Why Ambition is Stealing My Joy

It felt as if all of my ambition fell down the stairs with me that night, never to walk again. Well, nothing’s broken… so, I’ll walk again but you know what I mean. The much longed for solitude in which I create the best was destroyed in the careless slip of a step. Since falling almost two weeks ago, I’ve had to rely on my incredible loved ones and support system. Gosh, am I a lucky girl to have them. But, oh my goodness do I miss being me. I miss my get-up-and-go-ambition. I miss the strength of a well-abled body. Despite the breakdowns and moments of weakness, I’ve had the feeling the Lord is using this injury to teach me something.

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Messy Bun Ambition

We live in a sweatpants and messy bun generation, and I don’t exactly dislike it. We search for comfort and the cozy feeling of the hygge lifestyle. I’ve been known to brag about how many sherpa-lined socks and cute animal pajama pants I have. These days, embracing and striving for comfort is just as much a sign of a successful life as getting the dream job. It seems if you can afford the luxury of doing absolutely nothing, you’ve made it somehow. My super soft, sloth PJ pants are a prized possession, but I’ve seen the dark side of comfort. The desire to spend a few hours doing nothing is a powerful one, and that desire will always win unless you fight it.

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You Need More Than Just Ambition

When I was 9-years-old, I wrote a book. It took a lot of ambition to write this book! I always wanted to write a book at a young age because I wanted to show you can do amazing things when you’re young! I knew when it was time to write it, God would say, "Go." On April 10, 2018, I heard God say "Go.” I went downstairs and went to my mom's room. I told her, "I'm going to write a book!” I took the computer, went outside with my Bible, notebook and pens, and sat there. I was just so ambitious and ready for this moment I kind of forgot I actually had to write a book!

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The Fine Line Between Ambition and Obsession

Ambition is a word that has been tripping me up quite a bit lately. Standing at a complicated crossroads of sorts, I have had a lot of time to think about my own ambitions, the things that are important to me and the kind of woman I am still striving to become. Caught between others’ expectations of me, pressures from my job, and the need to finally strike out on my own, these thoughts have found a home in my brain over the past year. How does ambition shape our lives and how do differing interests and motivations affect the way we go after our dreams?

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Does Ambition Lead to Success?

I grew up believing ambition led to success. In school, if I studied and did the work, I would get an A. In sports, if I practiced hard, I was rewarded with more playing time. When I worked my first job, hard work equaled higher pay, more hours, and the admiration of my boss and coworkers. My achiever personality thrives in that environment! I can finish a project in record speed. When I set a goal, I don’t stop until that goal is completed. I love making lists and checking things off. (I’m one of those crazy people who writes something I just did on the list, just so I can cross it off…don’t laugh, I’m know I’m not the only one!)

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Passionately Ambitious With No Regrets

After a variety of internships at a magazine, two television shows, a radio show and a stint at the university TV station, I  was ready to back up my journalism work experience academically with a master's degree.  What followed was an accelerated year and a half strenuous program that allowed me a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to report at the London Olympic Games, and I've never looked back on my career choice since. That doesn't mean there weren't stumbles along the way. A year after graduate school, my radio news job wasn't able to offer me more than a part-time schedule and I simply needed to be able to pay my bills, so I made the difficult decision to leave and accept a full-time position with a marketing start-up.

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Driven by Heavenly Thinking

I used to buy into my own lies that if I wanted a particular path in life too much, I would become too focused on myself and my desires to be a participant in the highs and lows of the lives of the people I cared about. I told myself in order to pursue my dreams of being a fashion designer in the buzzing hub of New York City, I would certainly have to give up friendships and family ties and my fantasy of being a mother to babies with chub rolls galore. I thought, in order to make it big, I had no choice but to toss out every other element that fueled the joy in my life in order to collect enough stored up energy to put nothing short of 100% of me into my life’s work.

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Series Introduction: Ambition

We are only a few days into this new year and I don’t know about yours, but my social media feed is consumed by cliché resolutions and novel-length reflections of the year gone. Sure, I’ll appreciate the idea of a fresh start as much as the next girl — but so what? Setting goals to better yourself and pursue your passion is great, but at the end of the day it’s not enough. The bottom line is: you cannot have ambition without action. Period. End of story.  So, if you’ve set a resolution for yourself in the new year, then you’ve got ambition, girl! That’s the first step.

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Intentional Joy Leaves No Room for Grief

Loss and grief is a painful season life brings. Enduring those tear-filled, heart-shattering moments when reality sets in can absolutely alter anyone’s spirit. Although when 31-year-old Sarah Sligar lost her mother to metastatic lung cancer in 2011, her hurt led to unsurpassable amounts of joy. Like most precious mother-daughter relationships, Sarah and her mom, Nancy were incredibly close — best friends even. Whether it was having a conversation two or three times a day or hitting the mall for a bit of shopping, every moment together was undoubtedly cherished. So, when Nancy’s two-and-a-half-year-long battle with cancer was laid to rest, Sarah couldn’t help but feel devastated, lost and a bit angry.

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Leaving Apathy Behind

Getting caught up on the stress of life produces a wide range of terrible emotions. I get scared I'll never catch up. I get sad that I might never feel like I'm enough. But I think the worst thing I often feel in those moments is nothing. Apathy is a frequent opponent of joy. It's also one of my favorite modes of survival. Just a few days ago, I noticed I get frustrated a lot less than I used to. I used to cry when my son woke me up at 3 a.m. for the third night in a row. I used to contemplate the meaning of my life and get a little snippy with God. At face value, the level of calm I've managed to reach seems like a positive change. However, after a few minutes of thought, I realized I hadn't matured in my ability to process.

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Sharing the Joy in Your Heart

Don't take joy for granted, but keep growing your relationship with God and you will have more and more joy throughout your life. Of course, following God doesn't mean you're going to live the perfect life. You're still going to go through tough times and hard struggles, but at least you're not doing it alone. Share your joy and blessings with others, because you don't know how much that could change their day.

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4 Ways to Let Go of Comparison and Hold onto Joy

How often our thoughts are consumed with the belongings and blessings we lack. What we don’t have, another does — that’s just the way the world works. But, we grow consumed with the idea, in order to be happy in life, we must have everything we desire — even if it isn’t for us. So, we bow down to envy and unleash this terribly ugly part of ourselves we should have just kept hidden to begin with. And, all for what? So deep down we can feel better about our life because we’re at least “holding onto” a dream or goal that sure looks good on someone else — so naturally, it’d look good on us.

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Happiness or Joy? Does it Really Matter?

December is known as the season of joy, but what does that really mean? Is there a difference between happiness and joy? I guess I've never really thought about it. In preparation for this blog post based on joy, I did some research and found most agree happiness is more of a temporary emotion, but joy is an attitude of the heart. However, it's also said happiness is a synonym of joy. OK, so let's go with that train of thinking, because I don't tend to separate out joy and happiness — in my mind at least. December is said to be the most wonderful time of year, bringing us the most joy.

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How to Find Joy in Every Season

In those early parenting years, I experienced God’s strength and grace to operate on torturously few hours of sleep — and yet, I was able to because God’s grace flowed through me. I was able to love a screaming child after he had bit me, slapped me, and screamed bloody murder just because I was trying to wipe the dirt off his face. That was God’s love flowing through me. I think the key to finding joy in the difficult moments is not a guilt trip that “you better enjoy these moments because someday you’ll miss them.” All that ever did was make me feel bad — and real joy doesn’t make you feel bad.

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Contented Joy

I didn't begin to understand the joy that can be found in contentment until life got real. Dealing with the stress of taking care of a home and family, raising a gorgeous boy with special needs, and reaching a clinical level of anxiety, all had a way of changing my perspective. Living in my real, grown-up life, I yearn for contentment. I still have goals. I'm still striving to live the life God has prepared for me, but my greatest accomplishment is feeling the blessing of every second.

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5 Reasons Why You Should Be Joyous During the Holidays

Tis the season! The holidays are here which means everyone is struggling with something. Whether it’s the shopping, the cooking, the travel or even just a pesky cousin, everybody feels pressure around the holidays. And as impossible as it may seem, you can find some joy… even in the moments that seem most trying. At the end of the day, holiday celebrations are just that: a celebration. It’s the end of yet another year—remember this time of year gives you the opportunity to relax and get a little space from your everyday routine.

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Series Introduction: Joy

I’ll be blunt and say I don’t agree with the dictionary definition of the word “joy.” In my opinion, they’ve missed the mark and lost out on the true meaning of a word with the power to impact and change lives. The dictionary definition reads, “the emotion of great delight or happiness caused by something exceptionally good or satisfying; keen pleasure.” Two things, joy is not an emotion nor is it the reaction of something. At surface level, if you were to simply accept “joy” as another form of “happiness” then this definition would fit the bill. I’d like to dig deeper and challenge this vaguely cliché understanding of joy, so you can use this word to its full potential.

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What a Disastrous Thanksgiving Morning Taught Me

Friends, this is no joke — I was IN TEARS sitting in my window seat thinking to myself just how bad things had gone. To top it off, I could hardly take a solid, life-giving breath without my stomach quivering from that awful odor. I felt low. LOW. I was trying to figure out for the life of me why God was testing me on a holiday that should be filled with gratitude and smiles. I’ll tell you right now, I was in NO way thankful for anything other than my fuzzy sweater and the adorable, sleeping man next to me. Thank God for him. Now that I’m removed from this terrible start to my day and now that it’s only a memory, I can see how it actually added value to my life.

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Grateful in Love

"I'm sorry you have to love me." These words have fallen from both mine and my spouse's lips more than once. Nothing makes you feel more challenged and more inadequate than taking on the responsibility of jumping into a lifelong commitment with someone. I never saw life coming when we fell for each other. It all looked like bliss. But Disney lied, y'all! Being in love is hard, and I have yet to meet my fairy godmother or get my animals to talk back to me. Feeling love is simple but living that love is a lesson in humility, compassion, patience, and growth.

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Displacing Worry with Thanksgiving

Worry knows no bounds, limits or exceptions. Each and every one of us experiences worry — for some, it’s every single day. One moment we’re cool as a cucumber, the next we’re such a hot mess it’s a wonder we survive the day without blurting out four-letter words. OK, maybe we don’t… it’s fine, no one is perfect. But, worry and anxiety is a beast. It consumes every thought, and sometimes our actions. You might be asking, “Nikki how does worry tie into thankfulness?” Bear with me, I promise I’m getting there. I recently attended a ladies night at a local church and the amazing woman on stage discussed peace in reference to Philippians 4. She touched on this chapter with perspectives and teachings I’ve never heard before.

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