Inhoudsopgave van October 2016 - Guideposts

The Power of Forgiveness In our exclusive video, Jameel McGee (page 40) tells how his life was transformed when he forgave the cop who had wrongfully sent him to prison. guideposts.org/jmcgee 12 Steps to a Fresh Start Broadcaster Elizabeth Vargas (page 26), who in 2014 went public with her struggles with alcohol, shares the impact sobriety has had on her life and career. guideposts.org/evargas Captain’s Best Friend Meet Beaux, the service dog who is helping Wren Thomas (page 58) deal with PTSD on the heels of Wren’s kidnapping by pirates. guideposts.org/wthomas Breast Cancer Awareness A cancer survivor offers tips on remaining positive throughout treatment in our web-exclusive story. guideposts.org/cancertips…

THE CHECKOUT CLERK at the grocery store gave me a fistful of change. I was trying to corral the coins into my purse when the zipper jammed. “Murphy’s Law,” I muttered. I didn’t want to hold up the line, so I maneuvered my half-open purse and my two bags of groceries around to the end of the counter. There I continued my battle with the obstinate zipper. The woman behind me paid for her items and noticed my frustration. “Let me help you move to that empty spot over there,” she said, gesturing to a table. “It might be a little easier to manage. I’ll grab your groceries.” Yes, I’m a senior citizen, and you look young enough to be my daughter, I thought, but I’m still capable of taking…

I CAN FEEL IT COMING, LIKE A wave. My heart beats faster, my head pounds, my stomach churns, fear surges through me. It can happen in the middle of a busy day at work at the ABC television news magazine 20/20 or at home with the boys. There was a time not so long ago that I would have reached for the bottle of wine in the fridge—or the bottle I’d hidden underneath the bathroom sink. Now I’ve found something that works much better. Something that helps me live, not die—the powerful weapon of daily prayer. I don’t know if I was born an alcoholic, but I was definitely born anxious. The alcoholism came later in life, after years of drinking on the sly. But the anxiety? It was there…

Here comes October. May I ask, How many of you have started your Christmas shopping? As I have previously confessed, I am a last-minute shopper, prone to calling stores and asking, “How late are you open on Christmas Eve?” Or “How much do you charge to deliver on Christmas Day?” I can imagine myself banging on the doors of Macy’s, begging to be let inside for just five minutes on my way to midnight Mass. I tell you, it is no way to live! I don’t need that stress. In her cover story this month, 20/20’s coanchor Elizabeth Vargas shares that after years of severe anxiety she has learned that the best way to counteract it is with prayer. But maybe an equally good thing is to avoid stress when…

JUST BREATHE, I TOLD MYSELF. Any tension in my body would be mirrored in my horse, Endo, and he needed to be relaxed. In a minute, we would enter the show ring at the Oregon Horse Center to compete in the second phase of a discipline known as working equitation. The sport focuses on the partnership between horse and rider, particularly the equestrian skills used in working cattle. It uses various tests—dressage, ease of handling, speed—to showcase a horse’s athletic ability and willingness. The second phase, ease of handling, is an obstacle course that reflects challenges the horse and rider are likely to encounter in the field. Endo and I were competing at the intermediate level, and there were 11 obstacles on our course today. For the last, we would…

FINDING THE MASTER KEY “You have to be out by the end of the month.” It was the woman who owned the store next to our locksmithing business who gave us the bad news. My husband and I had already bought a larger space across the street, but we couldn’t move in until we’d finished the renovation we were doing there. In the meantime we’d arranged to lease our current place month to month—until our landlord leased it to our neighbor instead. “We’ve got nowhere to go,” I said to my husband, Jim, after she left. “We can’t afford to shut down while we wait to move into the new place— we’ll go out of business!” “We’ll have to find some way,” he said. But I couldn’t see a way.…

“ I’m becoming more and more myself with time. I guess that’s what grace is. The refinement of your soul through time.” singer and songwriter JEWEL “When I accept myself, I am freed from the burden of needing you to accept me.” STEVE MARABOLI, inspirational speaker and behavioral scientist “Our prayers may be awkward. Our attempts may be feeble. But since the power of prayer is in the one who hears it and not in the one who says it, our prayers do make a difference.” MAX LUCADO, pastor and author “Some people regard discipline as a chore. For me, it is a kind of order that sets me free to fly.” actress JULIE ANDREWS “Don’t be eye candy. Be soul food.” submitted by Guideposts reader KAREN LORIMER, of Lanoka…

The Warriors to Summits program helped Adele Loar deal with the emotional and psychological challenges of civilian life, but returning veterans like her also have to deal with practical matters, including finances. Here are some key principles for successful money management—for returning troops, and for the rest of us. Make saving a habit. Every time you receive money, set some aside. Automatically deposit a percentage of your income into a savings account. Start small, with an amount that’s comfortable for you, even if it’s as little as five percent, and increase it with time. To save for retirement, take the tax advantages of a 401(k) or a Roth IRA. Spend smart. Budgeting should be an everyday activity, one that involves all the decision-makers of the household. Set aside money each…

The last blush of daylight had faded from the sky. Now the unfamiliar road looked sinister. I gripped the wheel of my old sedan, anxious to get home. I had been visiting my friend Marie at a Christian retreat in Upstate New York, and stayed longer than I’d intended. “Call when you get home,” she’d said. She sounded a little worried. I was doing fine until I noticed that a warning light on my dashboard had come on—my engine temperature was in the red zone. I did a lot of driving for my father’s feed business, and he’d drilled into my head that “hot” on that gauge meant “Stop the car!” or the engine would seize. But I was an hour from home in the middle of nowhere. I didn’t…

The D’Amour family is part of a growing trend. More than 57 million Americans live in multigenerational households, according to the Pew Research Center. With several age groups under one roof, there are bound to be strains. There are also ways to make multigenerational living a positive experience. Home Instead Senior Care worked with a team of experts to develop these tips: Communication is the key. Before combining households, discuss everything from chores to bills to privacy. What are you concerned about? What are you looking forward to? Each family member should give their input. Be money wise. Does moving in together make sense financially? Home Instead Senior Care and Adriane Berg, author of 13 books on personal finance, created a calculator to help families make an informed decision. Go…

“ Here you go,” said our delivery guy, handing me the invoice. Five hundred eightynine dollars and thirty-seven cents. More than we made in a typical day. I took a deep breath, trying not to freak out. Just five months before, my brother Joe, my sister Maria and I had opened Ánimo, a juice and burrito bar, in Haddonfield, the suburb of Philadelphia where we grew up. I had left a good job as the director of sales for a golf course, put a lien on our house and taken out a small-business loan for $120,000 to get us started. Now, the way things were going, we would barely make it another week. I unpacked the boxes of organic kale, rainbow Swiss chard, juicing carrots, wheatgrass, beets, oranges and fairtrade…

FOLLOW US! I am disabled. There are many days I can’t leave the house, so I use Facebook to stay connected. One day I noticed that a friend follows Guideposts. I’d read the magazine at a neighbor’s, so I too clicked “follow.” Now I read everything that’s posted! I like the blogs from Michelle Cox, Julia Attaway and Diana Aydin— I feel like they understand all kinds of people. The Bible verses and inspirational quotes are always uplifting. I find that even in stories about hardship, there’s something positive—no one dwells on the negative parts of their lives. I had a busy life before becoming disabled, and it has been hard to adjust to the changes. On good days and bad, scrolling through the Guideposts Facebook page never fails to…