What a way to make a girl feel loved....thank you to everyone who messaged me, texted, e-mailed me, etc. after my last post. So...a few of you read this....Wow. I am not sure if I feel more embarrassment or joy. The joy came as so many said....you put words to what I am feeling....but joy also came because so many of you said...you put words to what I am feeling...which made me feel less alone. Ahhh...one of the perks of showing our vulnerability.
Thank you.
I heard this song in the midst of the craziness of this week...and like so many other songs when they come...it came as a lifeline to all that I know to be true...yet misplace in the busyness and onslaught of my life. I found a raw video attached here..Fall Afresh by Bethel Music...I hope you enjoy it. I hope it restores your spirit as it did mine, as it does mine. When I close my eyes and listen to it...I nearly feel transported (don't call the funny farm). Meditation has become a huge part of my healing and has enhanced my prayer life...while also causing me to feel even more odd in a world where sometimes I don't fit as my beliefs sound half hippie, half-Christian, a lot crazy. :)
I told someone that I felt God was putting a book on my heart...about being single in the church...at my age. I am resisting that urge. Nobody wants to read that. Nobody. Talk about disruption and ick. They wouldn't know where to put it in the bookstore...I mean come on....it MUST go in the humor section. Is there a classification for Single, Christian Humor in Barnes & Noble?
So...that makes me think of the fact that Krysta and I are "entertaining" Nora this weekend on the eve of her launch into all things adulthood...college. That just made me smile. :)
What do you tell a beautiful young woman as you send her off at 18 to a new city, new school, new life...a new adventure? What do I wish someone had told me at 18? Well...that would be a digression of novel proportions so let us now venture there. :) Seriously though, I do want to give her pearls of wisdom, sage advice, tips....good grief I sound lame and old.
So as I sit here this morning reading...watching Nora curled up on my couch reading like the bookworm she is...knowing that she has no clue to how truly beautiful she is...and I think of my Jordan about to start her second year of college...still questioning her deep beauty....and I am wondering what are we missing? What are we not teaching these girls, these young women, ourselves? Why so many questions, doubts, despair? Why??? And then I feel the anger and frustration building because I know we don't protect each other enough...women do not protect each other enough. Satan defeats us THERE.
My biggest angst (read that as attacks) this week have come from other women...now the "Woo Hoo" is that my biggest hurrahs have also come from other women...so we are not winning the war yet, but the battles are getting more competitive...:)
Women are NOT men. We internalize what people say to us, around us, about us. We "own" those arrows somewhere down deep whether deserved or undeserved. We marinate in them...for the Rest. Of. Our. Lives. *Ugh*
Every time you feel yourself about to say something, write something...even think something...towards a fellow woman/girl that does not come from a place of pure love...Stop. Hit the pause button. Ask yourself where that is coming from? Ask yourself to think of yourself in that person's shoes whom you are seconds away from emasculating (even if on a small scale...knowing that with emasculating there is truly no "small scale") and have compassion for where they might be at...going through...dealing with...
*Sigh*
Breathtaking isn't it?!
...and the tears flow...
I have been so hurt and angry this week. Bitter even. How dare she or he or they? Questioning where God is in all of it? I thought you were supposed to be HERE...NOW?! Wondering where my warrior was...who is protecting my heart for the love of Pete????? I am hurting here! What a whiny baby I have been...All. Week. I am pretty sure God is put out with me...YET he isn't. He isn't at all. He is holding me...even in THIS lesson. *Sigh*
*Sigh*
...and there is the lesson...
....and is what I want to teach, show, impart, love with Nora, with Jordan, with all of the beautiful girls and boys in my life (both young and old)...
I am reminded of Ethan...that simple little lesson walking back from the swimming hole at Camp Caudle. "Where is God Ethan?" Right here. Right HERE.
....more tears...
I can't protect Nora, or Jordan, or even myself....I cannot protect anyone. I can love them. I can teach them that God loves them. I can help them to see....to believe...to know...that God is there...with them...Every. Day....Every. Moment....
THAT is a hard lesson even for me....and I taught Ethan...who really taught me....because God was using him...and that is what God does...and that is what I call beautiful and breathtaking and boy is this growth thingy hard....and who knew being a giant, beautiful, vulnerable, icky, giving it all up mess would be OH. SO. HARD?!
The other day on FB one of my friends posted about their cat being nine kinds of upset in the carrier on the way to the vet to get their female parts rearranged (so to speak) and feeling sorry for whoever opened that cage...and I tell you I laughed until I cried...and then I read it to Nora this morning and laughed all over again...until I cried....and right now, in this moment of sudden clarity, I realize why it hit me so...because bless my poor, disrupted heart...I am that damn cat. Yup, I said it. God bless the people who have opened the cage door with me this week....*Shaking My Head*....
I digress....I might have some apology notes to write suddenly...
Whoa.
I am now laughing....At. My. Self.
God is so gentle with me...Bless. His. Heart.
God is rearranging my female parts....and I am not happy about it. I am angry, pissy, perturbed, disturbed, scared, terrified, giddy,...okay maybe giddy is too much :)....I am really just frightened beyond words. If I don't control the whole damn world, I am not sure WHO I am...and that was just a snippet of raw honesty.
I don't want to control...anything...anymore....but while my heart is willing...my body and mind are weak...and they are holding on for dear life...and bless them...it is time for them to give it up...because I am tired and my head hurts (I disobeyed the doctor and took two Tylenol last night...three day straight w/a migraine/headache...don't judge.)...I need relief. I need my body and mind to relent...this isn't a phase....this isn't a trial basis...this is me....truly, humbly, honestly, purely...Giving. It. Up.
So...if I have been crabby this past week with you...please forgive me. I have calmed down now. ;) :)))
I read this earlier this week...
"You will never find what you are looking for until you find yourself first." ~ Unknown
Well my tribe....here is to finding myself, ourselves...a little more...Every. Day. :))))
Sunshine Dreams to You ~ Today and Every Day! :)
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