Waking Up Me!

I can't believe it's been over three and a half years since I wrote here. Well, since I published anything here. I've been back periodically to write here, but left things abandoned because I just didn't have it in me to finish what I'd started. My heart wasn't in it anymore. Thankfully, I have found my way back again and my heart is filling up again. What happened to me, you ask? I fell into the pit. A place of sorrow. Of lost hope. Of keep-on-keeping-on and putting one foot in front of the other. I lost heart for the journey I was on. I let myself live in a self-imposed place of defeat. Sometimes, you get knocked down so much that you don't feel like getting back up again. I really don't see myself as that person, though. Someone who gets defeated. Someone who stays down. Instead, I am the girl who chooses to fight. I come out swinging. I drag my butt back up because I live by the motto, "If not me, then who?" So, again, how did life kick m...

My mom and I were on the phone yesterday and she told me that while at my house earlier in the day, she read my journal. It was the first journal I had written from back in 1990/91. I started writing in it after I graduated early from high school in January of 1990 and wrote in it up until November 1991 before I got my final details for the Navy. At first, I felt a bit taken back by the fact that she read my journal as I had no idea what all I said in it. Once she told me that it helped her to see me and know me better and in a different way, I let go of my apprehension over it. She explained that she didn't really know me back then and got a peek into my heart and soul. She didn't know that I loved Jesus very much even then. She did know I was lost and wandering, but said she was glad to read about my relationships, friends, and my beautiful heart. It's amazing how our perception of others without taking the time to truly know them can create the wrong picture of who they ...

I have a plaque in my living room above the TV that I bought when I started my life over after my divorce. It says, "God didn't promise days without pain, laughter without sorrow, sun without rain, but He did promise strength for the day, comfort for the tears, and light for the way." At Oma's service, there was a poem based on this premise in the memorial card. I think many of us have heard or said, "God doesn't give you more than you can handle." Unfortunately, that's not true. That's a misinterpretation of the following verse from  1 Corinthians 10:13 (NIV) : No temptation has overtaken you except what is common to mankind. And God is faithful; he will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear. But when you are tempted, he will also provide a way out so that you can endure it. The promise lies in Him being there for you or "provid[ing] a way out so that you can endure it." It requires us to seek Him. I believe that unti...