Queen of Quitting

 I have been known to quit a few things in my life.  I quit dieting, I quit exercising, I quit blogging, I just quit, especially anything remotely good for me.  

This morning as I was thinking about starting all the good things again, I had this thought... WHY?  and the very next thought I had is you are "the queen of quitting". Immediately all the other reasons I shouldn't start over today came flooding back in.  The negative self-talk that has become my Identity started telling me who "I am" again and why I don't deserve to start again.  

Since I'm working on changing my mindset and shutting down the negative soundtrack that I have in my head all day, I plugged my headphones in, turned on my favorite "mindset" podcast and started cleaning my kitchen.  I'm learning that taking some kind of action helps quiet the worst voices in my head and I know that a clean kitchen always makes me happy, especially when someone else does it... wah wah. 

Wouldn't you know today's topic was all about IDENTITY.  Personality, who we think we are.  Identity or the story we have told ourselves about who we are is the determining factor of the things we do.  The things we do then become the person we think ourselves to be.  AND the loop goes on and on and on for years until we start to believe that we will always be that person.  I know you've heard people say "well, that's just the way I am" and what they mean by that is they can never change.  So, like me when I called myself the "queen of quitting" I believe myself to be someone who always gives up... so why even start again.

As the hosts were discussing this idea of identity this quote hit me and honestly gave me so much hope for myself and maybe even a little forgiveness for the person I have been, and I pray that it has the same effect on anyone reading this post.  

"YOU are under no obligation to be the same person you were 5 minutes ago."  Alan Watts

That is such a powerful statement....  It doesn't matter what you did yesterday, because it's gone.  It doesn't matter what runs in your family, or what behaviors you have done in the past to give you the identity you have today.  

Because the sun came up today, we know we can have God's mercy for all the days before.  Because you have air in your lungs today you have been given a new opportunity to become the person YOU know in your heart you can be.  Because God said old things have passed away you know today can be a fresh start for you.  

What we do becomes the identity that we tell ourselves that we are.  The amazing thing about that is we can change what we DO and become the person that we desire to be.  We can literally change the story that we tell ourselves about who we are.  

I have a lot of old stories on feedback loop that continue to sabotage the person I want to be, but I CAN flip the script.

Another really important aspect of this is remembering your WHY...  So, for me, I want to get healthy.  WHY???  Because I want to be able to enjoy my future grandchildren.  I want to be able to play with them and have abundant energy.  I want to enjoy my life and not miss out on things because of poor health.  My WHY is health for the future so my choices today MATTER.  In the moment I may be in my feelings and want to eat total trash... but, I need to remember my WHY.  When I start to make healthier choices, my mind begins to "identify" me as a healthy person.  Healthy becomes my identity.  When health is my identity, I will naturally make choices that confirm that identity.

Another example of this for me is... I LOVE this blog.  I feel very passionate about sharing things that God is showing me and I LOVE sharing those things with people who might need to hear what God showed me that day.  Maybe someone out there will be helped in that moment.  Maybe they will be reminded of God's unconditional love for them.  Or maybe someone out there also suffers from some of the same things I do and maybe they will feel a little less alone. 

Even though I LOVE this blog... I also HATE it.  I hate the way it makes me feel about myself sometimes, so I have quit blogging a thousand times.  I started a long time ago with this thought in my mind "I am not a writer" but I do love to share.  So, with that identity firmly placed in my mind that I am a counterfeit writer I have started and stopped so many times.  I criticize myself and imagine there are phantom critics out there who also think "wow she sucks at this" and then I quit again.  

When those thoughts come in and that fear of failure or rejection comes in it's vital to remember "my why".  I'm not doing this to for approval, I'm not doing it for likes, I AM doing this because I want to share God's faithfulness with someone who could use a reminder today.

The stories we tell ourselves matter and they are creating the life that we are living right now...  The good news is you can change the story and you can change your life.  You can become the person you know you want to be.  You can start right this moment...  "WE are under no obligation to be the person we were 5 minutes ago."  Today, I decide to change my identity from the "Queen of Quitting" to "Queen of creating the life I want".

Most important of all is who we are and who's we are... 

We are blessed. We are chosen.  We are adopted. We are accepted. We are redeemed. We are forgiven. We are LOVED by a GREAT GOD, who sent His own son to give his life for us.  Ephesians 1 tells who we are IN CHRIST and because of that we have every reason to LIVE like we are the people God says we are and in the LOVE that he has lavished on us!!!

 

Don't be a donkey

 One of the joys of homeschooling is reading with your children.  There have been times during times of mourning that hearing my little ones read the Bible was the healing balm to my soul.  Other times what we read that day would be like a slap across the face. Take our little story today...

"A donkey having heard some grasshoppers chirping, was highly enchanted; and, desiring to possess the same charms of melody, demanded to know what sort of food they lived on to give them such beautiful voices.  They replied, "The dew."  The Donkey resolved that he would live only on the dew, and in a short time died of hunger."  Aesop's Fables

Comparison is the thief of joy.  

What kind of donkey do you have to be to spend all your time and energy comparing yourself to others? 

I've struggled with this for GOD ONLY KNOWS HOW LONG...  It makes me crazy.  At least I catch it now more than I used to, and I can talk myself out of it sometimes, but comparison steals my joy all too often. 

I have a great life that I love very much with many blessings I could count all day every day, but what do I do instead?  I ruminate on a single aspect in my life that has been a struggle FOREVER.  I tell myself if I had "that" I would be happy.  My life would be complete.  

As women maybe we are prone to do this more and with social media we only ever see the good side of a person's life so it's easy to compare someone else's life with ours and think they have something we need.  

Could be looks, money, marriage, it could be cars, houses, clothes.  It could be friend groups or careers.  But it's a lie to think that someone out there in the world HAS IT ALL.  Everyone has some wonderful blessings in their lives, and everyone has some serious hardships and struggles.  

You could look at a person's life that you admire and think "wow, they have the best life" because her IG shows the part of her life that she's proud of, but what it doesn't show you is the parts that hurt, the parts that keep her on her knees. However, they are there and at the end of the day I know that we would all choose the life that we are living and have been given.  So, maybe at the start of the day we should set our intentions that we are going to be grateful for our whole life, the good and the bad.  

Instead of being like the donkey and starving to death wanting someone else's gifts, we should recognize our own.  

The best way to overcome this disease of comparison is to be extravagantly grateful for what we have been given.  Starting with the simple, yet vital things like air in our lungs, a body that can experience this world and just keep going from there.  The simpler your gratitude starts the greater the blessings that you have to praise God for.  

God created the grasshoppers and the donkey each with their own purpose.  He didn't make them the same.  He didn't give them the same purpose, but they were both created to bring HIM glory in their own ways.  

Remember the Apostle Paul's words to the Philippian church, as he himself was sitting in prison... "Whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is LOVELY, whatever is commendable, if there be any excellence, IF THERE IS ANYTHING WORTHY OF PRAISE, THINK ABOUT THESE THINGS."  Phil. 4:8

There is always a reason to PRAISE.  As long as we are alive and breathing, we have a reason to praise the LORD.  If praise is in our lips nothing else can come out.  When we practice an attitude of praise and thanksgiving life has a whole new outlook.  

Life is already too short..  don't be like the donkey and starve yourself of the simple joy of living a contented, grateful life.  

Beauty from Ashes

 Well, I'm coming out with a bang. I'm going to talk about something we are never supposed to talk about, but I know that there are people out there like me and I'm sure this will bringing a little bit of healing and peace to those people...  The group of people I'm talking about are the "adult children of divorce".

This post is dedicated to the man who has had to deal with the consequences and affects that my parents' divorce has had on me.  It's also dedicated to my children who have also dealt with my insecurities over the years.  

First of all, I want to say even though I was only 10 when my parents decided to end their marriage, I knew WHY they were, and I understood.  Even at the time I remember thinking it was probably for the best.  It was a difficult time for everyone involved so I am in NO way shaming anyone.  

Secondly, I want to say that my parents' remarriages brought whole new families into my life that I adore, especially important to me are 5 of my siblings that I do not ever want to think about living without.  Both of my parents found new loves that have been lasting lifelong partners, best friends and amazing stepparents to myself and my brother.  

If there was ever a best-case scenario, I think my brother and I had that.  We love our families (all of them) more than anything.  

With all that being said I have a little story to tell. The details don't matter because one thing I've learned is you can have a best-case scenario and still have consequences that need to be talked about.  

The night before our wedding my future husband and I were walking from the chapel to the rehearsal dinner and of all the things two hopeful young people who were about to get married could be doing.. we were fighting.  I was upset about who knows what and he was dumbfounded.  What in the world could have turned his future bride into this ranting woman beside him?  I remember him stopping me in my tracks and demanding to know what was really going on.  

In that moment I just yelled out "why are we even doing this, it will never last?"

Boy did that catch him off guard.  I could tell by the look on his face this thought had NEVER occurred to him.  I could tell by his words that what I had just said was like some kind of foreign language he couldn't understand.  

What I know now was that he couldn't imagine anything other than us spending the rest of our lives together and that belief was the solid truth that was leading him to that altar.  What I didn't know at the time was because he had grown up in family that had stayed together through the good times and the bad, he didn't' even consider there was an alternative.

What I also didn't know was that was the beginning of me using my insecurities as a weapon against his unconditional love.  

And what he didn't know was that God had selected him specifically to help heal the broken insecure places in my soul.  He didn't know that he was getting a runner who didn't have clue how to solve conflict.  He didn't know that he was getting someone who had to be talked off the ledge on a regular basis.  

He also didn't know that when we hit a rough spot after 19 years of marriage that all of that stuff was going to come up and threaten to destroy everything we had built together.  He didn't understand that and neither did I.

For a season we couldn't figure out how to fix what had gotten broken.  Life had hit us hard a couple times and we were struggling to find our way to each other in the midst of these storms.  We were both feeling broken, alone and confused.  What had happened?  How had we gotten here?  More importantly how do we get back?  

As I said in my "I'm back" post yesterday...  God had been so faithful to me and in this season it's more evident than ever.  As my husband and I started trying to find our way back to wedded bliss our Heavenly Father faithfully dropped a book into our lives that has changed everything.  We started reading the book together and applying the principles we were learning about, and our marriage began to transform.  The love, affection and devotion all came flooding back in.  But one thing we knew for sure is we had to figure why it had derailed in the first and so that it would never happen again.  

Since this post is about me...  that's all I'm going to focus on.. the one big thing that God has revealed to me that is helping me better communicate to my husband what is wrong and what I need.

One night as Bobby was reading the chapter about solving conflicts in a healthy way there was a section that hit me and immediately answered so many of my internal questions.  The author had taken a little detour while talking about conflict with special section about "children of divorce".  He quoted from a book called, "The Unexpected Legacy of Divorce" and what it had to say was a HUGE lightbulb moment for me.  

"Because children of divorce don't know how to negotiate conflict well, many reach for the worst possible solutions when trouble strikes. For example, some will sit on their feelings, not mentioning complaints or differences until their suppressed anger blows sky high.  Others burst into tears and are immobilized or retreat into themselves or the next room and close the door.  But the most common tendency is to run away at the first serious disagreement and wrestle with unconscious demons.  This is because from the perspective of a child of divorce ANY argument can be the first step in an inevitable chain of conflict that will destroy the marriage."

That may not be everyone who experienced their parents' divorce, but I know after 20 years of a beautiful stable marriage to the most reliable and stable person I know, that's my reality.  

I have lived with the thought of impending doom forever.  No matter how good my life has been there has always been this thought in the back of my mind that it won't last.  I have held back so much of myself so that I would have enough of me left if he ever decided one day that he had had enough.  I have struggled to feel secure in my husband's love and sometimes even with my children.  I have struggled to suppress thoughts that one day everyone is going to leave, and I will be alone.  

That night while Bobby was still reading, I ordered the book that had been quoted off of Amazon and started reading it as soon as it arrived on my doorstep.  I made it through one page, and I was already bawling... so much of my crazy way of thinking was starting to make perfect sense.  So many of my "unconscious demons" were exposed and I started to see my life and my marriage through a clearer lense.  

And within the first few pages I realized exactly WHY GOD had gifted me with my husband and his specific characteristics and attributes.  God had been using him to show me the unfailing, unconditional love of God.  He was showing me that no matter how far I go he's going to find me and bring back to him.  He's been showing me what forever looks like all this time. He's showing me what "I WILL NEVER LEAVE YOU OR FORSAKE YOU" looks like.  

For the first time since that night before our wedding I am completely secure in this forever love.  I'm confident in my husband's love and more importantly in God's love.  

In the beginning of Jimmy Evans book "The Four Laws of Love" he makes the profound statement our spouses are given to us by God to heal of us of things in our past and with all the work that Bobby and I have put into our marriage in the last few months I can say with complete confidence that for us nothing could be truer.  

So, because of God's incredible faithfulness I can joyfully say cheers to the next hundred years.  Let NOTHING but death separate You and Me baby!!!!!

There is so much more to be said about this subject, but I definitely can't say it better than the two books I have mentioned so if this post resonates with you in ANY way you should look into reading them.  

God promises in the book of James to give wisdom liberally to anyone who asks for it...  so if you are struggling with any of the issues that came up in this post pray for wisdom and God is faithful to supply it.  

I also want to leave everyone with the thought that no matter where you find yourself on the spectrum of divorce whether you have been in it or you were the child whose parents divorced, or your marriage is struggling right now...  God brings beauty out of ashes, and He redeems and restores every single thing that we go through for His glory if and when we allow Him to move and work in our situations so take heart in knowing that His mercy is new every morning and His faithful love endures forever.  

I'm backkkkkkkkk...

 So, I have been thinking about this for a while. Starting my blog back is super, well a lot of things, but it's so hard for me, but also, I love sharing my thoughts with the world, but I scrutinize every single thing I say and do until I'm paralyzed with fear.  I know my grammar is imperfect and my commas are misplaced, sometimes, my sentences tend to run on and on (like this one) but really at the end of the day none of those things matter.  I have words in my soul that won't be contained and a few people who have asked me to (get over myself) so this is me getting over myself.  

So, to all my sweet encouragers keep your eyes open for future posts.  For friends who I've made over the last couple years this is my blog about how God has been faithful to me over the years, in spite of my constant wandering.  There is really no telling what you will find when you look back at posts from years ago, but I hope one thing you will see is that God is good, and He has been faithful to me.  

I have a million drafts that I have spent countless hours pondering over and IF ever any one single thing I wrote had the power to encourage someone about God's love and faithfulness then shame on me for not sharing it.  So, with all the fear that comes with exposing myself I'm taking the leap back into the world of blogging and I pray that you find something among these words that brings you hope or peace or courage to keep going no matter what, because Jesus is worth it all.  

 

Don't Shrink

You were made to SHINE.  Seriously, you were made to shine.  You were made in the image of the Creator of the Universe, who shines so brightly, that the Bible says in heaven we won't even need the sun.  You were fearfully and wonderfully made by the Divine glorious Creator of everything beautiful.  You were made to bring GLORY to GOD.  You were made to be an image bearer of the most glorious, incomprehensible beauty...  so let me ask you this???  Why aren't YOU?  

Why aren't you running wild in your beauty and gifts?  Why am I not living in the glory I was created to live in?  When did we stop?  Why did we stop?  More importantly, who are we hurting by NOT living up to our fullest potential?  When did we give up on our hopes and dreams?  When did we lose our passion?

I can tell you when I lost mine...  There was this moment in my life that I was on top of the world.  I was doing the thing I was made to do and I was loving it.  I LOVE to teach.  I LOVE women's bible studies.  I LOVE to motivate women to love Jesus with all of their hearts and encourage them to trust Him completely and some people say I'm pretty good at it.  It's the burning passion in my soul.  It's the thing that lights me up inside and something I know I was made to do.  Anyway, I was really doing my "thang" and in the groove, running my race and it felt AMAZING, but just when it was really feeling good and I was hitting my stride, I made fatal mistake...  I looked around.  

I looked around at the other runners and I started comparing myself to them.  "She's better than me, she's smarter, she's funnier, she had a degree, she this, she that".   Then I looked at the people in the stands and heard the remarks from the people on the sidelines and that sealed my fate.  I stumbled, lost my confidence and took a fall and I stayed there.  Limping off the track I began to tell myself I'm just not good enough.  Eventually, I gave up on all the things I loved, because of some phantom voice, who told me I wasn't good enough.  

Forget the fact that I was made for this.  The burning in my soul that compels me to do this thing tells me I was made for this.  My love for women tells me I was made for this.  My passion for yelling on the roof tops anything I am learning about God, love and life, all drive me to do this thing.  The only thing that mattered was this belief that I latched onto and it began to control my life.  Eventually, I kind of just gave up on me.  The belief that I wasn't good enough saturated into every area of my life.  My thoughts became a constant rumination of all that I'm not.

Recently, I've learned this concept that I will call "the mirror" and it goes like this...  people are a mirror for us.  In other people we are able to see things that reflect back to us about ourselves.  Some things are good and some things that we would do well to work on.  Sometimes, we may see things we envy and that clues us into the fact that we are not living up to our potential in that are of our lives.  Other times, we may see things that motivate or challenge us to strive to reach our goals.  We can be inspired by others if we allow the mirror to have it's desired effect.  

Lately, I have see the mirror effect in two of my sons...  they are both gifted athletes (that's not the mirror part) 😉 and I can say that because their physical abilities didn't come from me.  They have both been told on numerous occasions, they have been blessed with athletic ability and they have potential to go far on the field.  When they were younger they both shined on the field, but somewhere along the way as they have gotten older and more aware of "other people" the light has dimmed a little in their eyes.  I can tell they are starting to believe that little lie of "not enough".  I can see it when they come off the field feeling like they could have done better.  I can tell they have lost confidence and don't believe in themselves as much as they used to.  It's hard to watch because I know the potential that each one of them has.  

It's also sad because losing confidence isn't just about them...  Football is a team sport and when anyone on the team isn't playing their position to the fullest potential, it effects the whole team.  There are 10 other players on that field that need them to play at their best.  When everyone is playing their position to the best of their (GOD-given) ability's  YOU WIN GAMES.  

It's the same in this life that we are living for Jesus...  we are in this together and when everyone is walking in their gifts and calling...  GOD IS GLORIFIED!  We are made to bring GLORY to GOD.  When the sun does what it was made to do it brings glory to GOD.  When the moon does what it was created to do, it brings glory to GOD.  When we do what we were made to do and we do it with all of our hearts, as unto the LORD, we bring Him glory.  When we are do it together we win games.

Thinking about this reminded me of the story of David and Goliath.  For 40 days the army of Israel lined up on one side of a valley, dressed in battle gear and shaking in their sandals, wondering who would fight the giant.  Forty days in a row they got up, lined up in battle formation and did nothing.  Every man from the King to the armor-bearer was paralyzed by fear.   Until David, a teenage shepherd, showed up to check on his brothers.  

David was stunned by what He saw...   The army of the LIVING GOD was standing there being mocked and insulted by a Philistine barbarian. You know the story so I won't rehash it here, but the part I want to concentrate on is what happens after David steps up and slays the giant.

"David ran and stood over him.  He took hold of the Philistine's sword and drew it from the sheath.  After he killed him, he cut off his head with the sword.  When the Philistines saw that their hero was dead they turned and ran.  THEN THE MEN OF JUDAH SURGED FORWARD WITH A SHOUT AND PURSUED THE PHILISTINES TO THE ENTRANCE OF GATH AND TO THE GATES OF EKRON."  

When David believed God, he didn't doubt himself.  When David believed God, he didn't fear the giant.  When David believed God it didn't matter what his brothers or the king said...  When David believed God he knew that all things were possible.  If all things were possible then that meant God could use a shepherd boy to slay a mighty giant.  And when David believed God, he inspired a whole nation of men to believe God too.  He inspired them to get in the fight and defeat their enemies.  He inspired them to live a life of purpose for the GLORY OF GOD.  He inspired them to walk in the promises that they had been given.  

The same goes for you...  When you believe God and you walk in the purpose and passions that God has placed your heart you will inspire others to do the same.  You will inspire people to fight their battles and defeat their enemies.  When you shine, other people shine.  

"And WHATEVER you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the LORD Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through Him."  Colossians 3:17

"WHATEVER you do, work at it with all of your heart, as working for the LORD and not for man..." Colossians 3:23

So here's my question for you...  in what area are you shrinking?  Where are you not reaching your full potential?  Why?  What thoughts and beliefs are keeping you from being and doing all that you were created to do?  And lastly...  who could you inspire if you decided to go all in and overcoming your self-imposed limitations???  

Breaking up is hard to do

That's it I'm so done.  I am so over this toxic abusive relationship.  When you are done you just feel it in your bones.  You know the feeling...  when you're just so sick and tired of the never ending cycle of abuse and you just know you have to walk away.  Well, that's where I am.  I'm done.

I'm so sick of calling her and her being emotionally unavailable.  I'm sick of her judgement and condemnation.  She is the one person I can always rely on to tell me just how stupid I am.  Like clockwork I always turn to her for comfort and she spews out her toxic abuse.  

Is it really too hard for her to offer a kind word or a little hope?  Is it so hard to give some compassion when I need it most?  What is wrong with this person who is supposed to be my friend?  

What hurts the most is I hear her talk to other people all the time and she's not like this with them.  She tries to encourage other people and offer them hope, but ME, nothing.  She is so vile and mean to me that I just run away in shame.  It's hard to even look at myself through her eyes.  Am I really so horrible?  Is there really NOTHING to love?  Does she really NOT see anything of worth and value in me?  

But, today I'm done.  I'm done listening to the toxic spew and the hatred.  Yesterday was the last straw.  You will not believe what she did and how she acted...

I was in such a great place emotionally, I was so proud of the work I had been doing to deal with old junk and to get rid of stuff in my life that wasn't working for me.  I had decided that I was going to do the best I could do in every single situation and I was going to be proud of me.  I know perfection is not attainable, but I knew I could be better.  In fact, I had really let myself go in the last year.  

I had gained a lot of weight and gotten really lazy.  I took a good hard look at my life and I did NOT like what I was seeing.  So, I asked myself, "Angela, what in the world is your problem, this is NOT who you want to be."  With the weight that I had gained there was a constant feeling of hiding... I didn't want anyone to see me.  I didn't feel good about myself and my clothes were too tight.  But weight was just a symptom of something so much deeper...  What was it?  Well, that's a whole other post, but the bottom line is I was FULL to the brim of shame and self-hatred.

So, I decided to start small and love myself with tiny steps.  I couldn't do one thing about where I had been.  The past was the past and it was gone, but I could deal with today and I could take the step right in front of me.  That step seemed to be to love me.  I mean if God could love me, surely I could love me better than I had been.

So, I did some things.  A lot of things.  I got rid of some things and I gave myself some things I knew would help.  I took baby steps and I started small.  I read some books and I opened up my head and heart to receive God's love because I knew He was the source.  I started rejecting old ideas that I had and I started embracing some news ones...  and I started to really feel myself for the first time in a very lonnnnnngggggg time, so long in fact, that I can't remember a time when I liked me.  

But, here I am starting to feel a spark of self-love...  One thing that helped me was saying to myself...  "Talk to yourself the way you would talk to other people."  Be kind to Angela too.  My goal has been to fill up on love so that I can overflow it onto the people around me, because LOVE FEELS GOOD.  My kids want love, my husband wants love, my friends want love...  love is patient and kind, love is full of joy and peace... love is good.  God is love.  So, that's where I started, I just started loving me a little at a time.

I've read in my books that sometimes when you start doing this you start distancing yourself from the negativity in your life and sometimes that means people.  So, I can't say that I'm shocked that this particular friend would have to be evicted from my life.  She's rude and mean and cruel and nothing ever makes her happy.  

You won't believe what she did just yesterday...  I was in such a good happy place, almost in a bubble when I did something that snapped me back down to earth.  I was sitting at a red light and there were 2 cars in front of me and I didn't want to wait for the light to turn green.  Next door to me was a gas station so I decided to cut through, I was only a minute from my destination, why wait huh?  Well, I pulled right out of line and into the parking lot of the gas station and immediately hit a big curb...  actually it was square so I hit two of them.  As soon as the car bumped back down to the parking lot I hear a hissssss and you guessed it, two busted tires.  

OH MY GOODNESS all the feels came back like a flood.  I was embarrassed and ashamed and I wanted to hide.  I just wanted to melt away right there and just not deal.  I knew instinctively that I had done more damage than just the tires and all I could think about was the unnecessary expense that I had just caused and I went into self-destruction mode. 

But...it was an accident.  My little boy had just had an accident on the 4 wheeler the day before and I had offered him love and compassion and understanding.  I had said, "Everybody makes mistakes, don't beat yourself up."  So, remembering that conversation I said the same things to myself, because I had made a promise to talk to myself the way I talk to other people.

The embarrassment started to fade and I took action to deal with the situation at hand and I started to feel better.  But then I decided to do something unwise...  I called my friend hoping to connect with someone and ease my feelings of shame and humiliation over a shared human experience "that people make mistakes and it's going to be ok."  

That is NOT what I got.  It was the same old thing...  How stupid.  What is wrong with you?  Why can't you ever do anything right?  Look at you causing your family all this money.  It was just an endless barrage of hate and condemnation.  

I was so sad and I was already beating myself up, why couldn't my friend be kind to me and understand how bad I was feeling?  Why couldn't she offer me some love?  

I just realized in that moment that she wasn't going forward with me in my journey.  She had served her purpose, but it was time to let her go and walk away.  She was a part of a past that I didn't want to stay in.  So, I let her know it's over.  We are done.  I told her that we just weren't compatible any more and I needed some distance.  

You know what she did?  She listened to what I said.  She heard my heart and what I was trying to say and she said, "Angela, I want to be a better friend to you."  

I really want to believe her, so I'm going to give her the grace that I would want to receive.  Maybe she just needs a little time.  I know that she's able to be a good friend...  I've seen her be a good friend to other people.  

Yes today is a new day and since God's mercy is new, I guess my mercy can be too. 

So, Angela I forgive you for not being a friend to me.  I forgive you for hurting me and calling me stupid.  I forgive you for never offering me compassion and love.  I forgive you for expecting me to be perfect and for judging me.  I forgive you for a million different slights over the years and I agree that together we will work towards healing.  Thank you, Angela, for showing me who I want to be and who I don't want to be.  Angela, you know I've always loved you, I just didn't know how.  

I hope this post resonates with you.  There are so many women out there just absolutely hating themselves and living in a guilt shame cycle that feels like it will never end, but there is hope.  Jesus said to love your neighbor as yourself for a reason.  We can never love others if we are full of hate, even if that hate is self directed.  I hope you will find a starting point here in this space to begin to give yourself some grace, love and compassion.  God loves you and always has and always will.  He demonstrated His love by sending His Son, in that while we were yet sinners Christ died for us.  If God has lavished His love on YOU, who are you to condemn yourself as unworthy of that love.

I love you sister and my thoughts go out to you as you read these words...  leave your thoughts if you feel this speaks to you!!!

Let It Go

 "A journey begins with a single step." 

Our lives are a journey.  Along the way we pick up some things and we also lose some things.  Some of us, like myself, are hoarders.  We like to hold onto things when it is clearly time for us to let them go.  The fear of losing taints every joyous occasion and even threatens to destroy our beautiful lives.  In the same way that a toddler fights with all that they have to keep their paci, we fail to recognize what we stand to gain if we surrender something that we love.  

For me, losing my mom a few years ago was one of those moments...  Standing at her bedside I inwardly screamed, "I am not ready to live without her" and I meant that with every fiber of my being.  I mourned in the way that many do, who express the sentiment that they died the day they lost their loved one.  I've heard people say, "If I lost _______, you might as well put me in the grave" and I could understand that.  

That day the world lost it's magic and joy could not be found.  I walked around in a daze and even now when I think back to that time with 4 young children to care for, I don't remember much of what should have been a beautiful time in my life.  

For many years the insecurity of life and the feeling of being completely out of control consumed me.  Every area of my life had a dark cloud of fear hanging over it.  The question "what if" loomed like a noose over every moment waiting to snuff all the joy of life.  

I didn't realize at the time that I had died that day, the old Angela, who believed life was unicorns and magic was gone.  The child-like, care-free faith I had once known seemed to vanish away.  

But, one day a few years later a new Angela was born... sitting on the couch listening to my son read the Bible in his little boy voice, my mind latched onto something as if I was hearing it from far away or under water.  The words were spoken by Jesus, to a man who had just learned that his sick daughter had died.  The man had come to Jesus because his daughter was ill and wanted Jesus to come to his house to heal her, but on the way there was another situation that Jesus had to deal with.  By the time they were on the way again, news had reached the father that his daughter was dead.  

In that moment Jesus turned to the father and said, "Don't be afraid.  Only Believe."  

And I knew this was a moment in my life.  A step to take.  A door to walk through.  And I did.  Nothing major happened that day...  really I just asked a question...  "what am I not believing?"  

Over time I realized I was believing death was the end.  Subconsciously, I believed death was the end and I would never see her again.  I believed there was nothingness after that and heaven was a fairy's tale.  What was Jesus asking me to believe?  I believe He was asking me to believe that death is only a doorway and I had not lost her that day.  And this is HARD and it's going to be a really HARD truth to swallow, but her purpose on this earth had been served.  Maybe it's easier to receive in this way... as long as we are breathing on this side of heaven we have a purpose to serve... so in the same way, when the LORD takes us home, our purpose has been fulfilled.  For those of us that are still here it's up to us to release our loved ones and let them go.   

It's been 9 years and literally thousands of hours of growth have happened since the day I stood at my mom's bedside screaming that I was not ready for her to go and I feel like a whole other person.  I decided to believe God that day in my living room, listening to my little boy read and being confronted by my lack of belief.  I didn't push back...  I knew He was right...  I was afraid and I was full of unbelief.  So, I took a step that day and I will never regret that step.  

I had no idea that day standing beside my mother's bedside that I would face much harder things and be ok because I had grown so much stronger BECAUSE she had walked through death's doorway.  

That much harder thing came on November 29th, 2020...  It was early in the morning and my family was recovering from a pretty scary bout of CV, in fact my husband was still using an nebulizer to try to keep his oxygen levels up.  There were definitely moments when I pleaded with the Lord, "please, heal Bobby, we need him."   and so I never saw what was coming up around the bend.  It was a train coursing toward us that would change our lives forever.  The phone rang and there was chaos on the other end.  Bobby's brother was telling us that their Dad couldn't breath, that they think he has had a heart attack, the ambulance is on the way.  And I watched as a grown man, my rock, fell to the floor.  His knees buckled and his heart broke right in front of me.  His cries rang out through our house, but no one had the courage to ask what was wrong.  If you don't ask...  you don't have to face reality.   But, my children knew there was only a couple things that could rock their father to the core and they didn't want to face either reality.  

For me it was the most surreal reality though.  My heart was broken.  To know my father in law IS TO LOVE HIM, and to know my husband is to mourn and weep with him.  To know that my children, all 5 of them, would experience the most pain they had ever faced and to know that I was wholly unequipped to help any of them, was to feel a feeling of utter dependency, knowing only God could bring us through this.  

But, there was a whole other experience for me that day.  The harvest of 9 years of struggle and turmoil...  in my heart, mind and soul...  I watched my beautiful Father in-love walk through that door into radiant light.  I completely let him go that day.  He was in heaven, he was full of light and joy and he was with Jesus, happy and whole. He had completed his journey and I knew in an enormous way this moment was a part of my journey.  

Today in a book I read the words... "If life takes something from you... let it go."  And I thought about the people I loved whom I have had to let go.  Some have been pried from my hand and it took years to recover and some have been released and I immediately walked into the next phase of my life that didn't have them "physically" in it.  When someone had to be pried away, I didn't like to talk about them and all the joy, because remembering was painful, I would tuck their pictures away and I would cringe when I saw photos and memories from the past.  When I released my father in-law through that open door, I found his memory easy to conjure up and his smile readily available to enjoy, I wanted to see his pictures and talk about all that I love about him.  When I thought about him my heart would fill with joy and not sadness and I realized how much his passing through that door had taught me about life and death.  

My Father in-love's favorite phrase is "Just keeping living" and we plan to keep living in honor of a life well lived.  We remind ourselves daily that He would want us to keep on loving life and living to the fullest and so we do and we look forward to the day when we walk through that doorway and see his beautiful smiling face and feel the big embrace of his bear hug and we whisper to our souls... until we meet again... and in our hearts we know that death was not the end, just a door way into radiant love and light. 

This post is dedicated to all the people living in fear of the death of someone you love...  may you find some peace and encouragement.  I pray that you will "Be not afraid and Just Believe."  

In this life we will have to let things go that we desperately want to hold onto, but when we will let them go...  we will truly begin to live in the moment, not the past and not the future and it's only in the moment that we can find true joy, love, peace and abundant life.   That's my hope for you.