Do you ever feel...

Sometimes I look at people...and I see the same problem, issue, weird thing that the rest of the world sees. The only person who doesn't see it? is the one who has it.

And then I wonder, am I that person for the rest of the world?

Do you ever feel like you have a blindspot that the rest of the world sees?

I have no idea

whether I'll one day refer to this time as "the lost decade" or the "best years".

Arrows

Everyone has a chief insecurity....

May I never make anyone feel worse, less, purposeless because of theirs, even if is different from my own.

The perfect moment:

I'm sitting on the back patio of my new home. The temperature is a perfect 65 and it smells like autumn. I'm drinking a soy chai latte with my lil dog snuggled beside me and Needtobreathe singing "something beautiful" in the background. Could this moment be any better? I suppose the only thing one could add is ____.

If I were honest:

If I were honest, I'd tell you that I can't decide which church to go to this morning and my reasons for attending either are more selfish than I'd like to admit.

I'd tell you that the kids who rang my doorbell and ran have no idea how much I love pranks.....or how badly they frightened me....or that I nearly killed myself leaping from the bathtub and trying to get to the door.....or that it's probably best that they ran..

If I were honest, I'd tell you that I feel incredible loneliness most of the time and that my busyness is more of a coping mechanism than a necessity.

I'd tell you that I went to a concert this weekend and spent more time pondering the sky than the band. There was this weird cloud-cover that was so thick it seemed impermeable. I thought to myself how that looked a lot like my relationship with God right now....how the light is still visible, but it's through a nearly opaque cloud that I don't really understand. Sometimes when God and I have an issue...ok most of the time...it's my own fault. But sometimes He's just distant and the space between us is no more my creation than the cloud. I think this is one of those times.

If I were honest I'd tell you that I had a quiet time this morning and although it wasn't exactly encouraging, I still loved it and miss the endless mornings of summer when I could linger as long as I wanted.

I'd also tell you that I don't understand why God felt it so necessary to put it in scripture that the world cannot stand a "bitter woman who finally finds a husband". (Proverbs 30). and that I prayed for a long time not to be bitter.

If I were honest, I'd tell you that the spiritual temperature has raised at work and confirmed once again that I am exactly where He wants me to be. It also confirmed that right before God wants me to move somewhere, He makes me inexplicably miserable in the old place. He knows me well enough to know that I need that sort of confirmation or I'll never make a decision to go anywhere or do anything.

I'd tell you that I'd rather write than go to church this morning. I'd rather write than finish the coffee in my cup. Most days I'd rather write than eat.....and I wonder if I'm any good at all and if the desire to write is more to help myself than to help anyone in the world. and that despite all that....I secretly want to be a professional writer.

If I were honest, I'd tell you that I'm only writing this because i think that most people who would read it could relate at some point or another and that I'm laughing because I still chose to post on the blog that most people don't read.





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echo

I keep a blog-collection of letters that I've been writing to the youngest of my family. Some short, some long, some informative, some simple affirmations.

Today's post went like this.

You're beautiful
I just wanted you to know you're a wild and beautiful creation, a product of the same one who designed the stars, the ocean, and everything else beautiful in the world.

His heart is for you. It always has been.

He loves you more than I do....I know it's true. I just can't conceive how it's possible.



As I re-read the post, her little voice came to mind saying, "Cissy, how do you know?"

I found myself in tears in the middle of a coffee shop as I realized the answer is, "Because the same is true of me".

Thoughts from the train...

Authenticity is not convenient
A soft heart often will never allow you to maintain the facade of emotional control that is expected of you.
Tears pour at inopportune times….and don't show up when they're most appropriate.

Authenticity makes people uncomfortable.
It's as if our refusal of the blankness, of the numbness, somehow challenges their own embracing.
It takes more courage than comes standard and more intentionality then most would choose to spend.

Authenticity, is in itself, an indictment
It exposes a mutually accepted, and often endeared falsehood,
as a wall of evil surrounding the Holy of Holies.

Authenticity is what makes the citizen of somewhere else seem a foreigner here.
and awakens a deep homesickness in the most acclimated expatriate.