Stillness

Subject: Prayer

Abuse Survivor, bravery, confidence, contentment, courage, Faith, grace, hope, memoir, mercy, Peace, Prayer, Stillness, Trust, Vulnerability, writing

I find my phone to stop the alarm then drift for a minute, catch myself before falling into the bliss of a half hour.

It is chilly. I reach for the smooth treasure of indispensable device and question where I laid my glasses. My hand smooths the covers searching and there, good, they are there.

Many mornings I can’t find them, they’ve either been knocked from the table or buried in the covers, haphazardly left wherever, when my eyes grow heavy from straining over bedtime words.

This morning was easy, there they were right beside me waiting.

I said, “Thank you, Lord, for how easy that was.”

Realizing there is more, will be more for which I will say thanks.

Maybe that’s why Paul told the people to pray without ceasing.

Maybe he didn’t expect them to linger without taking a break with their faces to the ground.

Because that is not possible, to stay prayerfully posed all the day through.

Maybe praying without ceasing means just saying thanks for seemingly unimportant and not so life affecting things.

Like finding your glasses without having to crawl quietly on the floor next to your bed with your husband still sleeping hoping you don’t wake him…

To let “thank you, Lord” be as natural in your thoughts in the little things, practice for the big ones that life assures us will come back around.

Gently triggered, prayer is an audible or thoughtful response.

Maybe praying without ceasing isn’t impossible or silly at all.

But, is necessary and natural, a good for you practice like sleeping, breathing, eating, running, working or thinking.

A spontaneous response, rising up from the uninhibited ever expanding wellness of our souls.

Thank you, Lord, for words and thank you for your mercy when I struggle yet again with brevity in my expression through prose.

Thank you big time for making me brave enough to continue.

For thoughts that are informal, even casual or a little comical.

That you help me turn into words.

Thank you for accepting my offering of them to you as prayers.

To continue and believe.

Thank you for everything.

For the subject this morning:

Prayer.

I’m linking up with others who enjoyed the wisdom of Michele Morin at Tell His Story today!

Surprise! God Has Your Best Interest at Heart- Guest Post

You Can Rest Now

bravery, confidence, contentment, courage, Faith, grace, hope, kindness, memoir, Peace, praise, Prayer, rest, Stillness, Uncategorized, Vulnerability, waiting, wonder

“He makes me lie down in green pastures. He leads me beside still waters.”

‭‭Psalms‬ ‭23:2‬ ‭ESV‬‬

I had the most peaceful morning. I had slept so very well, the kind like a Saturday morning when it was just natural to sleep in.

Then I was easy on myself, I sipped coffee with the “grand-dog” near and eventually made myself breakfast, well, it was brunch.

It was to be a challenging day. I decided not to rush.

It felt like the right choice.

Interviews today, the call back for seconds, there would be three of them.

The first, a sharply dressed young woman.

I listened as she answered their questions, a panel of four, plus me.

She was articulate and graceful and I noticed the tremor in her voice, the sound that became less possible, the strain of nerves, a rush of something taking control.

I paid attention as she continued, answered tough questions about some things she didn’t really know.

She, a year older than my youngest child and she was an applicant for my job.

I watched as she continued, a question posed about management style, multi-tasking and de-escalations of conflict.

She answered without pause, said she’s a big believer in therapy and she had at one time thought it unimportant, her emotional self-care.

She talked about mental health, used the subject in a sentence about her church. Every area of her life, she had exposed to the light of the needs she knew, her own and others’.

Now she knows, she knows the value of taking care, of being alone.

The necessity of a sort of reset.

Had it been appropriate, I would have told her thank you, thank you for that.

Because you are brave.

Brave enough to know yourself and to continue the pattern you know that is right for you.

The thing that keeps you well, not just “fine” or pushing through.

This morning, I realized how desperately I was in need of rest.

It was so good, the way I slept.

Like I’d been out for a while and all the while someone so kind had been keeping their kind heart and eyes on me.

The word “recovery” came to mind and it seemed odd because I am well.

It was fitting though, this sense of this season representing recovery from exhausting patterns I’d become accustomed to.

I so greatly needed rest, I’d been unable to feel my own fatigue.

Until I began to see

you need it.

It’s an inward shift.

Today, I mentally applauded someone who admitted at one time anxiety made her weak and that now rest keeps her strong.

And so she listens to her mind, her body, her soul and she goes to the place that whispers.

Come away, get to the place you call rest.

You can rest now.

Peace is not found in a fainting towards the finish line pursuit, rather in the place you left it last to continue yet another exhausting other pursuit.

“The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want.”

‭‭Psalms‬ ‭23:1‬ ‭esv

Battle On

Abuse Survivor, bravery, confidence, contentment, courage, doubt, Faith, freedom, happy, memoir, obedience, Peace, Prayer, rest, Stillness, Teaching, Trust, Uncategorized, Vulnerability, wonder

In the Book of Luke, the 21st chapter, Jesus told of a poor widow having very little left to give.

Yet, she gave all she had, two copper coins.

And Jesus noticed.

He noticed her poverty and He noticed her commitment.

my girl and my grandma’s purple pansies

My days have been an absolute hodgepodge of diverse people and places this week.

All the voices loud and mingled together and pointedly expectant of me.

Who am I to have all the supposed answers?

At dusk yesterday I sat alone in the backyard. The clouds were clearing out, one lone puff of one resisting the drift, the last one to fade away.

I woke up today and told myself.

Don’t give up.

Don’t give up because the internal angst has blurred the external hope people read of, hear you speak of and assume you’re quite certain, okay,

It’s all good.

Yes, I say.

Everything gets messy before it becomes clear.

You’ll be super miserable before you walk away, that way you won’t feel guilty for leaving as you know is your typical sweet martyr way.

Or…as my sweet and ever sincere friend said the other day:

The peace you had in the beginning is still there, it is still leading the way. JM

The thing with the battle of the mind, the fight for the settledness of the soul is that it is insidious if we don’t know it is up to us, our own choice to refuse to allow its control.

To say, I know your motives, I know it’s your plan to make me weak from within.

Not happening today.

Today, I will see you in every face I see and I will battle on.

And maybe, just maybe even though not a single soul could ever know my battle, just as I don’t know the one that they own

They may see my countenance renewed and therefore, they may see you!

Chapter 21 of Luke continues with Jesus warning of persecution and it being an opportunity to bear witness of how we are different.

“Settle it therefore in your minds not to meditate beforehand how to answer, for I will give you a mouth and wisdom, which none of your adversaries will be able to withstand or contradict.”

‭‭Luke‬ ‭21:14-15‬ ‭ESV‬‬

I love the permission this gives me not to have to know every single thing.

Mostly I love the permission this gives me to not mull every encounter to the point of misery, rather, to trust I will know how to respond, what to say.

My responses will be different when I respond from the place of peace within.

Still, some may come against me, baffled over my demeanor and ready to push their agenda to topple my resolve and tip my trust from within.

This is earth, not heaven. This is to be expected here.

By your endurance you will gain your lives. Luke 21:19

I won’t give up.

I want to see the plans for my life I have yet to fully see.

Continue and believe.

This part is up to me.

Beautiful Things

Angels, birds, contentment, courage, grace, hope, obedience, rest, Stillness, Uncategorized, Vulnerability

Home too late for walking so I peddled as hard as I could and my arms worked hard, push, pull, push, pull.

The garage was dark and the airdyne was rusty.

I was hissy fit angry over something someone said and my litany of why was wasted on my husband.

Podcast tried to school me on something, I don’t know.

I stared towards nothing

peddling and pushing and pulling.

Until the fuschia caught my eye.

The crepe myrtle puffs of bloom bursting through.

Better

and life, my life I decide is beautiful.

He makes beautiful things.

He makes beautiful things out of us.

“You better?” my husband asks as I come through the door.

“Yes, I am.”

Telling myself,

He knows.

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.

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.

Understanding Better

Abuse Survivor, bravery, confidence, contentment, courage, Faith, heaven, hope, memoir, obedience, Redemption, Salvation, Stillness, Trust, Vulnerability

I wear a bracelet with a charm that encases a mustard seed in a little glass bubble.

A gift I purchased for me.

I need reminding. I need to continuously seek more understanding.

I need to allow my fingers to find and cling to it occasionally, my reminder of faith.

I’ve found a newness of a feeling.

It feels like a treasure, my new enthusiasm for understanding the kingdom of God here on earth and in heaven.

“The Kingdom of Heaven is like a treasure that a man discovered hidden in a field. In his excitement, he hid it again and sold everything he owned to get enough money to buy the field.”

‭‭Matthew‬ ‭13:44‬ ‭NLT‬‬

Understanding of God that both fulfills my deepest longings and increases with assurance what I believe.

I believe more than before that heaven is better than here. The great mystery of it all confounds me less and absolutely intrigues me more.

The disciples asked Jesus why he spoke in a way that included illustrations, parables?

Jesus told them it was important to him that they see.

Jesus feels the same about you and about me.

He’s intent on the increase of our understanding of him, of getting us as close to heavenly thinking as we can be.

If we only and simply even just a tiny bit in the beginning believe.

“Here is another illustration Jesus used: “The Kingdom of Heaven is like a mustard seed planted in a field. It is the smallest of all seeds, but it becomes the largest of garden plants; it grows into a tree, and birds come and make nests in its branches.”

‭‭Matthew‬ ‭13:31-32‬ ‭NLT‬‬

And then we allow our beliefs to grow, we anticipate heaven while we walk more closely to God here on earth.

I’m getting better at believing, believing in what I can’t see and in the fruition of my journey and the flourishing of my faith and the gifts of God in me.

Getting better at trusting that with quiet fascination and intentional nourishment, I will see my faith and the works of my hands continue to grow.

He’s not finished with me yet. Brandon Heath

Linking up with others who are prompted by “better”

Better

Not As Before

Abuse Survivor, Angels, confidence, contentment, courage, doubt, fear, Forgiveness, freedom, grace, hope, kindness, memoir, Peace, Prayer, Redemption, rest, Stillness, surrender, Trust, Uncategorized, Vulnerability, waiting, wonder, writing

I’ve made some decisions and haven’t turned back, took some chances and opportunities recently, things that are teaching me that not everything comes by chance.

Fortune shines on others more than me and

Oh well, it wasn’t meant to be…these were the truths I believed.

Being a believer of a God who is sovereign, who is in control, led to my conclusion that only just enough good could be for me and that as a believer in sovereignty I must surely stay in my place, must not seek more than a little, must stay anchored by doubt and by fear of failure, not trying at all because of the unlikelihood of success.

I intentionally handicap myself.

I’m beginning to learn from my children, adults who have most likely seen this in me all along but never called me on it, accepted my ways for this long.

I wonder how it feels for a child to see a parent finally coming into their own?

Close to 60 years old and becoming strong?

I wonder if they realize in their own way, they helped me here.

To this season of wanting my legacy to be more than the timid and tentative mama, they may have always known. The one whose thoughts were always deep and bent towards worry.

Here now because I want their faith in God and His goodness to be strong.

Several months ago, I lost control.

Headed towards an important event, we were “T-boned” by a crossing car and my car jumped it seemed into the deep ditch and the front end was crushed by a timely positioned pine.

The Labrador, my husband and me. He jumped from the passenger side and I screamed loud and long. It was a very odd and out of control sounding cry. It was fear.

My daughter answered her phone.

“Mama, are you okay? You are okay. You are okay. Now, stop crying, just breathe and calm down.

You’re okay.

Calm down.”

She called her brother. He called me.

Same reaction, the same level tone in a child of mine’s adult voice. It was the same assurance, same calm.

Control what you can control. my son

Months have passed and changes have been made, changes are on the brink of being announced, career, home, and faith.

Changes are taking place.

Last night, I gave up on watching “Ozark”. Intrigued by the young actor with the authentic twang, I told myself to try it again, watch something that at least causes thought.

Fifteen minutes later, I switch to a Julia Roberts movie simply because she’s beautiful and required less attention.

Told my husband I couldn’t watch, don’t want to go to bed with those thoughts.

Still, I was startled awake before light and had to shake off a horrific dream. I knew it was partly me to blame. I watched the gory scene, heard the horrific words, saw the actor’s fear and grief and evil exchanged.

I went over my average daily screen time. I ate extra spicy food and then had red wine and then topped it off with chocolate milk, Advil and crunchy peanut butter on a spoon.

I recalled the nightmare to forget and move forward. Remembering times before. I had the damaged perception to believe that bad dreams were God sent messages to me.

Messages like you’re still that wild and mistake making girl, you’re still the too attractive and easy for your own good young woman, you’re still the poor girl in the ill-fitting tops, you’re still the fat middle schooler in your brother’s husky jeans.

You’re still the woman in the pew unwelcome by the women who are already there.

I don’t think nightmares are for anyone’s good. If there’s nothing else I can control today, I will control this new truth, this new optimistic conclusion.

And I will carry it into my day, I am no longer living the trauma victim way.

“Thereafter, Hagar used another name to refer to the Lord, who had spoken to her. She said, “You are the God who sees me.” She also said, “Have I truly seen the One who sees me?”

‭‭Genesis‬ ‭16:13‬ ‭NLT‬‬

Hagar was a slave girl who followed along with circumstances that caused her to carry a label we today would most likely call “whore”.

I can barely type the word. You see, I’ve been called that before.

In the nightmare last night, I revisited that woman of before; but, she ran, ran, ran ironically away from a church and through the streets to find herself alone in prayer, her face to the floor.

She found God there.

She rose and she walked freely, more freely than before.

What mindsets have held you captive?

You are never in God’s eyes the person you were before.

If you have experiences that lead to nightmares, don’t succumb to the belief that these bad dreams are your restitution for your bad before.

Use the sense that God gave you. Combine it with good and trustworthy therapy and then add in what you know. Know what God knows and can control and then assert yourself to control

What you can control.

Your “resurrection power”, your “freedom living on the inside”.

You called me from the grave by name
You called me out of all my shame
I see the old has passed away
The new has come! Chris Tomlin

Be found in your wilderness, come forward to be seen and to be fully known.

True You, Letting Go of Your False Self to Uncover The Person God Created -Book Review

Abuse Survivor, Art, book review, bravery, Children, confidence, contentment, courage, doubt, Faith, family, freedom, hope, mercy, obedience, Peace, praise, Prayer, Redemption, Stillness, Teaching, Trust, Uncategorized, Vulnerability, wonder, writing

I’ve just finished a book that’s causing me to be more brave, to acknowledge my own unmet needs and my less than consistent motivation and faith.

It’s New Year’s Eve and I am hopeful for 2019! I’m rushing its beginning, my heart longing for change, helped along by a very important book!

My 2019 word, like a label, is Faithful. I’m believing more clearly that God is faithful, more importantly, I’ve decided it’s not too late for me to be faithful in a few things!

I considered deleting the opening sentence of this, it being characteristic of my brooding, possibly seen as seeking attention self, being pitiful. Too honest, too brave.

But, the geese flew over, a loud and harmonious chorus at the very second I felt regret and so I saw that as a sign.

Leave your truth there. It is time, use what you’re beginning to learn.

I’ve just finished a book I’ll read again.

True You by Michelle DeRusha

After reading about her “being called out by God moment” I was challenged to discover the true me, to label the labels I’ve worn all of my life, assigned to me because of circumstances out of my control and handicapped by some of my own mistakes.

But, I couldn’t do any of this suddenly, so I asked God, what are my labels, my idols, my self-handicapping behaviors?

And then I rested and returned to read more and to realize some of my behaviors, my default mindsets and choices are simply what I know as me, keeping me from becoming the me God sees.

I know how to halt my progress, derail the train as it approaches the life changing bend because I’ve not lived in the land of confidence and courage for long enough to extend my stay, to be welcomed in.

To believe it’s a place I could live.

In this book, I gained confirmation of this thing I do, putting limits on my blessings, selling myself short, minimizing my part in my arrival at the place of who I was created to be.

I make it less than it is, the good that’s come my way, through my own hands.

My grandson stood over me as I painted, finishing up pieces for my first exhibit. He sweetly said “You’re really good.”

I smiled and asked “You think so?” He replied yes and asked how’d I get so good at painting.

I replied “I just kept trying, I just kept learning.”

“No, you are a good painter ” he insisted standing so close beside me, captivated as I explained the use of palette knife instead of brush.

And I didn’t discount it, I didn’t insist that he was wrong. I didn’t minimize his sweet praises.

I didn’t do the thing I’ve done for so long, I accepted his assessment of me, I owned it, I believed it belonged.

He labeled me a “good painter”.

Crazy thing, I have been painting for so very long and until that little exchange I’d never felt I could be called an artist, “a painter”.

Always, oh well just the one who keeps trying, keeps trying, I enjoy it, it’s therapy, I had an art scholarship but I flunked out.

Strategically distracting from the accepting of just maybe I’m good.

In Michelle De Rusha’s book I was especially changed by Chapters Four and Five, the ones on brokenness and on dark and desperate periods she refers to as the “hard prune”.

In Chapter Four, I read of the emotional epiphany the author experiences as she comes to terms with her lack of intimacy and utters words to herself that must have surely broken her heart, that her heart was not as close to God as she’d believed.

I didn’t have clarity in my vocation, in my calling as a writer, because I didn’t know who I was in God. Michelle DeRusha

My thought? How brave and how very scary her self revelation!

I had to pause, knowing it’s for me quite the same.

Chapter Five describes seasons of doubt, depression, dark nights of souls.

Unbeknownst to the world until long after her death, Mother Teresa suffered from a long and relentless dark night of the soul. Michelle DeRusha

We’re conditioned to push through those times of dark abyss. We push through, we masquerade, self-medicate with substance and empty activity.

We keep plugging along when what we need most is to accept it, to settle into the solemn and to let the soul get quiet enough for long enough to know what it is it needs to know.

Our culture is contradictory to that response, the letting the sadness and the times devoid of tangible hope do God’s work.

I don’t think I’ve ever thought to welcome seasons like these, I’m quite sure I’ve never thought them beneficial, the blah absence of growth or motivation or meaning.

I never realized they have a reason, there must be a settling into stagnancy, an acceptance of lull in blessing or breakthrough so that we seek Him and find authenticity in our faith again.

We have to let go of the self we created in response to hardship, to circumstances and we must not be pulled back there, to the places we know because we’re afraid of good, it’s too unfamiliar.

We have to allow and own our uncovering of our souls.

Our deepest, truest, most essential self has been waiting all along for this opportunity to be uncovered and exposed to the light, waiting for the invitation to grow into its fullest, richest, most beautiful potential. DeRusha

This book was not easy for me, it was true in ways I hadn’t expected its truth.

Occasionally, I pencilled and tabbed and then set it aside. I feared I was not ready to see some things, afraid to be called out of my past and current patterns.

I was afraid it would be too scary and difficult and even unfair to my messed up me to consider thinking new possibilities of me.

Early one morning I had clarity in making my list of labels and it occurred to me that yes, all of these were decided for you, assigned to you, expected of you.

You simply played along, sat in your corner, came out only when called and never having any inclination that right now you’re still wearing them, really have all along.

God’s seen you quite differently and patiently and consistently is calling you towards His idea of you.

So, my labels I’m letting go of along with their clutching and anxious handhold?

Victim

Misfit

Big girl

Black Sheep

Lost Child

Throwaway Child

Shy Child

Hidden One

The One Without Needs

Addictive Personality

Pitiful

Failure

Dreamer

Middle Child

Quitter

Too Deep

What labels have you lived with for too long?

I signed up to help launch this book and I remember commenting to the author

“Something tells me this book may change my life.”

And it has, it has been a beginning towards change.

I’ve only scratched the surface here.

If you’re ready to live freely, openly and be pruned of unproductive, dormant and decaying parts of you, your “tree”, you should order a copy.

If you order by midnight tonight, there are extra encouraging good things.

I’m so grateful Michelle De Rusha experienced her coming face to face with her self defeating behaviors that hindered her knowing God fully and truly.

Her story is important because she is closer than before to her “God You”.

Me too, hopefully you.