how I take care of myself

I am excited to introduce this first installment in our quest for bi-weekly posts and lists and fun little random tidbits.  Below is a glimpse into some of the things that fill me with joy and feed my soul.  What fuels you??

Challenge Accepted!

Watch out... this is going to be Legen... wait for it...dary!! (As my good fictional friend Barney Stinson would say.)

Here's the scoop: My pancake fanatic, Ramen proficient, blog fluent friend -Kara lee -has thrown down a Blog Challenge, which I do not take lightly.  Every other week, starting this Friday- March 1st- we will be posting wonderfully silly and insightful lists.

Our inspiration for this was developed through recent readings of some of our favorite bloggers' like this one and this one and this one.

Please don't think less of us if we steal some of these exact list topics to start our endeavor.  Stay tuned... I assure you, you are in for at least a couple weeks of some great blog entertainment!  (hopefully we can last more than a post or two!)  

So here's to accepted challenges coming your way!!

I'm still waiting patiently...

Why are you so far from me?
In my arms is where you ought to be

How long will you make me wait?

I don't know how much more I can take

I missed you

But I haven't met you

Oh but I want to

How I do

Slowly counting down the days

Till I finally know your name

Ooo the way your hand feels round my waist

The way you laugh

The way your kisses taste

I missed you

But I haven't met you

Oh but I want to

How I do, How I do

I've missed you

But I haven't met you

Oh I missed you

I haven't met you

Oh but I want to

Oh how I want to

Dear whoever you might be

I'm still waiting patiently.

Picking up Pieces

I’m a big picture person.

Its not that I don’t appreciate the finer points…. I love carefully crafting icing petals on sunflower cupcakes and neatly organizing tiles to create a vibrant table mosaic. I love the little touches that take something from average to extraordinary… but I NEED a global view. I need to look at the whole picture from 10,000 ft. up and understand why. I need to know how it fits and what it affects and why it matters. I want to know the goal, the destination, the purpose, the vision…



It’s very difficult for me to walk forward without a blueprint. I know that God has a mysterious wonderful plan for my life … but I don’t see it. I can’t touch it, or taste it… or find it. I don’t know what it is or where I’m going. I don’t know what my future holds or what my purpose is.


Without a big picture to hold everything neatly together, things in my life feel Disconnected. Like Partial Floating Fragments of something… All I have are seemingly random experiences. Flashes. Like fireworks that quickly dissolve into a plume of smoke in the dark night sky. Just Traces of something. Memories. Events in the Past.

And it always brings me back to the question… where I am going?



I long for connectivity. For all these glimpses and dabblings to find unity and intentionality. To be nicely knitted together into an intricate and vibrant tapestry. To have more than just a handful of colorful loose threads slipping through my fingers. They might be beautiful threads… but what good are they? What use are they? I want to know the end product.



And my frustration grows. I cannot see the outside of the puzzle box to know what I’m working towards. I don’t know if these threads, these experiences will ever amount to anything. Will they become a quilt.  Will they have a purpose. Or are they just what they are. Pieces without a puzzle. Fragments of fabric. Ever Unfinished.

weheatit.com

Even without any point of reference, I continue trudging onward. Picking up pieces, and threads and trying to find places for them. Trying to tie them together or sew them messily into something. Trying to guess what the end might be. I trudge on… picking them up, yearning for an image to appear. Trying to find meaning in them. Hoping for an end product of substance.

A Million Miles... and here

Malawi was a million miles away (actually…10,170 miles). It was a place that I never imagined setting foot. A land on the other side of the world, on the other side of the equator. A distant culture. A different language. An unknown people. But now it’s here. It’s closer than next door. It’s hanging in my closet. It’s stuck to the soles of my shoes (and probably still between my toes). It’s ringing in my ears. It’s under every conversation I have. It’s in my memories and it’s in my heart- Forever. Permanently.

At first glace, Malawi was what I expected. Simple. Communal. Rural.

It was dusty- with a dry, red dust that swirled around you, coated your lungs and stuck to every inch of exposed skin. It was quiet- not an eery hush, but the sense of a slower pace of life lingered in the warm air. There was a contentedness and peacefulness. It was desolate and impoverished. Bumpy dirt roads. Thatched roofs. Goats meandering. People sitting in the noonday sun. Children with tattered clothes hanging on distended bellies. Women carrying water from the single village well.

It was the picture I had painted in my mind… except that it wasn’t.

I thought I would be shocked.

I thought Malawi would rock my core and cause me restless nights on tear drenched pillows.

I thought I would feel uncomfortable and forced to confront a radically different understanding of the world.

I thought I would be perpetually fatigued from heartbreak.

But I wasn’t, not entirely.

Because Malawi was more than I expected.

There was life. Real VIBRANT Life. It wasn’t a shell of existence. Or bleak hopelessness. It wasn’t a cracked and barren wasteland. No- there was LIFE. Color erupted from every chitenje and plastic water bucket. Laughter burst forth from the children playing with makeshift balls. Joy and hardship mingled in aged hands and weathered eyes. Vitality erupted from a different part of their soul through song. There was community. Rich. Deep. Community.

I didn’t expect to find so much life in Malawi. I didn’t expect to find such kindness and warmth in their smiles and handshakes. I didn’t expect to feel such love from people with so little. But there it was.  I was reminded that blessings don't only come in the form of development.  That sometimes, less actually can be more.  That family and community is supposed to be treasured.  That God's people are everywhere. That Love is a universal language.  Malawi was beautiful life.

It looked me in the eyes. It resounded in my ears. It held my hand.

And now… it cradles my heart.

Forever.