Leaning in

The seasons change so fast.

There is a nature park about a mile from my house. Correction. the park is about .7 miles from the house. But most days, when i'm not running, just walking, it feels strange to not have coffee with me. So I make a longer trip to accommodate my needs-to-be-broken- addiction. So this morning, i pulled myself out of bed "early" for my overnight schedule, drug myself to starbucks, ordered my americano and was shocked to find that the person behind me was ordering a pumpkin spice latte. She had 'unlocked' it somehow, which implied to me that she was very special in the starbucks world. Because i certainly didn't have the vaulted access to the PSL syrup, and neither did, much to her disappointment, the woman behind her.

We are in pumpkin spice latte season already?

Although i'm not certain i would venture anywhere near announcing the arrival of fall, i am anticipating it happily. Fall is heavy cottons, books, hot tea, changing colors and earthy smells. It's candles, blankets and quiet, chilly mornings, early evenings. Fall is not so fast, not so crazy, and i need that transition. My internal engine has been running too fast, too far, too long.

I recently was challenged to join this online bible study. The study is on Esther, and in so many ways, i think it comes in perfect timing. I need something to challenge and inspire me, To keep digging in when everything in me is fighting. In the confirmation email that my registration was successful, Jen pointed out something i've heard before about the book of Esther - it's one of two books of the bible where God is never mentioned. And yet the entire trajectory of Esther's story is marked by the loving, leading, hand of the Father. She's a strong woman that has purpose and plan to her life. And i need that hope right now.

I don't feel fulfilled. I feel like i'm a round peg in a square hole. I pray and i cry and I ask, and all i feel is silence and void. In my work life, in my personal life. In my loneliness, in my longing to be a contributor and not a consumer. I don't feel like i fit or belong, i don't feel productive or at peace. I don't feel utilized in any capacity within work, within relationships. I feel weak and pathetic when accounting accounts for every detailed mistake, big or small, and it causes me to finally cry.

I pray and ask and cry and doubt if i'm Gods beloved. Deep in me i am centered - the hope of Jesus, the anchor of our souls (hebrews 6). That matters. But all i know is the struggle. I question the truth of being Gods beloved when i feel so directionless, so helpless, so small, so weak, so lost and confused and alone. How am i supposed to believe and lean on the Lord Jesus when i feel like he's void in my life? I fully believe that he is orchestrating the events in my life, my present, my now, for his plan and purposes. But i am not handling it well. Somedays from the surface i'm surprised to find myself okay, functioning, and seemingly doing well. But sitting on the inner steps of my heart, I know there is much to be done. Much softening, much trusting, much need to remain being honest and not to throw in the towel and build walls of bitterness. I want to remain soft, but i am terrified that the only way i know to be soft will actually ruin the relationships i have with my friends, that being soft will make me to much to handle. That the fears that plague me will push me further into isolation.

Sarah Bessey, author of Jesus Feminist, wrote this:

"While i was preparing for childbirth, I learned how much of the pain women experience during labor is related to our own fears and resistance to the pain. Dr William Sears calls it the fear-tension pain cycle. Because we are afraid, we naturally hold back and tense up, and then there is more pain, so we experience even more fear, and on it goes, around and around, building with intensity on every turn. To interrupt the cycle, we need to surrender to what is happening, right now. We must lean into the pain instead of resisting it...  

It seems counterintuitive; we should run from pain, right? But believe me: leaning into the pain makes giving birth easier. I should be the mother of seven children, but there are only three tines with us now. Believe this: i have learned to lean into some pain - to let the pain be there, part of me, with out fear, without judgement, without refusal, because this is all part of the struggle of birth and life. And the pain will, somehow, eventually, give way to blessed release and relief and hopefully, joy.

I'll avoid the prescriptives and how-tos for both our sakes. Instead, if you are struggling to break that cycle of fear-tension pain, I'll tell you a bit more about the God i love so wild but remember, the subtext for all of it is this truth: lean into it. Lean into the pain. 
Stay there in the questions, in the doubts, in the wonderings and loneliness, the tension of living in the Now and the Not Yet of the Kingdom of God, your wounds and hurts and aches, until you are satisfied that Abba is there too. You will not find your answers by ignoring the cry of your heart or by living a life of intellectual and spiritual dishonesty. Your fear will try to hold you back, your tension will increase, the pain will become intense, and it will be tempting to keep clinging tight to the old life; the cycle is true. So be gentle with yourself. Be gentle when you first release. Talk to people you trust. Pray. Lean into the pain. Stay there. And the release will come. "

I read that, encouraged, and scared by the reality of truth within that. To be vulnerable and honest is so hard right now. But to not be honest is to remain in the same vicious, insecure cycle.

I chatted with a friend yesterday who over the weekend had a mishap with his road bike. He fell on a turn, without his gear on, which resulted in several pretty sevear scrapes along his side. After a couple days and some slightly scary looking yellow hues, he went to the doctor who instructed him to scrape the wounds down to the point they were bloody again. "The gravel is trying to work it's way out of your body" he said.

I thought about that, and how that is so true to my heart right now. I need the Lord to scrape away the criticalness, the ungraciousness, the hardness from my heart. I need to be softened again, desperate again, willing to let go of my pride and my fear and my self sufficiency and allow myself to be vulnerable enough to cling to my Abba, my Father. I can trust him to do that work.

I have to lean in. Into the "I just don't know."

The last couple days have been eventful to say the least.

Justine got her little puppy. Her name is Allie, and i have to admit as much as i am not a pet person, she's pretty cute. I had no idea that puppies could be quiet, and she essentially has made no noise since she moved into our little home last week. I'm not sure what a bark out of her would even sound like. I have a feeling that this anti-pet girl might start to grow uncharacteristically attached to the little munchkin. (see, "pet" names for the pet already. that's a bad sign).

Meggan broke her tibia this week. That makes all 17 steps to our upper unit apartment quite interesting. I know that Megs is not enjoying this experience all that much, but secretly, and maybe selfishly, I am. I'm enjoying time spent driving with her back and forth from work. I'm enjoying honest conversation, silliness, laughing and joking.

Meggan's friendship has meant a lot to me these last days as i continue on my 'overnight' lifestyle. It's given a little more purpose and direction to my day, giving me an opportunity to serve and to grow outside of just my world at work. This opportunity has really blessed me, really given me perspective.

There is still so much beauty happening in my life - i keep writing it, saying it, knowing it, shocked by it. There is richness in my friendships, even if it's not the level of connection my heart is still so desperate for. I sat on the patio of a coffee shop i'd been dying to try with Justine and enjoyed some sunshine in shorts, a T, and sunglasses. We keep seeing Hannah like she is an extension of our little apartment family. After a few alterations, I was able to wear my grandmother's wool green houndstooth skirt to work this week which frankly is an amazing feeling - kind of like getting a piece of her back for a few minutes. I made Parmesan Risotto tonight - it felt like accomplishing something notable in the cooking world. Kind of like running marathons makes you a runner, making risotto makes you a cook. I've been rewatching Downton Abbey like it's no ones business - something about the characters and their struggles in that show speaks directly to my soul.

I am loving attending Colossae. Something about the slowness in my approach there, something about being there inspires me to live more fully, honestly, rawly. There is something special happening there - it's not perfect, but i feel my spirit moved within me when i think about it, pray about it.

And yet in the midst of this all i fight my own humanness. There is a tension we all live in the middle of. In the now and also the not yet. Working out what it means to hope in a world of so much uncertainty and yet learning to be joyful in trusting of the Father despite it. I'm learning to live within my own tension of working a job with a schedule i'm not overly found of, of living within singleness with a strong desire to not be so, in trusting the Lord to bring opportunities to serve in a capacity that fits my gifts and trusting that the people he has poured into my life now are my calling to pray for and serve. It's learning to prayerfully hope for the future while living undeniably in the present. This isn't a new struggle, but i'm more at peace with the fight, knowing that it is good.

I know that the Lord is completely trustworthy in all things, at all times. I believe it with all my heart for others, but i'm not sure I always believe, know that to be true, in my own heart and mind. I want to learn to pray into my future specifically

I love these verses, wrestle with these verses, "camp out" in these verses, questions, and believing the implications they could have in my life if i LIVEd in their reality:


This i know, that God is for me - Psalm 56

Not one word of all the good promises that the Lord had made to the house of Israel had failed; all had come to pass." Joshua 21.

Through him we have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God.  Not only that, but we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance,  and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not put us to shame, because God's love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us. - Romans 5.

 Let your reasonableness be known to everyone.The Lord is at hand; 6 do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. 7 And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. - Philippians 4