Fighting Wrong with Wrong

Recently an incident occurred that left my ears stinging and my heart saddened. A stranger speaking to someone I was sitting beside began talking about the morals in other places compared to where we were at. Then suddenly he used extremely rude, offensive, hurtful slang to describe those persons whom he encountered elsewhere. I have heard terms like that used before, but never have I had such a hard time with hearing it as I did just then. May be it effected me the way it did because I saw it for what it was - HATE. Hate for another human being; a fellow child of God. I'm not sure if I handled the situation as best I could, but given I had my little one in tow, I quickly got up and left that area until the individual was gone.

My mind has spun since then about past experiences I have witnessed or heard about in headlines regarding individuals originally attempting to fight for what was RIGHT, but diving into WRONG in a much failed attempt to do so. There are too many examples of this in today's world. (Comment sections especially have gotten WAY out of hand.)

It's like there are two teams with a line drawn down the middle dividing them. Team Right and Team Wrong. Instead of staying on the Right side of the line as Wrong runs their play, you lash out at them lunging yourself to their side to "teach them a lesson," but little do you know, you crossed the line and joined their team... Ooops!

When someone makes fun of us or someone else, degrading and bullying them, do we really think calling them horrible names, and swearing at them is really going to fix the problem? NO!!! It obviously just fuels the HATE fire. A fight has now broken loose, instead of the opportunity to change someone's wrongful behaviour. I know personally from way back when(I'm talking below grade 4. Bully = me), whenever I would purposely hurt someone and they did it right back to me, it made me want to continue on being hurtful to them. However, when it was called out to me in a calm way that that was a very mean thing I had done and that it hurt them, the immediate remorse over my actions consumed me and I became ever-so sorry and desired desperately to change. Bullying someone back never works, but calling them out in an honest way does. You have to teach people how to treat you. It really comes down to this simple and wonderfully put quote:

"Defend your beliefs with courtesy 

and with compassion, but defend them."

- Jeffrey R. Holland                                        

the-cost-and-blessings-of-discipleship

I've really thought about it and I think I can see where we as individuals error - we don't listen. When faced with a difficult situation where something wrong is being done, instead of quieting ourselves and listening for that still small voice to guide us in our words and actions, we give into our inward screaming's of selfish pride and fear. We completely bypass our Heavenly Father (the lawmaker of right and wrong) in His infinite wisdom and guidance; therefore deciding to take matters into our own imperfect hands. ***We kick out our only true and sturdy leg that we had to stand on.***

We need to fight what's wrong in the world, we do, that's how changes for good can be brought about. BUT, we need to caution ourselves in knowing what the RIGHT thing to do is before we jump the gun in a riotous rage, because when we do so, unfortunately we just joined the wrong team.



Heaven's slice is actually fighting for what's RIGHT.

Trumped

I don't always wear a crown... but when I do, chances are I'm taking a blog photo.

I come from a long line of Rook players (and royalty...but we won't get into that), so I learned at a young age how to play the card game. In the game, there is 4 card colours: yellow, green, black, and red numbered 1-14, and 1 rook card. At the beginning of the game/round the highest bidder gets to determine what colour trump is going to be. Trump thereafter refers to any card that is that decided colour plus the rook card. The lowest card in trump (the Rook) beats any other card in a different colour; even the highest one.

Being trumped on a round humbles you. You throw down your highest in red and they throw down a trump-yellow 2 and take all your points with them.







Trump always wins, always.















I've been trumped, and trumped others hundreds of times in Rook, but also in life.

Love is trump.

It's easy to love people that love you; they constantly lay down trump for you and you to them. Following suit comes naturally to us (and is the rule in Rook). So on the flip side, when another colour is constantly thrown your way from someone, you as well throw down that colour. It's victim card after victim card, judgement card after judgement card throw down between both parties. Until one humbling day... you get trumped. You're shocked, naturally, your victim cards cease to hold any value in your hand, you're embarrassed at what you chose to lay down previously, feelings of guilt, shame, lowliness, and utter absolute gratitude fill your heart. You suddenly realize what you've had in your hand all along that sat unused: trump! You gladly return it back to them once your confusion of feelings subside. Sometimes you get to be the one who trumps; who shows another love after they give you a card of no value... and it feels awesome! You won! You went against the natural man to just follow their suit, and you determined that you in fact chose the road less traveled by, which as you know, makes all the difference.

There are times when winning is a necessity, and love can always be there for you to do so.

So when someone constantly gives you lemons, trump them!
(I don't like lemonade)



Heaven's slice is love.

Anniversary Trip

The hubs and I have kept this little tradition since we've been married where it is the others' turn to plan Valentine's day and our Anniversary every other year. It eliminates the possible blame game over not celebrating the dates and well, it's just super fun! Every other year I get full control over where we're going and what we're doing, and then every other year I get to be totally surprised over what my hubs comes up with.

It can be made to be super extravagant or super frugal, but either way these are The rules for it:

Valentines day:
- 1 spouse plans what we're doing that day and surprises the other on the day of. (date may be supplemented on another date other than February 14th.)

Anniversary:
- 1 spouse plans it all and surprises the other on the day of departure (date may be supplemented on a different date/weekend as long as it's close to actual anniversary date).
- Must be a trip somewhere where an overnight stay is enabled for at least 1 night.
- Must tell no one else until surprised spouse gets told. (some exceptions may apply such as needed directions from another party prior to trip date). (I'm really the enforcer of this rule as I don't want everyone else to know before I get to know cause I'm selfish like that lol. Plus someone could spoil the surprise and spill the beans to the other spouse.)
- Must be only the two of you (exception - offspring at the discretion of the parent (mostly by me - the mommy))
- Must have some sort of itinerary of activities (may be either a loose or strict itinerary at the discretion of planning spouse)

Our anniversary has become like an annual honeymoon. It's been pretty well my favourite holiday since we started this little tradition. I sooo look forward to it every year!

 Year 0

 Year 1

 Year 2

 Year 3

 Year 4

Year 5

 0

 1

 2

3

 4 - only car shot taken

5

My husband and I don't believe in wearing sunglasses at the same time.

It's pretty awesome getting to set up your very own routines of fun things your family does to spend quality time together. Tons of memories are made to share and bond over with the excitement and anticipation for more. There's just some wonderful comfort that comes from things that go unchanged.



Heaven's slice is traditions.

The Art of Listening

Sometimes I'm deaf.

(When I wear black studded earrings I feel like a trendy rebel - just thought you should know)

It's really hard for me to make out sentences let alone words from someone when there are surrounding noises. This is especially true when I'm in a crowd of people, because so many others are talking at the same time. I went in for a hearing test that showed I had perfectly normal hearing. I relayed to the testers that if there were other noises accompanying though, I wouldn't have done so well on the exam. Unfortunetly, they stated that that just wasn't how these tests worked. I was pretty bummed about the results; that handicap would have been nice to blame for my inability to listen.Why the rant? Because I LOVE listening, almost as much as I love being heard, and my inability to block out other noises is hindering me from being able to truly listen to people.

Though ears are for hearing, I believe that hearts are for listening. Listening means feeling, feeling for another's words that requires no similar story nor wisdomous(spell check and I are having a bit of a quarrel about this word, but I don't care I'm using it!) advice. It's the simple act of genuinely showing that someone's speech is valued, and in turn, that they themselves are valued.

I find it aggravatingly irritating when someone constantly either ignores what I say or immediately acts upon it.

Ignores - As in doesn't give any sort of interested word or even a glance your way.

Immediately acts upon - As in their brain is constantly spinning it's wheel on what they will say once you finally shut your mouth.They pounce on their own story or advice the very second you're done.

Either way, it's not listening. You are either viewing the speaker as invisible or as an object in which to bounce your own speech off of. It's not showing love, nor care, nor concern, which is what listening was always meant to show.

All of us I'm sure have had our share of experiences with friends, family, or acquaintances who have not listened when we wanted them to and it hurts.

But thankfully, no matter how many people in my life that may seem to not be listening, I know there will always be one who did. One who not only wanted to listen to my story, but know exactly with a perfect knowledge what my story was. Exactly how I felt in each situation, exactly how I acted and reacted, exactly in which ways I struggled and in which ways I succeeded... Exact enough that He died for me to know it, and to be my forever advocate because He knows my story. Christ, the perfect listener.

This post isn't supposed to be a 'high horse' type post, I truly have had many moments where I didn't listen when I should have. Only so many instances can be blamed on my deaf ears and mommy brain. A blanketed blog post apology may not be enough to fix any damages done, but I'm sorry regardless if I ever didn't listen to you when I should have.

I don't think that listening is a lost art upon us mortals, but I do think that it's an art often misplaced. People are listening, but no longer to the individual, they're putting their listening efforts into social media headaches and headlines. And it's sad, especially when it can make such a difference in someone else's day to just listen.

Heaven's slice is listening.