
Hey now! Thanks for stopping by. Allow me to introduce myself—I’m Lisa and I am happy to declare that I am certifiably imperfectly imperfect. The day I began to embrace this fact was the same day I was freed from my self-induced shackles and life became a whole lot better. On the best of days, when I feel most free, I look like a former perfectionist whose house needs to be cleaned, whose yard needs to be weeded, whose paperwork needs to be filed, whose head is full of creative projects I intend to tackle, but haven’t quite gotten around to just yet.
As my capacity to embrace the gift of imperfection in my life has increased, my eyes have been opened wider to find the Sacred who is ever present in the ordinary moments of life. In order to avoid a relapse into my dictator-like, perfectionistic tendencies, I try to fill my time with activities which require me to be away from the place I obsess about the most—my house. My favorite such pursuits include running, biking and walking in nature. Outdoor exercise has become the time and the place where I zone out, listen to loud music (or podcasts), self-medicate my Anxiety Disorder with a good sweat, pray, reflect, listen and find God’s presence, even in the messiest, most unexpected places of my life.
I am wife to a talented psychotherapist with stellar coping skills, thanks to his experiences of growing up as number 7 of 9 children and attending Catholic School as a student with undiagnosed ADHD, circa the 1970s and 1980s. I am mom to an amazing daughter who lives courageously with the daily challenges presented by a Sensory Processing Disorder and ADHD (compliments of her dad’s genes) as well as an Anxiety Disorder (compliments of her mom’s genes). Her entrance into this world and her beautiful life have been the biggest threat to my perfectionistic ways. I like to say that when she was born at exactly 3:00 p.m., the hour that we Catholics call the hour of Divine Mercy, it was then when God directly intervened into my life with mercy in order to save me from myself.
In school I was always an obsessive note taker and have retained that annoying characteristic into adulthood. I process life better when I write it down and then read it again. Thanks for stopping by and giving me a chance to air both my grievances and my musings in order to glimpse the Sacred, present in the moments of my ordinary, messy and chaotic life.
Thank you for the beautiful article in the March 2017 Christ is Our Hope mag. You are a gifted writer and it was just what I needed to read to snap out of my tendency to let my health issues overwhelm me. Life is indeed grand and our four seasons created by our God mirror quite beautifully our ever-changing spirits.
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Sue,
Thank you so much for your kind words! I am so grateful God could use my story to bless you today. Praying for you as you seek to find God in our four seasons and in your life as it is in the present.
Lisa
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I just read your article in the December, 2020 Christ is our Hope magazine. It was comforting about the mess my life often is and inspiring to my quest to find God. Thanks for opening your heart and soul. You helped me this Advent.
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Terri,
Thank you so much for taking the time to reach out with such kindness. It is encouraging to realize that God can use my story to somehow bless another. I am convinced no matter how messy, God will always come into the good, the bad and the in-between experiences of our lives, if we but bid him to enter. A Blessed and Merry Christmas to you and those you love!
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