You see this grainy picture to the right? It’s a picture taken of a hospital in Manila, Philippines, in the late 70’s, and this is where I was born.

That last statement is nothing short of a miracle. Because here are the events that had to occur for me to have been born in a hospital in Manila, Philippines:

• My parents would have to have the willingness to leave their home country of Vietnam.

• My parents would have to escape Communist Vietnam unnoticed.

• My parents had to assume the consequences of being arrested and thrown in a concentration camp if caught.

As mid-January approaches, many of us face the inevitability of the resolution slump. While we may have made goals or resolutions for 2013 with the best of intentions, it’s not always easy to stay motivated. As Growing Leaders founder Tim Elmore points out in the guest post below, it’s easy for real life’s demands to get in the way. Fortunately, it’s not too late. In the blog below, Elmore offers some suggestions for setting and maintaining resolutions, that coincide with the working parent’s priorities.

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From following my blog, I’m sure you have gotten the sense that I’m not a woman who sits on the sideline watching life go by.  I am engaged with life.  I live a life of action.

We all have people in our lives that have a tendency to drain our emotional energy.  It may be a family member, a child, our boss or a friend.

What I have come to understand is that everyone wants to be loved.  People do not come into our lives purposefully to drain us emotionally.  We allow it to happen.  I see two aspects of how this happens.

As long as I can remember my father encouraged me to make new friends and to be very kind and encouraging towards others. This time of year your local health club is the perfect place to make friends. Over the past twenty or so years, I have been a gym member in different towns and cities, and I have never had anyone address me with disgust or venom, or even much annoyance. Most gym goers seem much happier after speaking with me, and tend to stay at the gym longer, as do I when I have a friend to talk with. “Wow!

My holiday fashion article would have been shortly followed by one about the beauty of holiday music. Teachers across our nation have had an especially difficult week, and  I only got as far as the title of my article about our high school’s recent music performance, “Holiday Beauty at Hale Ray, Brought To Us By Rose Marie Evans”.

If I include myself in my immediate family, more than half of us, or three out of five are teachers, and everyone except for my mom spends at least twenty hours of his or her week at a school. Two of us, my father and I have been grazed by gun violence during the course of our teaching careers. Over the course of our careers, both my father and I have taught students who lived in close proximity to criminals and/or have engaged in criminal activity themselves. We have both been a witness to drug possession in our very classrooms.

The holiday period is a lot of fun for families, but ‘tis also a season of stress for parents. This year, try to lower anxiety levels and enjoy all that this festive season has to offer.

1) Stressor #1 – Shopping

• Be an organized shopper – know your budget, make a list, have coupons. Don’t be that frazzled mom with screaming kids wandering aimlessly through the mall. Know what you need and go get it. Have a plan and stick to it.