June 4, 2020

As I was gathering my checkbook, pen, and computer to pay some bills, my littlest blessing heard me say, “I have to pay these bills.”

Without missing a beat, she said, “You GET to pay the bills, Mom!”

I started to chuckle as I told her she was right on, and then I asked her, “Who told you this?”, already thinking it was me she heard it from.

She said, “You did!”

Well, I guess I am needing to heed my own advice and remember that in everything I do, I GET to!

So many things in life can change our outlook in life for either positive or negative. I hope that I would see things as the glass half full rather than half empty perspective, but I am sure I don’t always do that.

I don’t know anyone who always sees the glass as half full except for maybe my littlest because she finds the JOY in everything! When I was younger, I remember watching Pollyanna, and she personifies my girlie to a T.

In one scene, everyone is talking about hating Sundays because the minister preaches damnation and chewing their ears off so in the middle of all the complaining, Pollyanna said, “We get to have roast chicken, though! I’m glad of that!”

Someone then asks why she does the “Glad Game” all the time, and she said it was something her father taught her. “It helps when things aren’t going so well.”

She said if they learned how to play the game, they could find SOMETHING to be glad about. She was then asked, “What’s so good about Sunday, Miss Smarty Pants?”

She thought and thought what they all could be glad for….

“Be glad because it will be six whole days before Sunday comes around again!” You cannot deny that truth! Hahaha!

I love that because the problem was that these people could not find one thing good about Sunday because the minister seemed to ruin it for them. He even somehow ruined their breakfast because although they ate it before church, it sat still hot in their stomachs when he preached the sermons so somehow they weren’t able to completely enjoy it! They seemed to like to play the “Blame Game”.

I don’t know about you, but when I become negative, it can start off very subtle, easily becoming grumpy from the look on my face to the tone in my voice to the way that I carry myself, about even the simplest things such as paying bills. I might not think it’s coming off as negative but when you start a phrase with, “I HAVE to”, it is an automatic downer.

My littlest blessing and I talk often about how our child, whom we sponsor through Compassion, is doing. She lives in Haiti, and we have been corresponding back and forth with her for eleven years now! She does not have the comforts we have and take for granted. She is so happy just to be able to go to school and learn, living in a concrete block home with a metal sheet for a roof. There is no electricity or running water. When we send a gift for Christmas or her birthday, it is most used to buy food or something for the family, and she is grateful. She loves to sing! That is one thing I can relate to because I cannot imagine life without music!

I would encourage you to watch the below video and then make a difference by sponsoring a child for $38 a month. That is about $1.25 a day, and I am certain everyone can make “room for one more”.

So, I’ve thought of some of the things we GET to do throughout our lives:

So, next time we think of being a Negative Nellie about what we have been blessed with, let’s remember that there may come a day when we won’t GET to do those things anymore, and then we will have wished we would have been more like a Peachy Polly!

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Blessings,
Jennifer