The Mess

"I did what you won't do," my business coach declared from stage.  It seemed like he was talking directly to me.  

"Ugh," I rotate in my seat.  How many times have I made excuses that it is too hard, or that I am just too busy?  Too many to count.

"How old do you have to get before you stop blaming your past for your current failures?  You were abused?  You were rejected? You were a victim? Get over it.  You were made for far more than your misfortunes."  How many times do you blame your past for your current rut?  Your past existed.  There is no sense in pretending it didn't.  But there comes a time when you need to realize your future is more important than your past.  There comes a time when you have to stop acting as if your misfortunes are the defining title of your life.  I have a past too, everyone does.  But at the end of the day, it isn't the past that will define you, it is the way you respond to the past.  

I have honestly written a blog similar to this, but I have been re-inspired to focus back on the truthful subject.  In all reality, there are way too many people who will forever be controlled by their hurtful past, because they are unwilling to do the work to overcome it.  It is painful, it will not be easy, but allowing growth in a dead area of your life will push you far past that of an ordinary failure or success.  There is no way to see yourself for who you were made to be until you address the pain.  It will be there, anchoring you to the ground until you release it.  But only you can untie that knot and release yourself.

When I was growing up, us kids would get ourselves into various difficulties.  We would get caught in something, our hair matted beyond understanding, or cords in some irreversible mess.  In our childhood ways, we would run to our mommy, compassionately named the Knot Doctor, to help ease the mess.  She would patiently sit and detangle the mess and then we would be on our way again.  We need that Knot Doctor, and let me tell you, it isn't going to be another person on this planet.  Only God can truly detangle the mess life made.  But you have to go to him.  He will only fix it if you ask.  You have to ask, because your future starts now.

"Brothers, I do not consider that I have made it my own. But one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus." -Philippians 3:13-14

Destiny

This week, I am happy to say, has been a week of blessing.  There is nothing quite like blessing to remind you of what an excitement for life looks like.  It is amazing how busy we can get with our head down, grinding away, that we forget how beautiful the trees, birds, and sky are.

And what is the best gift worthy of lifting your head for is?  Easter.  No, not the bunny and colored eggs (however cute those traditions are), but the pure unadulterated gift from the son of God, himself: life.  And what a beautiful gift that is.  A gift, that unlike most, is not earned, but freely given.

Yes, I do fully understand the market will be flooded with well-meaning bloggers speaking of the value of Jesus' gift.  Regardless of this, my week of blessing will be fittingly incomplete without the mention of "The Christian Super Bowl" as our pastor so fondly calls it.

But anyways, one of the greatest lessons I have learned is that Christ's gift really was one of the only free gifts in life.  The rest take hard work and a lot of grind, but the reward at the end is so bright and beautiful that it makes all the hard work seemingly incomparable.  There is a sort of parable that comes to mind.  The Chinese bamboo tree doesn't break ground for four years after it is planted and then on the fifth year it grows 90 feet in 5 weeks.  Thus is the intricate story of success.  The beginning seems bleak and requires a certain multitude of faith in order to see its value.  Then, all of a sudden, after faith exceeds possibility, the impossible takes shape.  And what a beautiful thing that impossibility becomes.

I will be honest, this week I was laying in bed staring at the ceiling, thinking about why in the world faith has to exist.  Why can't God just reveal himself and then everyone could just sit in his glory?  Because God wants more for us.  He wants more for us than a mediocre acceptance of truth.  He wants us to be challenged and stand tough.  One of the best blessings he could ever bestow is truth after a lifetime of living by faith alone.  Only then will we grow to be all He longs for us to be.  Only then will we fulfill our destiny.

And Jesus answered them, “Truly, I say to you, if you have faith and do not doubt, you will not only do what has been done to the fig tree, but even if you say to this mountain, ‘Be taken up and thrown into the sea,’ it will happen. Matthew 21:21

Designed Decision

This week the Allen household came down with something.  Not exactly sure if it was a stomach flu or a response to food poisoning, but regardless of what it was, it had us down most of the week.  Between sharing our single bathroom, or debating over whose turn it was to get waited on, it has been an interesting week.  

Regardless of all of that, a few things have become glaringly obvious. First of all, if I intend to become more confident in my skin, I need to make a decision.  A decision comes before any type of growth.  This week I spent every day pushing off my responsibilities and vowing for a better outlook tomorrow.  Tomorrow came and went with more promises of a better future, but no work ethic.  So Marcus and I sat down tonight to do our weekly assessment of growth and decided to make this coming week (starting now) better.  Was our pathetic last week justified?  A little.  But we can still use it to better understand our comfort zones and what we tend to default to when challenged.  

Which brings me to my second realization.  Having a healthy understanding of what our comfort zone looks like is extremely important.  It is hard pushing forward every day.  There will be times when you want to crawl back to the time when life was easier and aspirations were low.  It is always easier to aim for a comfortable present, but if we want a better future, we have to create it.  The best way to get out of your comfort zone is to know when you are in it, and what will motivate you to get out.  I know it sounds trivial, but I can backslide very quickly on a bad day and get very comfortable, very fast.  

It is so important to know yourself.  That is truly the only way to love yourself.  The more time you spend discovering who you are, the more you will discover the unique eccentricities that God designed uniquely for you.  But first it takes a decision, a decision to grow.

“Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, and before you were born I consecrated you; I appointed you a prophet to the nations.” -Jeremiah 1:5    

Deflated

How do you teach people to love themselves?  That is the question that has been floating around and around in my head.  It seems that with any other learning, all you have to do is study it.  But with self-image, often the more it's studied, the more fault and weakness is found.

A couple nights ago my husband and I excitedly watched the third part of the Hunger Games trilogy.  The movie (Part 1) was invigorating and set us both into the Hunger Games-frenzy again.  So much so for me that I grabbed the book, Catching Fire, off my shelf and picked up where the movie left off (reading the remaining 212 pages in a matter of hours).  If you are familiar with the books you should know the ending has left many readers disappointed and grasping at straws at the end of the plot.  Why?  Because a strong and powerful character leads battle after battle throughout the entire storyline and slowly disintegrates before the readers eyes.  By the end of the story she is nothing but a shell of the person she once was, fighting the horrendous memories that haunt her.  Why am I telling you all of this?  Because it bothers me that an appropriate answer to pain and hardship is to disappear and lose the person you were designed to be.  Do I understand the pain that this character endured?  No.  In fact, not even close.  But to me, each challenge should be overcome, not passed by, surrendering pieces of yourself, until you are depleted like a balloon slowly losing its substance.

Am I taking this series a little too literally?  Probably.  But I think it highlights a piece of reality that is worth mentioning.  Instead of overcoming situational experiences in our life, we see difficulties as a reason to become less of ourselves; worse yet, we adapt to carrying a greater burden and never learn to drop it and move on.  Everyone on the planet has baggage that they are carrying around.  Sadly, most people's most defining feature is their baggage.  Why?  Because they don't know themselves well enough to think any different.  Their self is a sum of all of their circumstances instead of their circumstances being defined by their self.  You are more than what has happened to you.  You are what you think you are.  It's time to start thinking you are great.

"Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest." -Matthew 11:28    

Tonight's Dream

This week I was standing over my sleeping son and praying for him and his future, as I do every night.  His little fists were tightly closed and body relaxed into the comfort of his bed.  It is moments like this that I can't help but wonder who he will become and what dreams lay ahead for him.  As I left his room that night, I started thinking about who I am and whether I would want him to follow in my footsteps.  This is a very humbling thought. I am proud of who I am, but more proud of who I want to become.  If I want him to become something, or believe something (for instance believe in himself), I need to pave the way.  I can't expect greatness out of him, but never move beyond mediocrity in my own life.  This is motivation to me.  From the beginning, my son has been motivation to work harder and to be more.  It is easy to want more for my child, but never do anything to create it.  I want to show him what self-confidence looks like and what success looks like.  But that takes hard work.  It takes focus.  It takes drive.  And most of all, it takes belief.  I can work all day until I am blue in the face, but if I don't believe I can do it, the motivation will never stick around.  What is the point of working hard if you don't believe in the reward?  

Belief is essential to growth and self-importance.  Perception is reality.  Heard that one before?  Do yourself a favor and believe, even for a day, that you have more potential than right now allows.  Your future doesn't have to look like you are now.  But you have to decide to be different and want more.  It won't happen on its own.  

One of the greatest things I have learned is that the more I love myself the more that I want more for myself.  I want to achieve more, because I believe in myself and I believe in the dream that was placed in my heart.  Maybe you aren't there yet.  But you have to start, or your dreams of tomorrow will always be a day away.  

"The soul of the sluggard craves and gets nothing, while the soul of the diligent is richly supplied." -Proverbs 13:4

The Others

At his wife's funeral, a passionate minister, Dr. E.V. Hill, expressed a story depicting his wife's affectionate soul.  In Love and Respect by Emerson Eggerichs, it was described like this: "As a struggling young preacher, E.V. had trouble earning a living.  E.V. came home one night and found the house dark.  When he opened the door, he saw that Jane had prepared a candlelight dinner for two.  He thought that was a great idea and went in to the bathroom to wash his hands.  He tried unsuccessfully to turn on the light.  Then he felt his way into the bedroom and flipped another switch.  Darkness prevailed.  The young pastor went back to the dining room and asked Jane why the electricity was off.  She began to cry.  'You work so hard, and we're trying,' said Jane, 'but it's pretty rough.  I didn't have enough money to pay the light bill.  I didn't want you to know about it, so I thought we would just eat by candlelight.'  Dr. Hill described his wife's words with intense emotion.  'She could have said, 'I've never been in this situation before.  I was reared in the home of Dr. Caruthers, and we never had our lights cut off.'  She could have broken my spirit; she could have ruined me; she could have demoralized me.  But instead she said, 'Somehow or other we'll get these lights back on.  But tonight let's eat by candlelight."

You see, there is one job that we have as humans on this planet: to love others.  It's funny how often we get sidetracked and think it is all about us.  The greatest thing I have been reflecting on this week is the power that we have to live and breathe life into others.  Only then will you be truly fulfilled.  So as I focus on my purpose and, of course, my daily life to get there, what truly am I striving toward?  If I seriously analyze my life, how much do I feed into others?  Ok, so unfair question because I am a mommy and my life constantly is encouraging my little one.  But when I move that aside for a second, does my love extend beyond that?  My husband- does he get fed into and encouraged the way he deserves?  And the real and honest kicker- am I doing all that I can?  Or am I making excuses in order to do the minimum?  Life wasn't meant to live in order to just get by.  It was intended to be flourished upon, it was meant to be serving, it was meant to be beautiful.

"A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another." -John 13:34

Growth On Repeat

What a ridiculous week.  I honestly don't remember half of it.  As time continues to fly by, I have set a new goal for this blog.  Seeing as how the days seem to be eaten up faster than pumpkin pie on Thanksgiving, I have decided to take a weekly break every Sunday night.  A little me time, a little reflection over the past week and some intentionality moving forward.  A Starbucks date for me, myself, and I.  So as long as my life doesn't move in another unexpected direction, this will be my plan and time to think back over the previous week and share my reflection.  Not that I won't occasionally share my thoughts or aspirations throughout the week, but right now my commitment is set on Sunday Night Reflection.

I think the best description of this week has been pain.  Not all bad, after all, pain is the result of growth, but nevertheless, it has emphasized to me how important harnessing that pain for good is.  A few years ago one of the pastors at our long-time church spoke one of the most profound messages I have ever heard.  I swear, monthly I refer back to his thoughtful words and use them to assess my own life.  What are these profound words?  In one word, growth.  He estutely read about the Israelites in the desert and how they spent 40 grueling years navigating the challenges.  What a perfect analogy of life.  Time after time, the exhausted mob was put through the same challenge.  Faminine.  Then drought.  All their sustanance disappeared and they were asked to trust.  What was their response?  Fear, doubt, panic.  In the heat of the trial they not only fell from God, they questioned all of his promises.  They screwed up.  God understood, but gave them another shot to respond to their lesson and move forward.  Did they change their response?  No.  Fear, doubt, panic.  Again and again the cycle played.  Our pastor emphasized that the longer we spend not growing and learning from our experiences, the more we will have to repeat the same struggle.  I equate it to a video game.  Again and again you will edure a level until you pass it.  Only then will you move on.  Thus is growth.  Growth is essential if we don't want to be walking in circles for 40 years.  

The reality of the situation is that we can't control the circumstances that come our way.  There will be days that are hard and the wind gets knocked clear from our lungs.  It is our job to respond to these days with grace.  It is our job to stand up and face the wind head on.  Get knocked down?  Try again, with more strength this time.  The beauty is every time you get up and try again you will develop more stamina.  Another opportunity to pass the level and move on to the next.  You have an option.  Don't flee, fight.

"Now there was no water for the community, and the people gathered in opposition to Moses and Aaron." -Numbers 20:2