For my 6th-grade self

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Last night, my 3rd grader burst into song (this happens frequently in our house). It was to the tune of the Gilligan’s Island theme, but it was a song about—wait for it—prepositions. And she rattled off every last one of them. My jaw dropped.

I had an immediate flashback to 6th grade, 1st period grammar class with Mrs. Robinson, who was also my homeroom teacher. I was sitting in the second seat from the back in the first row of desks, near the door. And boy did I want to bolt out that door. Instead I remained glued to my seat, heart pounding and eyes brimming with tears as I held the results of my first test as a 6th grader. The big red D scratched at the top of the page—and the red Xs next to almost every answer I’d given? I didn’t even know how to process that.

It was a test on prepositions, which I’d been expected to memorize. I’d never had to study for anything before though, and had walked into class confident that I would just know the answers. They would be in my head somewhere, and I’d just summon them. (Why did no one teach me the Gilligan’s Island song?!) I was a smart kid—my mom and my teachers always said that. I was sure it would all just come naturally.

Not so much.

That big D. It looked so mean. And all that red ink! I was humiliated and quickly flipped my paper over on my desk to hide it from the eyes of the classmates sitting around me. Everyone was leaning in their seats to try to get a peek at other kids’ scores. My teacher must hate me, I thought. Everyone told her I was smart, but obviously I’m not. 

Middle school is hard for a lot of reasons. I had no idea the likelihood of bad grades would be one of them.

My eyes fill with tears as I sit here thinking about my 6th-grade self, because I didn’t know it then, but that moment changed me. I was ashamed, knocked off my “I’m so smart” pedestal, and all I knew was that I never wanted to see angry red marks on any of my papers ever again. How could I bounce back from this? What would my parents think?

I would learn how to study and memorize. I would strive for nothing less than perfection. “100%” and “A” were the only things I wanted to see written in red from there on out.

Well, I didn’t end up with a perfect record. PE and honors pre-calc would take me down. But for the duration of my education years, I never could let go of those less-than-A assignments or stop comparing my grades to those of the kid next to me—even in college.

(Interesting to think that 10 years after sitting in Mrs. Robinson’s grammar class, I’d be entering a career in which I made red marks all over other people’s writing for a living. And I would love it. Yikes.)

As a middle schooler, achieving less than perfection made me defensive, argumentative, and pouty—every correction a stab at my pride.

6th-grade

A lot of years have passed since then, and I can still recall the memory of being handed that D test in detail. Have I changed at all since then? Some days I wear my failures like badges of shame. And when I make a mistake and am called out on it—a typo on the page, a factual error in conversation, or spiritual guidance offered in love—guess what? Defensive, argumentative, and pouty.

My stinking pride! It’s still hanging around, all these years later—right there at the root of my perfectionist tendencies.

1 Corinthians 10:31 says, “…whatever you do, do all to the glory of God.” Sometimes I mentally tack “…so you better do it perfectly!” onto the end of it. Heads up, that’s not in the Bible. God is well aware of the fact that I can’t be 100% without him, and I’m certainly never going to earn 100%. That’s not the way it works. I make mistakes. I am a sinner. I need his grace. How often I forget.

So, dear 6th-grade Rebekah, with your glasses and braces and hair that just won’t cooperate, take a breath and wipe your tears. Middle school will get better. It’s your first memorable failure. There will be more, a lot more. (Sorry, kid.) God’s grace is sufficient for you. Believe it, because it’s true. And oh, how you’ll need it.

Click here to see all posts from the Grace, Freedom, & the Rules series.

{This series is part of the Write 31 Days challenge.}

Grace, Freedom, and the Rules

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The unpredictability of a summer schedule with kids home from school and no routine to depend on left me feeling a little bit crazy one week over the summer, so I resolved to create consistency elsewhere. I somewhat randomly chose a passage of Scripture to dwell on every day for one week. The same passage, every day. No hopping around elsewhere in my Bible or pulling out a devotional—just reading my selected passage, thanking God for the words, and asking him to show me something new each day about himself and myself. These are the verses I selected:

For from his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace. For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. —John 1:16-17 

I frowned at the page after the first read, puzzled by the words despite their familiarity from years and years of church attendance and Bible studies. I’d heard that first sentence a lot. It’s pretty and flowy, and on its own, sounds like a nice place to sit and rest, you know? After all, it’s grace upon grace—not just grace, but more grace on top of that! Okay, great. But what do I do with that? I moved on to the next sentence and began to focus on the bigger story—the eternal perspective.

“For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.”

God gave Moses the law to give to his people. It was rigid to say the least, and as we see in the Old Testament over and over and over again, the punishment for disregarding it was severe. Yet it was God’s grace in the form of rules to live by. It was a gift.

I think of one of those things parents love to say that kids loathe: “I’m doing this because I love you.” We want our children to stay safe from harm, so we establish rules; they have to eat their veggies, look both ways before crossing, and keep their seatbelts buckled. We’re not trying to make them miserable—we’re trying to keep them alive, for Pete’s sake.

God does this for us, too.

But there’s more. We also get Jesus. Grace upon grace. Another translation phrases it “grace in place of grace.” Jesus is God’s grace to us in the form of a person we can know and relate to, fulfillment of his promises, the One who stood in our place and took the punishment we deserved—death—so that we could truly live.

We have the Word, rules to live by. We have Christ, fulfilling the law and taking the punishment for the rule-breaking we will inevitably do—grace, mercy, and forgiveness. And we have the Holy Spirit to be with us always, intercede for us, and help us discern the hard places.

This was big for me to grasp, and in the moment understanding began to dawn on me, I reached over from where I’d been sitting in bed and shook my husband’s shoulder, startling him awake, because I needed to tell someone this thing that had never really clicked for me before. It’s gift upon gift upon gift—and as much as I like to convince myself I’ve somehow earned it by doing the right things, I couldn’t be more wrong. I don’t deserve any of it.

God’s rules and his grace work together. They don’t limit us. They set us free. 

This is a challenging concept for a girl who actually likes following the rules. (A lot.) So I’d like to take the month of October and look back at snapshots of my life each day, finding the places where those stories intersect with ideas about rules, grace, and freedom. It will probably be a little messy, which makes me uncomfortable. I might struggle some days to hit “publish” on work I know is unfinished and on thoughts I’m still processing. But I’m feeling expectant that this exercise will be a good one—both in writing and in better understanding God’s love.

Click here to see all posts from the Grace, Freedom, & the Rules series.

{This series is part of the Write 31 Days challenge.}

On being the light of the world, at Publix

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There are two Publixes in my town, and MY Publix, being slightly out of the way and in a quieter area, has been a delightful spot since we moved here six years ago. It’s bright and clean, and the employees are the friendliest I’ve ever encountered. The best part? If I hit it at the right time of day, it’s practically empty (so, good for me, not for Publix). You know the introverts of the world prefer grocery shopping alone and making eye contact with no one. And if I can make the trip without my kids in tow? *Insert praise hands emoji*

Well. Months back, a new apartment complex opened next door to my sweet, quiet, peaceful Publix, and as new residents began moving in, this terrible thing happened. All these people started shopping at my grocery store. They were suddenly crowding my aisles and forcing me to wait in a line at the deli counter (so, good for Publix, not for me). I could no longer find a parking spot in my usual row. A lover of consistency and routine, I didn’t adapt well to any of this. So many people everywhere! And some of them so grumpy, right there in my happy place! Where did they even come from?

My initial reaction was to change my approach to grocery shopping. I would no longer take my time strolling up and down each aisle, enjoying my solitude and the ’80s tunes playing overhead. No, I would be a defensive player. (That might be the one and only sports analogy you’ll ever see here, by the way.) Keep my head down, stick to the list, push my cart swiftly and with authority, make small talk with no one, beat the other shoppers to the short line, swipe my card, and get the heck out of there. I survive! I win!

But God. (Isn’t it always “but God”?)

It started with a man, cart full of groceries, two little girls up front and another walking beside, on a day when the checkout lines were particularly long. I had beaten him to the shortest line with my own full cart. I looked up and we made eye contact, and something in my heart said, “Move.” So I took a couple of steps back and beckoned him over from his place in the line next to me.

He took me up on the offer with a grateful smile, and I stepped behind him and waved at the little girls in the cart.

It was a tiny interaction that didn’t cost me much—maybe five extra minutes of standing. It wasn’t a huge moment in the history of grocery shopping and checkout line acts of kindness. But God stirred something in me right there between the tabloids and the candy.

I can be a gospel-sharer anywhere and everywhere I find myself. As a follower of Christ that’s not a task to do, or something I turn off and on as needed—it’s who I am.

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It’s time to change the way I look at grocery shopping—and every other mundane task that brings me into contact with other humans, for that matter. Every day is full of opportunities to be Jesus to someone who needs him. I just haven’t been paying attention—or worse, dismissing some opportunities with “but not right now…”

It’s not that hard or scary, either. I can do this stuff:

• Make eye contact with employees and other customers. Engage.

• Smile at people—even when they butt you in line or grab the last of the BOGO Oreos off the shelf.

• Let others go first.

• Be a helper.

• Share a positive word. Look for the opportunities to strike up a conversation with someone—which teriyaki marinade you prefer, why Oreo Thins are better than original, whatever. (That’s right, I said it.)

• Befriend the cashiers and baggers. Learn their names. Talk with them about your obsession with Hamilton. (Yeah, I did that.)

• Beat them to the punch by telling them you hope THEY have a great day first.

• Leave with a smile, not in a huff.

• Teach your kids to do all of the above.

“You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden. Nor do people light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a stand, and it gives light to all in the house. In the same way, let your light shine before others…” —Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount, Matthew 5:14-16

Lord, help me not to look past the people right in front of me every day—at Publix, at the post office, sitting in car line after school—stashing my lamp under a basket just because I’m in a hurry to get errands done. 

Where do your daily outings take you? What else would you add to the list above? Are there opportunities to be a light in places you hadn’t considered before?

The interaction might seem insignificant in the moment, but believe me, it’s not—not to the person on the receiving end. (It will change you, too, by the way.) And there’s no one like our God to take those little moments and turn them into something beautiful and kingdom-building.

 

What I learned {the summer edition}

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What I learned_ summer 2016

There are still three weeks of summer left, if we’re getting technical about it, but my kids have been back in school for two weeks already and I’m itching for the next season. So, here we go!

I should never, ever post a photo online of the stack of books I’m planning to read in three months. It’s just embarrassing. There were seven books in my stack, one of which I’d already read most of and so will not count here (Steadfast Love by Lauren Chandler).

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Seven books didn’t seem like a totally outrageous goal. But here’s what I actually finished: 

1. Stacey Thacker’s new book, Fresh Out of Amazing, which I had the pleasure of getting my hands on early as part of her book launch team. It was wonderful. Stacey’s stories are so clearly God-written, and I kept forgetting I’ve never met her in person—the more I read, the more I thought of her as a friend and a mentor. Her words are those of the girlfriend you sit and chat with over coffee at Panera, and I appreciate that kind of writing.

2. Three-fourths of Ron Chernow’s Alexander Hamilton biography. Fine, one-half.

That’s it. No, really. I blame Netflix and my children.

Before helping your child say buh-bye to the pacifier, be sure you are prepared with chocolate. And earplugs. One day in July, I decided I was tired of chasing down my 2-year-old’s pacifiers. So I did something rash I never would have gotten away with when her big sis was little: I walked around the house with a pair of scissors and cut the end off every paci I could find. (Pure evil, I know. I know.) The look on her sweet face when she tried to put them in her mouth! She declared them all “broking” and threw them in the garbage, and I thought, Hurrah! I’ve won! I’m a genius!

And that moment was followed by the worst three days we had all summer.

This is why I’m not spontaneous.

Building websites is fun. My friend Lindsey and I launched a new monthly email newsletter just last week, and I had the best time pulling together the website (really!). We used Squarespace, which I was already familiar with and is pretty easy to use—I’m no master coder or anything. But there was something incredibly satisfying about working on it—the challenges, formatting, troubleshooting, coming up with work-arounds when Squarespace wouldn’t let me do what I had in mind. Nerd alert!

TheDraftingDesk_promo1PS: Go subscribe to The Drafting Desk!

It was harder than I expected to send both my girls off to school this year. 

IMG_7094_blogThere are coyotes in Florida. Silly me for not knowing this, right? I’d heard about local spottings via my neighborhood board, but the only coyotes I’d ever seen myself were on Wild Kratts, and this one:

wile_e_coyote(Doesn’t count.) Until last weekend, when this one showed up in my backyard. IMG_9389

So, who wants to send their kids over to play now?

On a solemn note, I won’t be able to recall the summer of 2016 in future years without acknowledging the Pulse shooting. I’m still struggling to fully wrap my mind around the devastation that occured less than three miles from the house I grew up in. We witnessed something incredible in the aftermath of the horror though. I watched (as did my little girls) an entire community come together, uniting in prayer, hugging total strangers, and giving—giving so much. My 8-year-old and I scrambled around our house to find notepads, pens, snacks, and little gifts for those stuck waiting at local hospitals for their wounded loved ones, and together we delivered them to a local church. She and I sat and wrote notes to encourage people we will never meet. And I learned that though my children won’t fully understand the tragedy or significance of that day for years to come, our response mattered. Our prayers mattered. More tragedy was to come in the weeks that followed, here in our country and around the world. I believe God continues to sing comfort and love over those still wrapped in grief.

•••

I felt a cool breeze over the weekend, and the meteorologist might say it’s the result of tropical weather, but I’m calling it hope. Fall is coming, everyone. Hang in there.

I missed Emily Freeman’s link-up this time around, but if you want to check out my past editions of What I Learned, you can find them here. 

Back to school and a prayer for my girls

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IMG_6839I am not one of those moms who wishes it was always summer.

I love those moms. But I’ve had to accept the fact that at this stage at least, I’m just not one of them. Last year I made one of those summer bucket lists for me and the kids—sure, it was on sticky notes, but at least I wrote it—and guess how many items we checked off?

Zero.

I love a good list, but you know what I loathe? Not accomplishing anything on a list I made for myself.

So this year, there were no lists, no plans, no expectations. And summer has gone a lot more smoothly  than I thought it would, until two weeks ago, when all the together time started getting to the three of us—the 2-year-old, the 8-year-old, and me.

Overnight, they were done with summer, and I was done with summer. My darling angel children were now kicking, picking, and yelling at each other. All that unscheduled time was starting to make me feel twitchy and prone to yelling too, and all of a sudden, heading back to school sounded like the Best Idea Ever.

It’s been like waiting for Christmas ever since. HOW MANY MORE SLEEPS? (That’s me asking, not the girls.)

It’s not the getting-the-kids-out-of-the-house part I’ve been most looking forward to—though let’s be honest, I do look forward to that. It’s the return of a schedule I can count on, and shopping for school supplies and new sneakers, and the promise of a turning season. I know it won’t cool off here in hot, hot Florida for a good long while, but I don’t care. When the school year begins, it means fall is coming soon, and fall is my favorite time of the year. Turn, turn, turn. Let’s get this show on the road.

But now I’m sitting here at the dinner table at 9:42pm thinking about tomorrow morning, when my baby—who was just born yesterday, wasn’t she?—will step into a preschool classroom for the first time. She’s been talking about it for weeks now. “I’m going to PRESCHOOL! I have friends and a TEACHER!” I know that those two days a week are going to be fun and valuable for her, and I know that God is giving me those precious hours to myself because there are words He wants me to write and goals He is pushing me toward, for my own heart and for the kingdom. But preschool feels so big.

And then tomorrow afternoon, after scooping up my toddler from her first day and kissing her smooshy little face off, I will take my other baby—wasn’t she just born yesterday, too?—to meet her 3rd grade teacher. Third grade. Third grade. 

My mind is just one big pile of clichés about kids growing up too fast and savoring the moment and days being long but years being short. When more seasoned parents say those things to me, I roll my eyes. Yes, I know, I know.

But I’ve been weepy for days and just realized why. It’s because Christmas is almost here—we’re down to just hours away—and maybe I’m not quite as ready as I thought. What if they’re not ready? Have I prepared my daughters well for the next season? Cue the tears again.

Where else to go but to my knees?

God, hold their sweet, soft hands as they step into the new and different.

Make their hearts tender and sensitive to the feelings of others—both their peers and their teachers.

Remind them of Your Word, tucked safely in their hearts.

Give them eyes to see the child who needs a friend.

Make them bold enough to be that friend.

May they observe other potty trained children and take note (You know which one I’m talking about). Okay, I’m kidding. Kind of.  

Help them to make thoughtful choices.

Fill them with love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, faithfulness, and self-control.

Help them to give themselves grace when they make mistakes. Guide them in their I’m sorrys. May they extend grace to others and forgive freely.

Help them to be kind-hearted and to serve, even when it’s hard.

Open their minds to all that You have to teach them this year. Help them to soak up knowledge and grow in wisdom and in their love for You.

May whatever they do—from fingerpainting and building with blocks to writing book reports and performing in class plays—be done with their whole hearts.

Lord, please make them brave girls.

Make me brave, too.

Faithfulness {a post for Shama Women}

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Scripture card: She Reads Truth

I’m honored to be part of a team of bloggers writing on behalf of Shama Women, which operates training centers in South Asia where women learn sewing, cosmetology, literacy, and theology. Their stories are evidence of God at work in a country where there is open hostility toward Christians and the lives of women are marginalized. “Shama” means candle—these women are shining light into a dark place.

Maria is 20 years old. She is one of 10 siblings, with five brothers and four sisters. Years ago, when she was still very much a child in the eyes of the world, her mother passed away, followed by her father just a year later. In her culture, when there is no father or grandfather, the eldest brother in a family becomes the caretaker for any of his unmarried sisters. With both of her parents gone and no family patriarch left, this became Maria’s story.

Though her eldest brother took her in and provided a roof over her head, Maria was still expected to earn her keep, so she began cleaning homes. Her wages were low, there was little promise of ever getting a raise, and she felt uneasy and unsafe. Her brother was the recipient of nearly all of her meager earnings.

As young women in her country do, Maria had been collecting for herself a dowry to be given to her future husband. She didn’t have much to offer, the most valuable and treasured piece a tea set given to her by her mother.

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Photo: Shama Women

Just a tea set. It doesn’t sound like anything of importance. As I sit here and type, the shelves above my desk hold a variety of tea pots and cups and saucers, sets I’ve collected from here and there: white china with colorful flowers from my wedding, a brightly colored set given by my sister as a Christmas gift, several delicately painted, flowered pieces handed down from the women in my husband’s family, a tiny set meant for children’s play. They’re all special to me, but none carry anything close to the value and cultural significance of Maria’s. No, Maria’s tea set was much more than an heirloom. It was all she had to her name.

[… please click to read full post]

For the mothers

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My minivan didn’t come with any techy stuff, because at the time we purchased it, we were simply grateful to be buying a second car. Bare bones was fine with us—no media jacks, no DVD player, no automatic doors. Wheels, a solid engine, and a/c was all we needed, thank you Mr. Salesman.

Unfortunately, that means when it comes to music, our options are the radio or whatever CDs we have that still play without skipping. So yesterday morning, I did like I always do when I get tired of the local stations and fished one of the two CDs I keep in the car (JJ Heller and Ellie Holcomb, my favorites) out from under a pile of board books and shoes and stale pretzels on the floor. I blew the crumbs off and slid it into the player.

It had been—it has been—a long, long week.

I just needed to quiet some of the voices. No more news alerts popping up on my phone today, please Jesus. No more horrifying headlines to scroll through. No more “We interrupt this program for the following breaking news.” No more live conferences. It’s just been too much. Too much.

The CD player whirred (I sighed with relief, it’s working today), and JJ’s clear, soothing voice surrounded me and my girls on our drive. The title track, “I Dream of You,” is a mother singing love and sweet dreams over her child as she drifts off to sleep. I play it for my girls often, and I play it when I hold little ones in the church nursery. It always has a quieting, calming effect—on them and on me:

When you fall asleep
What will you dream
Castles and kings

The story’s been read
And you rest your head
Warm in your bed

My love, may you dream
Of beautiful things
’Til the dawn of the day bright and new

Wherever you go
I want you to know
When I dream
I dream of you

Fly over the sea
Float on the breeze
Careless and free

When your journey ends
Wake up and then
Dream it again

My Love, may you dream
Of beautiful things
’Til the dawn of the day bright and new

Wherever you go
I want you to know
When I dream…

I dream of gentle wind blowing in
Time seems to slow
Away we go 

Moonlight fills up your room
Darling, you are my dream come true

(by JJ Heller and David Heller)

The evidence of that morning’s round of crying had barely vanished from my face—I am a splotchy crier—and there I was, driving through suburbia in my minivan, kids in the backseat, just a routine morning, tears rolling down my face.

Because of the mothers.

I sing songs over my children, I do it all the time. I sing in the car and while I change diapers. I pray for them as they drift off to sleep, that they won’t be afraid and that their dreams will be happy. Those mothers, the ones who lost their children this week—at a concert venue, at a nightclub, during a family vacation—I’m sure they sang songs of love over their babies, too.

I cry for the mothers.

I ache for them. They are living through the unimaginable. Your babies are your babies, no matter their age.

And yet, I know that there is hope and the promise of peace. That those lullabies we sing to comfort our babies aren’t only for their little hearts. They’re for the mothers’ hearts, too.

Listen.

Our Father is singing over us, over all of this fallen world. He knows His children by name, and He weeps with us. He knows we might be afraid to close our eyes at night, that we don’t want to see what our dreams are bound to drag to the surface from the depths of our minds. He knows that the darkness feels scary and lonely and that right now, the daylight doesn’t feel much better.

He is singing a sweet lullaby of peace, the kind of peace that is beyond what we can comprehend. The only kind of peace that can bind up a broken heart.

A song for the mothers.

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What I learned in May

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What I learned_ May2016

It’s June 3rd, and the temptation to skip last month’s What I Learned post is big. We’re not even one full week into summer break and I’m running low on energy and inspiration. There are a few weeks’ worth of half-written blog drafts taunting me from their teeny minimized versions at the bottom right of my screen. Writer’s block has been real this month. Powering through, right? Here are four quick thoughts:

• I was introduced to this new month called Maycember, and ahhhhh, I get it. May brought with it the looming end of the school year, which meant extra activities, parties, a summer birthday to celebrate early, sorting out summer schedules and signing up for camps and dance class, rounding up thoughtful items for Teacher Appreciation Week, writing thank-you notes, attending closing ceremonies, and saying farewells for the summer. The jam-packedness of May rivaled the chaos leading up to Christmas break in December… dum da da dum, Maycember. (This blog post from Jen Hatmaker sums it up pretty well.)

• I don’t like cooking. That’s not something I learned this month; I’ve known that for a long time. I can cook. I just don’t find it fun. All that work, it’s gone within five minutes, and then you have to clean? Nah. (Don’t worry, family, I will continue to feed you anyway because I love you.) What I did discover in May is that cooking is a lot less of a chore when you’ve got an ’80s party mix blasting in the background. I’ve started rounding up my girls around 4pm every day for a dance party. We shake out the afternoon crankies to The Bangles and MJ and Cyndi Lauper (“Mommy, is this a grown up singing? It sounds like a little girl!”), and it is good. For some reason, I feel much more willing to feed them after that.

• It’s already too hot to drag my 2-year-old in and out of Target for stuff. She won’t stay in the cart, and there is a serious lack of free cookies and balloons to bribe her with (God bless Publix, though). By the time I’ve finished wrangling/half-carrying her like a football around the store while pushing the cart with one hand and listening to her scream just for kicks (followed by a grin and a “That’s loud, mommy!”), I’m sweaty and ready for the day to be over. And that’s before tackling the checkout situation, getting the cart back to its corral, and safely loading kids into the minivan (constant vigilance!). It’s only 10am and I am done. Forget that. I will be ordering diapers and other necessities online this summer, thankyouverymuch. This is why God gave moms the internet.

• This article: Nicole Cliffe: How God Messed Up My Happy Atheist Life. It’s one of those pieces I had to read, think about, and read again, because Wow. I hope you’ll check it out. Let the Holy Spirit use her story to give you fresh eyes and a better understanding of people and the incredible ways God draws us to Himself.

Until next month…

Check out what others learned in May here, and join in! 

Want to check out past editions of What I Learned? You can find them here. 

 

The journey of today {a post for Shama Women}

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Razia-window-e1462992268683-1200x1800Once a month, I am given the sweet gift of speaking with one or more of the founders of Shama Women via video call. They share with me stories of God at work at the training centers in South Asia while I type furiously to keep up. Their descriptions paint portraits in my mind of places I can only imagine, of women whose stories are so unlike mine—and yet we have everything in common. So, you can understand why I don’t want to miss a single word.

They pause to ask whether I have any questions, but usually I can do nothing more than silently shake my head, eyes wide, in awe of God moving in the most unexpected places. During my most recent conversation with the team, I gathered myself enough to ask what a typical day looks like for a woman being trained at one of the Shama Women centers. As they replied and the story unfolded, I placed myself there in her village, shadowing her day…

[… please click to read full post]

 

What I learned in April

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What I learned_ April

April went by so fast (cliché, I know, I know), yet its beginning feels so distant at this point that I’m struggling to remember—so I’m especially grateful today for my little yellow Moleskine notebook and that I had my wits about me enough to jot a few things down throughout the month. If I hadn’t, well, buh-bye memories. (Full disclosure, I spent 10 minutes looking for the notebook in order to write this post.)

So here’s April in a nutshell, short and sweet (well I tried, anyway): 

• I attended the Influence Network‘s one-day conference in Charlotte on the 9th (the first of several they’ll offer this year), and it’s tempting to just transcribe my scribbles for you here because there were so many takeaways that I found poignant during this season. (I won’t, though.) The kicker for me was this: Want to invite people into your life? Share your story. I listened to women talk bravely and honestly all day long, some through nervous laughter, some through tears. And I was completely ashamed of myself when I realized I had made judgment calls about several of them before walking in the door that day—solely based on their appearances and social media presence—and I had been so, so wrong. These were real women who had walked (or were still walking) through times of real pain and real struggle. I had no idea. Their faith was astounding. I was blown away by their testimonies and honored that they were willing to invite a room full of strangers into their stories.

There’s a lot more there, but this isn’t supposed to be one of those posts, so I’ll leave it for now.

• Hamilton. I’m talking about the Broadway musical. (Yes, I was just introduced this month. Yes, maybe I do live under a rock.) Who lives, who dies, who tells your story? 

• Ready for another cliché? I blinked, and all of a sudden my tiny newborn baby turned 2. Didn’t we just bring her home from the hospital last week? When did she go from this:

10293562_10154158508470324_2110380520204866727_oto this?

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Sigh.

• Even journalism majors need to work on their writing skills. I’ve been taking Ann Swindell’s online course, Writing With Grace, and while it was humbling to acknowledge my need for a creative writing refresher, her course has turned out to be an incredible encouragement to me on this little journey. We’re a little over halfway through the six weeks, but I’m already willing to say I highly recommend it. There’s always room for improvement, and there’s always something new to be learned—not to mention the publishing field is ever-changing, and it’s been about, oh, 13 years since I’ve taken a writing class. Yeah, I was overdue. Onward!

• Finally, this month being brave looked like:

not pretending I like something just because it’s popular. Doesn’t that sound silly? But certain books, music, movies, blogs, podcasts, whatever—it’s hard for me to say, “Actually, I didn’t really enjoy that” when someone (especially someone I admire) is raving about it.

answering the question, “So, are you going to have any more kids?” with all the back story you could ever want. It was probably the most challenging post I’ve written to date, but God’s nudging on this one was not to be ignored. I was moved by the many responses I received, and it was affirmation, once again: When God tells you to share your story, share it. You need to tell it, and someone out there needs to hear it.

Until next month…

Check out what others learned in April here, and join in! 

Miss the March edition of What I Learned? You can find it here.