never been here before

Some wounds can only be healed when everything is all out in the open without a bandage keeping the scratch sterile and protected.   Because sometimes the wound needs to be exposed. Bumped a few times. It hurts like a mother, but it will be worth it because eventually the wound will dry out and close up. But that time of exposure, that time of bumping, causes a fair amount of screaming and pain. But it’s all so we can stop working around the pain and start using that appendage again. So we can move on. This happened to me recently with a wound on the tip of my index finger, right by my cuticle. It made the last week of packing and moving miserable. It doesn’t really seem like it would be that big of a deal, but that cuticle area hurt more than having my wisdom teeth out, which I didn’t even take my pain meds for. Apparently my tolerance for physical pain is off the charts. (I guess I make up for that in how I handle emotional pain.) But a little bump on that cuticle had ...

I’ve been thinking a little bit lately about why I have the people in my life that I do. Of course, it involves my own choice to an extent… because love is about a series of decisions you make. Yet once love is there, it’s difficult to turn away from that. So, those people are also, on some level, not a choice. They are there because they are… there, we are bound by an invisible and often un-understandable tether. Somehow, in some ways, our stories have linked and it’s no longer a choice. But a bond. But there are points you can turn away, too. Sometimes you must. This should not be taken lightly. That said, when I think about those I choose to have in my life: those who walk alongside me in the big and small things, the ones who call me for a last minute lunch at Culver’s after church, ones who stop by my house or my office without warning, sometimes with coffee to bribe me (or just to make me feel better), the ones who call me at 2:30pm during the week, knowing I’m at w...

When I was a kid, my dad owned a ranch up in the north part of Nebraska . We had a house up there to use when we wanted, so we often spent weekends there. Or in the summer when I wasn’t in school, we’d be up there for longer periods of time. There was a lot of land on the ranch. Rolling hills, sprawling fields...it was idyllic and beautiful. My dad and I used to ride horses in these fields a lot. I don’t know what his agenda was – if he was checking on the cattle or just wanted to spend time with me. Who knows? But I remember one day we found an ornate looking piece of metal. This intrigued my dad to no end. He loved this kind of stuff. So we starting search around the area and collected these metal pieces that looked as though they belonged together. It became like a treasure for my dad, whereas I just rolled my eyes every time he spotted a piece and asked me to get off the horse and grab it. I don’t remember how long this went on. But I’m pretty sure it was a few ye...

“Calling-out?” “Convicting?” “Keeping accountable?” “Restore him gently” (to use a softer, biblical phrase from Galatians 6) So, basically, being someone’s Holy Spirit. I was having a conversation with my friend/cousin Meredith the other day and she mentioned “the hustle” – a term Brené Brown has attached to people who make you work for worthiness. The friend that makes you do just one more thing… I know some of Brown’s work, of course. I’ve written about it here a lot. But “the hustle” was a new term I’d never heard attached to her name, so I did some research. I discovered this: If we spend a lifetime trying to distance ourselves from the parts of our lives that don’t fit with who we think we’re supposed to be, we stand outside of our story and have to hustle for our worthiness by constantly performing, perfecting, pleasing, and proving. - Brené Brown – Hustle for Worthiness I guess Brown did a study once upon a time, in a DVD that has been discontinued, ...

So I’ve been waiting. For a few days now. I found out I hurt someone and I apologized. I’m not getting a response. Just silence. The things that go through your mind when a relationship is broken, and you’re trying to fix it, can be all-consuming. You wonder if they even got your message at all. Wondering if you should try again, push the issue. Then you spend some of the time wondering why you did what you did and berating yourself for it. Then get angry at them for not responding, muttering things like, “Well, that’s not very Christ-like of them. What about Matthew 6:15?” and “They are being so immature right now. What else could I do? I can’t undo it, I can only make restitution.” ( Restitution?  Yeah, you can tell I’ve been spending a lot of time in the Old Testament lately.) Yep. So far, right on course for the Kübler-Ross model. Then you start to wonder if the apology was even necessary. That maybe you really didn’t hurt them all that much and you are making ...

My index finger stopped just above that blue button. I was pausing. I was unsure. Was I not only ready to send this but ready to deal with the response? This is the world we live in today. An impersonal yet somehow personal way of connecting with each other… instantly. I remembering reading several years ago that gmail was instituting a change in their email policies. If it was a certain time of day (late hours of the night) a notice would pop up after you hit “send” and asked, “Are you sure you want to send this?” I think it was called the “drunk email” something – with their goal to prevent stupid things from being sent if you weren't in control your capacities. What is so bad about that, anyway? Not the drunk part, of course, but the idea that we wouldn't have time to write a perfectly constructed response to a real person? A live person with feelings and a heart and eyes that you can’t ignore. The idea that we could say what was on our heart and that the...

I was in a hotel room after the first day in Milwaukee, journaling. It had been a very long time since I’d sat down with paper and pen to journal about my “feelings.”  I’ll journal here, typing furiously or sometimes painfully slow, depending on my emotions in that moment. And I journal through books of the Bible sometimes as my devotional. I write down notes on paper in meetings, at conferences. But I’ve stopped the “Dear Diary” kind of moments. Looking back at that entry today, I understand why. You don’t censor yourself when having that journaling moment. And I mostly don’t censor here, I guess, but there are details left out “to protect the innocent.” So the words in that red spiral notebook hit me hard today. It was December 4 th , the Thursday night of one of the worst weeks of my life, professionally and personally. I needed to process my day but the feelings I’d left back in Arizona kept returning. So they were weaving very carefully into what I wrote that nigh...

While I have taken the time to identify who and what I must fall out of love with this year, I also must take a moment, with my words and my heart, to remind myself of those I plan to stay in love with. With my heart open, trying so much to let others love me and know me and be there for me (and hopefully I've been able to be there for them in the way they deserve, too) I have found those who have been good to me. Those who have been careful with my heart, who've taught me what grace really looks like, what the inconvenience of friendship looks like, and if I’m being completely honest, what true love looks like. It looks like calling me every morning while I’m putting on my makeup to remind me they are there for me. It looks like bringing me coffee or flowers. Just because they know it will mean the world to me. It looks like those who've grieved with me, lamented with me, prayed with me when neither of us felt like it, but Jesus made it so. It looks...

My word for 2014, though I’m only realizing it now that it’s over, was courage. As I think about what I want and hope from 2015, there is a phrase that keeps running through my head. “falling out of love with what isn’t good for me” The phrase, “falling out of love” might be controversial, especially for those of you close to me and didn't know that I actually fell in love. I only recently realized it myself. (A couple of weeks ago, to be more precise.) Perhaps I didn't fall in love in the traditional sense. But I did, indeed, fall in love. And I fell in love with some things that weren't good for me. There was a lot of heart work done in 2014, where I resolved to be more honest with those I love. And honest with myself. I wanted to be less closed off to the hard experiences and feelings that life brings. And less closed off to let others know me and love me, so I could more fully understand the love of Christ. And it was pretty awful. I am gl...