The Friday Five & Calling Myself Out On My Entitlement Challenges This Week

and ways to fill your journal; embracing your limitations; age and 'the best is yet to come'; what not to say to your suffering friends; August's creative play; gathered collections and kudzu monsters

A bushel of smooth leaf hydrangeas that I cut off of the bush to hang to dry. It looks as if I’m standing in the middle of a hydrangea bush, but no, I’m just holding the large, gorgeous blooms. Bees and butterflies were swarming all around for this shot. Seconds later, I dropped all of them as something flew into my hair.

A personal note

Hello and Happy Friday, friends.

I’m going to get vulnerable with you today (well, I guess I do every newsletter), and the topic is entitlement, more specifically, my entitlement…😩 Yes, this week, I was faced with a big fat dose of ‘check yourself before you wreck yourself, Kelly’ and actually, I’m here for it.

I mean, I write about BECOMING and the becoming process is often not pretty. Becoming the masterpiece God designed for me to become is without-a-doubt a refining process and and as Christians, we should want to be called out…

But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me. That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong. - 2 Corinthians 12: 9-10

The crazy thing about entitlement is, I preach to my children all the time about how the Lord opposes the proud, and gives grace to the humble¹, and to do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves², yet, here I was this week with not one, but TWO times the Lord humbled me and illuminated my entitled attitude.

The first time, I engaged with an artist whom I admire and follow on Instagram after she made a post about her truly lovely retreats in beautiful, far away countries by saying something along the lines of, I would love to know how people afford these when finances are tight…along with another comment about how trauma has changed me but her podcast inspired me to find the best version of myself again. Her reply is when I first felt the yuck in my heart. That should have been a sign for me to pause and check my heart, but I didn’t. I got offended.

All the ways of a man are clean in his own sight, but the Lord weighs the motives. - Proverbs 16:2

Her reply was something to the tune of I’ve had trauma, too, but I don’t let it define me. My thoughts went like this: well, you don’t know my trauma or that I’m still living in it and have been for 6 years and I’ve been working really hard to not let it define me…and so on. I was justifying my yucky heart, like it was owed to me to respond that way because of what I’ve been through. That night, I went to bed, woke up waaaaay too early the next day with all of this on my mind. Funny how the Holy Spirit works in our refining process; I literally needed a night to sleep on it. She meant no harm with her comment. Just because I decided to share something vulnerable about where I am right now, doesn’t mean I should expect her to honor that or be gentle with me. She doesn’t know me or my trauma at all and I shouldn’t respond as if she does or should. Her words were not harsh, I just heard them that way through my pain but thankfully, the Holy Spirit softened my heart and I was able to reply, after some time and led by the Spirit, graciously.

Then, something truly beautiful happened. Yes, I felt lighter and like I had honored God with my response to her because of the way he’d changed my heart, but get this, in his never failing, gracious love and kindness, later that day I jumped onto another artist’s Instagram Live who invited her followers to create alongside her. She welcomed comments and I shared that it was tricky for me to make the lines we were making because I have a shaky hand. She proceeded to talk, actually a lot, about this and even recommended a FABULOUSLY INSPIRING Ted Talk, ‘Embrace the Shake’ (also in my Friday Five list below), which was all about creating art within our limitations. Exactly the topic that started this whole thing…limitations, and how to use our limitations to our advantage. What a beautiful God-wink.

The second time the Holy Spirit convicted me about my entitlement was actually a little trickier because it seemed innocent enough (so often entitlement and pride can be disguised that way, am I right?). It wasn’t until after I felt I had my justified moment and mentally, could move on, that the yucky feelings started pouring in again. I took the time to analyze what was causing them, realized what I was doing and how entitlement had reared its ugly head AGAIN, and then, I had to sit with my refining in that moment. Later, I was able to praise God, again, for his patience and goodness toward me.

I was driving to pick my son up from his overnight church camp, about an hour away from our home. As I passed by tobacco plant fields, silos, and the kudzu-covered highway monster clusters³, I recognized that my mind had fallen into a welcomed lull.  At one point, I looked to my left to behold a vista of a large cow field with the cows grazing in a cluster and the sweet little calves standing near their mommas’ legs. This innocent country scene felt like a much-needed deep breath. And I must have chosen to take a particularly exaggerated one because in that moment, I unknowingly allowed my car to barely-drift over the line into the lane beside me to my right. I was jolted out of my lull by an angry, aggressive driver laying on his horn – one, twoooooo, three-four, then fiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiive times. I quickly threw my hand up, as if to say I’m aware, I’m sorry, yet he proceeded to honk at me several more times.

I felt my face flush red and my knuckles whiten as I gripped the steering wheel to regain my composure. The nerve of that man. I then looked in my mirror to see what kind of man this very angry truck driver was. I kept my eyes on him for a few moments in my rear view mirror and saw that he was nearly passing me on my right. There wasn’t much forethought put into this next thing that I did but as soon as he passed me, I assumed he would look over to see who I was, so I proceeded to bring my arm up to my face and dramatically sneezed three times into my elbow, slowly and intentionally jerking the car just barely, so he might see that what had happened before was a series of innocent and unavoidable sneezes. And, then, after he passed, and I didn’t look at him to see if he looked at me, I felt better, Ha, I was merely sneezing, don’t you feel bad, now?

For the longest time, my ‘in your face’ moment felt affirming, it felt justified. After all, I really wasn’t on my phone checking Facebook, or putting mascara on while driving 55 mph, I was taking in beauty. Surely, that’s OK, right?

And then I realized, I was angry at him for giving me an injustice (interrupting my beauty with his loud, obnoxious horn), because he first was angry at me for giving him an injustice (driving into his lane), but ultimately, I drove into his lane. His loud honk, and my hand-wave acknowledging my apologies should have been the end of it. My entitlement just took it too far. Then, I felt really silly for faking sneezes. 🙄

When it comes to most forms of entitlement, I can assuredly say I can’t check the boxes…quite the contrary, I am hyper aware of others and their feelings. But these were sneaky and I could easily see, if it were not for the Holy Spirit convicting me in the process, how I could overlook these examples as heart-work needing to be done, and I know the downward spiral that can turn into. I’m thankful the Lord stopped me when he did.

I tell my kids all of the time, you get good at what you practice so be careful what you’re practicing…which in most cases, it is to say - you can also get good at bad things.

I am ever-grateful for the Lord’s undeniable and relentless love for us, shown in how he is constantly pruning and refining and sharpening us to become the masterpiece he planned for us to become long ago. Heaven has no place for entitlement. Neither should I.

God loves us just the way we are but He loves us too much to leave us that way. - Adrian Rogers

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1. This week, I shared an article about journaling: the real struggle with ‘new journaling syndrome’, and 31 ways to fill your journal

2. An incredible Ted Talk: Embrace the Shake

I mention that this Ted Talk became a God-wink this week when I was struggling with my limitations - not being able to afford the lovely artist retreats so many of the artist friends I admire organize; and that I struggle from the effects/limitations of trauma…BUT GOD…after he softened my heart on a situation and convicted me of my pride and entitlement, he lovingly directed me to this video about how to work with what you have, how to use your limitations to your advantage. This nearly 10 minute video is so powerful and this artist’s creativity is awe-inspiring. I shared it with my kids and they thought it was pretty awesome, too. Definitely check it out if you haven’t already seen it.

“Limitations may be the most unlikely of places to harness creativity, but perhaps one of the best ways to get ourselves out of ruts, rethink categories and challenge accepted norms. And instead of telling each other to seize the day, maybe we can remind ourselves every day to seize the limitation.” - Phil Hansen

3. An inspiring podcast: The Best is Yet to Come with Jan McCarthy

I was chatting with my hairdresser the other day and she was telling me about her mom and how her mom doesn’t have any hobbies and she doesn’t enjoy getting out to meet new people. That conversation prompted me to do a quick mental scan of all of the older ladies in my life and what they enjoy doing. I had a neighbor who, at 72, was babysitting neighborhood kids, reading stories to them and playing outdoors with them, knitting prayer shawls for ladies at her church, having Pampered Chef parties, and baking special Halloween treats for her friends. I’m thankful for her presence in my life because she is such an inspiration to stay active, curious, and in community.

I know as those of us approach various age-milestones in life, we may struggle from time to time with thoughts that we aren’t relevant, or wonder who would be interested in what we have to say or do. In this podcast, Jan, at 68 years young, shares her thoughts on this and inspires the artist in all of us to ‘live’!

“I started art, making art for the first time in my 50s. That’s what I mean by it just gets better and better that you never know what’s around the corner there. It could be the one thing that you just never knew.” - Jan McCarthy

4. Five Things Not to Say to Suffering Friends - And Five Things To Say

I love Vaneetha Risner. I have referenced her before in my article When Detours Become the New Path. I get her emails and read her latest posts and they are always so relevant, encouraging and helpful, particularly when walking through a season of long-suffering.

This week, she shared Five Things Not To Say To Suffering Friends and Five Things To Say. I whole-heartedly agree with everything she’s included and urge you to consider reading this. If you haven’t already ministered to suffering friends, you will at some point. This post is very helpful.

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5. This month, I’m dedicating August to a month of creative PLAY and gathering - care to join me?

I was so inspired by some of the resources I’m sharing with you this week: the people I encountered and the impressions they made on me, and by the Holy Spirit to really make an effort in my creative play this month. I play a lot in my art studio, but more often than not, it’s structured play, you know, kind of like a kid’s play date with the moms standing nearby overseeing to make sure all things remain in control.

I want to play, but my inner voice wants me to play ‘within the lines’.

I want to explore, but my inner voice says, ‘keep it pretty’.

So, this month, I’m committing three things to myself:

1. Engage in creative play everyday with NO preconceived ideas, outcomes, or thoughts - just get in there and create; in fact, create messy art!

2. Give myself permission to make ugly things or things that I wouldn’t want to post (but I might actually post them because then I’ll be taking my advice to ‘get out of my head’ by not worrying about what others think)

3. Embrace my limitations - if I can’t use a certain art supply because I don’t have it, no biggie. If I don’t have time to make something really great, I’ll use the time I do have to make something. If I can’t create a certain way, like how I admire and see other artists creating, that’s OK, I’ll focus on what I CAN create with my skills.

To hold myself accountable, I put out a call to action through my church’s social Facebook site, my personal Facebook page and my neighborhood page seeking like-minded women to create with here in my home art studio.

To my great surprise, there was a HUGE OUTPOURING of women interested and wanting to create in community - far too many for me to fit in my home.

This shows that there is a need, friends. A need for someone to take the plunge and make the effort to organize something like this because if you’re feeling that void in your life - whatever it may be - then chances are, there are others who are feeling it, too.

So, I am going to embark on this new adventure and pray that it will be a blessing for all of us involved. Care to join us and do something similar in your town? It could be a book club, a walking club, a nature club - anything you love where you’d like to find like-minded friends to come along and join you.

Also, if we haven’t met there yet, I’m over at Instagram here. I have shared before that I don’t spend a lot of time on Instagram. That’s an intentional boundary I’ve set for myself in this season for my mental health. I allow about 5 minutes to scroll and post, then get off. I don’t play algorithm games, I don’t spend the time to create reels and videos and find interesting music to add to my posts. I do the bare minimum and my number of likes and followers affirm this. But I have a healthy relationship with Instagram and none of that bothers me. I do plan to show up more often this month to support my August play goals. Please join me if you’re on Instagram!

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13 Summer Picture Books Adults Love, Too

I wrote this article on picture books last week and am already working on my next themed topic for picture book recommendations. Let me know if you’d like for me to cover a specific theme you’re interested. It’s a great way to put my love of picture books to good use!

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Creative Corner: Gathered Collections

I’m loving these gathered collections in origami paper or vintage boxes. I think I’ll do this with some of the shells we’ve collected from different beaches.

(Click the photos for sources)

And click the photo below for instructions on making origami boxes from book pages if you think you’d like to give this craft a try:

Source: Linda Germain

Here is another gathered collection, not using boxes, that I adore. If you click through, this collection is kept in a very modern and unique tree house that is worth taking a look at.

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A little more on entitlement

I dug a little deeper this week on the topic of entitlement and in case you’re interested, here are a few resources I found to share:

Psychology Today’s article on 9 Types of Entitlement Tendencies and How to Overcome Them

Michael Kelley’s article on 4 Reasons Why Entitlement is Destructive for the Christian

Desiring God’s article on Entitlement Will Rob You of Rest

Scripture that addresses entitlement

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Quotable:

“Life is pure adventure, and the sooner we realize that, the quicker we will be able to treat life as art.” - Maya Angelou

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A Poem I Wrote This Week:

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A few shots from the week

This week has been all about hydrangeas as the hydrangea season is coming to an end here in the southeast US. I ADORE dried hydrangeas and this year, new to this house, I am excited to have many large blooms to dry and use around our home for decor. I grabbed the shears and began cutting branches, ripped off all of the leaves and bundled them together to hang upside down to dry. In a few days, I’ll arrange them in a vase in our dining room. I can’t wait!

My middle son getting creative in the art studio with me this week. He made a rubber band shooter out of cardboard and the plastic circle ring that clear tape goes around.

This was a painting that I never varnished and this week, I decided to update it with a message as a reminder to myself - in art, in life, in everything.

Eastern leaf-footed bug on my Preston, my youngest son’s zinnia plant.

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1. James 4:6

2. Philippians 4:3

3. Highway Monsters are the kudzu-covered trees that I wrote a poem about (above) this week