Just Some Background... well a lot of it

The last few years of my life have been nothing short of an adventure.  It doesn't always seem that way, but then I hit another peak and when I look back, I see how it's all weaved together and it amazes me every time.

I want to start writing about my newest journey but I feel like I have to give a little bit of a background to what led me here.  

This is a story about God, and how He changes literally everything.  I think I have to tell you a little about who I was before He started knocking on areas of my life I couldn't have fathomed would have changed.  Here's just a few things...

• Total people pleaser
• Completely afraid of failure
• Insecure in any talent I possessed, so much so that I didn't even try
• Relied on appearances to snag attention
• Must get married to "start" my life
• Unable to say no
• Lover of things, even if it meant mounds of debt to get them
• Constantly compared

I realize all these things make me seem pretty... what's the word... lame?  But if I'm being honest about what was under the surface I presented these were very much there.  They're things I didn't notice until I was looking back at them.  I cared about being at the club and looking pretty, and wearing the right outfit and being seen by the right people.  I always wanted the party to start at my place, to provide the drinks, and the food, and shots were on me.  I loved my friends and I loved them fiercely but I thought they loved me for what I did for them, I thought I had to perform to be accepted.  I never wanted to be seen as weak so I rarely cried, rarely acted like I cared about things that mattered, I rarely tried anything I could fail at.  I thought I was just supposed to get married, raise children and work a pretty good job, because that's what people did.  Every relationship I was in pretty much ended in infidelity so I never felt good enough, I constantly compared myself to those around me.  And I needed things.  I needed retail therapy.  I packed my closets, pantries, drawers, cabinets and my life with things.  I packed my credit cards, student loans, and more with debt.  God existed only when I really really needed something and when my dad died of cancer, He didn't exist at all.

It took about a year or so for me to take those words back and another 4 years for Him to completely break through in a really tangible way for me, but when He did it was incredibly undeniable.  

I just got really excited about Him, because even though I was raised in a religious family the reality of Him being a personal God who wanted relationship was new. I've also always been a full on passionate person, about anything that I love.  But mostly because I had this completely unexplainable joy.  Something I had never experienced before.  So I started reading my bible.  I started reading everything I could.  I started trying to go in whatever direction it was that I thought God wanted me to go in, but I really had no idea what I was doing.  As time went on things about me started to change, God started revealing things about me that I didn't even see in myself.  It would be through reading the bible, listening to sermons, bible studies, journaling, other people, or a combination of some or all of those things.

First thing I realized was my necessity to be noticed. To have the right outfit, to wear the right makeup, have my hair curled just right.  So I went make-upless for a while and cut my hair short.  Not because I fully didn't want to care about my appearance but because I didn't want it to define me anymore, I didn't want to get my worth from it anymore, it wasn't who I was.  

Second thing was pride.  I loved the praise of anyone really.  I was noticed before by what I wore, where I hung out, and what I had.  Now I was being noticed by what I did for people and through volunteering, etc.  And I think I got the same satisfaction, just in a different way.  I still struggle with it if I'm honest.  At the end of the day I know how the changes in my life have come and who is responsible for them.  I have little to do with it.

Third was my need to perform.  My need to people please.  My inability to say no.  I've always wanted people to depend on me, to come to me first when in need.  I don't know why, but I found a lot of my worth in it.  As a result my schedule was always full.  My bank account was always empty (or negative.)  I was always drained.  This carried over into my life as a Christian.  My worth and identity was in what I could do for people, what I could do for God.  It was like I had a contractual relationship with everyone.  I performed, I received friendship/relationship.  The weird part is I didn't expect my friends to perform in anyway to keep my friendship and none of my friends I've had for years have ever done anything to make me believe that to be true.  I wanted to be involved in EVERYTHING at church.  I wanted to do it all because I was new and I wanted to meet people and I wanted to experience everything but also because I wanted to be needed.  Because I performed to belong.  Because if I did enough good things God would give me a husband and maybe a white picket fence too.  So God showed me that He's not a vending machine.  He showed me that there is literally NOTHING I can do to make Him love me more than He already does.  

In the midst of this He showed me that it would a good idea to be quiet.  To just keep my mouth shut.  I had listened to so many sermons and read so many books and I would just spit out what I heard about God.  I wanted so much for people to like me that I tried to show people what I knew instead of who I knew.  My insecurity in what I knew I'm sure showed.  So I stopped talking so much and I listened and I worked on my relationships with people and with God.

Next He taught me that He is God and I don't have to understand why He does the things He does or where the path is taking me or why my life doesn't look the way that I thought that it should, I just have to keep stepping forward.  He showed me just how misguided all of my decisions were and how literally nothing could compare to what I had now.  He taught me somethings about grace.  That's it's completely and utterly free.  No matter how hard I try I'll probably never get it right and that's okay because when He decided to change my heart and take over my life He already knew how many times I'd stumble and He chose to walk it out with me anyway.  He's not surprised by anything.  He made me the way I am for a reason.  I want people to come to me first because I really love people and I want to be able to be there for them.  I want people to come to my home because I love making people feel welcome and entertaining.  I'm given talents to use them, not to be intimidated by failing.

Things I've been seeing lately and working on...

Debt.  I've always had so much of it I just always thought it would be there.  Then I heard about Dave Ramsey and started hearing stories of people who have way more than me and pay it off in a matter of a few years.  So I'm working on freedom from that.

Clean eating.  This one is new, and is totally a work in progress.  God has put some pretty amazing women in my path that are committed to fueling their bodies and not filling just them.  I've never struggled with weight which is great, but I've worked out pretty much never and have eaten well pretty much never too.  I've seen that food can either drain us or energize us.  The design of our bodies is amazing and we can push them to do some pretty amazing things too.  I want to want this for myself more.

Saying no.  The entire month of September I pretty much made no plans.  I just said maybe to everyone instead of yes.  During that time I read a lot of my bible, journaled a lot, had worship sessions in my car and in my kitchen, mostly while washing dishes and dancing.  I talked to people a lot about my faith and what I struggle with.  It was pretty great.  At the beginning of the month I read Matthew, the message version.  I no lie saw this verse over 10 times randomly in different ways.

It was used in church service, it was in a book I was reading (twice,) a sermon I listened to online, this picture was something a friend of mine posted to her Instagram (and each one in the message version no less.)  I kept thinking wow how cool that God would give me this is assurance that this month of rest was exactly what I needed and exactly where He wanted me.  But it just kept coming back up.  The last time I saw it, it clicked, I wondered if I kept seeing it because I wasn't seeing what God wanted me to specifically see in it.  One of my biggest struggles with God is that I think He is going to make me sell all of my things and move to some far off place with no creature comforts and it terrifies me.  It can paralyze my relationship with Him because I don't want to hear it.  I really have no idea why.  But the fear is real and it's a real problem that I struggle with.  I also didn't really realize just how attached I was to my things and to my home and to my comforts until recently. 

....And this is where the story weaves together beautifully.  And I'm a little wrecked by the way God works....

The words jumped off the page  "I won't lay anything heavy or ill fitting on you," the flood gates opened.  I literally had been telling friends and family of this real fear I had and my attachment to things and how my relationship with God was suffering because I didn't want to hear His voice because I was scared of what He would ask.  And He chased after me, even after I say no please don't say anything, like a child with my fingers in my ears yelling "la-la-la I can't hear you," He was persistent and caught me with a verse out of His book.  A verse that covered everything I'd been struggling with.  Chased me with it until I saw what He wanted me to see.  I haven't "randomly" seen the verse since it clicked.  We had been singing Good Good Father at church and it just hit me.  It's like He was sweetly saying I'm not here to make your life miserable and take everything from you.  I'm a really good dad so please just trust me and walk with me.  All of this is easy with me.  So I prayed about it and I asked Him to help me with it.  Two weeks later I'm sitting in my bed, sick, going stir crazy and I literally have an overwhelming desire to get rid of everything.  Not only that but I realized how my desire for things, and all of the stuff that I have in my home makes it impossible for me to stay organized.  It makes it impossible for me to focus.  Impossible for me to be effective.  Impossible to flourish in my creativity.  They weigh me down.  I spend more time cleaning that ever necessary.  And I honestly just didn't see it before; I've never desired complete simplicity in my life more than I do right now.  I think that's why when I hear "...was blind but now I see..." I cry every time because the things in my life that hold me back, that weigh me down, that keep me from freedom, I literally do not see them.  And God slowly reveals a new one for me to work out, with Him, in His time.  It literally never works until He decides.  What I love and I have incredible faith in is the fact that once He calls it out it comes to completion.  It knocks me to my knees.  The thing I feared the most a month ago, I'm chasing after today.  And all I did was seek Him in it and honestly ask for help.  He chased me and showed me and lit a fire that I now get to run with.

So what is all of this about?  What am I going to be writing about?  My journey to a freedom from my stuff and from my debt and whatever else comes my way.  I want to be accountable.  God never asked us to do anything alone, He asks us to do this in community.  For us to help each other along.  

Another thing I know about me is that I'm a sharer.  I don't do it because of the whole pride thing, I do it because I love it.  I do it because if it encourages just one other person toward freedom then hours of writing is worth it.  I do it because some pretty amazing people have inspired me and pushed me to new places with their stories.  Mostly now, I do it because I'm not afraid of it anymore.  I'm not afraid of what people with think about me anymore.  Everyday I step further and further into my true identity and further and further away from what the world says about me.  And the joy that comes with that.... I'm not designed to keep it to myself.

More to come y'all.