Everyone wants to know how to do something.  Sometimes it’s learning a new skill, and sometimes enhancing something you already know.  Whatever that is, there seems to be one good way to do so.

Go and do it.

Sometimes the best way to learn something is to be thrown into the situation and you having to just learn it.  Think swimming.  You can talk about it all day, learn strokes on paper, practice breathing, but until you actually get tossed into the deep end, it’s all head knowledge.  Once you have to tread water, it becomes learned (or you learn you can’t swim!).

Here’s another thing.  You can’t learn something if you never do it to begin with.  You can’t learn the guitar having never picked one up.  You can’t learn to write if you never put pen to paper.

So here’s some encouragement for you, and some friendly pressure: go do something if you want to learn how.  You’ll never know unless you try.

So, what do you want to learn?

[ Image by SNAKPhotography ]

As some of you no doubt saw these past few days on my Twitter feed, my grandmother passed away on Friday after a massive stroke.  I still don’t know what to think or do, even after her memorial service last night.

The biggest shock for me was the fact that my grandparents visited over Christmas and all was well.  Nothing really hinted at the future.

But what I really want to say is how fragile and precious this life is.  That we can be fine one minute and gone the next.  I think we forget that in our day-to-day stuff.

And also how utterly unfair and cruel death is.  I haven’t experienced many family members passing away yet.  But I believe God made us to be with one another forever, and every time someone leaves this world I’m angry and upset.  I don’t want to say goodbye, even if I know that we will be together again in Heaven, because I shouldn’t have to.  People for whom we care about that deeply should be with us, not gone.  And the only explanation I can find is that we were not made to say goodbye.

So, I don’t know if there is a point to this post.  Today is just an outpouring of my many emotions from this weekend.  Just never take for granted this fragile life.

[ Photo by Son of Groucho ]

Just wanted to tell everyone merry Christmas from me!

Hope your holidays are merry and bright, as the song says.

Enjoy your (hopefully) off time from work and enjoy your family and friends.  And thank God for his blessings and love.

[ Photo from jerry7171 ]

For my readers, I’ve been very slack on my posting recently.  It’s been 2 months since I posted last.  That’s too long.

In any case, I think my blogging hiatus was a little needed for me, if a little abrupt.  I’ve been working at a new job, coding new themes on the side, and playing like crazy at my church’s Sunday night service.  No excuses, but I’ve felt very busy.

As a New Year’s resolution, I guess, I’m going to try and post at least once a week.  Also, I’ll probably be doing a redesign on this blog.  I’ve been learning a ton about web design and development and I feel like it’s time for a new look.  If you’ve got some things you like or hate about this look, leave a comment; I’m always looking for a little feedback.

‘Till next time.

One of my favorite parables is the story of the prodigal son.

The story goes like this: A father had two sons.  The younger was, well, young and thought he knew better.  He wanted his inheritance, and his father gave it to him.  He went away, blew all of the money on wine, women, and song, and ended up in the most degrading place he could think of, fighting not to starve.

Then something great happens.  The words in the Bible say that “…he came to himself…”.*  We’ll be back here in a second.

After this, the son realizes that even his dad’s servants were better off, and that he’d go home and beg to be a servant.  When he gets home, his father runs to meet him and welcomes his lost son back into the family, not as a servant, but as a son.  (There’s a bit more, so go read it in Luke 15).

As I emphasized before, there’s a huge turning point in this story.  The son comes to himself.  Meaning he comes back from his rebellious stage to the truth.  The words also imply that something happened inside the son.  They imply there is some point that we should all be at, and we can get away from, but we must choose to head towards.

This is important.  God will let us run away from Him.  He will always be there, but He won’t force you to stay.  It’s a choice.  And you and I choose.  When the son “came to himself” he chose to go back.  It’s subtle.  We control our direction.  We can either go away from God, or go toward Him.

So, if we’re away from God, we must make the choice to go back.  If we are near Him, we must make the choice to stay.

It’s all about coming to myself.

* The ESV and the KJV say “came to himself” and the NIV says “came to his senses”.  Same idea.

[ Image by h.koppdelaney ]

So, what happens when you are in the midst of a struggle?

You do all you can.  You fight for it.

This can be said of any struggle really.  At least any struggle that truly matters.  (Figuring out the difference between important ones and unimportant ones is another matter)

When the job is on the line, you do whatever it takes to make it work.  When a life is at stake, you do all you can.  When you see something that needs to be changed, you do all you can.

As someone once told me, “Just take the next step.  Do the next thing.”  You may not know where you are going.  But you can see where you’ve been and where God looks like He’s taking you.  Go that way.  Move towards that.  Keep getting better at your craft.  Keep refining yourself.  Even when the road looks like a dead end, there is something you can do.  Sometimes that something is to wait, but there is always something.

Go forward with confidence, and go with God.  He can tell you where to go, but He doesn’t make you do it.

Time to step up.

[ Image by rbrwr ]

One thing I’ve been realizing lately is that awareness by itself is not enough.

It is not sufficient to just be aware of a problem.  If I am aware that I have cancer and yet do nothing to kill and destroy it, the cancer will still kill me.  Only when I take action against the cancer does it ever go away.

Raising awareness is good.  Knowing your enemy is good.  These things will prepare you for the battle.

But there is still a battle.

As it says in a song I like, “How can you expect to win this war if you’re too afraid to fight.”  And the fight will be hard, but it is better than not fighting at all.

Be aware.  But also take right action.

[ Image by mendhak ]

Sometimes the way forward is just that; forward.  Sometimes the next thing you need to do is the thing that you should have been doing all along.  Most times, we know where the next step is, we just don’t want to take it.  We feel like we can’t, or aren’t allowed, or shouldn’t.  We just need to start walking in that direction.

I play music.  It’s something I’ve loved since I was in grade school.  I’ve played in bands at church before, but recently I haven’t been playing.

Here’s the thing: I have been given a talent from God to play music.  It’s something that I am passionate about, and I love playing music.  But lately I haven’t been using my gifts.

Now, for a time, taking a break is fine.  But to not use the gifts God has given you is bad.  You lose something about yourself when you don’t use your gifts.

This past month, I started using my gifts again by getting involved in a new band at my church.  And it feels great!  I don’t know why I waited so long to get back into playing.

So here’s the point.  You all have talents and gifts from God that you can use.  Are you using them?  You can’t keep your gifts and talents to yourself and stay whole.  You have gifts and talents for a reason.

Move towards using them.  Move forward with your task.  Take the next step.

[ Image by carnavalet ]

In the last few weeks, I have been trying to improve my cluttered Mac environment.  My dock had gotten quite full, and to make room I’d have to make the dock so small I wouldn’t be able to read any of it.  And, I’ve been doing a lot of developing WordPress lately so I’d been trying to use OS X’s Spaces to help.  So, after chatting with my brother about our organization skills, I came up with a few tricks I thought I’d share.

Uber Spaces

Mac OS X’s Spaces is a great organizational tool.  Apps can be confined to a single space so that your view isn’t cluttered with 10 open programs each with 3-5 windows each.  Cool idea.

Well, take that to the logical ultimate.  16 spaces each with its own app focus.

Each space has a “theme” that governs what should appear in the space.  For example, I have individual spaces for my browsers, my social media apps, my chat apps, and my music apps.  I have the spaces set up for only those apps, as well.  So, when I click on Seesmic in my dock, it jumps to the social media space, keeping my browser separate.  It keeps everything in a logical place.

Alias Folder

My dock was organized by topic, mostly.  Firefox and Safari are next to each other, and OpenOffice and the iWork apps are close together as well.  The issue was that I began to aquire too many apps that I wanted quick access to.  Hence the shrinking dock problem.

Solution?  Make alias folders.  I now have a folder entitled “Aliases” in my Applications folder that has a bunch of aliases I made of the apps I wanted quick access to.  I organized them into subfolders (such as “Social Apps” for Seesmic and Tweetie, and “Office” for my office apps) and dragged the subfolders into the right side of my dock.

Now, I have quick access to my apps – which are all organized into folders – without eating a bunch of space on my dock.

The Looking Glass

Still one problem remained.  I use the internet for half of my computer use now, like Gmail, Google Reader, FriendFeed, Facebook, etc.  So, my spaces plan goes out the window.

The answer is Prism.  This plugin for Firefox (also available as a stand alone app) can create “apps” for individual web pages.  For example, I saved Facebook as one app, Gmail as another app, and FriendFeed as another.  That way, I can group Facebook, FriendFeed, and Seesmic all in one space without having to use Firefox.

You can set it up for any webpage you want.  I have my Google apps under prism as well, so my Google Reader is separate from Firefox.

All of these help keep the workspace manageable.  And I hope you find these useful!

What kind of tips, tricks, or apps do you use to help out your workspace?

Think of a baseball team.  9 guys all playing together.  They all have one goal: win the game, be the best team.

How do they get there?  They practice, they work together.  They usually have very good players.  But they’re not perfect.  They have imperfections.

No team is made up of perfect players.  That means they all have strengths and weaknesses.  The shortstop plays there because he’s a good shortstop, not catcher.  The catcher isn’t a good pitcher.  The pitcher can’t hit very well.

We have teams because we need each other.  We can’t all play every position.  Nor should we.  God made us all different, so together we make a better whole.  We should learn to use our diversity.  It gives us a vast resource to lean upon.  The slugger can teach the pitcher how to hit better.

When you have a team, you can rely on your teammates to help cover your weaknesses.  And you can help cover their weaknesses.  As a team, you can accomplish more.

In your team, where do you fit in?  What are your strengths and weaknesses?  What are theirs?  Once you learn these, your team can work better together and achieve more.

Some things to think about.