When our lives are filled with the mundane, Monday becomes Friday overnight it seems. Join me on a journey to live a little more. This isn’t new territory for me, and probably not you either. But it’s one thing to survey the land we’ve been promised, and another thing all together to move in and build your log cabin!

A few things we’re all probably familiar with, but like myself, seem to forget them easily.

1) practice thankfulness.

I know we’ve all heard some absurd example from someone about “Oh I got stuck in traffic and just praised the Lord that at least I have a car”. I mean, I am thankful for having my car, but… traffic… Come on! So jumping from A – G in the steps to thankfulness isn’t something that happens over night! And those wonderful saints who are always thankful, well, good for them! But they have probably been practicing for a long time and didn’t get there over night!

Here are a few things to help jump start your thankfulness:

• Who can you thank today for something simple?
• Who can you thank this week, that you wouldn’t normally thank?
• What can you thank the Lord for daily that He is providing for you?

2) practice slow moments.

I shared some on this and exampled it in a previous blog Life is Beautiful

There are so many beautiful moments that we miss because of our hurried lives. What would it look like to find the extraordinary in moments that would typically fly past us?

Here are a few things to help in practicing slow moments:

• In a daily circumstance, think sitting at your desk or your commute to work, find something strange or beautiful to look at (not a person, thats weird LOL). Try to think about what makes it stand out to you. Again as an example you can take a look at Life is Beautiful.
• What is something naturally occurring that you enjoy? For me it’s red birds. Start keeping your eyes out for what ever that thing is for you. A particular type of tree, a particular color, a type of architecture. When you see them, practice point #1!

 3) practice serving.

Serving is a beautiful way to not only bless others with your kindness, but to give others an opportunity to practice #1. An example for me? I LOVE opening doors for people! Sounds funny possibly, but I enjoy it. In fact, if someone is ahead of me heading towards a door at Starbucks, sometimes I rush ahead to get to the door to open it for the person. Sometimes the person will try to rush too, thinking I’m trying to beat them to the line. So many times the person looks at me with a quick look of confusion when I stop at the door to open it for them, then a smile cracks and a gentle “thank you”.

Here are a few things to help in practicing serving:

•  Again, think office or traffic. What are ordinary things where we often put ourselves first or expect to be served? In driving and the “last minute guy” is wanting to turn right from the left lane, slow down instead of rushing past. At the office, the task that EVERYONE hates to do.. what if you start doing it?
• When you’re grabbing your coffee, every barista is used to “hey how are you, good you, good..”  Develop a 2nd question that communicates you actually care and give them time to answer. Get past the “hey how are you, good, you, good”, then ask “hows your day going?” This is another one I’ve made a practice of, and it breaks them from their mundane, and again, helps them to practice #1. Your drink won’t be ready any faster if you take 15 seconds to ask with a genuine smile, and you may be the only person who’s asked them sincerely.

Call it crazy, but I call it hopeful. No moment has to be ordinary.

How do you practice changing moments

from mundane to extraordinary?