Feeling a little insecure about my masculinity

Here are the results of my genderanalyzer.com analysis. How 'bout them Padres huh? Who's watching the Super Bowl this weekend? I love that recipe...DOH! They got me!

Results

We guess http://godmeandpoker.blogspot.com is written by a woman (57%), however it's quite gender neutral.

Is this correct? Yes No Don't know

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Wednesday Words

It's been an interesting week. My week generally starts on Thursday night if you're wondering. I had my last day of fasting last Wednesday and I'm looking forward to macking on something today. Wednesday is my one real day off and it truly felt like a sacrifice to not eat on that day, as cheesy and weak as that sounds. I've grown soft, what can I say?

Letty and I attended a Quiet Time Workshop on Saturday at Journey. It was given by the Daily Journey ministry and it was awesome. I worked overnight, shot over there after a quick shower, and was amazingly able to stay awake the whole time without a problem. Journey makes good coffee! I wish they had a website or something I could hook you up to but I'm not sure if they do. If anyone knows of one or maybe even if Ann has a blog let me know.

The gist of the workshop was to help us find a deeper, more meaningful relationship with God through our quiet time. I've already been doing this, but it was more of a reading the passages of scripture from my bible reading guide as opposed to the more meditative practice that they were talking about.

The best part for me was the small group that they broke us down into so that we could practice the techniques for ourselves. Our leader was Kevin Brangwynne, who's a cool dude that I've been twittering back and forth with over the last couple of months. He did a great job of leading us through it and I loved everybody's take on what they read and what they experienced. I think The Lord's been speaking strongly to me about not being such a "weekend viewer" of what goes on at Journey on Sunday and start to become an active member of my church. This was a great start to this journey for us.

Sunday was more conviction time as Ed was talking about practicing different spiritual disciplines. The one that spoke most loudly to me (just like last year) was the discipline of tithing. We were doing it for awhile and then fell away from it as the year progressed. The funny thing is it was true what God said. We were blessed more financially when we were tithing than we ever were when we were not.

I think the spiritual principle I get from this is partly that in doing this I'm actually obeying and putting into practical application that I actually walking the walk and not just talking the talk. It's easy to say "Oh yes God, I believe in you and I will sing your praises from here to eternity" than it is to hand Him my hard earned cash. I'm cheap man. It's definitely an issue with me that I have to address. The truth is that none of it is mine, it's all His, and I should be grateful that He lets me keep 90% of it. If I can keep myself in that frame of mind it's not a problem. It's when my fear and financial insecurity get the best of me that I fail miserably. Lord, please keep me humble and of service to You this year in this particular discipline.

I think our next step is to find a small group to become a part of. I'm going to start sincerely looking for one this month. I think it's the next step for us. Pray that I don't chicken out or get lazy.

Have you noticed that there's been a fundamental shift on this blog's emphasis on God and my journey with Him as opposed to poker and my personal life? What the heck happened? Amazing how He works huh?

Here's a little poker content. I am on fire right now. I've finished in the money (ITM) in 5 of the last 7 tourneys I have entered. I don't believe that God is influencing the outcomes of my tournaments. Let's get that out of the way right from the start. I will say this though. Since I've become a Christ Follower my game has become so much more disciplined than it was before. I'm not allowing my results to affect the way that I play which is huge. I rarely tilt anymore and I think it's because I'm not out to destroy others but just play the best that I can and let the results be what they are.

A little personal life content. Probably the guy that has been my best buddy throughout my life dropped in from Minnesota last week to play a reunion show with his old band. We only got to hang out Wednesday afternoon (right in the middle of my fast) but it was still great to see him. I'm sure that we all have that friend that no matter what the twists and turns of life bring us it's like nothing has changed when we get together. It's so good to have someone that you are that close to even if you only see each other a couple of times a decade anymore. So anyway, it was great to see you Dave and I love you and your family. Hope I can get out to Minnesota one of these years and hang with you, Elena, and the kids. God Bless.

OK, a couple of questions for anyone that happens to drop by,

Do you have a best friend?

Everyone's always asking questions about what they would improve about themselves. I'd like to know what's something that you like about yourself! Such a better question. I got the idea from another blog I read, JudiFree. I like my eyes and my sense of humor. How about you? What do you like about yourself?

Powerful

A powerful message from John Piper on the prosperity gospel that needs to be heard. Heads up to Katdish who I found this from. Thanks, it was something I needed to hear.

Wednesday Words

At Journey we are going through a 21 day season of fasting. While we are fasting we are asking God, "What?" What do you want from me, Lord. If I was asked while I'm fasting what I want I would say a delicious cheeseburger, or maybe a nice slab of prime rib with a yummy baked potato. Unfortunately no one is asking me.

If you haven't noticed, today is my fasting day. Every Wednesday through these 3 weeks is the day Letty and I chose to fast. She has it way harder than I do. She has to work, it's my day off. I get to sit at home and fast, read, pray, play cards, PSII it, nap, and do whatever I can to take my mind off of eating. I wish I could say that whenever I am hungry I instantly go to prayer and meditation but I don't have it like that. Sometimes I think a poker tournament or a NCAA basketball game will quell my hunger. Pray for me on that one.

I think that the one thing I'm getting from God is to draw closer to him through my Church. Which of course scares the heck out of me. I'm kind of an introvert by nature and most of the friendships in my life have been forged by necessity or happenstance. I'm hoping that God will make me realize that this IS necessity (much like NA has been for most of my life).

I'm finally getting cracking and jumping on the Bible study guide that I printed out from Ed at the beginning of the year. When I get home from work in the morning it's the first thing that I do. If I try to do it at any other time it just doesn't get done. Is doesn't not a word? It's showing up in my spell checker as not a word. Hmmmm.

Football season is over and I think the Chargers made a nice run just running out of gas and facing a really good team at the end. That Steeler defense is just too fast. Hopefully we will get off to a better start next season. I'm going to say something that might get me excommunicated from Chargerville. Keep Norv. Give him one more year. Hey, he's getting us to the playoffs and we are actually winning playoff games. Maybe with a healthy Merriman it would have put us over the top.

Spring training starts next month and I know absolutely nothing about the 2009 version of the Padres except they have an unhappy Jake Peavy, no Trevor time, and Adrian Gonzalez. It could be fun watching a young team rebuild this year. Or not.

Alright, off to do my daily reading and then who knows what? Have a great day. Oh, BTW

Now that the New Year is underway, how are you doing with your resolutions or goals? Have you changed them up to be more realistic?

Happy New Years 2009

OK, here's the obligatory New Years post, since I have a little time to do it today. I'm not going to do the year in review though. I prefer to look ahead and set some goals for the New Year.

I think I have quit my second job. I have only been there one day since the dentist and it wasn't working for me. Maybe sometime in the future but as for now it's way too hard for me to try and talk for 6 hours a day on the telephone. I'm a little bummed because I was starting to get back into it after having taken a couple years off but I'm sure it's because God has something else planned for me. I'm a little scared about the loss of income as well but we made it before I took the second job and I'm sure we will be fine now as well. Pray that God watches over me and my family financially in the next few months, it's going to be a little tight.

On the work front, I'm hoping to get back into working in an office environment again. When I say again, I should mention it's been close to 20 years since I've done it. I think with my nice new smile I will feel more confident about pursuing that line of work. I'll probably try some of the temporary service places part time to get my feet wet and maybe sneak in the back door of a good company. That's what I did before and it worked out really well for me. The only problem then was that I was too strung out to not blow the job after a few months. I shouldn't have that problem this time. I love Wal-Mart but I'm tired of working nights and beating my body up on a daily basis.

I'm going to try a structured bible reading plan this year. I was cruising blogs when I ran into Ed Noble's blog and he made a strong suggestion to try it. You know, if I was really trying to be a disciple. Alright, I felt called out. I can do it. I'm using the Discipleship Journal Bible Reading Plan. Click on the link to check it out.

As far as poker goes, It is what it is. I'll just play within my bankroll and if it goes well, it goes well. I'm sure that I will play in a few live tournaments this year up at the casinos if time and money allows it. I love to play but I don't want it to be the "be-all", "end-all" of my existence. There's way more to life, ya know?

The ones that go without saying of course are be a better husband, father, grandfather, brother, uncle, friend, co-worker and Christ follower. I think if I can do the last one the others should fall into place, dontcha think?

I'm also thinking as a secondary goal trying to drag my ass back into the studio and record some of my songs. I was talking to Ronnie about this and he sounds down with it so maybe there will be some new 66ohm music released this year. That would be fun and something that I think for me needs to be completed.

OK, I'm sure that's more than enough to swallow for a whole year! Let's see how it goes, and I hope I can remember that Easy Does It!