I’ve been wrestling for days with what my next blog post should be. I’ve had a few in mind, but none of them seemed quite right. I’ve been thinking about you, reader, and what you want to hear, or even need to hear. But the truth is, I don’t know what you need. I just write.

I came across an old blog post I’d written a few years ago. I was so bold, had so many answers and new discoveries. I thought about my recent writing – my tone, my message, even my demeanor as I write. I feel like my story has quite a bit more brokenness to it now. And I’m starting to be okay with that.

I haven’t taken a break from writing. In fact, I’ve been writing more than ever. But mostly I’ve been writing for me – or to me – to help me understand my own broken story. The words that have transferred onto my computer screen are so dear to my heart, I just want to tuck them away for a while and let them sink deep into my soul before I share them with you.

And I’m finally okay with that.

I’m okay with that because I’ve realized something: It’s okay to do something just for me.

I grew up in a culture where that attitude was treated like complete selfishness. So often we hear sarcastic phrases like “If momma ain’t happy, no one is happy” and we get this negative connotation set to happiness.

A few months ago, we were in the thick of packing to move across the country. It was another wintery day and I’d just finished trudging through the home improvement store yet again, lugging more packing boxes and tape. I was in between surgeries, in a lot of pain, and my post-concussion brain was just not keeping up. So I did the next logical thing.

I went straight to Walmart and bought Justin Bieber’s latest CD.

At first I tried to talk down to myself because I’d thought about buying it before, but spending the $11.74 on myself just seemed totally unreasonable. We were facing all of the moving expenses and moving to an area with a higher cost of living. Why was I being so selfish and buying a CD?

But in that moment, I felt cared about – even if it was just myself doing the caring.

I felt cared about in a way that somehow made up for the fact that I was packing up most of my house by myself. It made up for the times I sat alone in hospitals and ER rooms by myself ridden with pain and fear. It made up for the days when I laid in dark quiet rooms after my concussion and was alone for hours.

I had learned in those times that it is OK to take care of myself sometimes.

I try to take moments throughout the day – ten minutes, twenty, thirty, or two, however many I have – and just rest my soul and feed it a little. I’m a busy mom, dedicated to spending my days with my little ones. But I still try to find some time to read a bit of a favorite book or listen to some music that I love or sit down at my keyboard even for even just a single song, and just feed my soul.

I’ve found more balance in my life than ever, just by taking a few moments for myself.

I smile a little whenever  I listen to JB’s newest music – not just because I love this album way more than I probably should admit – but because I always remember the day when I bought it. It was such a simple thing, but in that moment, it fed my soul.

I’m working on some writing projects that are pretty exciting to me. But right now they are just mine. I feel a little bit like a new mom who doesn’t want to pass her newborn around the room yet, she just wants to keep that little bundle tucked in close to her heart.

But darling, I haven’t forgotten about you.

I want you to know that you’re valuable. Those dishes will wait, those weeds will be there another day. Your soul is a beautiful, important thing. Feed it.

I’m notorious for killing plants. I’ve killed nearly every plant I’ve ever had in my possession – save one, which didn’t make it on the move from the North to the East. Regardless of this known fact, one autumn when plants were really cheap at the hardware store, my husband unexpectedly came home with a palm tree.

A palm tree.

I tried to explain to him that if I struggle so badly keeping plants alive that are native to our region, how am I supposed to keep a palm tree alive? But he said he always wanted a palm tree and I should just give it at try.

It died just a few short months later.

At that time, I smugly informed my husband that I warned him of this and he should stop showing up unannounced with plants from tropical islands because I am an eastern girl living in the north and I couldn’t even grow a sunflower.

I’m on a quest right now to usher some intentionality back into my life. The moving-across-the-country saga has gone on for a few months now and I decided maybe it’s time to stop using that as an excuse for the random choices I’ve been making – or rather, not making.

So I deleted my Netflix app off my phone. I know myself well enough to know that even if I was really desperate to watch Netflix, the extra three minutes it takes to load it on the TV just isn’t worth it to me. If I can’t watch it in my bed, I will probably not get to it at all. Which has proven true. (And since it’s been exactly 36 hours, I am obviously now an expert on this and can speak with quite authority.)

I’ve noticed a slight shift in my thinking – even if it is very slight.

I have this way of projecting my own experiences into the drama that I’m watching and continually thinking about it. I start thinking that maybe I deserve to say some things to some people, too. When do I get my moment in the rain in an open field to yell all the things I want to yell at people?

Let me just say, those moments probably won’t come. Because on the off chance that I’m somehow standing in an open field in the middle of nowhere with whoever it is I’d like to yell things at, it probably won’t be raining and it will lose all dramatic affect.

Then it will just be me standing in a field. Yelling. Which is ridiculous.

Don’t get me wrong, I am not anti-Netflix. I enjoy it as much as the next person. But when there have been three – three – lessons, studies, or sermons in the past week that have pointed me to the idea that I need to be more intentional about my time if I’m going to grow as person, in relationship with God, and move on from the past, I start paying attention.

I don’t know how long this will last. I’m giving it a week for now, I don’t want to get too ahead of myself. But I want to start the idea in your head of asking you – what are you keeping alive?

I think the main reason the palm tree died was that I didn’t pay attention to it. I think I probably watered it once  because I figured that palm trees were used to not getting rained on. I neglected it and it died on its own.

Maybe the key isn’t always taking things head on and trying to understand them and talking through them or standing in fields yelling about them. Maybe it has more to do with starving the things that don’t bring the fruit of joy and peace, and feeding the things that do.

Just some thoughts from my couch on this quiet, Netflix-less afternoon. Because now I have time to write.

I have never wrestled with a post more. I have written, rewritten, thrown away, went on contemplative drives, yelled at my computer, tried to make sense of it all and I have come to realize one thing: I am not fighting the post, I am fighting myself. Such is the process of writing from the middle…

My dear friend, Audrey, often says something to me that sometimes irritates me but I know she’s right:

“The only way out is through.”

I never wanted to be that person who had days where I was immobile, fragile, or debilitated. I never wanted to be the person who cried through every church service, in the middle of small groups, during coffee conversations. I didn’t want to be someone who carried pain.

We have this way of trying to escape our pain. Inside us there is this desire to learn to live outside of, away from, or past our pain. We think if we can resume normal life, it’ll somehow dissapate on its own.

My darling, this is not true.

I’ve been emoting my way through Cheryl Strayed’s book Tiny Beautiful Things where she answers letters from people who are troubled, scared, hurt, betrayed, lost, etc. So many of the writers ask the same question: how do I move on from here? Her answer is often so simple: You find a way to live in your new world where these things have happened and become part of you.

I recently had a similar conversation with my counselor. I get in this rut of thinking if I can just get things to look and feel the way they did before the storms ruined them, we would all go back to normality and somehow I could live outside of the after math.

That’s not going so well.

Last year, before the storms hit, my hair was long, my body was fit and healthy, my brain was sharp. Since then, all these things have changed – I cut 15 inches off my hair, had multiple surgeries, a concussion, pain in relationships, loss of friendships, deaths of dreams. I find myself fighting to feel normal. I will my hair to grow back and my body to be fit. I think that somehow, if I can physically feel normal, my insides won’t hurt so bad.

But the truth is, darling, my insides hurt. I cry through the church services and the small groups. I come late and leave early. Coffee dates are filled more with broken stories than with laughter. I don’t feel at all like myself. And yet, somehow I feel more like myself than ever.

Through the wrestling, the crying, the yelling, the pouring out of my heart, and the now tattered pages of Tiny Beautiful Things, I found a truth that struck to my core. I’ve been fighting it but every day it creeps in a little more.

I am, at this moment, a culmination of all the things I’ve experienced – what I’ve done, what has been done to me, what has happened around me. Who I am at my core is shaped by each of these things. It influences what I belive about myself, God, others, the world, life, death, light, and darkness. There is no getting around it. Experience shapes us.

Pain shapes us. There is no moving on.

We don’t move on. We don’t leave whatever happened to us in the past as if it doesn’t affect us. Of course it affects us. We cannot act like it doesn’t matter. It matters, or we would not hurt. There’s a difference between holding grudges and being scarred.

There is no pretending. There is no unloving someone, unfeeling hurt, unlosing something or somone of immeasurable worth. There is only finding your place in your new world that includes new pain, new loss,new scar, and most importantly: new growth.

There’s a deep honesty that comes with learning to accept our stories as reality and realizing that trials, pain, and loss have changed us. And there’s a treasure to be found in the place where we look at ourselves, battle scars and all, and see the warrior fighting within us – the warrior who continues to press on.

I believe the best thing I can do in life is find who I am now, and learn how I am going to live a full life not inspite of my hurts, but with my hurts. Many of those hurts came with invaluable lessons. This is me. This is what I have to work with. It is my choice to keep fighting her off or make her as beautiful as I can, right here, right now. I want to keep learning to find that person and love her to bits. I want to be kind to her, gentle in the pain, joyful in the triumph.

If I could tell you one thing right now it would be this: Find your “You”, culmination and all, and love them well. You’re worth it. Your insides are worth it. Your story is worth it.

I recently started a writer’s workshop taught by Allison Fallon. It’s been a dream of mine to do something like this for a long time. And while it seems like a strange time in my life to be starting something like this, it’s been really inspiring so far. This week we filled out quadrants of a square with various words, phrases, and memories from our childhood. We took those words and phrases and plugged them directly into a poem. I was amazed at the beauty that came from this. This is where I’m from. Enjoy.

 

I am from a brick house,

from pine cones and stones

I am from trees, flowers,

freshly cut grass

I am from mud and football,

from laughter and wind.

 

I am from fresh air, fields,

corn husks, and sticks

I am from a creek,

from warm summer evenings

I am from sunshine

I am from siblings

 

I am from I love you

from do your best

I am from Jesus made you

from let me talk to you

 

I am from let me pray with you

from tell me about your day

I am from sit on my lap

from Jesus is the son of God

 

I am from Christmas,

from candles and carols

I am from poinsettias blooming,

from sledding and gift giving

I am from carols, lights,

and reading bible stories

 

I am from red and green tinsel,

snowmen building and pine needles

I am from pumpkin pie,

from games and puzzles

I am from stars and angels

I am from family

 

My youngest son walked at 10 months. So many times it seemed like his feet got ahead of his brain. He didn’t have a steady concept of height, heat, or danger. Out of my two boys, he landed in the ER about twice as often. Pain is how he learned many of his lessons.

I had coffee with a new friend today. The conversation turned to God’s protection. I mentioned how I’ve experienced an increasing amount of pain in my life throughout the last year on many, many levels. I felt like God abandoned me, that he didn’t see my struggle, that he didn’t try to protect me from the pain.

Today, my friend offered wisdom that struck deep:

“What if God’s way of protecting you was allowing you to experience the pain?”

I stared at my mocha, taking in this new concept.

I could have scooped my son up every time he darted towards the stairs. I could have kept him on the same floor his whole life. I could have carried him every time we went up or down. But he wanted to climb. And often, when he climbed, he fell.

Ultimately, falling is what taught him to climb and to gain strength.

Sometimes God’s way of getting us to move on from stagnant, harmful, or destructive places or patterns is to allow us to experience pain. Pain is almost always the thing that convinces us to change what we are doing. If what we are doing feels good and comfortable, we’ll probably stay there.

There is something about pain that protects, corrects, and redirects.

Pain is what reminds me that something still isn’t right. Pain reminds me that something still needs to be resolved. Pain reminds me that I need to keep making progress.

I mentioned in my last post that I’m mad that I can’t have a prettier story. I’m still mad about that – sort of. I’m coming to grips with it. I am frustrated by the process and by the pain, but I’m trying to learn what the pain is teaching me. I am learning to be kind to myself in the process, to give myself days that I can grieve and think and not feel bad that there are dirty dishes and piles of laundry.

I’m learning not to hate the pain.

I’m banking on the fact that God still loves me and that He sees me. And I’m begging him to keep transforming the pain into a story that is worth telling. I still believe in redemption. I believe that my pain has a purpose. I believe it won’t always be like this. I believe that there is solid ground to be found. And I believe that some day, when I’m done tumbling down the stairs, I’ll learn to climb again.