A Feeling I Know

There comes a turning point in every decision that brings change and a Freak-Out causing me to consider that perhaps I made a wrong turn. I am so intent on making the right choice, having the best options, and being the most prepared, that at the first sign of feeling scary or foreign or out of my comfort zone, it confirms every fear that I was, in fact, Wrong. 

Even in the fog and fear, I have trained my heart to take courage, my mind to adapt to new processes, and my soul to find rest in the pauses. In this position, it has been especially challenging to feel capable, confident, or remotely competent as the spreadsheets are emailed, Financial Aid numbers analyzed, and daily training using codes that sound like another language. After all, I've been teaching numbers and letters the past six years to young children... I don't know anything about unsubsidized federal loans or a student's gross budget awards for the year!

Through daily internal pep-talks of "it's okay, you're going to be okay..." combined with um, prayer... I'm telling myself that I can do this. When everything feels new, it's instinctual to shut-down and cry. I remember what it was like to take steps towards the things I always felt like I couldn't do... that feeling is familiar. I am continually learning to take the one-step-at-a-time before I extract the situation and enlarge it to this-is-the-rest-of-my-life. Nobody got to Santiago in a day - and it was the learning curve of becoming a pilgrim that felt so exhilarating. Those initial walks were blisters, and soreness, and exhaustion, until one day I started walking 25+ miles and forgot how hard it used to be.

I am reminded of the journey... and how every journey of beauty beckons one back to the Shire - the disillusioned brilliance What Used to Be- comfort, steadiness, reliability surfaces in our minds as perfection. We cling to what we know; but that is not the path I want to take... I want to see the challenge and take it on, overcome, and learn. Every opportunity offers a chance to grow - and you have to go through the Difficult to Become. Though I resist hard changes, I rest in Truth; where God calls is Good. He provides, He leads, and He knows. He does not lead to dead ends; every place leads to somewhere else. That is the walk with God I look back on in my life, and the one He has me on today. I will rely on Him because He is my strength and He has been nothing but faithful and good to me!

On 29

29 has been a year of change and transition; fear and doubt; heartbreak, real love, challenge and growth... it has led to a new state, a new job, another new job, and most importantly - a man who is greater than anything I could've dreamt on my own. I've traveled, celebrated, wept; wondered, questioned, and been formed.

This time last year I signed a contract to teach at Tri-City Christian, and Michael hopped in my car packed up with my life to drive through all the national parks until we finally arrived to San Diego. I celebrated my birthday of 29 amongst my best friends in CA with a surprise party and a bonfire on the beach. I moved into my studio home-- my first time ever to live alone-- and felt my heart ache with a lonely feeling foreign to anything I had known before. I doubted whether God truly had me in CA, wondered if I would ever be in a relationship, and feared I made the wrong choice. My commute in the fall was tears upon tears, crying out to God and friends and my mom and anyone else who would listen. I made silent plans to return to Chicago and re-embrace the life I had there; pick up where I left off and start back where I finished. Every weekend was turned into travel - to weddings, to fall, to friends and reunions. My dearest friend Steph came out for a weekend to encourage my heart, watch sunsets, and pray for me. I knew that by the time I turned 30 I wanted life to feel different... But I didn't see a way.

November came around and brought me a relationship that appeared to be good; it offered a glimpse at a dream and a hope that I could be loved. It quickly turned, and brought nothing but anxious thoughts, fear of the future, and an insecurity within myself that I was incapable of being good for someone else. New Years was spent with all my best friends along the shores of Mexico; I surrendered a lantern of doubt and determined 2016 would be a year of trust. My heart was broken, but God was at work. He knew every place I searched and longed and feared.

My friends rallied around me, made me laugh, and supported me joining dating apps. January 12th was the day my world changed. I didn't see it coming and I didn't know it was happening and I never could've predicted it. The best man stepped into my life; he fought through my resisting, and provided a place for me to feel safe, known, and cared for in the most tender of ways. He sought after me and appreciated me. When he looked at me, his kind eyes and gentle strength gazed right into my heart. He saw who I was on the inside and loved me. He broke down my walls and gave me a place of trust. The world was now a place of color; a sense of adventure brimmed each time we were together... He made me feel that as long as we were with one another, anything was possible. My heart, my dreams, and my passions were the very places He wanted to seek out. We fell in love over early morning coffees, Beacon's sunsets, happy hours, and walks on the beach. At 1 month we went to Mexico with his friends, at two we roadtripped home to our families, and at three he told me he loved me while flying a kite overlooking the harbor. It has now been six months - going on seven - and I am more and more amazed at this man I get to do life with than ever before. We have wine tasted in Mexico, roadtripped the coast, summited a 14er, fly fished on the Eagle, stargazed in Big Sur, picnic'ed sunset cliffs, and biked the Golden Gate Bridge. We have driven to Mexico for tacos, explored vineyards in Temecula, night biked up the ocean of Santa Barbara, and cheered for the Cubs in Chicago. In all these things, my favorite nights are the ones where we are at home -- walking to the sunset hand-in-hand, drinking a cocktail, making dinner, and dreaming about our Someday. It is in those moments that I see how my every day is transformed with Benjamin beside me. It is in the errands, laundry, around-town drives, Costco runs, and car washes that I get a glimpse of God's relentless love. He gave me the greatest man to do life alongside - a consistent, loving, sacrificing best friend - and I would do all the heartache and tears and questions that wrought my soul in this 29th year over again, if I knew Benjamin was waiting for me on the other side.

29 has been a year of the truth in Psalm 18:35: "God's gentleness has made me great." He held my hand and took me through - He provided in ways I didn't think possible - and most of all, He called me closer to Himself through giving me an earthly example of His great love. With 30 on the horizon, I feel a new sense of maturity, growth, and ownership of my journey. I feel anticipation of what's ahead met with excitement for what is now. A new decade breeds new adventures; and I can't wait to jump the hurdles, take on the roadblocks, seek the extraordinary, and write the story with Benjamin.

The Next Best Thing

At some point during the last year, I came to deeply understand that teaching is not the story I want to continue to write. While so much of me is the Teacher Personality - I'm organized, positive, punctual, planned, nurturing - there is also a part of teaching that limits the lifestyle I want to live. I am the token friend who falls asleep at dinner at 8pm, sends limited email/texts during the day, and craves an hour of silence after work. And yet, even with reflecting and processing this part of myself, it was fear that allowed the questions to surface - what if I couldn't find another job? What if I hated giving up my summer? Won't life be worse if I step out of what I'm comfortable with?

The older I get, the more habits I develop - and as much as risk is invigorating, it is also terrifying. It is unknown, blind, and uncomfortable. It is flying to France and beginning a journey of 550 miles. It is packing up the car and moving across the country. It is saying yes to a man who is giving his love. Risk breeds reward, but risk also presents the possibility of failure. And if I fail, then what?!

I am plagued by the fear of being in a situation I hate and not finding a way out. This seems irrational, as I have never once been in a place of being completely trapped, yet somehow I convince myself this will happen. At the end of the school year, I willingly signed a contract for another year of teaching, knowing this wasn't what I wanted to do. God was nudging me to Trust; He was urging me to have faith He would provide something better; He consistently spoke that He is For Me - but I chose to go the avenue of security. I am reminded of what Lucy learned of Aslan "He isn't safe, but he's good." What kind of story do I want to live?!

I have watched friend after friend stay in relationships with guys that do not treat them to the standard they deserve. A third party could look in and wonder why they are staying in the relationship when it's obviously wrong?! They try to make it work, see it through, give it their best. They live in a "why not" world... Life is not presenting them another option, so why not remain in the relationship they have in front of them?! The act of living out an unhealthy relationship naturally keeps the heart from other options. We can't see that life could be so much better with someone else because our emotional energy is spent on the person we don't want to be with. There isn't anyone else available because we have cut ourselves off from the Unknown.

Living from my heart and making decisions based on what I know of myself is what it means for me to live an integrous life. In all I do, I want my heart to be present - I want to make decisions knowing it aligns with my values, passions, and desires. Staying in teaching would be like staying in a bad relationship. The act of committing myself to a job I didn't want made me unavailable to other opportunities that could be present. In some ways, I avoided the scary realization harboring within me - admitting I didn't want to teach anymore felt wrong - what is my problem that I can't make this work?! Why do I always want something better?! I allowed the fear to rise, the questions to follow, and the admission that it was Okay to settle within me. I had to quit in order to move forward. Stepping into the unknown allowed an increase in my faith. This lack of stability led me to a place where there was nothing else holding me back from pursuing other options with my whole heart.

In a series of random questions with friends, I was once asked: What do you want written on your gravestone at the end of your life? As morbid as this question might be, it also provided a focal point to the mission of my life. In an instant, I knew: She lived and loved with her whole heart. That's the center of my purpose - living fully from the depths of my heart, pursing what God has laid in front of me, and trusting in his unfailing character. I want to love Him the best I can and pour out His love into the relationships in my life. That's it.

In the faithfulness of God, He has brought me to work at Point Loma Nazarene University -- a dream of mine since the early stages of moving to San Diego. Through a series of circumstances - seeing an old Baylor friend while grabbing a last-minute coffee with Suzy, hearing about a new program at PLNU and applying on the website, connecting to the interviewer through relationships from Wheaton - I can see how He knows me more fully than I do, and I can trust Him with the most intimate, and even scary, desires of my heart.

While a part of me grieves the end of summer and a change of career and a whole new rhythm to life, tomorrow I will show up to my first day knowing that I have advocated my truth and am living out my heart in the fullest way I know how. God has called me into something new, and there is excitement in knowing I am walking through the open door He has given me. As any journey often reflects: it was never meant to be lived alone. He put Benjamin by my side as my biggest fan, a community of friends here as a constant refuge of safety, and my Studio by the Sea as a place of rest and reflection. Trusting in Him is the greatest adventure of all and one that I will fight the fear to choose over and over and over again.