“Now all glory to God, who is able, through his mighty power at work within us, to accomplish infinitely more than we might ask or think.” Ephesians 3:20 NLT

Tom and I have a lot to process from our trip to Alaska. All the planning paid off, and God did so much more for us than we could have imagined. You will hear more about it in the coming weeks, but here are a few photos and some quick takeaways.

Dinali (aka Mt. McKinley, the highest point in North America) We are in the 30% club! Only 30% of visitors get a view of the mountain. Most visitors don’t get to see it because of cloud cover. The clouds are always shifting, so parts of it may be visible, but rarely the whole mountain. We had beautiful views of the whole mountain more than once. This shot is from about 40 miles away!

Margerie Glacier (Glacier Bay National Park) What a spectacular sight! Visitors hope to see the glacier calve, when large chunks of the blue-green ice shed into the ocean with a dramatic crash and splash. We didn’t see that, but as you can tell, we had glorious weather and beautiful views.

Ketchikan, Alaska Ketchikan was the port furthest south in our journey. We had a beautiful, warm, and sunny day to walk around and enjoy the city park and to stroll along the famous Creek Street and Salmon Walk. Summer visitors watch the salmon swimming upstream during the spawning season. No coats needed this day!

My biggest takeaway for you today: The most important preparation I did was to prepare my heart for the unexpected. I will tell you more about that next week. Check my post from May 30, Don’t Sweat the What-ifs for a preview. Every thought and Scripture I shared in that post came into play during the trip. I am so glad I had those tools ready!

Check out my book The YES Adventure: Transform Your Life with One Word for encouragement, inspiration, and more about God-centered goal-setting. Please leave a review on Amazon! That will help other people find the book and receive guidance and encouragement in their God-centered goal setting.

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August 15, 2026

How to Win the War Within (Repost)

'Since, then, you have been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things. ' Colossians 3:1-2

You’ve left the room, but the argument is not over. Your thoughts are stuck in a loop. The same hurtful exchange of words flashes across your mind over and over and over. You can’t seem to reset your inner replay. All the emotions that should have stayed in that room follow you everywhere you go. Hurt and anger continue to shout in your ears. Your heart rate is through the roof. Hot anger rises in your flushed face. The war is far from over.

Your inner screening room then begins playing out possible outcomes for a future exchange. You don’t really know what will happen, but your mind is already strategizing your next offensive in the war of words. Your emotions rise and fall with every imagined interaction. When you hurl an imagined barb at your intended target proud and triumphant vindictiveness rises to the surface. You feel all the emotions of a situation that hasn’t really happened and then you carry that resentment into the next conversation which turns into another altercation. Your emotions have become attached to an unreality. Nothing actually happened before you walked into the room. Do you truly want to spend your emotional energy on something that isn’t even real?