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You are beautiful :)
Gotta get
some
peace
I NEED PEACE
April 1, 2015 Wednesday
Hello Beautiful,
Happy first day of April and “Happy” April Fool’s Day to you beautiful!
Well, with the ending of one month and the beginning of another, we end our conversation on Joy and open with a new conversation. For the month of April, we are going to talk about Peace.
I hope you were able to grasp the essential nuggets from the topic of joy. As always, if there is something that you have questions about, would like to know more about, would like to get prayer for, whatever, always feel free to contact me and I will help you in the best way that I can.
Two important things that we can take away from the topic of joy:
-
Our source of joy comes from God alone. Not from people or things
-
If you have joy, spread it like wildfire. Everyone needs some extra joy
This month, there are going to be numerous, wonderful tidbits of peace that you can take with you and apply to your everyday life. God knows we all could use a little more peace and a lot less stress.
Keep checking into the blog and adopt what you read to have a more beautiful life.
Love,
Karissa "Beautiful" Hagemeister
HAPPY EASTER
April 5, 2015 Sunday
Hello Beautiful,
Happy Easter and Resurrection Sunday, beautiful! I hope you are enjoying your day surrounded by the love of friends or family. I hope you are experiencing the newness of life that Easter represents. Not only the beauty of Spring is being represented and celebrated but the new life that we each are offered by the sacrifice of life that Jesus gave when he died for all of us.
I think today is the perfect day to begin our conversation on peace. Today we celebrate the resurrection and life and the gift of Jesus Christ. Jesus is the greatest gift of peace. To have him as Lord of your life, it gives you a peace that everyone else cannot even comprehend.
Happy Easter, beautiful
Photo of Karissa Hagemeister
Jesus has a perfect plan for your life. He works everything out. He knows all. He cares for you beyond measure and loves you more than you could ever know. Knowing all of this, we should be able to trust him with our life, our decisions, everything in our life. We should be at peace allowing him to move as he will in our lives, working all the details out.
Not only did Jesus give us the gift of eternal life, but his death brought us peace in knowing that we are safe and secure in him. We are steadfast in him because he cares for all of our needs in this life and we are at peace knowing that we will be with him in the next life.
If you do not know Jesus as Savior and friend, Easter is as good a day as any to meet him and welcome him and this peace into your life. Take the first step towards peace today and experience life like you never knew existed.
Have a sweet day, beautiful.
Love,
Karissa "Beautiful" Hagemeister
Jesus died to give us peace
CONTROL
April 7, 2015 Tuesday
A peaceful stroll by the river
Photo by Karissa Hagemeister
Hello Beautiful,
I have this really bad problem of wanting to be in control of everything that has anything to do with me. I like to know what is happening, when and how it is happening weeks before it does happen.
Being in control does not bring me peace. It brings me turmoil. It brings me chaos, fear, anxiety. But it is so hard to let go. It is so hard to be at peace. I know I am not the only one who deals with this. Most people that I talk to really like having control. I guess it gives a sense of power.
Is it worth it feeling like we need to be in control all the time? Is it worth it living without peace? We may feel like we are in control, but we never really are. We do not have that kind of power to make everything work out the way we have planned it in our heads.
If I think about it, NOTHING ever works the way I plan it. Why do I even waste my time planning and stressing over things if they are not going to happen that way?
It really is a strange thing. But if you are on a journey looking to get more peace in your life, maybe we can find it together.
I just picked up a book today, “In Pursuit of Peace” by Joyce Meyer. I felt it would be fitting. It has 21 ways to help conquer the anxiety and stress that we face on a regular basis.
This month, I will share different tidbits of what I read from her book. I have already cracked it open and have found it to be very beneficial, I think you may too.
It is possible to live in peace, beautiful.
Love,
Karissa "Beautiful" Hagemeister
Why do I want to be
in control?
I SHOULDN'T, BUT ...
April 10, 2015 Friday
Hello Beautiful,
I am really getting a lot out of this book about peace that Joyce Meyers wrote. I have been learning what I have been doing wrong all along. I have always strived for peace. But it always seemed so far out of my reach. I would have short moments of peace and then there would be moments of turmoil or stress again. Kind of like a roller coaster.
Here is what I have been learning from the first few chapters:
1. Not in Your Control: Nothing in my life is really in my control. Especially the people in my life. I cannot make them do, think or feel anything. I need to quit trying to make things happen. If it is meant to be, it will be or it will not. We touched on this in the last blog. Let it go.
Allow things to happen on their own
Photo of Karissa Hagemeister
2. Listen to Your Gut: When you have a feeling that you should not do something or say something or buy something, you should go with that feeling. You need to get your will under control. Or at least I do. This happens so often with me. I feel that I should not do something but I want something to happen so bad that I do it anyways. Afterwards, I have so much stress and inner turmoil because I tried to take things into my hands and they did not turn out how I figured they would. It creates a storm in my life.
What happens a lot with me, is I know how things are supposed to be or where they are supposed to be, so I push the issue prematurely. It is supposed to happen but it is not meant to be at that moment. I need to wait and allow the course to do what it will.
I am just an up-tight, control freak. But I promise, I am working on it. Already, this month has been pushing and testing my peace so much. But I am being patient and allowing things to happen as they should instead of trying to make them happen. And it is so hard.
But if I can do this, anyone can do it, even you, beautiful. Let’s get to a more peaceful place.
Love,
Karissa "Beautiful" Hagemeister
Listen to
your
Gut
WHERE IS MY PEACE?
April 12, 2015 Sunday
Don't let him take your peace
Photo of Karissa Hagemeister
Hello Beautiful,
Have you asked yourself recently, “Where is my peace?” Does it seem out of reach? Far away? Impossible to get to?
I have been asking myself that question a lot over the past few weeks. I keep wondering what I am supposed to be doing. How did I end up in this situation, lacking my peace again? I feel pathetic.
The book, “In Pursuit of Peace” written by Joyce Meyer, she explains that the devil is constantly trying to steal our peace. Peace is a gift that God gives to us when we accept him as our Lord.
There are 3 main things that the devil uses to steal our peace and if we recognize what they are, we can more readily stop him before he gets too far.
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Lies - Satan is the father of lies. He will lie to you about everything to get you to live trapped in deceit and trapped living in lies. He lies to you and when we believe his lies, instead of what God says in his Word, our peace vanishes quickly.
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Working Through Others - Satan will use others to steal our peace. It can be through untrustworthy individuals, angry or upset friends, you name it. We get blindsided and think that they are the problem but it is really Satan messing with your peace through them.
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Judgment - When you are made to feel guilty about something that really is not something that offends God, for example not reading enough of the Bible each day, not spending enough hours praying or fasting, our peace can be stolen. These things are meant for us to grow in our relationship with God not define whether we are a good person or not.
So if you are lacking in the peace department, try to get to the root of the problem. Why are you feeling this way? What is the main cause of your peace vanishing?
Stop the lies in their tracks and trust God, allowing him to bring you the peace that is rightfully yours, beautiful.
Love,
Karissa "Beautiful" Hagemeister
What's stealing your peace?
WHY WORRY?
April 16, 2015 Thursday
Hello Beautiful,
I have heard it said, many times in my life, that worrying does not add years to your life but it can actually take years from your life. No matter how much I hear that and how much I wish I could stop worrying, it is just not that easy.
I got addicted to worrying before I even knew what it was. When I was 8, my parents got divorced and that caused me to start worrying about everything in my little life. Because I was too young to understand what I was doing and I had no idea how to explain it to grown ups to get help, I lived with the torture.
Worrying became a part of my identity. It became a part of who I was. Ever since than, I worry ... about everything. I don't even realize that I am worrying until it feels like I am in too deep and I can't pull myself back out.
Taken from "In Pursuit of Peace" by Joyce Meyer
Photo by Karissa Hagemeister
I have been able to slowly gain control of my brain and what it thinks about it, but it is still so strong because it has been in control for over 15 years. I know there is no way that I would be able to conquer worry and fear on my own.
"There is no fear in love (dread does not exist), but full-grown (complete, perfect) love turns fear out of doors and expels every trace of terror! For fear brings with it the thought of punishment, and (so) he who is afraid has not reached the maturity of love (is not grown into love's complete perfection)." 1 John 4:18
Until now, I never understood what 1 John 4:18 meant. Perfect love casts out fear. Just the other day, I finally got it. God loves us perfectly. If he loves us we have nothing to fear. He is going to be there with us through every situation. He already knows how things are going to turn out. He already has a solution. When we can fully understand that deep of love that God has for us, than we know that their is nothing to fear or worry about.
Once you are able to grasp the depth of the love that God has for you, beautiful, you will be able to experience peace in your life.
Love,
Karissa "Beautiful" Hagemeister
God
LOVES
you
DOUBLE MINDED
April 25, 2015 Saturday
Finding a life of peace ...
Photo of Karissa Hagemeister
Hello Beautiful,
Do you ever feel like you have a difficult time making up your mind? You flip flop from one option to the next. Maybe you do that a lot, with minor as well as major things.
I work in retail and I hear people say all the time, "I can never make up my mind." Did you know that having a double mind, or being unable to make up your mind steals your peace? I guess it is kind of like worrying. You think about something for too much or too long and it can stress you out.
I am pretty good at making up my mind, especially in smaller things in life, like what to eat and what to wear. But sometimes when I come up against a really big decision that I know will affect me far into the future, I freak out. I am scared to pick the "wrong" option and can be confused for weeks or months, changing my mind multiple times a day before I make a solid choice.
I have actually been in a situation like the one I just mentioned for over a month. It is HUGE. Meaning, whatever I choose, I will stick with for life. I have been in so much confusion and turmoil that I really just want to check out of the situation. I am constantly going from one side to the other. And that has caused even more problems.
So what I have ended up doing is taking a step back. Not engaging either party. Clearing my mind. And allowing silence to be my friend. Taking a step back really does help when we have a big decision to make.
Last night, I finally came to a place of peace with the situation. I will have to remember to step back quicker when I have big decision to make to get to peace sooner.
I wish you a peaceful weekend, beautiful, with small decisions that are easy for you to make.
Love,
Karissa "Beautiful" Hagemeister
Make up
my
mind
HURRY UP!!!
April 27, 2015 Monday
Take a rest ... before you burn out
Photo of Karissa Hagemeister
Hello Beautiful,
I am always in a hurry. Rush here and there and get one billion things done in one day. I know we all are living that way. Life is not slowing down, it just seems to be speeding up. Sometimes I feel like I am just going to fly off this Merry Go Round of life.
1. Hurrying definitely keeps us from living a peaceful life.
I do not have many days when I am off from work. When I do have a day off, there is no relaxing for me. I usually have a list a mile long and I go at inhumane speeds for the whole day trying to get as much of it done as possible.
Living like this, I have found, is not good for my heart. My heart races the entire day and then when it is time to go to sleep, it takes way too long for me to calm down and actually fall asleep.
Ready,
set
RACE!!!
Now that I have realized this is a big problem, I have started to speak to myself and tell myself to be calm, take things slowly. I am not in a race and I do not need to hurry.
2. Taking a day to REST.
Tuesday of last week, I took an actual day to just rest. That was the first in over 6 months. I am always trying to get things done that I forget to take time to rest. It is so vital that I remember to do this because it actually doubles my energy when I get back into the grind, instead of burning out and wearing my body out.
I definitely need to work on adopting a time to rest and respecting myself enough by resting in that time.
Slowing down and getting some rest would do all of us a lot of good. Rest a little today, beautiful. You deserve it.
Love,
Karissa "Beautiful" Hagemeister
THINKING IN THE STORM
April 29, 2015 Wednesday
When you are going through the storm, keep your mind in check
Photo by Karissa Hagemeister
Hello Beautiful,
This is our last post on peace, but in some ways I feel it is one of the most important ones. Your thoughts are really what determines if you will remain in peace, even through the stormy times in life.
Did you know that you can control what you think about? Not only can you, but you should. I did not learn this until about 4 years ago and it made a tremendous difference in my life.
Before that, I was constantly depressed, afraid and I really was over life. As I learned to start thinking about what I was thinking about, I realized that the problem was in my mind. My thoughts.
Once I became aware of my thoughts, I took the ones that were bringing me down and destroying me and I replaced them with other thoughts.
Thoughts that made me happy, peaceful, smile, full of love. Whatever I could to counterattack the negative and depressed thoughts.
It is definitely not easy. It was possibly one of the hardest things I had to do, overcoming my own mind. But I am so glad that I learned to do that because I am a lot more aware of my thoughts now and when they start to go in the wrong direction, I get a hold of them real fast and that downward spiral before it has a chance to get out of control. It is no longer a hard thing to do. I have trained my mind and let it know that I am in charge of what I think about and how I feel.
I still have storms in life but it makes it a little easier to get through the storm with my head up, when I can keep my thoughts in the right place.
If you have a problem with your thoughts, your attitude or feelings, try to get your thoughts in order. Show them who is control. Get your mind back, beautiful and be at peace.
Love,
Karissa "Beautiful" Hagemeister
What are
you thinking about?
