Abuse Survivor

Set Your Intention

Abuse Survivor, bravery, contentment, courage, Faith, fear, Forgiveness, freedom, hope, memoir, Peace, praise, Prayer, Redemption, surrender, Trust, Uncategorized, Vulnerability, wonder, writing

In a matter of twenty minutes, these are my thoughts upon waking:

Set your intention.

Tomorrow’s freedom is today’s surrender.

Resilience can be developed, the effects of trauma can be undone. It is like exercise, my choice.

First, I roused from a heavy like cinder block sleep that finally came about 3:00.

Mind you, I had been sleeping, just not resting.

Years ago, I had no sleep apnea but my mind was found to be a racer, a wrestler all night, the report told. But, I woke and from I don’t know where, thought “set your intentions.” thinking of my friend the gentle, Dana and how I rarely make it to her class. Still, this might be a worthy goal for me, every day.

Set your intention.

Then, a song you won’t hear on the radio and rarely on your favorite subscription, the lilting tone in the voice of a man I decide is surely kind, sings of tomorrow’s freedom being today’s surrender.

Lord as we turn to You
Come free us from our sin
We only have today
So let us now begin
From dawn to dusk
We are waking up. Dawn to Dusk, All Sons and Daughters

Thirdly, I’m scrolling twitter and land on an article on resilience. I decide, this may be good and so as I’m waiting for the coffee press to do its little trick, I read.

Wouldn’t you know it?

It’s about focus and choices in our mindsets, our turning negative to good by deciding to look for the “silver lining”.

The article describes Bradley Cooper’s character remembering a song that sparked his outburst, his sadness and his potentially defeatist again mindset. Jennifer Lawrence tells him it is just a song. (By the way, did you see the greatest moment in my opinion of the Oscars, only second to Regina King’s acceptance? Bradley Cooper exited the stage with Lady Gaga on his arm and lifted his hand to his forehead as if wiping the sweat from his brow in a whew of relief.”

Saying, at least to me,

I did the thing I thought I couldn’t do.

The choice to not be led down a path of negativity towards depression and dismay signifies not allowing your past to dictate your future.

It is not easy, patterns are embedded. It’s safer to be the you that you and everyone else has always known.

To set your intention on that little tiny pinpoint light calling you forward, not the murkiness of the darkest traumas of before.

To measure your life in a dawn to dusk way, to wake up and surrender every morning, believing over time tomorrow will only know freedom, no longer waking to unravel your nighttime tragic dramas.

To look for the silver lining, tell about the silver linings you never imagined would be. The biggie for me, stop saying oh my goodness I never thought it could be, still letting the past have its undeserving part in my story.

Instead, celebrate with intention and boldness the good, all of the good!

Try not to include the bad in as many of your stories!

Be amazed at the lining up your morning, take it with you all day.

A waking thought giving you a new way to think about healing.

A song about freedom.

An article about the power of the mind and the way we drive our days, our lives, simply by choosing the optimistic road.

The steadfast love of God endures all the day. Psalm 52:1

Grief and Grace and Beautiful Things

Abuse Survivor, Art, bravery, confidence, contentment, courage, Faith, Forgiveness, freedom, grace, grief, memoir, Peace, praise, Prayer, Redemption, Stillness, Trust, Uncategorized, Vulnerability, waiting, wonder, writing

The Sway of Grace

There was no inspiration in the sky above me, its color was thick and like taupe mixed with gray.

The color of old water left in the kitchen sink, murky from faded suds and dirty plates.

No music seemed to suit me. The podcast I was moved to hear again had strangely gone away.

I walked on with the bounce of a trendy and sort of tired old song.

Next one and the next the same.

They were not working, the songs that usually drive me, keep me distracted from the pain of my hips, my feet.

Songs about grace and Jesus too trendy for me today, too much like radio pop.

Volume down.

Twelve or thirteen minutes I told myself, just a brief bit, you can endure it.

So, I picked up my pace and I listened to my feet hitting the ground and I know it’s not possible but I could describe the sound of my own breath coming up from my core.

And I felt it, the way my body changed as my breathing weaved up and past my ribs and into my particularly patterned exhale.

Control, keep control. Focus on the release.

I kept on and got to the place with the dangerous curve and the steep right bending hill.

The geese had congregated on the water and were conversating loudly.

I slowed and felt the wind sweep across my face making me realize the warmth I’d created on my chest, caused by my own private version of running my race.

For about a minute, maybe seconds more, there was this bliss caused by God’s grace.

In a less than spectacular sky I couldn’t find Him and so, grace found me.

Again.

And I ran up the hill, all the way this time.

Although I’d decided I might not be able, I kept running.

Last week, I sort of analyzed my life using the big chunk of moments, days and years that were either sorted and stacked as either joy or fear, as either mistake or reconciliation.

My husband and I recalled the dog adopted and where he peed, pooped, what he destroyed, and how difficult he was in the beginning.

I asked him to compare the joy of the Labrador being with us to the initial hassle and adjustment.

He agreed he was worth it.

Worth it to sit in your spot at end of the day to have a big dog plop down and prop his big face across your feet.

Worth it to be greeted at the door with his goofy eyes and happy tail.

If you look closely at your life, all the happenings that you know were true trauma, the interruptions that you remember and think that was it, that’s what totally blew my chances of being complete, you might be justified in never believing you should believe.

You might not take chances with new things.

Perhaps, the trauma that began it all has never been fully grieved, a grievous grey sky that you haven’t faced fully, haven’t accepted for what it is and so you’ve not felt it, not allowed the grace to be greater than the fear.

In college, my first year, I was raped.

I blamed myself. I hid in shame.

The big and grotesque figure of an athlete loomed behind me the next day in Chemistry lab, elevated just over my shoulder, he was enormous and so powerful in his seat.

I blamed myself because my sweater was way too tight and glaringly hot pink. I know better now; but, only recently realized this thing that made me live so very long in fear and defeat.

It was unresolved grief for the artist in me that died there that night, accepted the disbelief of me.

But, even better than the realization that this trauma was not invited by me is the realization that this incident makes up really only an hour or two of me…of my whole 58 years!

I don’t minimize the damage, I’m just choosing to line it up beside the other things:

I was the middle child, shy girl who went to college on an art scholarship.

I drove myself through Atlanta all the way to the beautiful mountains of Rome.

I tried something new and I made a great friend who was beautiful and statuesque and intelligent who still remembers me.

I learned to love running there, running uphill every day.

We dined at a splendid restaurant where my friend worked on Friday nights, my choice always, Chicken cor don bleu.

I won an award for a painting and my parents came up to see my blue ribbon.

I began, just a little, to see Jesus differently and it challenged me.

I was brave there even though interrupted in this horrible way.

I was harmed in many ways by that night at a party; yet, that’s only a tiny bit of my experience, of my life.

The greater experience is that I was held even then and I am still held by the grace of my Father’s hand.

I was His child then. Didn’t believe it but that didn’t matter.

So, I choose looking back only to be certain of my worth from His perspective and of the importance in believing there is always so much better I have seen and been given, even when I line it up to the most unjustified of my griefs.

I pray if you’ve known trauma you’ll see the freedom of deciding daily that you are more at peace when your recall is one of the evidence of grace, not a harsh gauge of resentment over someone who harmed you and thus, kept you from all that might have been.

There’s truth in that sentiment. It just won’t take us anywhere, certainly no new places.

You’re so much more than the stain of your pain.

When the cool evening breeze brushed my face yesterday it was God saying to me, I saw you keep going.

I saw you turn your attention to me.

Continue and believe.

Don’t let the pain of your past cut short your beautiful race.

Luke recorded the healing of a woman bent by her pain for close to twenty years.

For me, my frame of reference for all my defeats or my failures has always been the harm done towards me by others, the hurtful choices made for me and the ones I made.

Disabled for far too long by my pain until I decided to welcome a change.

Like the woman Jesus was criticized for healing on the Sabbath, I am free.

“And behold, there was a woman who had had a disabling spirit for eighteen years. She was bent over and could not fully straighten herself. When Jesus saw her, he called her over and said to her, “Woman, you are freed from your disability.” And he laid his hands on her, and immediately she was made straight, and she glorified God.”

‭‭Luke‬ ‭13:11-13‬ ‭ESV‬‬

Leave grief behind, notice the unrelenting grace of your God.

This perspective of forward not former thinking is the direction God is guiding me towards memoir. If you know someone who has lived hampered by harm, share my words. I pray God increases each reader’s awareness and embrace of His grace as He is with me, moment by moment, daily.

Grown and Growing

Abuse Survivor, bravery, courage, freedom, Homeless, hope, memoir, Prayer, Redemption, Uncategorized, Vulnerability

In Progress

Today a woman I love who I’d never have met were it not for my work and a shelter, a temporary home.

She stopped by with her girl who was born there, now 3.

Just stopped by to see me.

We talked about a young woman who is helping her, a beautiful girl the age of my daughter.

We both agreed. She is special.

“The Lord your God is in your midst, a mighty one who will save; he will rejoice over you with gladness; he will quiet you by his love; he will exult over you with loud singing.”

‭‭Zephaniah‬ ‭3:17‬ ‭ESV‬‬

Then the woman who used to live in our shelter said, “I want to be like her when I grow up.”

I said, “me too”.

Then I told her and I meant it.

I’m not there yet either.

Not in the place of joyous all the time hope and freedom but I’m closer than I’ve ever been.

And so is she.

Then, I reached for the paper under my keyboard with Isaiah 43:19 and I told her about my Sunday, how I prayed and cried and prayed to finally believe.

I am free.

She held the little slip of paper and then said, “I hope I can remember.”

I told her to keep it.

I don’t need it.

She reached across my desk for a pen.

Then we told each other goodbye and keep praying, no stressing and don’t give up or give in.

I noticed the paper when she laid it on the table to put the jacket on her baby.

In blue ink she had added.

“Finally, free.”

Forgetting the former.

Tonight, I read just a sentence or two of someone’s blog. The idea of God being our nourishment, otherwise we’d never grow.

I thought of my existence, of my faith being like long ago designed genetics, like deep roots I’ve only just begun to allow to be fertilized.

I thought of how I am growing at a rate lately that seems to have been after a stagnant stretch of nothing happening too long.

Yet, I’ve been cared for and I’ve been attended to and now finally, I will grow, my growth is beginning to have an ease about it, a natural bloom.

Not forced.

Finally free and thus, able to grow.

Trying is Succeeding

Abuse Survivor, Angels, Art, birds, bravery, confidence, Forgiveness, freedom, grace, memoir, mercy, Redemption, Vulnerability, writing

The following was to be the launch of my newsletter. I had a very good morning and I prayed and then tried. MailChimp, you are not a friend of mine.

But nothing’s wasted, right…other than my time.

There’s a lesson here and it keeps coming back to continue and believe.

Eventually, I know I shall see. Forward not behind, I’m moving forward.

Here you go…the newsletter that wasn’t meant to be.

“Finding Your Sky” is an expression of what, for me feels like believing in possibility and considering God’s view of us and His longing for us to live not based on our “befores”. 

What if we focused on next steps rather than our stumbles from before?

Take just a second and ask yourself what you believe about redemption, about second chances, about freedom from shame over past mistakes.

Ask yourself if you believe in redemption for others but struggle to accept it consistently as mercy meant for you. 

When good things seem to be coming your way only to go another do you decide “that’s okay, I wasn’t worthy anyway?”

I did this today.  

Working on this very thing.  

Trying is succeeding, I believe, when it comes to stepping towards new things. 

I thought of all the people Jesus beckoned just to try, to pick up your mat, to step into the water, to not turn away ashamed when He knows all our sins by name. What if we held out our withered hands to touch his, to grow stronger and open to all the good He has waiting to give? 

Do you have a spark inside that feel likes what I like to call a “treasure” but you keep it close and hidden because “what will happen if I try to be something, someone other than what everyone has always known?”

Each month, on a Sunday, I’ll send out this newsletter. I’ll ask God what it is He has shown me that someone else might need to know. I’ll maybe add some art work or inspiration you can download. There will be scripture to say so much better what I am trying to say.

My prayer is to help you believe in the beauty of redemption, to have you look up to the broad sky and to be open to new things and to continue in them, to continue and believe. 


Remember not the former things, nor consider the things of old. Behold, I am doing a new thing: now it springs forth, do you not perceive it?
Isaiah 43:18-19


This verse is marked by a sketch in the margin of my Bible.

The timing of it was beautiful, I had been talking with a therapist about my past trauma. Therapeutic insight and challenges were met by my response to her question one day,

“How will you know when it is time to stop remembering and move on from your trauma?”

Our sessions were typically visited upon by cardinals in some way and so I answered, “I’ll know when I find a redbird feather.” As crazy as that must have seemed, she accepted my remedy.

A few weeks later, I was gifted two feathers and then, in the most unexpected of places, my own backyard, I noticed one of my own.

What would prompt you to stop dwelling on your hurts and pain of before and to allow freedom to beckon you forward? 

It’s safer to stay there, in the places we know, the people that we are known to be. 

It’s gradual, this new way for me, this believing and being exhilaratingly hopeful of what might be.

Here’s the angel girl from my Bible, the one dressed in blue who is ready to believe. Maybe by March, mailing lists and newsletters, etc. will come together! My plan is to include a downloadable image, a pdf of a painting. I’ll keep trying.

I’ll continue and believe.

Trying to Swim

Abuse Survivor, Art, bravery, confidence, courage, doubt, grace, hope, Labradors, memoir, mercy, obedience, painting, Prayer, Redemption, Teaching, Trust, Uncategorized, Vulnerability, wonder, writing

Colt’s first glimpse of the ocean, photo LT

I have an unfulfilled desire to be a swimmer, strong and freeing I long to be the one swimming laps at end of the day in our pool.

I long to be a singer too, one of those people with no concern over those around me or before me, just belting out a lyric from the bottom of my belly and resting my hand at my heart as I am fulfilled in the joy from within.

I’ve heard both are possible, with training and time and I tell myself it’s surely a crazy desire, Lisa Anne.

Clearly, you have more than enough on your plate! I’ll stick with art and words for now, come June I may try swimming again. I will.

Two things are pending, waiting for me to take a grand plunge and with time and training get them just right this time.

I won’t grow if I don’t continue to try. This one thing I do know.

I am the most ill equipped marketer when it comes to marketing me.

I’m embarrassed to ask for help and I get all bent out of shape when I believe people can’t believe I cannot figure it out on my own.

This is my perception.

When it comes to confidence in myself in this area I have none.

But, I am committed to trying.

I will update my blog today or tomorrow, keep my name on the front end, the uncomfortable place that says find her, read her words, and I’m adding a Sunday evening newsletter to all who want to hear my thoughts at end of the day, the end of a week. I know what I want to call it and I feel God leading me to what he wants me to say.

I may change my confidence, it may not say “quiet” or “confidence” at all.

I just need to continue. It may say continue.

I’ve deleted my art page. It had only three followers 😊 and I’ll incorporate hopefully a more professional look with links to connect interested buyers.

Yes, today I will begin, hopefully be complete by tomorrow.

I get confused over confidence the more I travel this writing and painting road. I make it bigger than it is, the challenge of trying and then following where God wants it to go.

Look it up, the dictionary says confidence depends on ourselves.

That can’t be so.

If it’s all me it becomes either reward or rejection and it goes back to being all about me, chubby little brown haired girl longing to be noticed.

I love the words to this song that keeps circling back to find me:

In Over my Head

Whether I sink, whether I swim 
Oh it makes no difference when I’m beautifully in over my head…Jenn Johnson

A song about abandoning fears and longing to see just how far we can go when we believe and allow God to lead.

Continue and believe.

Paul met Jesus and he knew where his life would go. Absolutely and unwaveringly he acknowledged his fear, his failures, his past violent offenses and he kept on, kept on walking the way He was called.

I don’t believe any of us should go through life without coming to a point where all we truly want to know is

God, where do you want me to go?

“Therefore I, a prisoner for serving the Lord, beg you to lead a life worthy of your calling, for you have been called by God.”

‭‭Ephesians‬ ‭4:1‬ ‭NLT‬‬

May my efforts be worthy of what continues to feel like my calling.

I’ve written for more than five minutes as I am inclined to do. But, these are my thoughts on confidence and I’ll share with others here:

FMF -Confidence

Seesaw Prayers and Stephanie Sue

Abuse Survivor, Art, bravery, Children, confidence, contentment, courage, doubt, Faith, family, Forgiveness, freedom, grace, hope, memoir, mercy, Peace, Prayer, rest, surrender, Trust, Vulnerability, waiting

From God’s perspective, I believe we pray more than we realize, that our thoughts are to Him, sort of informal prayers. Maybe He’s nudging us to pray, saying your thoughts are not trivial, nor too troubling, tell me more. I believe He says let’s wait and see, get there together.

What’s blowing my mind today is the reality of God hearing my prayers! Oh Lord, forgive me for taking this lightly or for only getting excited and wanting to sing loud praises when it’s mind-blowingly big.

I try to get out in front of God, as if I need to coax the direction of a certain “perfect” way. If I’m honest, God must think I’m whiny or either aggravating, the pendulum swings one or the other way.

Like the seesaw, I’m either the queen of the world buoyed up high from my worries by the force and folded knees of my brave cousin, her butt at the bottom and feet firmly in the smooth cool sand.

Showing me, like Jesus.

I’ve got this. Sit still.

Then she lets go and either drastically I hit bottom or she’s easy and my place and turn in the pattern is more like rest on the level ground than a harsh descent, desperately back to prayer.

Or she’s so skilled in her timing, my seesaw partner, that she leaves me in the interim wanting me to trust her weight and balance will keep me there.

I don’t like the middle, the supposed to be at peace with not knowing, the trusting place. Yet, God always teaches me when He increases my faith, my confidence there.

He shows me that He saw me praying a different way, a surrendered and boldly strong expectantly way and so He moved and the situation, hours later changed, the circumstances swayed.

He answers our prayers all day throughout the day. I sometimes pray as if I’ve speculated the river is dry and the flow of sovereign power and grace can’t make it back my way.

Then He does it again. He answers the longing I brought and left with Him, the one I considered not bringing at all.

True story.

Prayer changes things and people.

I hope I remember it long, the thing that happened and It hit me…oh, you prayed! I’ll store it up in my journal of others chronicling the big grace and answered prayers of before along with the little ones He has anticipated and given replies that I may never know.

I don’t have to rush ahead fearing He doesn’t see I need His guiding hand.

I just have to stay close, let my trust be my hand in His hand on this ever changing road and that memories like seesaws and brave cousins who taught me so much are teaching me still.

This post is for you. I miss you, brave and beautiful one, Stephanie Sue!

“pray without ceasing,”

‭‭1 Thessalonians‬ ‭5:17‬ ‭ESV‬‬

Grace, Hold my Hand

Abuse Survivor, Angels, Art, courage, grace, hope, memoir, mercy, surrender, Trust, Uncategorized, Vulnerability, waiting, wonder, writing

“…let not your hearts faint, fear not, and do not tremble, neither be ye terrified because of them;”

‭‭Deuteronomy‬ ‭20:3‬ ‭KJV‬‬

Sometimes I think of Jesus being next to me there, wherever there might be.

I think of my hand held still by my side, Him holding it to keep me from being overly talkative, “talking too much with my hands”.

I think of my mornings when things make more sense and I sense His presence as if the chair next to me that rarely seats a soul, might be Him with me, He might be seated there.

I think of the way I believe in angels now. Until I began to paint them were so insignificant, were not reality for me.

The same God in that childhood church that confused me, made me believe, for me He just wasn’t there, is the one who is ecstatic now over me, ecstatic that I am understanding grace and mercy and that I believe!

Lord, what is my place in this, what is my role in this time, this question of staying in my place or climbing carefully to higher places knowing you will not let me fall?

And what should be my response if I am to put one foot in front of the other and then am unable to move on, overwhelmed by the fear of being farther than before?

Asking myself why on earth did I climb way up here, how embarrassing that I can’t move because I’m worried I’m going to fall.

Yesterday, I thought of grace. I saw it on another’s face and I felt it when I stood behind a podium and my voice, I sensed was making waves like the threat of undercurrent, a dangerously coming high tide.

I initially called it nerves.

I’d been sitting and waiting for my name to be called to stand and to speak, to make a plea for our cause.

I told myself on the drive over, this is important, this is so important and then decided on it being for less and yet, so much more.

Told myself, this is for the children.

The children labeled homeless.

The matter was important. I took my notes and laid them there, all numbered in sequence to refer to, only seven points.

My nerves, I decided were passion.

Although I did not realize it then.

I paid no attention to my notes.

I spoke from a place, it must have been trust. I do not know what the outcome will be. I find it so “un-me” when it comes to asking for money.

I do know I felt it.

I felt God’s grace.

A humble and quiet chubby girl, a poor child faced a room filled with philanthropist women.

And she spoke. She was able to stand and she spoke.

Grace doesn’t promise winning proposals or submissions.

It does say “Try, I will be with you.”

And it silences the voices that say you don’t belong.

Grace reminds of God’s favor while unconditionally insisting that some fears might not go away, but try…

Grace says try.

It is both necessary and unnecessary in that we must embrace it and surely we must remember it did not and does not have to be given.

It is not necessary.

But, it is good.

It is good that His grace always stays.

Imploring us to new places and making new spaces we will walk in and can be sure they are wide, so very wide it is impossible for us to fall!

But, to try.

Try.

Try because well, grace is waiting to remind us, try.

New Things in New Places

Abuse Survivor, birds, bravery, confidence, contentment, courage, Faith, family, fear, freedom, grace, hope, memoir, mercy, Prayer, Redemption, Stillness, Trust, Uncategorized, Vulnerability, waiting, wonder, writing

I got this from my mama.

I’ll rummage through the clearance aisles and I’ll look for the most neglected, damaged or left behind things in the store.

I rarely go for the item that’s marked way down as far as it can go but still not worth anything for me, nothing that I would consider complementary to my home.

I picked up this little cracked bowl, held it up and noticed the red tag, $1.79 and I began to decide if I should take it home.

I thought how I’d not be bothered by the chip on the rim, how the design was really like no colors in my room at all.

Then I remembered the insect pen and ink drawing by my son from long ago and the birds on my table, one of them a black crow.

So, I bought the little bowl and it cups the brown magnolia pods perfectly well. It’s a little thing added to the place I gaze to measure the morning’s sun, a small thing, a beautiful change.

Last night before group work out, I walked/ran. It was dark and I was alone on the track. Women playing tennis on the lighted court, people alone with their dogs walking in balance and pace. Runners ran past me in their running attire, graciously passing me thinking I’d stay in my place.

I turned up the volume and told myself, you can run too.

So, I did and then I went inside to join my work out group.

I was doing everything I could to run out my mood, to outrun its pursuit, to work the kinks of dread and worry out in an intentional sweat.

To have my hope come back, my rest, my request to not fall back into my patterns of dread.

And I was intentional like Job in my prayers and I talked to God in my car after a good and solid and rigorous workout.

Take from me these disenchanted ways. These ways of being sidelined by bad dreams that I decide will surely come true in some way.

Then I waited because I heard His Spirit say,

this will not be an immediate change, immediacy in my reply will not build the trust that should be.

Yes, this I know.

You know what happened next if you know my God.

Small shifts began to change me, good food, hot shower, soft blanket, early sleep.

Brought pleasant dreams about little babies and being someplace laughing.

We all were having cake.

My dreams are just as real and as vivid as my nightmares. Jesus, help me to know fully this truth from you.

And if the bad ones come back to visit sparked by some passing thought or something I read, I know they will not take over.

You, my Heavenly Father, will not allow it, did not plan this for me.

But if they come back to stir up memories, may the fire of the trauma be for good use not bad.

May its memory spread wide and complete like the farmer burning his entire field for a new crop.

Destroying all the old, in preparation for the very same place to grow something new.

The former crop has done what it was supposed to do, God and the farmer know it is time to yield the same harvest or maybe something totally new.

“Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past. See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland.”

‭‭Isaiah‬ ‭43:18-19‬ ‭NIV‬‬

I’m smiling now as I write this. Will my prayers bring something like useful soybeans or will my words and art look more like giant stalks of hearty corn?

Or will the works of my hands and my mind exhibit a stillness and calm, like soft amber colored wheat stalks, late summer swaying in pleasant wind?

Or will it be all of these, beneficial, nourishing as well as calming?

It is possible.

Continue and believe.

Continue.

Believe.

Mary Geisen wrote a similar story, one about continuing on our roads. I feel it’s a feeling so many of us have. May we all be better and more faithful because we share the brave telling of our stories.

Tell His Story

Where Words Go

Abuse Survivor, bravery, confidence, contentment, courage, Faith, freedom, memoir, mercy, obedience, Stillness, Trust, Uncategorized, Vulnerability, waiting, wonder, writing

A chunk of my day yesterday, a beautiful Saturday so warm I had to move from my favorite place.

To a library corner more shady and less distracting after all.

I tried my hand at something new, a thing God told me to do, told me so by giving me words that finally made sense as I sat in my morning chair.

I had found the Psalm circled, “memoir” written in the margin.

“You turned my wailing into dancing; you removed my sackcloth and clothed me with joy, that my heart may sing your praises and not be silent. Lord my God, I will praise you forever.”

‭‭Psalm‬ ‭30:11-12‬ ‭NIV‬‬

And I finished it, the bio and summary of my book proposal. It will need tweaking and parts of chapters added today.

I typed away until my laptop battery faded, dead. Thank you, family, by the way for the best laptop ever last year on my birthday!

Lunch on Friday included a friend who felt it was time for us to know one another more and that our mutual conversation and revelations deserved a special date.

It was special. She is special and together and separately we are strong despite our perspective hardship and heavy loads to bear along the way.

She told me to keep writing.

She said that I must.

I know her instructions are true otherwise I’d not keep doing this thing I do.

Sitting in a quiet space and hoping for new perspective or a gentle lesson.

God speaks to me and I share.

I pray the words go where they need to be read.

And I do thank God for words.

I do love them so!

Linking up with the Five Minute group. Writing with spontaneity and expanding my horizons as God continues to enlarge my borders.

https://fiveminutefriday.com/2019/01/31/fmf-writing-prompt-where/

Happy Sunday, readers. God is waiting to be found in it.

Sky and Bloom

Abuse Survivor, birds, bravery, confidence, contentment, courage, Faith, Forgiveness, freedom, grace, hope, kindness, memoir, mercy, Peace, praise, Prayer, Redemption, surrender, Trust, Uncategorized, Vulnerability, waiting, wonder, writing

“Catch the foxes for us, the little foxes that spoil the vineyards, for our vineyards are in blossom.”

‭‭The Song of Solomon‬ ‭2:15‬ ‭ESV‬‬

Cold in a way I had no idea, I removed the soft heavy blanket and because the birds had begun to sing, I turned and saw the sky behind me, bright with pink.

Longing to see more and to see with a more private view I ventured to the backyard.

Bare feet on crunchy frozen grass, my steps became a dance and rather than staring towards the sky I became captivated by the camellias.

Pink, I decide is the color of vibrance and optimism. Some petalled balls fallen from the branches and in varying stages of change, some clinging gloriously and a few yet to bloom.

I pray we don’t get the icy days we southerners disdain.

I pray the terminal frost that curtails the continued growth stays away.

Because, the camellias this winter have blossomed in grander and more undeniable ways.

Or is it my notice that has changed?

Has a sense of hopeful curiosity begun to enlighten my belief?

Changing doubtful speculation to committed curiosity over things that might finally be?

Things I believe are for me, abilities and opportunities designed by God.

I am beginning to trust it might be, that I will see.

Jesus has seen me and is pleased in my growing understanding of Him.

Mercy is becoming more than “Christiany” expression tacked on in hopes to gain acceptance.

Mercy, I am finally seeing.

Is for me.

Jesus, leaving Jericho heard the desperate cries of two blind men sitting on the side of the road.

Their sense of hearing compensated for their inability to see and so, they cried out loudly to Jesus asking for mercy. The crowds chastised them, these pitiful men positioned on their way.

How dare they ask to be seen, much less to be able to see?

Have you felt this way?

Felt that according to God and to others, you should stay in your place, why on earth would you believe there could be grander things to see?

The blind men must have been desperate, must have been shouting.

Jesus paused for them.

He asked them what it was they needed.

Jesus wanted to hear their deepest need.

“And stopping, Jesus called them and said, “What do you want me to do for you?” They said to him, “Lord, let our eyes be opened.” And Jesus in pity touched their eyes, and immediately they recovered their sight and followed him.”

‭‭Matthew‬ ‭20:32-34‬ ‭ESV‬‬

Yesterday, I sat anchored by weighted rice bags on my abdomen and thighs, the sense of settled safety, I was seeking.

I joined in my friend’s “Midweek Mindfulness” and loosened up the places where my stress had made its abode.

Anchored and waiting, eyes closed in meditation, I struggled to be still, to stay composed.

Surely, this will soon be over, I don’t know how much longer I can hold this pose and I can’t think of a single additional thing to let go and I’ve prayed my prayers and I’ve focused my focus…

Then she begins to speak of curiosity and I naively conclude she’s done this solely for me.

It actually could be.

I listen and decide curiosity is a worthy mindset, not one curtailed by pessimism or conclusions to my stories, rather a careful and hopeful, continuous pursuit.

The blind men could have chosen what they’d always chosen, likely just being careful to stay out of the way

Instead they decided to be brave, to be curious about Jesus and to give new sights a try.

This morning beckoned me out onto the cold January ground and led me to see beauty, not only in the morning sun but in the blooms fallen and fading making way for new.

I get emotional over a couple of lines in a pretty song. The voice is captivating, tender and true.

She makes a quiet and sure proclamation over her soul and unknowingly, mine.

She sings, “the foxes in the vineyard will not steal my joy!”

It is a tender song, inspired by the verses from the Song of Solomon, a book that reads like poetry, sonnets and splendidly passionate love.

Good to Me

What are the “foxes” in your vineyard? What present or past or based on your own predictions is set on stealing the joy you’ve begun to get a tiny taste of?

Exchange the sly intentions of the evil one committed to keeping you back for the mercy of the merciful one who asks.

What do you want me to do for you? Jesus

Speak of your need despite others silencing your curiosity.

Believe mercy will always meet it, always meet you.

Lift your eyes to the hills.

Your help will come.

Continue and believe.

I’m linking up with other writers at Tell His Story. https://marygeisen.com/in-the-middle-of-winter-guest-post/

https://marygeisen.com/the-one-word-that-almost-wasnt/