Lost Things

Well, I finished Levi's book tonight (late Monday night), a perfect end to a restful 3-day weekend.

Levi Wilkins:  A beloved husband, father, friend, mentor, firefighter, author, mountain climber, marathon runner, stage 4 adrenal cancer survivor, a fellow Oklahoman, and a brother in Christ.  I knew of him through my cousin, Ashley, and I prayed and donated to their family during his arduous cancer journey.  Having never met the Wilkins fam in person, I felt connected after following his blog for a couple years...

I was shocked and sad to hear that Levi was killed in a mountain climbing accident in September 2023.  The more I've reflected on that, particularly after reading this book, the more I see God working through this story.

While battling cancer, Levi wrote several essays he intended to publish in a book.  Posthumously, his friend, Doug, took on finishing that project for him, adding forewords and reflections by close friends, along with the eulogy speech and a few photos at the end of the book.  

Levi's words are thought-provoking, poignant, real, funny, and inspiring.  In the midst of deep suffering and internal wrestling, he consistently returns to the light of Christ and the hope of the Gospel.  These essay chapters are not in chronological order, but in the order Levi wanted them read... it adds an interesting element, like watching a show that flips back and forth between different years and seasons in the character's life.  All things considered, this book is rich and hopeful, and I highly recommend it! ❤

Levi's wife and children visiting the place where he fell...
Praying for God's abundant grace in their lives!

Some highlights and favorite quotes:

A climbing friend describing him: "he continued to live his life in big, awe-inspiring ways; not flippantly approaching risk, but embracing it boldly and responsibly."

Levi's introduction:  "I was not supposed to be a patient or victim. In fact, I was the guy who swept into other people's lives when they had problems, and then I made things better... But then: cancer... May these notes enable you to continue placing one foot in front of the other when the unexpected happens in the midst of this crazy, beautiful, heart-breaking thing we call life... To those curious souls who are either bold enough or naïve enough to look into the dark night of the soul and search for the light within: read on."

Awaiting the first surgery:  "I have fought it my entire life, but now my struggle is at an end. I am called to love Him more... At ten o'clock last night I gave up the thing that is most dear to me - my family - in exchange for Christ. He is taking care of them anyway, and much more so than I ever could.  I will lie down on that cold operating table tomorrow morning in peace... To the pure, all things are pure."

"This week, I've been broken by both pain and despair... unable to help my family move through life, I felt discarded because of my brokenness, an island of purposelessness amidst the swirl of a family's life... I try to wrap up all of my thoughts with a neat bow on top just like my writing, but the truth is sometimes I'm just shattered inside, despite all desire to the contrary. But I think the Gospel has a lot to say about broken things and purpose."

"I found that the hardest part of the whole experience was looking out at the huge monstrosity that is the suffering ahead. I could handle this moment's suffering easily enough, but not all of it at once... Maybe I should stay there, then, and not let my head get the better of me by trying to melodramatically bring all of the oncoming suffering into the field of view all at once."

"'So what's it like having Stage 4 Cancer?' Nobody has asked me this question. I'm going to answer it anyway." lol

"I'm not worried this is the end or anything.  It feels more like a bump in the road, an inconvenience that we'll make it through... But what if this is it?  What if this is how my story ends?  It's a shitty ending, really.  Totally unoriginal. He died of cancer. Oh, how sad."  *I love that he overcame cancer and got a better ending. He loved others well and lived with an adventurous and ambitious spirit. He wrote an inspiring book, and he died doing something he loved, climbing a mountain with friends!

"It's easy to look at the pale, drawn faces and the IVs filled with poison and see only death at work here, but the truth is that a lot of life happens here, too.  It's just harder to see - So here's to hoping things aren't as they seem, that there's radiance and beauty hidden just beneath the surface... I think it's there, and I sure hope to see it."

'That really is its own form of suffering - just a fear that I'm forever somehow just diminished. Like I'm less me than I was before."

Planning his next climb:  "I know it's ambitious. A lot of things have to fall into place just so for me to beat cancer and have time to get into shape to make that happen. But if you only ever make little plans, how are you ever going to do great things?"

"I'm scared of my upcoming surgery - after all, my pancreas, stomach, intestines, kidney, and adrenal gland are all up for grabs - but I'm trying to hope.  I'm trying to remember that, despite the indifference and occasional darkness of life, there's meaning in every moment and that, when death finally does come, whether it be soon or far off in the future, there's goodness on the other side. After all, the stars burn brightest in the blackest of night."

Mid-way through chemo:  "So when I say I'm doing well, I really mean it.  Even cancer people are allowed to have good days! I'll admit, at first I did feel an obligation to be defined by and dedicated to this cancer thing.  But I read somewhere that it's okay to be okay.  So I've given myself the freedom to do just that... And when I'm in the mist of one of these valleys, I'll be honest with you if you ask about it.  Because that's the main thing that cancer is teaching me - how to be honest and authentic, both with myself and others."

"The thing about fear is that it disturbs our ideas of what should be... but I'll bet God knows better than we do what should be, and He's driving this ship whether we like it or not."

"My body is dying, and quickly, but my soul has never been more alive.  Today, I am thankful for my wounds."

"I've spent a lot of time in this place, and right now I'm tired of it.  But thank God that all storms pass.  And in the meantime, I hold fast..."

"This all comes to an end someday, and whatever it is you think happens afterward begins. I don't say it to sound morbid, I say it to bring hope. Now is the time to forgive. Now is the time to live. Now is the time to do something you always wanted but never thought you could. Money comes and goes, jobs are fleeting, and the grass on your front lawn will keep growing back.  So take a risk and love people and be vulnerable with them.  Don't just exist, but live abundantly.... This is your one and only shot. Make it count."

Victory:  "An hour ago I rang the bell at the cancer center, meaning I'm finished with treatment... Everything has changed for me this morning, but for all these people it's just Wednesday... Life is funny like that.  Every day is somebody's biggest day ever, and every day is just another day for so many other people. It's all just part of the beautiful, chaotic life that we lead... I love it all so much, and I'm so glad I get to see more of it."

In his third round of chemo:  "Is that sad, or is it the grace of God that such suffering no longer seems extraordinary?"

Awaiting surgery:  "I think that maybe now, sitting up in the middle of the night because I can't sleep for thinking about all the terrible things that might occur two days from now, God is asking me to believe in stupid things too.  He's asking me to believe that good still happens in a broken world and that, at the end of all this, there's more beauty to be found than we can even imagine.  He's asking me to believe that He is for me and that I am loved despite my deepest doubts and that He can see me through even this.  He's asking me to believe that He is so good that one day we'll look back on this shit world and it won't even matter that much in comparison to the glory that surrounds us."

~Levi Wilkins

❤

Shame and Vulnerability

I didn't connect as much with Anatomy of the Soul, but this one (Curt Thompson's second book) really made an impact!  To paraphrase and summarize it, shame stems from relational abandonment, whether real or threatened... and our healing MUST come in the context of safe relationships - these wounds cut deep into our way of thinking and viewing ourselves, and we cannot work out shame wounds in isolation.  Shame carries the fear of being inadequate, forsaken, or abandoned, the lie that we are not important enough for God to remain with us.  Love and shame are opposing forces... the presence of the Holy Spirit embodying the voice of love, and our spiritual enemy pushing the messages of shame. Our indulgent sin and idolatry is an attempt to satisfy our hunger for relationships, our longing to be known and loved and desired. And vulnerability is the gate we must pass through to deepen our connections with God and other people.

"No one ever feels the sharp sting of shame apart from an initial encounter with someone else that, despite perhaps even having no conscious intention to do so, activates the shame response."
(We only experience shame in relationship, so it must be healed there, as well.)

"I need to hear that my behavior was really as bad as I think, if not worse, while simultaneously sensing that the person I am confessing to is not leaving."

"Of all the variables that encourage the development of secure attachment in a child, the single most powerful one is the degree to which the child's parent has made coherent sense of his or her own story."  (Strong motivation for me to be intentional about healing.)

"Part of shame's power lies in its ability to isolate... Shame's healing encompasses the counterintuitive act of turning toward what we are most terrified of... we anticipate this vulnerable exposure to be so great that it will be almost life threatening.  But it is in the movement toward another, toward connection with someone who is safe, that we come to know life and freedom from this prison."

"To be human is to be vulnerable... Honest vulnerability is the key to both healing shame and preventing it from taking further root in our relationships and culture."

-Curt Thompson, MD

Here it is again - how vital our relationships are and how important it is to have safe people you can talk to about past trauma or hidden sin struggles to find healing.  Brene Brown is big on telling your story to safe people because saying it out loud takes away most of shame's power... but that felt like a worldly message to me until I read this book.  The whole "shout your abortion" movement and other cultural things where people seek to minimize shame by pretending it's all okay and being proud of whatever sin they've chosen.  This is not that.

This is admitting that our perspective is skewed by shame, and seeking healing and re-integration in the context of safe relationships.  As Jennie Allen put it, "The only way to heal from trauma is to not be alone in whatever trauma happened to you... There's a reason you do that behavior, and it's a part of you that needs to feel seen, safe, and soothed."

So anyway, my close friends can probably expect some deeper conversations on this in the future.  Someday.  I paused the audiobook to think through how that talk might go, then I had to stop the imagined conversation in my mind to preserve my mascara before work last week. lol  So I'll have to work up to it.

 

Anyway, here are a few of the latest memes I've saved, just to end with something lighter:

Snobby cats make me laugh...

True story. lol

"It's the most wonderful time of the yeeeear!"

Aww, tornado drill memories. lol

Happy Saturday Sunday now, friends and fam! ❤

Annie's Writing Advice

"Anne Lamott says, 'Write like your parents are dead,' and I just could not disagree more with that.  I understand that for some writing, that might be right.  But for my writing and my life, sacrificing your real life people on behalf of telling the story you want to tell does not play well in the long run.  If they're still in your life and if you're still working on a healthy relationship... there has to be an off-record life." 

~Annie F. Downs

I've thought about this so many times since I heard her say it on a podcast with Eddie last week.

"Sacrificing your real life people on behalf of telling the story you want to tell does not play well in the long run."  

Agreed.

Annie Downs and Emily Freeman

For the record, I enjoyed Anne Lamott's Bird by Bird book on writing, and I understand what she's saying with that advice and even quoted it in my 2015 post linked above.  Her book made me want to be a more honest and less inhibited writer, to say the real stuff that's difficult to say.  For someone sharing a traumatic backstory about a severed relationship, her advice is probably a bit more fitting.

Anne Lamott's advice is definitely more popular among writers, but Annie's statement feels more powerful, more aligned with my personality, and more God-honoring... and I'm grateful that this advice is also coming from a seasoned and successful author!  

Being more honest about my own struggles is something good to strive for, but I want to be careful about honoring others where our stories are intertwined.  Any time I have worked on a potential book, the biggest "writer's block" I have dealt with is this major internal argument with myself in trying to figure out how much to say and what's okay to share.  I have often felt like I'm being too timid or cowardly in not being willing to just put it all out there, Prince Harry style, but this helps me reframe that caution as relational wisdom.

My real life people matter more to me than any blog post or book ever could.  Even if I became a New York Times best-selling author, that would still hold true.  And even the ones who have left my life or made big decisions I disagree with - I don't want to publish words that would shame or dishonor them.  I do still want to write a book that tells some personal stories, but to stay true to myself and God and my family and friends, I will need to do that very thoughtfully, maybe changing certain names/details and getting the permission and approval of any friends or family I write about.  Which sounds freeing and fun, as I'm thinking it all through here.

Starting fresh on the book could be the best strategy for lots of reasons.  Even though it's a small group of readers and a blog that's not accessible to search engines, I need to be better about that here, as well, and will make an effort to do so moving forward!  **Please ALWAYS feel very free to let me know if I've posted any photo or quote or story you'd rather not have here for any reason, even if it's something from years ago.

Anyway, I could go on about this topic for a while.  But the summary is that I'm very thankful for Annie's wise advice and this reminder that keeping some things off-the-record is vital to cultivating healthy relationships, which is at all times a massive priority for me!! ❤

Words of Wisdom Wednesday!

"The ability to easily explain suffering is the clearest indicator of never having suffered... Death does not transform into life easily.  Redemption costs, and whenever we encounter it, we can be certain we have stepped into the realm of the supernatural."

"I believe one principle of Scripture is that in order for any truth to bear fruit as God intended, it must be worked out in me prior to my delivering it to others... You cannot lead a traumatized individual into the power of His resurrection unless that same power has been exerted over the bondages and fears of your own life."

"If you are going to enter into the suffering of those who have been traumatized, you have to learn how to sit with and listen to fear, anger, and great grief with compassion and understanding.  You will also have to learn how to do it for far longer than you prefer... Be patient, and then be patient some more."

"You and I become the representative of God to the [trauma] survivor.  Our work is to teach in the seen that which is true in the unseen.  Our words, tone of voice, actions, body movements, responses to rage, fear, failure all become ways that the survivor learns about God. I believe the reputation of God Himself is at stake in our lives. We are called to represent Him well."

(All quotes above are by Diane Langberg in Suffering and the Heart of God)

"And He has committed to us the message of reconciliation. We are therefore Christ's ambassadors, as though God were making His appeal through us."  ~2 Corinthians 5:19-20 NIV

"When someone has been given much, much will be required in return; and when someone has been entrusted with much, even more will be required." ~Luke 12:48 NLT

"For whoever has [spiritual wisdom because he is receptive to God’s word], to him more will be given, and he will be richly and abundantly supplied; but whoever does not have [spiritual wisdom because he has devalued God’s word], even what he has will be taken away from him."  ~Matthew 13:12 AMP

Happy Wednesday, friends.  This week is intense with work and school and family stuff, but I am thankful for this reminder today.  Sanctification (moving toward Christ, loving and honoring Him with our lives) matters.

These things are true for counselors, but also for every child of God.  We have the sobering calling and the sacred privilege of being His ambassadors.

Our words and our responses may have a greater impact than we realize on hurting people.  May we be receptive to God's Word and use well what we have been given, may our heart attitudes become more and more like Christ, and may we represent Him well!!

❤ ❤ ❤ ❤ ❤ ❤ ❤

Unchanging (Words of Wisdom Wednesday)

My latest audiobook was Jen Wilkin's "None Like Him: 10 Ways God is Different From Us (And Why that's a Good Thing)."  Thoughtfully written and powerful.  My favorite chapter was titled "Immutable: The God of Infinite Sameness."

“The Scriptures speak of a God who does not change.  Like the tallest mountain peak on the horizon, from generation to generation, God stands unchanging, immutable, anchoring the landscape of human existence as all else around Him ebbs and flows, blossoms and withers, waxes and wanes.  The Rock of our salvation endures.  

“For I, the LORD, do not change.” -Malachi 3:6

“Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever.” -Hebrews 13:8 

James celebrates the goodness of the God “with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change” (James 1:17). 

He is immutable, not just unchanging, but incapable of change of any kind...  The past holds for Him no missed opportunity. The present holds for Him no anxiety. The future holds for Him no uncertainty. He was, and is, and is to come.”

Honestly, I had a rough day yesterday - just feeling overwhelmed and anxious and a little shaky and off physically.  But the truth of these words is bringing me great comfort today.  God's love, His goodness, His power, His individual plan for each of us -- it's not going anywhere.  He has ordained our days, and we can trust Him.  Jen says the only real constant is not change, but GOD.  I love that.  So I am thankful that we all have the ability to change and grow and mature, even in the areas where we feel most stuck.  And I am thankful that our God will never change.

“We live differently when we regard the future as a place we will go 'if the Lord wills.'  God does not owe me the seventy or eighty years of which Moses speaks in Psalm 90.  Every year He gives is a gift, gracious and undeserved.  Thanks be to God, not just for the years He has preserved me but for the years He has ordained for me, perfect in number and known only to Him.”  ~Jen Wilkin ❤

Below are her questions at the end of that chapter... all very worth some thought.

Questions for Reflection: 

1. How is the knowledge that God does not change reassuring to you? How might it be a caution to you as well?
   
   
2. What human relationship, possession, or circumstance do you cling to for stability instead of our unchanging God? How reliable have you found that substitute Rock to be?
   
   
3. How prone are you to use "always" or "never" language in an argument?  What might this tendency reveal about your belief?
   
   
4. What "always" or "never" have you wrongly believed to be true of yourself?  Of someone else?  Of a circumstance or relationship?
   

"Close in prayer.  Write a prayer to the Lord confessing one thing about yourself you have believed to be unchangeable.  Ask Him for an awareness of where you have grown hardened and for grace to learn to change.  Thank Him for the great gift of human changeability.  Praise Him that He, the Lord, does not change!”

I hope you find this truth encouraging/comforting today, as well.  

Happy Wednesday, friends and family!

Photo Friday + Words of Wisdom

Lord willing, I will close on my new home one week from today.  Get excited!  

The six months of living with Mom and Dad has gone by faster than expected, and I am both excited and a little exhausted at the thought of the moving process ahead!

As I settle in, I will try to keep this in mind:

"Give it six weeks.  And by it, I mean nearly everything.

Whether it's the new school year or a new job, or maybe you're newly single or starting a new health focus or getting sober.  Maybe you went back to school for the first time in twenty years or maybe you've got a newborn or you're new in town.

Whatever change is working its way through the systems of your life, change is hard - even good change - and finding your footing in a new landscape is hard, and doing something new always takes more energy than we think.  And here's a big thing: putting pressure on yourself to do it better/faster/more seamlessly actually doesn't help - it only adds a heavy weight to carry...

Time, grace, self-compassion. Patience, asking for help, releasing the pressure.

Six weeks - at least."

~Instagram post by Shauna Niequist, 10-13-22

* * * * * * *

And without further ado, here are a few pics from Carter's football game on Monday night!  It was nice weather and fun to sit with Mom and chat a bit with some of the CHA moms.  

Here's Carter and Nathaniel being serious and intense footballers! lol

Kyndal and Kenzie, ready to strike a pose or two... Miss K is loving her new CHA ID badge and glittery badge holder! lol

Jaceman and Barrett

Carter is number 9

I wasn't really following the football game, but I did get some good pics where you could see his number, so yay for that! lol

They had a special thing where the elementary girls got to cheer with the junior high girls at halftime, and seeing so many parents videoing at the fence made me laugh!

Aww, fun memories of CHA cheer clinics and usually being the "backspot" who steadied the flier's ankles then caught them under their arms as they came down!

CHA won - yay!

Google Photos made me a color pop of this one too.  They're two of the better players on the team, and this is kind of a perfect pic for how seriously they take football.  (Well, them and the majority of Americans. lol  I'm not in that club, but I enjoy the games and the whole team spirit atmosphere there!)

The foundation was there last week, and on Wednesday, they were putting up the frame for the house right behind me... makes me happy that it's the one moving fastest out of the three being built on that side of the street. =)  And I like the whole vibe/energy of being in a place with a lot of new homes and people starting new stories!

Mom and Dad and Shane (my realtor) joined me for the walk-through on Wednesday.  We got blue dot stickers to place anywhere we saw paint issues, and the Taber guys did a short educational portion teaching me some basics about my new fireplace, appliances, alarm setup, sprinkler system, storm shelter, etc.  There's a booklet I'll get with all that info next week, which is good news because I doubt it all stuck in my brain.  We got to make a couple little requests and get several of our questions answered.  It's really nice that they do this!  Next Wednesday will be a final walk-through to confirm that they've made the changes, and then I'll close on Friday!!

We will probably do the epoxy or some other coating on my garage floor... but it makes me happy that the only verse you can still see is this one on the foundation inside my storm shelter... "I will look to the Lord, and confident in Him I will keep watch.  I will wait with HOPE and expectancy for the God of my salvation.  Do not gloat over me, my enemy!  Thought I have fallen, I will rise.  Though I sit in darkness, the Lord will be my LIGHT!"  ~Micah 7:7-8  I love the placement, and it's one of my favorite verses, and I remember dripping sweat while writing it in the intense July heat! lol

So that's all I've got for today.  Happy Friday, friends and family!  Hope you have a lovely weekend ahead!  

May you "fix your thoughts on what is true and good and right. Think about things that are pure and lovely, and dwell on the fine, good things in others.  Think about all you can praise God for and be glad about." ❤

AFD on Singleness

Annie F. Downs did a lengthy Q&A podcast on Singleness this week.  She's a Christian author and speaker who lives with a God-centered joy and hope and confidence as a single woman.  And as someone who's walking a similar road about five years behind her, I really appreciate her insight on this topic!  Below are some quotes from that podcast that I wanted to take the time to write down and remember...

 

I am really paying attention to who I listen to right now.  I have a lot of friends that have a lot of good opinions about my life and about things I'm walking through, but I'm also going: When you say that, what have I seen in the rest of your life?  And how do I know you're connecting with God right now?  And how have I seen you trustworthy in the past?

I don't think you have to believe that you are called to singleness unless you feel that and feel like that's what God has put on your heart.  I think we're allowed to desire every day until God either meets our desire or He meets us...  I do not think there is an age you have to stop hoping.  Because the real question is:  When do I have to stop hoping?  And the answer is: don't.  Never stop hoping unless your desire changes.  We will not be a group of friends who are without hope!

We can redirect the conversation from a place of love.  Understand that no one is approaching you about your singleness because they want to rub in your face that you do not have something.  They are walking toward you because they care.  So just be direct... Communication is the key.  Being a good communicator on behalf of your own heart is really important.  Let's remember that our dating and married friends were at one point single, and they are really trying.  They are not trying to be trite or trying to be discouraging.  Some of them have been married half their lives, and they do not know what it's like to be single here (at this age).  God has heard you every time you pray.  He cares about every detail of your life.  And it is in His heart to give you the story that will make you have the life that brings Him the most glory and that brings you a lot of joy and moves the gospel forward!

Your feelings can ride, but they don't get to drive.  You can feel left out and hurt, but then you tell yourself the truth!  No one else is getting what God has for you.  Everyone is getting what God has for them.  Not one of my friends has married the man I'm supposed to be with.  No one is birthing a child that you were meant to birth.  No one has been given the gift from God that God has for me.  So with some sadness and pain and feelings, I can celebrate what God has given them because I want God to give everyone the thing they want.  My story is my story, and God is not messing up my story and doing someone else's right.  We have an abundance mindset here: God has enough good things for all of us!

Q:  How do I know if I should be dating or if I should just embrace my singleness?
A:  What do you want to do?  If you want to be dating, be dating.  Are you totally happy being single right now?  Trust it.  Trust your body, trust your heart, trust your mind if you are walking with Jesus.  You can trust yourself.  And the longer you are a person, the better you'll know yourself.  If you don't want to put yourself out there, don't.  You are totally welcome to not date again.  No one is making you be in relationship if you don't want to be.  Trust yourself...  You are not going to miss what God has for you if you feel exhausted with dating, if you feel tired of dating, if you are hurt.  Overarching, no matter what, you are not going to miss God's best plan for you if you are pursuing God's best plan for you and if you say to Him, I want in my life what You have for me!

When you try to kill hope, you actually kill a lot of other things in you.  If you cut off the bottom feelings, you're cutting off the top ones too.  And I don't know you, so I cannot imagine why you wouldn't be good enough for someone to marry.  Because you are made in the image of God, and you are lovely in a thousand ways.  I guarantee that, because God doesn't make mistakes, and He doesn't make people that are not lovely in many ways.

I think everybody has body image issues.  He's not looking for a toned-down version of me or a smaller version of me.  When someone is taking you on dates, choose to believe you are attractive to them.  Be as healthy as you can, but release the pressure to look a certain way.  He wants to be with you, so don't show up trying to be anybody else.  Be all the way you!

Let me tell you what is actually true:  No one will love me as long or as well as Jesus loves me.  And I don't know that I would've known that at 20.  But my primary relationship through the rest of my life is with Jesus.   Because whoever comes along next will not live my 20s and 30s with me, and they did not know me as a kid, most likely.  So I have learned very profoundly that Jesus is the primary relationship of my life!  I'm in pretty constant communication with God.  I feel so lucky that I can process every moment of every relationship with God... I'm not alone.  He's right there with me.  So I'm constantly praying because I'm constantly processing.  The person you can trust the most to handle your pain the best is God.  Be a good communicator with God!

When you're an adult living on your own, you can start thinking about what rhythms you want to have.  You may want to spend certain holidays with your friend community.  But if you want to be with your family for every holiday, do that!  They love you and they know you.  It isn't, like, I have to stop being at these holidays in order to be a grown-up.  No, you don't.  Do what you want to do and what feels healthiest for you!  Something I say a lot is: Wherever I am, I am all there.  Of course I battle the lie that I'm missing out... and truly, you are missing out on wherever you aren't.  So that is not a lie that you're missing out.  What you have to deal with is the lie that you are in the wrong place.

I have a sister who is married with a child, and of our group of sibling and cousin relationships, multiple are married, and I'm the oldest.  I'm the firstborn of that side of our family.  It is hard, and I had to work through some things with God and in counseling.  But I worked through them so that by the time we were standing next to each other, there was joy.  And I will say again, no one has gotten the spouse that God has for me!

Don't give up on the church because they have not handled your life stage very well.  Most of our pastors are men who got married when they were 22.  They got married young and went to seminary years ago when singleness was not as prominent in the church as it is now.  Most of them don't know what to do.  So feel your sadness and disappointment in your local expression of the church not doing what you wish they would... and then start fixing it.  The best thing you can do is be a part of the solution.  A lot of people are disappointed in the church for different reasons.  The solution is, if you want to see something change in the community you live in, start being a part of changing it!

I love my life!  I'm content in my life.  I also do not have everything I want.  Both are actually true...  I could live this life as it has grown and changed for the rest of my life.  I have things that I really want and I will continue to hope for.  So that's how contentment has played out in my life: I have built a life that I love, and I still have things that I want.

All of us could be dating anyone right now if we dated anyone.  But there's something you care about that you have not found yet.  So keep waiting for the thing you're looking for.   If you had no standards, you know today where you could go find someone to date you, to sleep with you, to probably marry you.  But that's not what we're looking for.  So consider settling - I'd suggest you consider it so that you know why you don't want to!

Your words have the power of life and death.  If the context is, I am saying something that is not life-giving because I'm afraid or because I'm hurt, don't speak that stuff out loud.  Speak life over yourself:  I'm available to relationship.  I am working on my mental and emotional and spiritual and physical health, and that is going to make me better in relationship than I would have been yesterday.  I am open to meeting someone new.  I am available for relationship.  I am not married yet, but I hope to be.  I do not have kids yet, but I hope to.  Using that life-giving language affects the world you live in.

Sometimes I pace back and forth in my hallway, and I say out loud:  "God, You are kind.  God, You are good.  God, You are for me.  God, You are working everything out according to Your will.  God, You care about every detail of my life."  ...And my hope stands on top of those sentences.  Every single one of these questions, the question under the question is: Does God love me, and does He see me? And am I going to be okay?  So what I would say to you, friends, is God loves you.  And God sees you.  And you are going to be okay.  I promise in the long run, you are going to be okay.  There is not one story in my life in any area where I have not been able to look back on when it was done and say, that was God, and that was His kindness... even if I lost a relationship or a person or in tragedy, He still is God, and He is kind! ❤❤❤

~Annie F. Downs, TSF Q&A: Singleness podcast, released on 8-18-21

The Smallest Hope

"Here is my servant whom I have chosen, the one I love, in whom I delight; I will put my Spirit on Him, and He will proclaim justice to the nations.  He will not fight or shout or raise His voice in public.  He will not crush the weak or quench the smallest hope.  He will persist until He causes justice to triumph.  And His name will be the hope of all the world." 

~Matthew 12:18-21 ❤

Sharing because these verses, especially the last three sentences, were encouraging for me today!  Hope you find strength and comfort in them too.

Happy Tuesday, friends and fam.  Hope it's been good so far!  Now here are a few random pics and quotes I haven't posted yet...

I'm convinced that I think about death more than the average person, but that's not a terrible thing according to Ecclesiastes, and it helps us follow the advice below.  It's good to remind ourselves that life is short and unpredictable, and to make sure the people we love know that we love and care about them.  I'm thankful for those who have done that well for me. I got a call from JEM just checking in a few days ago that was unexpected but meant a lot to me - little things like that can make a huge difference when someone is having a rough day.

Mark's birthday was May 2nd (our awesome CHA friend, Mark, who passed away from lung cancer in 2016), so I texted his mom to say I was thinking of her and remembering him.  She was grateful and very kind, and she sent back a picture of her with his son after he won a medal in a golf tournament recently (Mark's favorite sport), and that all made me happy.

Subject change, but I'm trying to incorporate more jogging back into my workout routine.  Not as fun for me as the bike rides and strength training and yoga, but I want to get one more race medal, and I know the cardio is good for me so long as I keep proper form!

I'll still be on the bike most days, too, just maybe for shorter rides.  Cody's latest XOXO ride was fun times last week!

This was posted in one of my Peloton groups, and it's true.  I'm proud of myself for fighting for joy and hope, and I applaud you if you've been working to do the same!  It's worth the effort, always. #chooselife

Something light and happy - Lindsay's baby, Waverly ("Wavy J"), with the biggest LV bow ever!  How adorable is her smiley self!?  And Lindsay cracks me up buying this bow! lol

Mom and I went by Dad's office a couple weeks ago, and I took this pic in their break room.  All the motivational quotes you could ever want are on the walls somewhere in that office. lol  And all the candy and cookies and Mike Muecke water you could ever want are in there, too. =)

Took this one to send to Rach - I was surprised seeing her in so many of the staff pictures on the wall, but she did work there for several years back in the day!

Another lovely reminder quote...

I'm saving a lot of these lately.  Action leads to momentum, so I'm challenging myself to push forward on a few things that truly matter to me.  It's good to consider the cost and be certain about the goal, but you can get stuck overanalyzing that stuff, and I don't want to let comfort or cowardice stop me from living a full and meaningful life!! ❤

I'm donating a few old books that I no longer want or need... but I felt kinda weird about my name being on the front page when they're going to random strangers, so I ripped it out and had a pile of name confetti. lol

I think that's all the randomness I have for you today. 

May the 4th be with you! ;-)

Try Softer

As a devoted Christian, a childhood trauma survivor, and a licensed counselor, Aundi Kolber has a lot of valuable wisdom to share, as well as practical coping skills to teach, and she does so with gentleness and compassion.  She gives you practical suggestions and exercises at the end of each chapter to apply what you learned.  I recommend this book to anyone sincerely seeking wholeness and healing from past wounds.  Below are a few of my favorite quotes from her first book, Try Softer, (which I read cover to cover in two days, which may be a personal record):

"We come by these tendencies honestly.  We've learned to white-knuckle our way through life to armor up against pain and difficulty; we believe minimizing our wounds is the only way we'll be loved."

"You don't have to dismiss your pain here.  You don't need to shrink it down or pretend living through it wasn't hard. We know God is with us through it all, but that doesn't mean life hasn't cracked you open... The wounds you have experienced are valid.  What's happened in your life matters."

"The work of trying softer begins when we release our desire for the quick fix and tend to the wounds underneath the surface.  Otherwise, we're going to stay stuck."

"Change happens in layers and is rarely linear. It takes as long as it takes. It's okay to be unfinished... The process of blooming is as valuable as the flower it produces." ❤

"Part of my brain knew I was deeply loved by God, but because of my own unresolved trauma, I couldn't think myself into experiencing His love for me... It's only been through intentionally working with my own pain that I have come to experience the true reality of a good, kind, and compassionate God."

"Research shows that taking longer to exhale than to inhale signals to our nervous system that we are safe."

"The way in which you move through hardship matters greatly.  It can predict whether something becomes integrated into your experience and loses its intensity or builds in power to the point that you feel it might overwhelm you."

"It's difficult to build toward compassion - toward ourselves or others - if we continue to be highly critical of everything around us."

"Before we know something is happening in our conscious mind (including our emotions), we know it first in our body... We must begin to listen to what our bodies are telling us. We always pay a price when we try to live disembodied lives. Our memories and experiences do not simply go away.  Our bodies are their keepers, for better or worse."

"No matter how hard we try, we can't hate or shame ourselves into change. Only love can move us toward true growth."

"I pray you remember to be gentle with yourself as you grow, knowing condemnation never leads us onward but instead stunts the process... And when you are weary, may you never - no, never - lose heart.  May you know in an experiential, personal, and transformational way that the One who has called you is faithful." ❤