Once upon a time...

Once upon a time, there was a girl who woke up and realized that it was time to stop living as if she wasn't worth much.

Once upon a time, there was a girl who mustered up her courage and set out on a journey to re-invent her life and break the cycle of unworthiness.

She got fired from a job she didn't really love anyway.  She started using her gifts and talents and passions to do what she loves to do and let the provision that work become quite enough.  She walked away from relationships that were feeding her negativity.  She left behind the big house, big paychecks, and lots and lots and lots of "stuff."

She started each day asking God to show her opportunities to use her gifts, to expand her ability to impact others in a positive way, to sustain her and provide for her and her kids.

She went to bed each night thanking God for showing her a little bit more of His plan each day, for the incredible gifts and talents and passions that had been given to her and her kids, for friends that spoke of her worth and her beauty, and for His unending provision, mercy and grace.

And somehow, over the course of two years of fighting through fear and doubt, she began to really see and know her own uniqueness, beauty, glory, worth.

How deeply she is loved.

How far she had come.

How many patterns and habits and chains had been broken.

How everything that had happened would shape and inspire the days ahead.

How, all the moments she got tired and felt defeated, He was right there beside her; fighting for her; interceding for her; knowing her even more than she knew herself and making all the seemingly right and wrong details come together for good.

How He delivered on every single promise.

And she knew that His plan was just right for her, and that all it took was the courage to stop trying to write her own story, and let just Him be the author of her "once upon a time."

(photo from flickr creative commons:  timo_w2s)

Waiting on a warrior

If there is one, over-arching thing I've been learning this year, it's this:

The jealous lover of my soul has nothing less in mind for me than a warrior of integrity and courage, that makes me want to be more courageous and have more integrity. 

One who loves Jesus, and loves that I love Jesus.  

One who knows how I take my coffee.  

One who learns how I like to be kissed.  

One who can’t wait to hear the details of my day and share the details of his.  

One who never tires of learning me, and letting me learn him.  

One who "gets" how simultaneously messed up and gloriously made I am.  

One who celebrates my gifts, talents and passions as much as he celebrates and embraces his own.

I am worth it. 

And, as I talked through this a bit with a good friend tonight, I realized just how far I've come in the past year.

And, that God has faithfully used the struggle and pain of the past two years, and the years even before, to set me free.  

I appreciate freedom because I knew imprisonment and manipulation.

I appreciate provision because I lost much.

I know my beauty because it radiates from the inside out.

I know my worth because I know my maker.

I know joy because he is making me new.

I will wait on a warrior, because the jealous lover of my soul has nothing less in mind for me.