It's Okay...

I don’t know about you, but I, for some crazy reason, am very good at remembering dates of significant events in my life and throughout history. Tomorrow, December 21, is one of those dates that has significance; December 21, 2008 to be exact. I do so well at forgetting (or trying to anyways) throughout the year until the holiday season beings and it hits me. Remember my post from not too long ago called “Purity?” I talked about a story that I hope to be able to share someday. Well this is the one. Although I am not entirely ready to share it, I will say that I went through something that no one should ever have to experience. Unfortunately though, I am neither the first nor the last to go through it. It was emotionally traumatizing and changed me in so many ways. It has made me cautious in some aspects of life and not as cautious as I should be in others. Since that night I have guarded my heart more and my lack of trust grew deeper.

It’s been two years and I wish I could say that everything is okay. But I can’t. It will take time, I know this. I have realized a few things the past couple of days as I have thought about the past. The first is that not all guys are like my ex, the one that hurt me the most. The second is that I have to let go of the shame and guilt that go along with that night. By holding on to it all, I am not giving myself the ability to grow. I have also learned that God has given me amazing friends that are there for me through anything. The fourth and one that I feel is rather important to remember is that it’s okay to not be okay yet. It takes time.

With what I have realized, I hope to trust guys a little bit more. I may have to constantly remind myself that they are not all like him, but I’m okay with that as long as I truly believe it. I hope to completely give this burden to God and not pick it back up, again. I hope to grow as an individual; to have a closer relationship to God and in turn be a better version of myself. I will make sure my dear friends know exactly how much they mean to me and I will continue to thank God everyday for putting them in my life. I will remind myself when I am down that is okay to not always be okay and that God put wonderful people in my life to help me through anything I am going through.

Two years ago, my life changed forever. Being able to write even just this little bit about it is a huge step towards being completely healed. The process takes time but I’ll get there and I’ll be able to share the story in its entirety. Until then I will continue to look to God for guidance and to thank Him for the beautifully chaotic life journey I have been given.

Relationships

As human beings we have a natural desire to feel loved. We do whatever we can to attract a special someone, or even just get him or her to glance in our direction. Sometimes we even change a part of who we are in hopes of things working out. Although I am not a relationship expert, I have been in a few, each very different from the others. From each one I have learned something. And through the pain and tears that came from them, I am finally seeing the truth in the quote by Ross Van Hoelscher:

“Don’t rush into any kind of relationship. Work on yourself, experience yourself and love yourself. Do this first and you’ll soon attract that special loving other.”

We try so hard to be perfect for someone, usually the wrong someone, that we forget about ourselves. We forget about what we need and what we deserve (and I don’t mean those low standards we typically will set). I think that we work so hard to find our significant other because we see an ideal image of love and romance in movies, television, and books. Don’t get me wrong, I do believe in fairytales, but they are not all the same and rarely ever do they follow those found in films.

Every person has a story full of events, both good and bad, that have brought them to where they are today. God is writing each of these stories. And we have to trust that He will send us that special someone, when the time is right. I am realizing that before God can put that someone in our lives, we have to work on ourselves. Before we can be who we need to be for someone else, we must first know and love ourselves by involving God in our stories, giving God control.

I know that I am very guilty of trying to intervene and edit God’s version of my story to make it fit that Hollywood ideal. But it is time to put that pen down and give God full control. To be one hundred percent honest (which is one of my goals for this blog, and in life), giving God full control is much easier said than done. Do I trust God with my life story? Yes! But I am still human and I crave to have that special someone who loves me and that I can love, and I want him now.

I pray that by giving God complete control, He will guide me in the direction of His will, to be the person He wants and needs me to be. God is amazing and without Him we are unable to reach our full potential.

Purity

I really should try to start writing more than just once a week, but I don’t want this blog to be about me venting, rambling, or gossiping. I want it to have a real meaning. And I want to maybe help somebody by sharing my experiences and what I have learned while on my walk with God. Because of this, I have been writing after attending The Well. Although church is not the only time and place I have a relationship with God, it seems that my thoughts throughout the week all start after hearing Travis’s message or talking about struggles with a friend or two.


Last night’s message was about purity. I found this out before service and half jokingly said that I was going to leave. I am glad that I didn’t. I, like most, hear the word purity and think of sex. And because of an event from my past, purity in terms of sex is a very touchy subject. Although that story is one that I hope to be able to share someday, today is not that day. I do want to talk about what I learned last night and that is purity is not just about sex.

Purity goes far beyond sex; it could be selling yourself short or engaging in a sin, no matter the size. Impurities always start out small. Like a hole in the wall that leads to bigger impurities and greater sin. I know my hole in the wall, and I didn’t write it down last night because it led to something I am not proud of. I started dealing with this hole in the wall a couple weeks ago after things had gone a little too far. Believe me when I say that it wasn’t easy to end things, but I knew that it had to be done. We knew it couldn’t go on anymore. The hole that led to this impurity was simply having a friendship and communicating through text messages. The messages became a daily thing, then an all day everyday thing. We then started to hangout occasionally. The hangouts soon became a nightly thing: cuddling on the couch watching movies and staying up all hours of the night. All this led up to my friend cheating on his girlfriend. I had become the other woman. Like I said, it is not something that I am proud of.

During his message last night, Travis said, “Your mistakes are not open cuts, they are healed scars that tell stories of great hope.” I do not feel as though these cuts have completely healed to become scars. But by confessing my mistakes and asking for God’s forgiveness and guidance, these cuts are definitely in the healing process. Through God I am becoming brand new. He is incredible.

320 Faith

Okay, so I have kind of been slacking a little. I know. It’s been a rough week. So much going on in life, I have become overwhelmed. I wrote tonight though after The Well service. It was a sit down with a pad of paper, a pencil, and music and just write kind of night. As I type it out I will try to make it flow better but will probably leave it the way it is, since I feel that is when I make most sense and do my best writing. So here it goes:


I find it absolutely amazing the way that God works. At work yesterday I missed a call from a good friend. I text her to see what was up. She said she was calling to say hi and that she was thinking about me. I needed that. I just didn’t know it at that very moment. Last night tore me up. It was then that I needed my friends, “hello. Been thinking about you.” After the end of the day, all writing done (yes I wrote yesterday but it was a vent that will not be read by anyone, not even me). My mind was still going nonstop. I got in bed and wrote: a list of things about me that most people don’t know. It was a list about my past that I have been prisoner to. Something I didn’t realize until tonight when Travis spoke about 320 Faith. “Now to Him who is able to do immeasurably more than we ask or imagine, according to His power that is at work within us.” – Ephesians 3:20. It is from believing this that we get 320 Faith. Travis’s message tonight was about six reasons we fall short of 320 Faith. He said how some will fall in to one or two of them and others may fall in to all. I was one of those who fit all six reasons. Because they all hit me so hard, I wanted to write about it and think them through.

The first reason we fall short is that we believe God has great plans for others, but not me. We usually feel this way because of guilt, or the feeling that I am too broken, too dirty for God to love me and to care. We are each God’s masterpiece (Ephesians 2:10). This is something I have to remind myself daily. I think that tonight I will write in on my mirror as a reminder every morning as I get ready.

The second reason is that we want a detailed explanation from God. Like a little kid always asking why, we question what God asks us to do instead of trusting him and obeying. “Sometimes all you know is what God told you to do. And that has to be enough.” I am the type of person that every little detail is planned out and I am a mess if it goes wrong. I want to learn how to just obey and to let God have full control. “Faith is the opposite of control.”

The third reason is that we desire to “take up our mattress” rather than taking up our cross. This is like our ball and chain. For me this is my past. This is where the list I wrote last night comes to play. The events on my list, my past, have become my prison. I had never thought of it as a prison until Travis said, “you may be a product of your past, but you don’t have to be a prisoner to it.” This brought tears to my eyes. For so long I have let my past run my life (without realizing it). My past keeps me from trusting. I am a prisoner of my past, ready to break free.

The fourth reason we fall short from 320 Faith is: fear. We’re afraid of the things we think might hurt us. These things we fear cannot hurt us if we have faith and trust in God. It’s kind of funny, because one of my biggest fears is trust. I have been hurt so many times by some many that I feel like the only person I can trust is myself. There have been times I have not been able to trust God. And I am working on that.

The reason that hit me the hardest was the fifth: we have a season of regret in our lives. I try not to have regrets. And most of the time I don’t have any regrets. But some events recently have given me regrets. And they are still fresh in my mind. I regret falling. I regret not stopping it sooner. It is safe to say, I am in a season of regret.

The sixth and final reason that we fall short of 320 Faith is: we try to accomplish things in our own strength rather than being desperate for His. “By His power God raised the Lord from the dead, and He will raise us also.” – 1 Corinthians 6:14. Travis used the analogy of being in the ocean, the waves crashing and throwing you around as you reach for God’s hand and strength to raise you above the crashing waves. I find myself being pounded on by crashing waves. As though I can do nothing right. Like everything I touch falls apart. And I, being the head strong independent woman I am, have tried getting out on my own and have not succeeded. I realized tonight that it is okay to say that I can’t do it alone and that I need God’s strength to help me through.

After service, I had an amazing talk with the friend that called yesterday. I was able to get some things off my chest, to cry, and to feel loved and cared about. As often as I pretend to be okay, I am not. I am broken and realizing that the only way to piece myself back together is by being desperate for God; and remembering the Ten Faith Promises that Travis listed out, all of which can be found throughout the Bible.

God is incredible and has put amazing people in my life. And I am oh so very thankful.

Numb for the Holidays

Why is it that every time I sit down to write I can’t remember everything I had just thought out? as I was getting ready for bed I thought about the holidays and the fact that I get numb every year. So I am going to try to write about it. Huge emphases on the word try. Today is Thanksgiving and I realized yesterday that the annual “numb for the holidays” has started. If you know anything about what is going on in my “love” life, you would probably think that I am emotionally numb because of that…At first that is what I had thought all week. And then it hit me that Thanksgiving is today, the first of the big Hallmark holidays. Also the first big holiday after my Aunt Pat passed away. Yeah, that just adds to it all. But you’re probably asking why I am “numb for the holidays,” I, like most people, have been hurt in many ways. Within the past four years the most painful holiday has been Christmas. Because of this, I put my wall up even higher than normal the week of Thanksgiving. That way I am prepared for anything. The problem with this though is that the wall is not just blocking the bad, it is blocking all emotions. Without emotions, I cannot grow overly excited. I cannot get my hopes up. Without emotions, I cannot fall. Yes there is more going on in my life that I need to deal with emotionally, but I have already started growing numb and do not know how to get out of this “dip,” this emotional rollercoaster that I experience. I want to learn how to be okay with the holidays I want to learn how to trust again. Trust: not an easy thing for me. Trusting, I am not. Trust, I do not know how. Every morning I look at my wrist and read it: Fiducia, a reminder that it is okay; a word of hope that I will someday be able to trust again.


Every year as I am becoming less numb after the holidays are over, I sit and write a list of goals for the new year, a long list of new year resolutions. Yes a long list, usually 20 plus things. And every year, trust is on the list somewhere. Starting today I want to work on my 2011 new year resolutions. The first and most important: trust. I hope that with trust I will get away from this emotionally numb period each year. It will take a lot, I know this. That is why I will begin with trusting God. I will trust that He can help me through this. I will do my best to document my days, both good and bad. Hopefully I will be able to write every day, if I am unable to I will write as often as possible. I do not want to sell myself short when I know that there is hope. There is at least one person on my side. The greatest of all: God. I can and will get through this. He is amazing and always with me. <3

The Simple Things in Life

Last night, I sat down to try to write. I knew what I wanted to say I just couldn’t figure out how to say it. No words fit the way I was feeling. But today, my brother and I found a mama duck and her baby ducklings swimming in my aunt’s pool. It was then that I found the words I had wanted to write last night. “It’s the simple things in life that make it all worth it.” My Aunt Pat passed away a few days ago; we were at her house grabbing the last few things we need for the funeral tomorrow. Through the sorrow of losing a loved one it’s these simple little things that make you appreciate life, the things that let you know it will all be okay. Aunt Pat’s favorite color was purple. It just so happens that the dead bush in front of my family’s home had a single purple flower yesterday when we got home from running around making the necessary preparations. When Anthony and I got home today, my daddy told us that he found purple wild flowers growing in his garden. I always hear the saying, “life is short” but I have never really lived like it. With the events of the past few days, I realize now that it’s oh so very true and with this realization, the simple things in life mean so much more. I have a new appreciation for life and I will start to live life like it is short and I will open up my eyes to see more of those simple things that make it all worth it. Although her journey is just beginning, this chapter of my Aunt Pat’s life here with us is closed. We will forever miss, and love her. We will gather as a sea of purple in remembrance her. It will not be a day full of tears, rather a day to remember the good times we shared.