It’s an interesting thing, picking a word for the year ahead, to inspire you and propel you, to speak a theme into forthcoming months that hold nothing you can predict. I mean, you can try to predict! I sure did! And I’ll continue picking a word every year because there’s something spiritual to this practice for me. But I’m also making a note to put on extra armor for whatever opposes my word, the things that challenge and chafe it, making it equal parts uncomfortable, impossible and totally perfect. In this case, this year, I’ve prayed most days against long-held fears, which by God’s grace, I’ve overcome in great numbers.
There’s just no way I could’ve foreseen how much courage I’d need in 2019.
But God knew, obviously, and this is why I know it was He who impressed it upon my heart:
Courage to finish losing my baby weight, for the very last time, shedding all 62 pounds, and sharing that journey openly with so many people.
Courage to try out spin class, when I was sure I’d fall off the bike—but instead found a genuine passion. I finished 42 rides and can now keep the beat, the whole time, from muscle memory.
Courage to parent my girls with resolve; to stand up as their fiercest advocate.
Courage to remember that they’re in God’s hands, that as their mother, I am merely His conduit.
Courage to camp in Yosemite for seven whole days in a recreational vehicle!!!
Courage to fly to Cabo with only our family of five, no extra hands or assistance, and happen upon the time of our lives.
Courage to keep fierce boundaries when they felt harsh but holy and true.
Courage to change my relationship with my phone, refusing to let it own me.
Courage to dive deeper into our marriage, with renewed excitement for the next 60 years.
Courage to keep on writing when I often wanted to quit.
Courage to keep on sharing when my inner critic said, No one’s listening.
Courage to tell you that I’m embarking on something exciting and new!!!
Oh, precious friends who are reading this, thank you. Thank you so very much. I know you are probably also the ones who have watched my Instagram Stories about my Creative Funk of 2019 and maybe even followed my writing for years. I am just so grateful you’re here. And now, if I may, I’m going to dive a little deeper into the Funky Season I’ve spoken of—and tell you where it leaves me today. (It’s good news, you guys! It’s GREAT!)
When I look back at my life, I can pinpoint very specific times when I entered a time of angst and unrest. These kinds of times are so painful and yucky to navigate when you’re stuck in their sludge. But in retrospect, it always becomes very clear to me that these were months (or years) of an actual crossroads—of truly asking, What’s next?
Graduating from college.
Looking for my first writing job.
Deciding whether or not to return to work after maternity leave.
Considering whether to have a third kid.
Both of my painful miscarriages.
Oh, I can list these things casually now, but if I zoom in and revisit them, I can vividly recall the unknowns and the agony; the very, very real fears. The sleep lost, the circular questioning. The sensation, at times, if I’m honest, that finally, God chose to forget me. He decided He no longer wanted to speak to me or “bless” me or reveal Himself to me or give me signs or promptings or truths. Looks like I’m on my own now! Might as well see what I can come up with in planning the rest of my life!
(My plans usually aren’t very good.)
I know this might sound dramatic, but this is where my funks often land me. Searching for meaning and purpose—questioning my purpose and self. And in this case, standing at a very real junction again for the first time in SUCH a long while! These times are often annoying. But eventually they also prove to be deeply necessary. Like a temporary uniform I’m required to wear because it’s the only one fit for the job but darn it if it isn’t itchy.
I didn’t consciously realize the extent of stirrings within my soul (invisible pricks on my skin) until my 34thbirthday. This weekend happened to mark the climax of My Big Funk. But thanks to the God who keeps loving me ever so fiercely—despite any of my bratty protests claiming the opposite—I found myself waking up to the honks, cold chill and pure magic of New York City on that November 8. Later that evening, I stood in front of the White House in Washington, DC, the city where I’d meet my brand-new niece the following day.
And do you guys know what I paused to realize as I inevitably turned into Yoda as one does on birthdays? I realized that this, 34, will be the first year in 8 when I am not pregnant, or nursing, or having a baby, or grieving a miscarriage, or battling post-partum depression, or losing baby weight, or wondering constantly whether or not we are going to have one more baby.
I just read that again to let myself feel its weight.
Finally, away from my kids for a couple of days, walking around with no real aim and zero responsibility, holding hands with my husband, I felt my feet find new clarity upon those cold city sidewalks.
I let my tense body exhale.
I permitted the strongest parts of myself to relax into tenderness and uncertainty and some genuine sadness I felt.
I peeled everything back.
I looked myself straight in the mirror.
I allowed myself to acknowledge that a certain very long season that broke me down and built me back up in 700 ways over 96 months had finally come to an end—and that I felt more grief than I thought I would.
We tend to make sweet little jokes and comments about our last babes, these little encores from heaven. “I can’t believe it! They grow so fast! I’m hanging onto every milestone!”Tears-flowing Emojis for real. Sometimes we joke and sometimes we sob, but in both cases, our cries are real.
Am I really done being pregnant? Have I reached the end of my baby-bearing? Will I really never hold my own newborn again?
What does this mean for me now?
There is a letting go. There is fresh joy and promise and wide, brand-new, open space.
But there have been waves of grief, too.
And I had to let them crash in.
I had to face the end of my road, and all the emotions that rushed right in with this finish line.
I had to acknowledge that, as I looked ahead to My Next Right Thing, whatever on earth it may be, the absence of a new baby ahead felt utterly foreign and frightening to me.
It feels good to say that out loud.
Eight years is a really long time.
As I leaned into the utmost core of what had been going on with me, though, I began to feel something else. I began to feel free. There I stood, there I kneeled, there I walked concrete streets. I talked to Doug at great length, and to my mom, and to family, and to some of my closest friends. I literally prayed without ceasing.
And then, newly bolstered by Anna’s anthem from Frozen 2, I saw my own Next Right Thing appear—right there, in my path. I really did, at long last. And now I am pouring renewed creative energy into a whole new project that I will reveal so soon. I’m not quite ready to dish all the details, but I promise I will this spring!!! In the meantime, I’m giving this New Thing the purest fresh start humanly possible. I’m getting super quiet to let God lead me step-by-step through the process. It’s something I never would have foreseen, but simultaneously something that’s been brewing in my heart for 30 years.
I also want you to know that I don’t mean to sound so cryptic!!!!
But I learned something beautiful about oranges during this Christmas season, while visiting Doug’s childhood home, which sits on two sweeping acres and brims forth with fruitful trees. I learned that oranges only continue to grow in their sweetness while they are on the vine. If they’re pulled too quickly, they come out sour, all wrong. The acid content reduces, the longer they stay on the tree. And you can’t always tell by looking, before you eat the oranges, which of them will be sweet—and which of them will be sour. But the ones that have stayed on the vine, until their time, to grow and flourish into completion—
You know.
You know.
Without doubt. You know the goodness as soon as you taste it. And you can’t argue with the proof of the fruit, or with the Holy Farmer who planted it. So, I’m staying over here on my vine for a little bit longer, even if it feels uncomfortable—because it feels the most right, right now. I’m praying and growing and putting down my little head as I work in faith. As God grows and prunes my idea. As I trust that I’ll taste and see.
And please, please know that, in time: I CAN’T WAIT TO POUR YOU SOME ORANGE JUICE!
The most important thing, though, is that my fire is back, after a creative stretch that felt soaked in setbacks. It’s not at all what I thought. The burn is for something new. But Elsa inspires me, too, so I’m heading dead-ahead right on Into the Unknown.
My brilliant older brother has really been helping me as I move out of this season creatively and try my hand at the unfamiliar. He’s been such a source of encouragement.
After a family dinner a few weeks ago, when we said good-bye, he said:
“Love you, Sis. Congratulations on your creative burst.”
Burst.
Could it be?
“See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland.” Isaiah 43:19
You know what I’ve found, if anything, in these past eight years, which I will forever hold sacred? That you have to go through the desert to get to the stream. You have to wail and weep before you can find your true song. You have to go through the funk to get to the fun. You have ride out the storm before you feel yourself standing strong, face up, palms out, on the other side of the rainbow.
“The darkest nights of the soul are when His light shines the brightest.”
My Mom wrote that inside of a card she gave to me as My Funk reached its final crescendo, right before I went to New York. I was struggling, feeling lost in terms of direction. I told her I was having a hard time believing that God still had a future and hope for me. That maybe He, you know, finally got bored with me and moved on and kinda forgot to remember me. Even after all of the times He’s come through for me, with actual miracles right in my hands. You can just call me an Israelite! My mom told me that she’d believe for me when I’d lost my faith. The front of the card said:
“Always believe something wonderful is about to happen.”
And today?
I believe that again.
With absolutely all of my heart.
Sounds like a burst to me.
**********
As our flight to DC from NY prepared to board on my birthday, I fixed my gaze faraway outside the slightly fogged-up airport window, the Manhattan skyline still clear. My throat caught a bit. I wasn’t quite ready to leave. The food and our friends and the freedom. Electric energy everywhere, not the least being inside my veins.
But I was ready to go meet my niece.
To hold God’s most tangible promise of heavenly life in my arms.
Maybe not my own baby. But a new one for me to love.
Do you not perceive it?
I didn’t then.
But now, I’m beginning to see.
This year gave me strength; this year gave me faith.
In so many ways, 2019 gave me Courage to lift my head—
And believe.
After all, in a New York minute,
Things can get a little strange!
In a New York minute:
Everything can change.
Believe it.
And if you can’t?
I’ll believe for you.
**********
Happy New Year, my precious readers and friends!!!
I’m so thankful for every single one of you.
I’ll be blogging less in the first half of 2020 as I focus on My New Thing,
but you can still find me here, and over on Instagram, always!
TBD on where I’ll be doing my book recs in the New Year,
but you know I’ll be reading and dishing!
Can’t wait to keep you updated on everything I’m up to in this fresh DECADE!!!
MERRIEST EVERYTHING.
BIG HUGS FROM ME TO YOU!!!
