I’ll Have a Glue Thanksgiving Without You | Kyle McMurray Coaching, LLC

Episode 72

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If you’re listening to this today, Thanksgiving Day, instead of listening to this right now, let me encourage you to go check the turkey, check on the biscuits, hug your mother, sit down with your grandparents and listen to those stories they want to tell you. Then come back and listen to Living the Freedom Life. I want to share with you some things I learned about glue today.

Happy Thanksgiving Day Everyone! You’re listening to Living the Freedom Life Ep 72 I’ll Have A Glue Thanksgiving Without You

It doesn’t take long to realize that you have something to be thankful for. It doesn’t matter if you traveled to get near family for this day, or they traveled to you for this day, I even have a friend that’s hosting a “zoom giving” day. A virtual Thanksgiving online. Pretty Innovative and cool if you ask me.

Yeah, sure, all of us have a Hallmark type of gathering in mind but most of our holidays happen differently than that. Fractured families, exes, inlaws, grown kids, travel schedules, travel restrictions, Granny passing, there are some families that are reminded of a tragic event that happened around this time, whatever the case may be in your family, that no longer fulfills that Hallmark picture in your head, things are different than they were.

You see, Things are different when the glue is missing.

I remember as a kid, we had to have a separate table for me and my cousins to eat. We would run around in a pasture, get in trouble for playing on the Round Hay Bales, then go play in the barn, then we were restricted to play inside, We’d go down to the basement and play games there, those were great memories. All of it was because we were together, and that takes glue.

Things are different when the glue is missing.

My daughter now lives several states away and she is at the age where she needs some furniture. I’ve been restoring a table for her, and we’re taking it to her for Thanksgiving.

As I was restoring this table, when I put it back together, I forgot to use wood glue. I found out quickly that I needed to disassemble this table (again) and then use wood glue in addition to what I had used. It made the table stronger, solid, I could trust setting something heavy on it. I could tell, it was going to be dependable for many more years to come.

Things are different when the glue is missing.

Let me pose something to you.

My grandmother was the glue that held my family together. My wife’s mother was the glue that held her family together as well. When I was restoring that table, it wasn’t even going to make the trip, unless I had glue holding it together.

Things are definitely different when the glue is missing.

You may say “Well, You just have to have the right mindset to see it” …and I think that is a problem in our society. To be in the right mindset, it takes work to apply glue. And one of the main issues that I see is that people don’t want to put forth any effort. They don’t want to work for it. They just want to experience the Hallmark feeling. There is a consumer mindset to this. We just want to plop down, in front of the TV, and watch.

I want to challenge you to be the new glue. I know, it’s obvious that the glue is missing. We’ve established that. There is a problem. The question is, are we going to just continue to be depressed about the situation and try to find ways to avoid it, or do something about it?

Be the new glue.

It’s going to take effort and applying glue takes work. Hard work. Hmmmmmm.

Restoring that table for my daughter taught me something about glue. I want to point out 7 quick things that I learned about applying glue.

I had to disassemble the entire table…again.
1. You may have to undo some things over and over again.
Once I started, applying the glue wasn’t that big of a deal.
1. The hardest part is starting. That’s true in Ministry, 90% of ministry is just showing up.
Then it required pressure
1. When you apply glue, the parts just kinda slip and slide around because they don’t know where to land. Family will be like that too. You may have to apply some new pressure in order to give direction. When you glue wood together, you use clamps and screw them down tightly until it dries. That’s pressure, that’s also direction.
It also required clean up
1. Whenever you apply glue, things are going to get messy. Just expect it and be prepared for it, and things will be okay.
The reward is far greater now.
1. It’s one thing to go to a store and buy a piece of furniture. But it’s entirely different when you restore something and it’s reward is far greater. The Hallmark movie that you liked so much, that took screenwriters, producers, an entire crew to film, lighting, audio and then editing. There was a lot of work done to put that movie in production and it provided a livelihood for a lot of families. That person who was a part of working on that movie, they watch it with a different intention, now don’t they? The reward is far greater for them.
Because of the Glue, The table is now trustworthy.
1. Before, that table was rickety. Now, I can trust it to set things of value on it, things of weight, I can show it to the ones I love.
And the last thing I want to point out about what I’ve learned through glue is that it will last much longer now
1. I signed the bottom of the table, where no one would see it, just for her. No one else needs to know…well, okay, YOU will, but if you are looking for something that means much more than the wood and the function of a table, that is what lasts. The work I put into that table, will now last much longer than that of the table.

So today, things may not look like the picture in your head about Thanksgiving.

Things are different when the glue is missing.

Now, go be the new Glue.

When you dare to do that, you are Living the Freedom Life.

Happy Thanksgiving Everyone. Until next time, this is Kyle