If you’ve read my blog for any time, then you know I’m big on perspective, because I believe it’s the secret sauce for living a victorious, overcoming life. I’m convinced that our lives are determined not by what challenges life brings our way, but by how we choose to think and subsequently act when faced with inevitable obstacles.

When life gets hard, pour on some perspective and watch God elevate your character to frame your circumstances in a whole new light.

While blogging is one place I hang my hat, I spend most of my time as a missionary working alongside my husband. In addition to our work in the Philippines, we’re also oversee an awesome band of fellow missionaries in Southeast Asia.

Today, I’ve asked one of our missionaries to the Philippines, Lindsay Choi, to share her recent journey and some tips she’s learned to help shift your focus when you lose perspective.

Panic, Pesos, and Perspective

I was in the fetal position in my daughters’ closet, weeping, sweating, terrified, and only able to stammer a few words: “God. Help. Please.”

A week earlier, a wave of inexplicably severe anxiety had crashed over me. Panic attacks sprang on me without warning, leaving me gasping for breath, unable to function, tortured by devastating scenarios that played on repeat in my mind.

What instigated this storm? I honestly don’t know.

As a nation we were facing social upheaval, a contentious election, and divisive opinions about the pandemic… but this anxiety was more personal than all that. The icy hand of fear grasped my heart and conjured up visions of the worst things I could imagine happening to my family.

The anxiety and panic plunged me into depression. While I was never suicidal, I remember thinking, “If this is what my life is now, I can’t do it.” And the enemy of my soul shouted back: “YES! This is your life now. Give up!”

What eventually pulled me back from the brink of despair?…Scripture, worship, prayers and messages from my family… and a lesson I actually taught on perspective back in 2012.

I was teaching English in the Philippines, and we were using the book of Habakkuk to practice reading comprehension. As we watched Habakkuk go from fear to faith, I prepared a simple object lesson to demonstrate how Habakkuk made that leap.

I had each student hold a Philippine peso, a coin about the size of a nickel, up to their left eye while closing their right. When they all complied, I asked the class what they saw.

“The peso,” came the replies.

“Only the peso? How is that possible?” I pressed. “I’m here, and I am a little bigger than a peso.”

There were a few giggles… and then from a student in the back came the one word I was seeking: Perspective.

I reminded my class that day that our focus can warp reality. Small things loom large when we hold them too close. We may be surrounded by beauty, by friends, by opportunities. But if we’ve brought our small, insignificant concerns to the center of our vision, life will shrink and our souls will be threatened by a coin-sized fear.

In Habakkuk 1, the prophet is asking God some modern-sounding questions: “Why? How long?” He vents his frustration and confusion. And God answers:

Look at the nations and watch—
and be utterly amazed.
For I am going to do something in your days
that you would not believe,
even if you were told.

Habakkuk 1:5

Notice how God’s response to Habakkuk was not the obliteration of evil nor relief from pain; it was simply an adjustment of focus. Look, God says. Watch. In other words: shift your focus. Raise your eyes. See a different reality.

In 2012, I went to the Philippines as a missionary, leaving home out of a season of disappointment. While overseas, God highlighted Habakkuk 1:5 for me. For years, I had focused on my struggles; I finally realized that it was my focus, not my circumstances, that had birthed the disappointments I was fleeing.

God was calling me to watch what He was doing. And He was right: I would not have believed if I’d been told what He was going to do with me.

Fast forward to that August day in 2020. I huddled in a closet, unable to play with my kids or cook dinner or chat with my husband or consider the future without terror. And this verse is drumming through my mind on repeat: “I am doing something. I am doing something. I am doing something.”

I didn’t feel the truth of that statement in those agonizing moments. But I learned that you can know something is true without feeling it.

you can know something is true without feeling it.
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So again and again, I dragged my eyes away from the “peso” that had swallowed my vision and I looked up.

Minutes later, I would find my gaze fixed once again on the peso. Almighty God, Creator of all, King of kings and Lord of lords, had been eclipsed by my infinitesimal human fears.

Not once, not twice, but countless times I lifted my eyes until I saw Him once again, seated above the flood. Eventually, the turbulent sea of anxiety stilled and I floated again on the gentle waves of His goodness.

A repeated adjustment of my perspective finally brought me to the same conclusion that Habakkuk comes to at the end of his short book…

Even if the worst things I can imagine do happen, I will rejoice. I will trust. I will invite the Sovereign Lord to be my strength.

Practical Steps To Shift Your Focus

If you are in a season where your focus is continually eclipsed by “coins,” I encourage you to do a few things I’ve found most helpful:

1. Find Scriptures that speak to your situation and write them out by hand.
2. Post these scriptures around your house where you will see them often.
3. Fill your home with praise music.
4. Let trusted friends and family know you are struggling, and allow them to send you words of encouragement, lyrics to songs, and Scriptures.
5. Remind yourself, as many times as necessary, what you know is true; not what you feel is true in the moment.
6. Pray for a perspective adjustment so you can see your mountain as God sees it.

You will find proportions drastically changing as your focus shifts. Mountains may shrink down to molehills. Molehills, things that were on the periphery and seemed insignificant or mundane, may swell to become holy mountains.

The right perspective, a heavenly perspective, gives you power to hop over molehills, climb mountains worth climbing, and move forward in God’s perfect plan for you.

If you could peek behind the veil and see how God is working in the darkness of your situation, you wouldn’t even believe it. Lift your gaze to the One who is truly larger than it all… and prepare to be utterly amazed.

I’m Lindsay Choi, wife, mom of 2 princesses, missionary, teacher, and writer. I inhale coffee and doughnuts, and if I have a minutes of free time, you’ll find me curled up in a comfy chair with a book… or five. God has been incredibly gracious to me. I am humbled and honored to share my story with you. If you would like to support my family and me as missionaries to the Philippines, please click here.

The post Shift Your Focus – Guest Post By Lindsay Choi appeared first on Shellie Bowdoin | The FABulous Journey.

This weekend we saw two major storms unleash their full fury on both sides of the globe.

Hurricane Florence ripped across the Eastern seaboard of the United States. Meanwhile on my side of the world, Typhoon Mangkhut mangled the terrain of the Northern Philippines and Hong Kong. Both storms dumped a literal ocean of water upon these unwilling landscapes.

Only time will tell the work it will take to restore these areas to some sort of normalcy.

I myself awaited the onslaught with a saddened relief; knowing that I would not be in the storm’s direct path, but realizing all-to-well that many others had no choice.

Many who were much less prepared to weather the effects of the storm… the effects that will remain long after the water has receded and green shoots once again emerge as eventualities in the tropical climate.

(Source)

Conditional Gratitude

At times like these, I’m grateful…grateful to have electricity, running water and a firmly secured roof over head. But what about the other days of my life? Am I so willing to express gratitude when these blessings become just commonplace expectations in my everyday?

So, I went without electricity for about three hours on the morning after the storm. But, how long will the residents of the Northern Philippines have to go without it? I doubt I would feel quite so grateful if I had to change places with them.

Often, I’m guilty of expressing conditional gratitude. But, Paul reminds us to:

 ^…give thanks in all circumstances; for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.

Thessalonians 5:18

We don’t serve a conditional God, quite to the contrary, He promises to never leave us or forsake us.

Yet, we seem so easily distracted by the crises of our everyday. Does this sound familiar?… I was in a hurry and couldn’t find a parking space close to the mall, so I had to park a “mile away”…things just didn’t line up for me today. Before I knew it, I had allowed this incident to color the rest of my day…. I was not grateful, in fact I felt resentful and just plain bothered.

Now, if this same scenario happened to me, on THIS day in light of the recent calamities that many others are enduring, I would be more likely to say, “what have I got to complain about?…so I have to walk a few more steps to the mall…right now, people are out there wading through waist-deep water!”

God doesn’t change, but often the framework of our response does. We are guilty of conditional gratitude.

What if?… We disciplined ourselves to focus on God’s unchanging face…to intentionally focus on His constant character and unfailing love despite our everyday circumstances.

What if?… We could practice a lifestyle of gratitude for the beauty of the mundane that gives us respite from tears or sleepless nights…for the blessing of minor inconveniences that can easily be chalked up to triviality if given one second’s thought?

What if?… We could just practice gratitude and thankfulness because in so doing we are pleasing God and living smack dab in the middle of his perfect will for our lives.

So, what do you choose…conditional gratitude or genuine gratitude?

Conditional gratitude fails to acknowledge that God is always loving, always seeking and always working things for the good in our lives, regardless of the conditional state of our present reality.

On the other hand, genuine gratitude finds its most sincere expression in a positive attitude and the confident assurance that God’s got your back no matter what life may bring.

God wants us to choose genuine gratitude, because he knows that our perspective ultimately colors our thoughts and our thoughts determine our behavior. Basically, we view life as brighter and full of more possibilities…it’s a win on all sides!

~ Shellie

PS – Back to the aftermath of Typhoon Mangkhut (Typhoon Ondong here in the Philippines)…Pray for the northern Phillipines…they are hurting. We will be assisting in the rebuilding and repair in the coming months, feel free to contact me if you would like to help with these efforts.

The post Conditional Gratitude – It Shouldn’t Take A Crisis appeared first on Shellie Bowdoin | The FABulous Journey.

When’s the last time you were blindsided by a good dose of disappointment? Regardless of who you are, dealing with disappointment is an inevitable part of the human experience, which unfortunately hits when you least expect it.

Maybe the hardest thing about disappointment is that it typically rides on the wave of expectation. Whether anticipation of a particular outcome, reliance on another person or planning for an special event; all of these scenarios are rife with expectation. So, when things don’t turn out the way you planned, you often feel worse than if you had never expected anything in the first place.

I was recently slammed with a major disappointment…my husband and I had been planning a trip back to the Philippines for months. I had already purchased loads of gifts to take back to our friends and set up a number of dinner dates. We were running a tight schedule prior to our departure. In fact, we were flying out on the heels of a week away, so I had only an afternoon left to pack our clothes before departing for Asia early Monday morning.

However, as we drove the 3-hour trip back home on Sunday afternoon, my head began throbbing and before I knew what hit me, I was experiencing the worst headache of my life. By the time we arrived home, it took all my energy to get out of the car and drop into bed. My husband unpacked the car from our trip and stacked all of our purchases in the corner of the living room.

Every few hours he would poke his head in the door, hoping for any sign of improvement. But, as the hours passed, we both eventually had to face the reality that I wasn’t going to make the trip. I knew he hated to go without me, but there was no way I could go on a 26-hour flight feeling that way. He finally called to cancel my ticket around 10:30 that evening.

Dealing With Disappointment

I was bummed to miss the trip and I experienced more than one twinge of disappointment as he recounted his various adventures over the phone throughout the next two weeks. But, that didn’t mean I had to walk around under a cloud of “woe is me” until he returned.

Dealing with disappointment is a skill each of us must master in life. Face it…we all have to deal…the true question is whether we ride the wave or allow inevitable disappointments to drag us under. Ultimately, I had to make a conscious decision to move on when things didn’t go exactly as I planned.

the true question is whether we ride the wave or allow inevitable disappointments to drag us under.
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Here are some important things to consider when dealing with disappointment:

1. Don’t Take Disappointment Personally

Don’t fall into the trap of “woe is me” when disappointments come. We can easily convince ourselves that the universe has conspired to wreck our lives, when in actuality, it’s just a fact that no one gets 100% of what they want 100% of the time.

Take a deep breath and acknowledge your present situation. Only you can decide where to go from here.

2. Step Back To Look At The Big Picture

As I have mentioned often in previous posts (here, here and here), perspective is everything. Take a moment to look at this disappointment in light of your life as a whole. Will this one disappointment derail your life? Make a list of the things that are going OK. Would someone else dream of living your life, just as it is right now?

3. Consider What You Can Learn

We like to think that everything that goes wrong has to be someone’s fault and we often want that “someone” to someone ELSE. But in reality, if we take an honest look, we can learn a lot about ourselves when disappointments come.

has to be someone’s fault and we often want that “someone” to someone ELSE.
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Ask yourself, “am I gracious and flexible?” If not, do you live with a sense of inherent entitlement? Disappointments can be great learning and growing opportunities, but learning only comes from honest introspection.

4. Look For The Silver Lining

Silver linings are often found when you look for them. In the end, my missed trip allowed me to be home when my husband’s dad underwent unexpected surgery. Consider what new opportunities might have been afforded by your recent disappointment; possibly a change in direction, a pursuit of new activities to occupy time or a new relationship to replace the old.

Consider what new opportunities might have been afforded by your recent disappointment
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Here are some notable quotes to consider when you are dealing with disappointment. Pick one or more to write down.

We must accept finite disappointment, but never lose infinite hope. – Martin Luther King, Jr.
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As someone who has faced as much disappointment as most people, I’ve come to trust not that events will always unfold exactly as I want, but that I will be fine either way. – Marianne Williamson
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Usually a feeling of disappointment follows the book, because what I hoped to write is not what I actually accomplished. However, it becomes a motivation to write the next book. – Anita Desai
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Burning desire to be or do something gives us staying power – a reason to get up every morning or to pick ourselves up and start in again after a disappointment. – Marsha Sinetar
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The beauty is that through disappointment you can gain clarity, and with clarity comes conviction and true originality. – Conan O’Brien
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The post Dealing With Disappointment appeared first on Shellie Bowdoin | The FABulous Journey.

If you look at this picture, it’s pretty easy to see that it’s a book shelf housing a few classics. However, if you take a step back to see the bigger picture you would realize that these “books” are actually not as large as they appear.

They are actually just intricate props for a meticulously constructed doll house.

That’s the value of perspective. If we’re not careful, we can blow up small situations and events in our lives until they soon seem bigger than everything else. However, taking a moment to exam our perspective can help us…well, put things into perspective!

So, how’s your perspective this week?! Enjoy your Wednesday!

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Karren-Host // Oh My Heartsie Girl // Spaghetti-Squash-Carbonara // If you have never tried Spaghetti Squash your missing a great way to create your family delicious meals without using pasta, this recipe I made “Spaghetti-Squash-Carbonara”
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Co-Host Evija Roberts// From Evija With Love //How To Make A Quilt For a Baby // When I knew my sister was expecting a baby I knew I would make something extra special for my new baby niece.. I really wanted to attempt and make a quilt for her..
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Co-Host Shellie Bowdoin // The Fab Journey //My Dad Taught Me Some Valuable Lessons About Money//My childhood taught me that life is about a lot more than money, but then that’s because my dad made such sound decisions with his. When it comes to financial matters, my daddy taught me a few things about money that have helped me live a lot more and worry a lot less.
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Co-Host Pili // My Sweet Things //How To Transfer on Fabric In Less Than 5 Minutes // I’ve been receiving questions about transfer into fabric since I posted my romantic pillow or lavender sachets and I thought that a picture is worth a thousand words, so I decided to make a little tutorial to show you how to do it.
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Your Co-Hosts Picks From Last Week

Sadie Seasoned Goods //// From “Cutesy” to Spooky: Thrifted Cookie Jar Halloween Revamp // A cookie jar turned Halloween with some creativity and paint change the entire looks Must see the original!!

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Repurposed 4 Life // From Chicken Crates to Coffee Table // This is the result of using things other then there original purpose. A very unique coffee table.

Purfylle//Make a Linky Party Tracker // Stella Lee shares how to create more than a spread sheet track linky parties, when to linkup

Marilyn’s Treats // Questions All Bloggers Need To Ask Part 4 The Bottom Line // Even if you are a seasoned blogger or just getting started Marilyn gives us an insight of what it takes to have a successful blog.

Dreaming of Leaving // 6 Best Side Dishes for Thanksgiving // What are your favorite side-dishes for the holidays?

Lovely Livings //Autumn Kitty // LuAnn’s Persian Himalayan “Girly”kitty loves to sit in the window to watch the birds outside!

The Lou Lou Girls // Caramel Apple Spice Cake // This is a beautiful dessert, and Jessica says it is easy to make!!

Much More Creative // Halloween Cameo Votive // Brenda loves cameos and picked a skeleton cameo and made this amazing votive candle and vignette for Halloween this year!

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It’s interesting how some things can really shake up our priorities and perspective!

Last week I made the long, long journey from Manila, Philippines to Tampa, Florida. If any of you have ever been on an international flight you know just how taxing they can be. My flight was one of my relatively shorter trips; clocking in at 26 hours. I have made the trans-Pacific crossing more than 20 times and it never gets easier!

If you ever do take one of these flights you will gain a new appreciation for the bath room. It is your one opportunity to be alone for at least a minute or two!

I know fast food gets a bad wrap these days and I have to admit that some of the criticism is well-deserved. However, there is nothing more inviting than a good ol’ McDonald’s restaurant in the midst of an otherwise foreign environment to make you reconsider your objections!

Taking time to appreciate the small conveniences and blessings in our lives can help us realign our perspectives. International travel can make you just uncomfortable enough to gain a new perspective on the everyday things you take for granted.

I hope everyone has a fabulous Wordless Wednesday!

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The post Wordless Wednesday – International Travel and Perspective appeared first on Shellie Bowdoin | The FABulous Journey.