Nevertheless, because my meeting over the weekend involves several incredible bloggers I felt it only appropriate to jump back to 24/7 Life for a quick post about these wonderful people. So without further ado, my Saturday meet-up with the West Coast Ninja’s…

Several months ago when blogging was still high on my list of many priorities, I had the privilege of getting to know some great bloggers, many of whom I live near in the Pacific Northwest. Throughout the week we would read each other’s blogs, comment on a post that would hit close to home and tweet blog links to our respective blog followings.

A few months ago the term “west coast ninja” was used to differentiate those bloggers in the group who were located on the west coast from those on the east. This distinction lead to some good natured teasing, but also the organization of a blogger meet up.

Now you can imagine how difficult it would be to organize a meeting of busy people who live in various cities and states. Nevertheless that is EXACTLY what happened. Although not all of the “Ninjas” were able to make it, a group of six bloggers from Washington and Oregon convened at the home of Cindy Holman, one of the bloggers (by the end of the meeting on Saturday  we had dubbed Cindy’s home “The Pink Palace” due to Cindy’s love for pink and it’s incorporation into her decor).

I have to say this was an incredible meeting. There was great food, wonderful conversation and more laughs than you can imagine. What stood out to me about this event was that prior to this meet up there were only a few personal connections. However we all had come together via social media and the blogosphere.

I find that it is not uncommon for people to bad mouth social media because “it could never create the same type of relationships that face to face interaction can.” However, from my several years of both personal and professional social media experience, the community and relationships formed through these various mediums have the potential to be legitimate. While I had only met a couple of the bloggers in person before, I felt as though I had been friends with the others for years, because I had gotten to know their personality, situation in life, and beliefs via their blogs, Twitter, etc.

There is no doubt in my mind that face to face interactions are vital, but social media has the power to help develop and sustain relationships that would never have been formed if in person handshakes and greetings were required.

I encourage you to check out the blogs of this awesome group of people. They are caring, genuine people who have a lot of great things to say.

Simply click on the name of each blogger to transported to their West Coast Ninja site.

Chris Goforth

Cindy Holman

Deanna Morauski

KC Proctor

Keri Welch

]]> http://davidnmiles.com/2011/11/07/when-ninjas-convene/feed/ 4 http://davidnmiles.com/2011/08/02/from-marion-indiana-with-love/ http://davidnmiles.com/2011/08/02/from-marion-indiana-with-love/#comments Wed, 03 Aug 2011 03:22:08 +0000 David http://davidnmiles.com/?p=2305 You probably all hate me and I can understand why. I haven’t posted in weeks. It’s a tough battle raging in my life right now for my time and attention. I have a wife and 6 month old daughter, a job, a second job, grad school, a blog, etc., etc., etc.

Is there too much on my plate…sure one could argue that. Heck, I’ve been arguing with myself about that and that’s why I haven’t been posting much the last month or two.

Right now, I’m in Marion, Indiana taking a couple classes for my masters degree and as a result, my wife is at home sick with our daughter…who is also sick apparently. My work email inbox is inevitably filling up, and I think I’m working on putting on the freshman grad school 15 by eating in the cafeteria for two weeks. Life is crazy and yet I feel so blessed.

I have such a supportive and amazing wife who is willing to let me pursue my dreams, a job with the flexibility to let me take off for a couple weeks…a second job that is flexible enough to let me take off for two weeks,…and a metabolism that is strong enough to still keep my weight barely in check even though I’ve had chocolate milk and soft serve ice cream the last two days.

Life is good and crazy all at the same time and I thought I’d let you know that since there are many of you who have been regulars to 24/7 Life and have probably been wondering what’s up.

I do plan on getting back to posting more regularly but for a season the blog will be spontaneously updated and I hope you still watch for those random posts that will pop up every now and then.

So with that, I send my virtual love from Marion, Indiana.

Goodnight!

On Sunday I had the chance to preach and I was excited to unpack Psalm 27 as a part of our “Summer of Psalms” series. However, as I mentioned I don’t do this regularly anymore so I spent a good couple of weeks meditating on this scripture, researching, writing, etc. I wanted to make sure I was prepared.

Needless to say I was excited for Sunday to roll around and and I felt ready to share the message that God had placed on my heart.

As is always the case when it comes to public speaking, I get a little amped up and nervous before hand. It’s like the excitement before the big game. In general I don’t think this is a bad thing, but I learned on Sunday that this “excitement” mixed with a lack of breakfast can have serious consequences.

As I made my way up onto the stage to speak I began to feel a little weak and this only continued to get worse as I started introducing the subject and passage for the morning.

I went from simply feeling shaky, to feeling a little lightheaded to breaking out into a cold sweat.

Not good.

As I did my best to calmly continue with the message my mind was flooded with distracting thoughts…

…”Am I going to faint”…”If I do faint, who is going to take over for me”…”I don’t think anyone else is prepared to get up and speak”…”Should I just go for it and see if I can pull this off”…”should I mention to everyone that I don’t feel well”…Am I going to be able to preach again if I pass out up here”…”Can everyone see me sweating up here”… etc., etc. etc.

After just asking everyone to stand while I read the scripture passage, I myself had to take a seat on a nearby stool to avoid a dramatic fall. From there I continued the reading and upon completion explained that I was feeling faint and asked for a glass of water.

Fortunately everyone was incredibly gracious and after a couple of moments sitting down, getting a sip of water and regrouping I was able to continue.

…But what If I couldn’t have continued?

What if I had passed out in front of several hundred people…?

That would have been incredibly embarrassing and would undoubtedly leave me with a good amount of emotional scar tissue.

Fortunately, I was able to avoid a grandiose meltdown, but it was close my friends, much too close.

In between services I had several people come up to me offering food and I took them up on it. There was no way I was getting back up on that stage without some food in my stomach and a boosted blood sugar level.

That did the trick and second service went off without a hitch. But it could have been bad and would have without a doubt been my most embarrassing moment.

If you don’t mind sharing, what is your most embarrassing moment?

I enjoy yard work for the most part (weeding excluded). That probably sounds crazy to most, but I find it to be somewhat therapeutic and the ability to create a beautiful landscape within which to live is exciting to me. Although I don’t have any real landscaping skills, I get a great deal of satisfaction from watching plants come into their own as they establish strong roots and grow season after season.

A couple years ago I purchased two small lilacs to plant with the hope that they would grow into nice, big, fragrant additions to the yard. When Monika and I moved into our house four and half years ago there was very little done in the way of landscaping and so I took it upon myself to change that. Since then I have planted, and transplanted dozens of plants, loaded and unloaded yards upon yards of bark and added new garden space.

I have also pruned like crazy.

Sunday night I was out working in the yard, mowing the lawn, and pruning these two lilacs as they have grown quite significantly over the last two years and I was struck by how counter-intuitive it seemed to be pruning them.  Both plants had beautiful deep green foliage and looked incredibly healthy. Moreover, I was pruning them because they had grown to be quite tall, just like I wanted.

With each cut I made I had to keep reminding myself  that this is in the best interest of the plant and that new growth will be fuller and even more lush. This may sounds ridiculous, but it wasn’t easy to do.

As I was part of the way through pruning the second plant I was reminded of John 15:2 where Jesus says. “[2] Every branch in me that does not bear fruit he takes away, and every branch that does bear fruit he prunes, that it may bear more fruit” (ESV).

How often in life do find ourselves sitting complacently by, thinking that we have arrived, rather than taking a close look at areas that need to be pruned either because they actually aren’t producing fruit or because with a little time and effort they could produce so much more.

When it comes to our spiritual lives, it’s easy to look at Sunday morning church attendance, mealtime prayers and Bible study involvement as signs of a growing Christian. And they might be. But how much more growth could take place, if  instead of staying home to watch our favorite show on TV we got out of our house to engage in community service? What if instead of taking that big extravagant vacation we went on a mission trip? What if instead of X we did Y?

Pruning areas of our lives is even more difficult than pruning what appears to be a perfectly healthy and growing plant, but the end result is also so much more significant.

When was the last time you pruned your life? Are you willing to make the cuts necessary to spur on even more growth?

image via http://www.thedigitallobe.com/

Enjoy!

I find it to be exciting.

And so tonight, I want to introduce you to Kris Orlowski. Kris and I both went to Western Washington University and in fact had a some classes together. I doubt he’d remember me, but when I saw his name on a schedule of local concerts I had to check to see if it was the same guy I knew from college.

And sure enough it was.

Kris is a talented musician and if you haven’t heard of him before, hopefully this little introduction will be “the beginning of  a beautiful friendship.”

If you would like to hear more of Kris’s music you can find more music videos on YouTube or you can check out his website.

Although my blog was anything but focused it ended up acquiring a fairly nice audience of people who were just interested in talking about life.

I ran “An Anthology of Thoughts” for a year and then shut down shop to began ”24/7 Life” and have been blogging here ever since.

I began this blog because I wanted to be more intentional, more focused.

I wanted to find my proverbial “niche,” and at times I did.

I would begin shifting my blog in a particular direction convinced that this was what my blog was supposed to be about, only to realize that there were other topics that I wanted to share thoughts on.

Truthfully, I kind of feel as though I am at one of those places now. There are some great topics that I would like to write about but I can’t decide what specifically to focus my limited time on and that has resulted in a lack of inspiration.

I know that may not make sense but it almost is as if there is so much that I want to talk about that I don’t know where to start.

Moreover, I have been incredibly busy and trying to post a certain number of times a week, comment a certain number of times on other blogs, etc. has because a burden. Not because I don’t want to do those things, but because I feel as though I HAVE TO in order to continue growing my audience.

Truthfully, that’s stupid.

I am not a professional blogger, nor to I anticipate that I will become one through this blog.

What I am is someone who enjoys writing, sharing thoughts, building relationships and engaging in community. And so I think I am going to spend some time evaluating what that means for this blog.

I fully intend to keep blogging, even while I wrestle with this dilemma, but I make no promises on frequency, topics, etc. I also fully intend to stay engaged with other blogs, but I make no promises as to the number of comments.

Blogging should not feel like a burden, but currently it feels like one and so it’s time for a course correction.

I hope that those of you who have been a regular part of this blog’s community will continue to read, you just might find yourself surprised with the things I end up posting.

Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, I proudly present to you my first Father’s Day gift!

Was it recently or somewhere in the distant past?

Could you even come up with a name?

I was watching the music competition show “The Voice” last night and a surprising thing happened. Blake Shelton, one of the coaches chose to save a contestant on his team who quite honestly is not a favorite to win. While she has a beautiful voice, she is young and inexperienced especially compared to the other other members of her team who were vying for this spot in the next round of the competition.

However, Blake said he chose her because there was more opportunity to create change with her than with the other two competitors.  There is no doubt about the fact that this is true. Xenia, the teenage girl he decided to keep is a diamond in the rough. She has talent, but little in the way of confidence or stage presence. She really is a project, if you will.

http://youtu.be/5G3G_cpGLoI

Hmm…interesting thought. Choose the person who requires probably the most time, energy and investment over other contestants who are more polished and professional because there is the potential for change. Change that could ultimately lead to great results.

I thought that was a pretty gutsy move, especially in a competitive setting.

I wonder how often we pass by opportunities to invest in people like this because we are afraid of the time or energy that it will take to help them grow and develop. The time and energy that it will take to help them change.

The truth of the matter is the people that need to experience change the most, are often the people who require the greatest investment.

I guess the question we all need to ask ourselves is are we willing to make those types of investments in people’s lives. And if not, why is that the case?

There are a lot of people that need to experience change and we have the ability to help the process along. But it often requires us to take an unconventional approach. It requires us to go against the grain. We have to choose the hard path over the smoothly paved street.

Is that something you’re willing to do?

There are a lot of women that blog, in fact there is a vast community of mom bloggers who regularly post on life as a mother. However, there is one mom whose blog I am quite fond of and that is my mom.

My mom, Laura Miles has been blogging for several years now about the ins and outs, ups and downs of life and she never fails to do so in a humorous and/or heartfelt way.

If you knew my mom, you would know that her writing sounds exactly like the way she speaks and perhaps that’s one of the things I enjoy the most. Every post she writes is like having a conversation with her and that’s a nice thing.

Over the last several years as I have blogged and engaged in reading the blogs of others I have come to really appreciate those blogs that are open and honest. Heck, if they’re not honest, what’s the point.

Well my mom’s blog, In The Midst is one of the good kind. It’s an open and honest reflection on her life, both the joys and frustrations.

So if you are looking for a new gem of a blog to begin following, I would definitely encourage you to begin following In The Midst, by Laura Miles (aka my mom). It is a great read and full of wonderful laughs, insights and “tidbits” of knowledge.

Check it out and leave her some comment love.

http://lauraemiles.blogspot.com/