen come to the beach, grab a net and scoop up from the ocean tiny fish for bait, then sink a PVC looking pipe into the sand, plant their pole into the pipe and stand there waiting for it to bend. Fascinating! I discovered the beaches in the fall have biting flies — not really a fun thing. But they also had shopping stores that we don’t have in this part of the country. What a treat!

My time there flew by and before I knew it, I was back on a plane heading home to my family. The endless stories I told my family once I returned has them now asking, “When do we get to meet them?” Soon …

Many people come and go in our lives. Some have a specific purpose in our journey and then move on. Others are woven into the very fabric of our life. Such friendships stand the test of time and the ups and downs of life. A true, treasured dear friend such as this — is priceless!

Recently I remodeled my home office. The before pictures resembled a perfect case for the clutter police.

Apparently there was a time that I must have thought more is better. My walls were plastered with so many things my head spun looking at them. Paperwork piles spilled onto my floors like a gigantic bucket of Legos dumped onto the floor. My craft table held a plethora of items — none of which had to do with crafts. And at one time, I even fit a treadmill in the cluttered room. This room has always overwhelmed me.

It was time to attack it once and for all and dig in. My husband beamed when he saw me bring out trash bag after trash bag. My daughter wondered who stole her mother as she exclaimed, “This isn’t like you mom!”

My husband graciously built me closet organizers, and painted my walls while I shopped for the perfect wall decor — not too much, nothing overwhelming. I wanted a room to relax for my quiet times, a room where I would want to escape and write, and even melt when the stresses of life overwhelmed me.

After four months, my office is done. It’s perfect! My love for the beach is my theme. The colors are soothing while the message to “Relax” is tactfully placed on each wall. Not too much, not too little. I can melt in my beach-type sitting area. Now I look back at the before pictures and wonder how I existed with so much clutter in this room just a few short months ago.

It’s easy to allow our lives to fill up with clutter. We get accustomed to how it feels and looks and it becomes our normal. When we recognize it, overwhelming feelings can threaten to take us under. But don’t let them! Keep your head up and get out the garbage bags to remove what weighs you down!

“You did it!” “Congratulations.” “You’ve come so far.” “What an achievement.”

Everyone wants to be successful. Society shouts their view of success. However, what truly does success look like for a parent?

If we had to name five top indicators of a successful parent, what would they be? Perhaps what first comes to mind centers on a child’s exterior performances, a child’s visible achievements, or how a parent’s child rates on the popularity scale. But is that really parental success?

By definition, success means achievement of intention. In that light, the question becomes what as parents do we plan or attempt to achieve?  The picture of success then changes.

If busy schedules overwhelm you, then having an actual sit-down dinner together three nights a week becomes a parental success. If one-on-one time with your children is always overshadowed by daily demands, then one planned outing every few weeks becomes a parental success.

So take a moment today, to define what successes you intend to achieve as parents. The culmination of little parental successes brings about achievements with lasting value for our children.

Time flies faster than anything. The demands of life are relentless. Schedules overflow. In the midst of it all, our children grow up quickly. Precious moments in time with our children threaten to loose their memory as the next thing barrels in.

Time snatchers. They come when you least expect them, sneak up on you, and threaten to steal your moments. Sometimes they win, other times they fail. How can we let them fail more often? Here are few helpful tips:

1. Overcommitted? Repeat after me, “No.” “No!” “NO!” Understand the world won’t fall apart if you say no to a good thing. It just allows another person an opportunity they didn’t have before.

2. Overloaded schedule? Does your day-planner resemble a Chicago O’Hare airport departure monitor? Hit the delete key and truly ask yourself what can be rescheduled? What isn’t that important? A hurried person is a stressed person. If you fall into that category, see #5 below.

3. Overwhelmed? Society’s pace brews this automatically. Take moments to just be. Remember to breathe. Listen to some calming music. If small children make this difficult, put them in bed a few minutes earlier so you have an opportunity to relax in the evening. They aren’t tired, you say? Give them a book to look at or read in their room. It teaches them the value of down time as well.

4. Worried? Let those buggers go. Let God take care of those things–you don’t have control over them anyway. Glenn Turner said, “Worrying is like a rocking chair, it gives you something to do, but it gets you nowhere.” John Lubbock refers to a day of worry as being “more exhausting than a day of work.” So, let it go.

5. Stressed? Are demands causing you to squeeze the stress ball until it burst? Relax. See #3 above. Give God your day before you start and let go of those things that cannot be accomplished. God may have ordained them to be done in a few weeks–not now. “A time to relax is when you don’t have time for it.” (Sydney J. Harris)

Lily Tomlin gives this advice, “For fast-acting relief, try slowing down.” Easier said than done, I know. Life does not give out free time. Instead, it steals our time like a vacuum. So, what can we do? Unplug the power cord! It is possible. Go for a walk with your kids. Play catch in the backyard. Go for a family bike ride. Who knows, you might even have some fun!