And he looked very thoughtful.
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Category Archives: images
about right
Image
collections
I just love beautiful images. Since I have about a million saved on my computer (gathered from around the internet), I thought I’d show you some! Which is your favorite?
just like a girl
The other day at our apartment dinner table, my roommate Desiree confessed to me, “I’ve been looking at wedding rings lately.” She seemed a little embarrassed.
Quickly, I made a confession of my own: “I’ve been looking at wedding dresses.”
Please note, both Desiree and I are as single as single can be. There is no urgent need for us to be planning out the details of our future weddings, but it’s just so fun.
Here are my favorite wedding gown options. Thoughts?
The Scale of the Universe
dressing up
As a reminder, I recruit high school students, many of whom are my Facebook friends. These days, when I log into FB, my newsfeed is positively littered with photos from … what else … PROM!
I never went to prom! I had this idea that if I went to prom it needed to be with a boy I really, really liked– now that I’m 30, I see that I should have just gone with a friend. It would have been a great excuse to dress up and have fun. I can’t say that I regret not going to prom– trust me, I don’t waste a lot of energy on re-imagining high school– but seeing all these pictures makes me wish I had an opportunity to get all dolled up.
So– don’t judge me, ha!– I went online this week and looked at prom dresses. Here are my favorites. What do you think?
I boast in the cross.
I give the credit for my rescue from OCD to Jesus Christ alone, and I believe that CBT and medicine and doctors were the tools He used.
Tonight I listened to a sermon online given by John Piper of Bethlehem Baptist Church, right here in Minneapolis. He was talking about something that won’t make sense to some:
“[F]or redeemed sinners, every good thing–[and] indeed every bad thing that God turns for good–was obtained for us by the cross of Christ. Apart from the death of Christ, sinners get nothing but judgment. Apart from the cross of Christ, there is only condemnation. Therefore, everything that you enjoy in Christ–everything you boast in, everything you exult in–is owing to the death of Christ. And all your exultation in other things is to be an exultation in the cross where all your blessings were purchased for you at the cost of Christ’s life.”
Essentially, if I follow the path of blessings back to its source, there I will find the cross–the death–of Jesus Christ. Because the death of Christ was an act of grace, an act of rescue.
I am grateful and blessed and pleased to be free from the clutches of obsessive-compulsive disorder. In doing so, I am exulting in the cross of Jesus.
As Piper said, “[Being dead to the world] means that every legitimate pleasure in the world becomes a blood-bought evidence of Christ’s Calvary love and an occasion of boasting in the cross.”
tricho
In Matthew 10:30, Jesus says, “And even the very hairs of your head are all numbered.”
That is lovely to know as someone with trichotillomania.
Trichotillo-whatta?
Trichotillomania. The compulsive urge to pull out one’s hair. NBD. 😉
I’ve suffered from this for years, can’t remember how long– I think maybe I started compulsively pulling my hair out in college. I am blessed though– some people have it waaaay worse than I do– to where I’ve googled some images and have deemed them too disturbing to post.
Here’s one that’s pretty mild:
My own pulling is from a very specific spot on the back of my head. Over the years, there have been many times when the back of my head actually is sore because of how much pulling I’ve done. For a long time, I’ve had a “tuft” there– a small “sprig” of shorter hair, since I let it grow to be a couple inches and then pull it again, so there is a patch of continually short hairs. But now I have short hair, so you can’t see it, suckas. 🙂
It’s not as big a problem for me now as it used to be, although when I get stressed, I will just sit on the couch and pull and pull– just ask my roommate. I am gaining mastery over it now, but it used to be this COMPULSION– if I didn’t pull I’d miss this tiny release. I learned that if I squeeze my hand into a very tight fist, I could sometimes get the same release as a pull.
I know, I know. One more weird tale from the obsessive-compulsive.
At least I didn’t eat my hair then, as many tricho sufferers do. If you’re ready for nightmares, google it.
it’s all fun and games until someone with OCD is in the room
When my Bible professors showed this to the class all those years ago, my classmates laughed.
I had to think about it for awhile.
quote for ya
Quote
“As we discussed in Chapter 1, the more you fight an obsession, the more frequent and intense it becomes. This is called a paradoxical effect, something we all experience at times. For instance, if someone commands you, ‘Do not think of a red elephant,’ you will automatically respond by thinking about a red elephant.”
Edna B. Foa, Ph.D., Stop Obsessing!
JACKIE LEA SOMMERS 