Elora Nicole Ramirez's Blog, page 25

knowing your purpose :: He's already spoken

Editor's Note: during the month of June, members of my Story Sessions community will be posting about what it means to pursue dreams, engage in self-care and practice active boundaries. They had free reign on what they wrote, and the topics come from my 30 Days of Prompts. I'm so excited about the wisdom these ladies will share with you, and I know you'll be inspired.

xoxo,

Elora Nicole  

 //

It’s a question that’s perplexed the church for decades, and I think I’ve got the answer.

Not meaning to be smug or anything but I just want to tell you I know what your calling is! And I know the calling of every single other person on the planet. Your purpose is to make disciples of all nations and to love God and love your neighbour. Do you want to know how I know? It’s because it is my purpose too.

It’s all very exciting isn’t it? 

Before we go on I want to tell you this: God’s final word is His Son - Jesus is more than we need. Anything else is a bonus. 

We have the bible; it’s the story of where we’ve come from, it’s the story of the people of God from creation, but along with that, it’s the mandate for where we’re going. While it can sometimes feel vague and confusing and fuzzy; If you’ve got the Holy Spirit inside you, and you’ve had a revelation of Jesus Christ, it is all you’ll ever need. 

God made you. Do you know that? He formed your body, but He also made your spirit, He made you good at some things, and He gave you passions and desires. Did you know that? Did you know that He knows you? 

I know that God speaks. I know that he speaks clearly to people, I’d never dispute that, my problem lies in the being dependent on the audible voice of God to move, sometimes to even obey what’s in the bible. Our purpose is obeying what’s in that Book. It really is that easy. He might speak to you, He might tell you exactly how He wants you to execute those commands. But that’s all He’s telling you, because His ultimate final word is His Son. Everything else is simply commentary. 

‘We need to talk Sarah’ He said, ‘I want you to be a writer. Now I know you’re dyslexic and an introvert who doesn’t like to share your feelings, but this is something I want you to do.’ = the time God didn’t tell me He wanted me to be a writer. 

I find purpose and meaning in writing that I get nowhere else in my life but God never told me to do it.

If I know what my passion is and I know what the bible says, I get to match those two things together.

God didn’t create me to be a robot who waits for instruction before I eat cornflakes or rice crispies in the morning. I get to make choices, I get to choose to honour God in my decisions. 

I brandish the word Godincidence around like it’s going out of fashion; mostly in a tongue-in-cheek way, but I am a massive believer in the Godincidence. I thought once that I might like to write, since I’ve been pursuing it I’ve discovered people actually like what I’ve got to say, I’ve made some internet friends and although I work long hours at my job my writing fits around them almost perfectly. You might call that a coincidence, I however call it a Godincidence. 

I know some people who’d question whether or not God wants me to be a writer. They’d say I need to hear it from God; He’d need to tell me that’s what He wanted. They’d say I need to hear it in an audible voice and have someone else say it to me too. I say poppycock! (I’d say something stronger if I wasn’t writing in Elora’s space). 

Guys please hear me: what I’m saying is that God speaks. But He has spoken, and if we’re not hearing Him, perhaps the first place we aught to be looking is to the bible.

// 

Sarah McCarten is a 30-year-old blogger/nanny. She’s from Yorkshire, but resides in Richmond in South West London, although you’ll often find her pottering around Watford. She loves Jesus, is passionate about theology, and she thinks she might want to be a vicar one day. She loves to write, sew, read, and cook. She’s not as funny as she thinks she is. She pretty much has the best friends in the world. 

She blogs here and tweets here.

knowing your purpose :: walking in the knowing

Editor's Note: during the month of June, members of my Story Sessions community will be posting about what it means to pursue dreams, engage in self-care and practice active boundaries. They had free reign on what they wrote, and the topics come from my 30 Days of Prompts. I'm so excited about the wisdom these ladies will share with you, and I know you'll be inspired.

xoxo,

Elora Nicole

//

It’s the question man has asked for hundreds of years: who am I, and what am I here for?  To know one’s self is so important on the life journey.  To know your purpose is part of knowing self.

These things have not always been easy for me, but I’m finally walking in the knowing and it’s wonderful.  At times it has been my undoing, but to be honest, I need the undoing.  I was walking in a cloud of misgiving, preconceived notions, and misappropriated passions.  I kept chasing other people’s dreams trying to make them my own.  It didn’t work.  I can’t give you any one reason why I did it.  Perhaps I was searching to “find myself.”  I wasn’t ever really lost.  I just wasn’t tapping in to the essence of who I was meant and made to be.  To know your purpose is to know yourself and to allow all you do to come from that place.  

Here’s brief definition on the word “know.”  It has multiple meanings.  Ponder these words on what it means to know (Know 2013).

To perceive directly
To have direct cognition of
To have understanding of
To be acquainted or familiar with
To be aware of the truth or factuality of
To have a practical understanding of
To be convinced or certain of

If you were to ask me my favorite definition, it would have to be “to be aware of the truth or factuality of” – I think this is how God moves in my life.  He’s been bringing me into the awareness of who He is and who He made me to be.  It hasn’t been easy.  I’m like the New Testament Bible disciple, Peter.  I have to hear it three, four, and sometimes even five times.  Awareness of knowing my purpose has been beating and breaking down walls that have kept me from being.  It’s just been that kind of season in my life.  It is the area where the Savior has been fighting for me.  I have sloughed off so many old, destructive ways of thinking.  And not to be cliché, but I feel and think differently.

There have been many times in my life where I felt I didn’t have an original purpose and idea of my own.  Of course, that is only a feeling, and it was not the truth.  Take little journey with me.

In life we often expect things to go as planned.  The reality, as I’m sure you already know, is that life is unpredictable.  We can make our plans, but life still happens.  We can have our dreams, our visions and our goals, but life can come and disrupt our pretty little order and how we meant for things to be.  

Sometimes in the process of interruption, we are shaken to our core.  Our sense of self may lie in tatters – a wreckless and untintended mess.

Does this change our knowing?  Does this change our being?  Does the messiness of life redefine or repurpose the essence of who we’re made to be?  Does the chaos of life-change mean we had it wrong?  Does it mean we have to start all over and find another purpose?

I certainly don’t have all the answers, but this much I know is true.

I am who I am no matter what happens.  When I know who I am, then circumstances don’t cause me to have internal crises of faith, belief, or knowing.  My purpose remains unchanged and steady – rock solid.  These truths will never change no matter what I do or where I am: to love God, to love others, to do what the bible says – these truths have transformed the way I think about purpose.  

Sure I’ll cry, feel out of sorts, and even shake my fist at the sky, but that does not change who I am and what I’m called to do.  Even the writer of Psalm 139 knew this: “Your eyes saw my substance, being yet unformed.  And in Your book they all were written, The days fashioned for me, When as yet there were none of them” (NKJV, p. 1020).  We were made with purpose before we came to be – what we would do and how we would live out our lives, God already knew.  This truth is further echoed in Ephesians 2:10: For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them” (NKJV, p. 1985).  That’s good news today!

Maybe you didn’t or couldn’t believe you have meaning and purpose in your life like I once did, but the truth is that we do! Words that ring out in my heart are that I am fearfully and wonderfully made. I am a treasure – loved wholly and wholly loved.  These words meld to my soul.  I know it and believe it.  Recently I’ve seen it born out in my life, my writing, my relationships, and my endeavors.  It’s like God’s little reminder that my purpose can’t be stripped away from me.  It is guarded.  It is a part of me.  It always has been a part of me and always will be.  It spills over into the ordinary-everyday-mundane of my life – meeting with friends, spending time with family, encouraging others, and even the work I choose to do – all organic and nothing forced.  Ever were I to change careers, my purpose would remain the same.  It can be expressed no matter the work I do because my purpose is part of my being.    

I believe this truth.  It cannot be shaken, and though storms of life may violently assail me with or without warning, they do not alter the truth of who I am.  

When I choose to accept the knowing, the awareness, and understanding then the hellish things have no power over me.  When I falter and step out in ways unsuited to me, then I feel the warring inside bidding me to return to the uniqueness of God’s call on my life – to be His, a beloved daughter who loves God fiercely, learns to love others better, and do what the bible says.  That’s my purpose.  It will never change.  

To know your purpose is good.  To know thyself is even better because that knowing becomes the power that drives your unique purpose into being.  

To be able to articulate the truth of certainty in self-knowing is to be better equipped to weather the ebb and flow of life.  We were made to know and to be known.   That knowing informs and shines light on our purpose. 

Perhaps today is the day you choose to know, to believe, to perceive, to be convinced, to understand, and to be more intimately acquainted with who you were made to be.  Perhaps today is the day you choose to take a step of faith in living out your purpose.    A revelation such as this steadies the soul, enlightens the heart, and allows you to fully and wholly be.  Maybe, just maybe today is the day you dive deep.    

So only this remains:  Do you know who are you really are? Now, it’s your turn.

Now, go live by just…being!  Let that being become what you do.  It was always who you were.

//

Marvia enjoys sharing the journey of life and living more fully.  She is young at heart and believes in God.  She's all about authenticity and learning to just be.  While her life may not be perfect, she is on the road to perfection in Christ.  Marvia seeks God and to be like Him.  Her desire is to share love, light, hope, words, thoughts, dreams, faith, and whatever else seems good and prudent.  She is often found walking the rockity-bumpity journey of life in wide open spaces of Texas, sipping tea, drinking coffee, splattered with sugary flour dust while baking with family, laughing and snorting loudly, dancing ridiculously, and most recently getting her Zumba on.  This is where the rubber hits the road and where her faith is fleshed out.  Join her on the journey.

knowing your purpose :: it all matters.

Editor's Note: during the month of June, members of my Story Sessions community will be posting about what it means to pursue dreams, engage in self-care and practice active boundaries. They had free reign on what they wrote, and the topics come from my 30 Days of Prompts. I'm so excited about the wisdom these ladies will share with you, and I know you'll be inspired.

xoxo,

Elora Nicole

//

Dear Mother of little ones who wonders if it matters,

It does. All of it. You do. In fact, I believe nothing else on earth has a greater purpose than you. Don’t roll your eyes. I’m serious. You there, exhausted and hurried, wondering how you made it through the day (or maybe what day it even is), I’m talking to you.

Everything you do teaches, corrects, reinforces, guides, and cultivates. In fact, even the things you don’t do teach, reinforce and cultivate. See, you can’t even help how much purpose you have-even just by existing.

Everything you say sows a seed (whether you want it to or not). The words you speak to your spouse, the stranger in the grocery store and most especially, the words you say to yourself- send a message of human worth to that little two-foot-person in your life. She hears you. In fact, what you say and how you say it will become her inner voice all the days of her life.

Your response to cries in the night, lost passies, growling tummies, scraped knees and holes-punched-in-adolescent-walls will be the measuring stick he’ll use to evaluate his importance in the world. How you meet his little-boy needs can determine whether or not he’ll be able to meet the grown-man needs when it’s time, or even if he is able to care about anyone else’s.

Your goofy songs-about-nothing and wordless baby babble, nose to nose with a little face that changes every day, says, “I see you and you are something to be seen”.

And what about when you’re wrong? What about when you just. can’t. anymore? Well then, that little one learns how to say I’m sorry. How to say no. All about reality and honesty. How to set boundaries.

And what about the not-so-precious-moments in her life? The moments resulting in thrown hairbrushes or venomous words that sting your mom-heart? Well, sister those are the most important moments in her life masquerading as emotional torture. Most important because this is when you get to look her in the twelve-going-on-twenty year old eyes and say, “I love you, even now.” And then she’ll know the difference between real love and counterfeit.

So does it matter? Yes. If you’re a mom, every second has purpose.

The four hours of sleep a night.

The poopy diapers.

The snotty noses and bumped heads.

The mid-day pumping in a public restroom or seven-hundredth time you wash bottles.

It. All. Matters.

But, not to everyone. Your boss may not care about the twenty seconds of sleep you got just before the alarm went off. Your friends who are far from being parents of little ones (even if theirs are grown) may not get your insistence on always being home by seven p.m. to get baby girl to sleep. And your co-worker may never understand why you don’t call her niece you’ve met one time, to babysit.

They don’t understand the single threads. How it all matters.

And not, like, just a little. It will matter for generations. Because this little one who learns whether or not he is important, may have children of his own, or become an uncle or mentor or teach. And all those tiny fragile threads that mean nothing in and of their own existence will come together to serve a purpose greater than you ever realized.

So sometimes, we have to be okay being the only ones who really understand our purpose.

And my hope is that you would accept what I’m telling you. Not in a general, universal truth kind of way. In a very specific, personal kind of way. The kind that changes how you see that poopy diaper or seven-hundredth bottle. The kind of accepting that allows you to trust each individual seemingly insignificant thread to serve the tapestry’s greater, beautiful, purpose.

All my love to you.

//

Erin began her life at her grandmother's house in West Texas, riding horses and searching for arrow heads. After surviving adolescence, she carved out a life in Austin where she married a photographer, gave-up on writing and recently started writing again. You can find more at A Peculiar Love, where she writes about our adoption journey and at Find Me In September where she writes when she's feeling brave.

knowing your purpose :: the answers may surprise you

Editor's Note: during the month of June, members of my Story Sessions community will be posting about what it means to pursue dreams, engage in self-care and practice active boundaries. They had free reign on what they wrote, and the topics come from my 30 Days of Prompts. I'm so excited about the wisdom these ladies will share with you, and I know you'll be inspired.

xoxo,

Elora Nicole

//

“Here is the world. Beautiful and terrible things will happen. Don't be afraid.”

― Frederick Buechner

You find yourself living a life of pioneer mission in a community house in the middle of a poverty stricken housing project when you were expecting to be at medical school.

You begin to ask yourself some questions. 

One of those questions might* be, ‘wow, I didn’t realise I would crap out of my chemistry exams quite so badly.’

Another question might be, ‘what is God doing that He would lead me to this place, at this time, with these people, when it was no-where near on my radar of calling or purpose.’

And then you might find yourself leaning into a new learning of who you are, a leaving behind of the old ways, a growing up of sorts, a releasing.

You might find a depth of love and a fierceness of fire that you never knew existed within you.

Then, fourteen years later, when you’ve adventured to this point in time, spanning continents, hurtling from safety to danger, learning to trust in the Wild Jesus you follow, you might come to an understanding that it wasn’t about ‘Medicine’ at all - it was about Shalom. Justice and Wholeness and Restoration and Reconciliation.

And it all makes sense.

You just stuck a label that didn’t quite fit onto your purpose.

You’re called, in the words of Shane Claiborne, to be a ‘Professional Lover’.

* by ‘might’, read, ‘definitely’.

//

Our western worldviews tend to lead us to view the past as being behind us, and the future ahead.

The Hebraic idea is vastly different.

The Hebrew word for the future, for tomorrow, is מחר – ‘mahhar’. The Hebrew word for the past, for yesterday, is תמול – ‘Temol’. 

‘Mahhar’ comes from a root that means ‘behind’, and ‘Temol’ comes from a root that means ‘in front.’

The past is in front of us, the future behind.

What we see is where we’ve come from, the things that have shaped us, the road of purpose we’ve been led down. The future is at our backs, entered only as we live more, see more of our past, understand more of our journey.

//

“The place God calls you to is the place where your deep gladness and the world’s deep hunger meet.” ― Frederick Buechner

I have noticed a tendency in some to somewhat mythologise purpose. To go to extremes and either speak of ‘purpose’ in hushed tones as though she were a flighty bird that might be scared away should we speak too loudly of her existence, needing to be wooed into our proximity so that we could read her wings and search her being – or to shout loudly from the rooftops of this enigma that we are seeking our with every fibre of our being, desperate to lay claim to that which is eluding us, conquering, sword in hand, slaying dragons as we go.

I WILL find my purpose.

In the book of judges we find Gideon threshing grain in a wine press. Hiding. 

A wine press is the last place you'd want to thresh wheat. Its a sunken pit. The chaff would never blow away, the good would stay mixed in with the crap. But Gideon is hiding, trying to keep his grain from the ravaging Midianites. 

I don't know what's going through Gideon's mind whilst he's threshing the grain. I don't know what he thinks God is going to do to get the Israelites out of their fix, I don't know if he thought he would have a part to play in whatever that might be. 

But God knows, and God communicates. 

The Angel of the Lord appears to Gideon exactly where he is and speaks words that must have sounded crazy to Gideon. Mighty warrior.

Gideon is given a purpose.

Does that purpose wait until Gideon has acquired the requisite skill set?

Does that purpose begin when Gideon has processed all the trauma that he and his people have been through?

Does that purpose begin once Gideon has got a prayer circle around him to discern what God might be saying?

No. 

The Lord turned to him and said, “Go in the strength you have and save Israel out of Midian’s hand. Am I not sending you.' (Judges 6:14)

Go in the strength you have. 

Prayer circles aren't bad. Getting skilled up isn't bad. Processing your journey isn't bad. 

Thinking that God only gives you purpose when you have all of that sorted? 

Not so great. 

Go in the strength you have. 

There is purpose right where you are. Right now. 

Yes, Gideon had an angel of the lord. We have Holy Spirit.

What is it that you're waiting for?

You know your heart and your passions. You have Holy Spirit. 

Gideon was told to go in the strength he had and God would put the rest in place. 

What are you waiting for? 

//

Maybe purpose is to be found in the quiet beating of our hearts, the thing that stirs our souls when no-one else notices it. 

Maybe purpose is to be found in the reflecting on the journey, of the moments so well lived that you could hear God breathe sighs of joy. 

Maybe purpose is to be found in the fire in our bones, when passions for Justice rise up and inaction is no longer an option.

Maybe purpose is to be found, as Beuchner suggests, where our deep joy and the worlds deep needs intersect. 

Maybe it’s that simple. 

When we know our God and we know our journey and we know ourselves, we will know our purpose.

There may be moments when that purpose blazes like the sun, burning out the shadows and daring darkness to squash the beauty that is illuminated by the fierceness of our love. Where systems are disarmed and wrongs are righted and regimes that hold back the Kingdom are brought to their knees and bathed in light.

There may be moments when that purposes sits, rocking in an old chair, wrapped in a blanket, providing safety and warmth and hope. Where truths are murmured over tired souls, the lonely and lost find a home, the hungry are fed with gentle love, and all is put right in the world. 

But there is purpose nonetheless.

Borne of a journey, lived in radical obedience to the Lover of all, forged in the fires of hope and courage and daring.

//

You find yourself living a life of pioneer mission in a community house in the middle of a poverty stricken housing project when you were expecting to be at medical school.

You begin to ask yourself some questions. 

And the answers may surprise you.

//

Claire Bent is a dreamer, schemer and adventurer. Her favourite words are, 'but, WHY?' which is both helpful and revelatory, and irritating. She would rather go barefoot, hopes there's Assam tea in heaven, feels like East Africa is a second home and thinks that The West Wing should be on curriculums.

She also runs a community development organisation and is a pastor in a South London church.

the rebellion

She told me I'd rebel in the ways of monks, ringing the bells all over the hills.

It would be a freedom song, a call to action for women who are tired or hurt or broken down.

And I didn't believe her at first. I never do. I always sniff and rearrange myself and close my eyes against the blessing. 

But it's time to own the rebellion. 

Months ago, I started Rebel Diaries. It came out of another conversation with a friend after a few of my words resonated with a few of you and I realized there may be a whole lot of us aching to share our story.

So I opened it up for you to share, sometimes anonymously and always from the deepest places of who you are as a woman struggling to love this messy Bride who cuts and ignores and wounds and wants so badly to be good but often falls short because she's the human collective.

You kept sending me your stories, and I kept getting this vision of an army of women holding each other up and breaking in their marching boots and I soon realized this wasn't a passing thing. 

See, it was gaining strength and velocity. And I loved it. I wanted to take each of you in and hold you close and grab your hand and whisper brave one you got this. 

This is what Story Sessions is for me. One of the things I loved about teaching was reading something from one of my students and feeling that up-tic of breath when I realized that there was potential within those words. And I'd reach for the student as fast I could and would look him or her in they eye and because I'm emotional I'd get all teary and I'd say, "you can write, you know it? These words...they mean something." 

I'd get the same way with my classes when we'd talk of narrative theory and how sharing stories can be healing and there would be the typical snicker and I'd grow all quiet and feel this mother-bear instinct kick in and I'd stand there in front of them and grow hot with the words flowing from my mouth.

Don't you dare let anyone tell you that your story means nothing. Your story is everything. Your story is part of you.

I swear you could hear a pin drop in those moments.

When I started Story Sessions, I had no idea how everything would come together. The teaching, the word-fire flowing through my soul to my heart to my mouth to their ears, even Rebel Diaries. It all seemed disconnected at first.

And then I got this email ::

Sometimes, I see your AP english training in some of our sessions and I think "Oh man, I bet Elora had no idea how God was going to use that, but here it is, setting us free." Not even that was wasted. I see the way you handed God every broken story you have, and I see the way He is making it beautiful again, and I think "I do believe that God can work all things into good. Turns out, I still believe that." So thanks, for being my general. Thanks for starting the army. I am so very very grateful to be allowed to sing my song.

And I started to cry. Big, fat, weepy tears all over the steering wheel because it's true. I had no idea. I had no clue He would use those moments grabbing the hands of my students and looking them in the eye and trying not to cry when I tell them their words matter. There's no way I would have believed you if you told me a year ago I'd be doing that very thing with women I've never even met before but that I would fight for in the space of a single breath.

These women - they're more than just individuals who've submitted pieces for my blog or signed up for an eCourse. They're my sisters. 

And every time someone else joins, a smile breaks across my face and the tears start to fall again because the army is getting bigger and our bells are ringing louder. Do you hear us? We're calling out to you. 

Join the rebellion?

because i'm into you, may

books i read :: 

Unravel Me - I can't even. When someone writes lines like I want to trust but it scares the skin off my bones and I don't know how to be a verb, an adverb, any kind of modifier. I'm a noun through and through...you're gonna pull me in and I'm going to fall in love with your characters and become a fangirl of your writing. Not maybe. Definitely. Read this series. 

And so with that, I bid you goodbye until July. I have some incredible women from my Story Sessions community writing for me in June and I just can't wait for you to read their words. 

---

Want more? Maybe even my words in your inbox? Sign up for fresh content here and receive a free copy of my short story collection. I would love to continue the conversation and I won't ever spam you. Promise.You can also find me on Facebook or follow me on Twitter. Let's meet.

so we'll beat on.

When I was in graduate school, I took a class on Educational Psychology. We focused a lot on developmental theories and how our brains work and what makes kids react the way they do and why sometimes, it seems we're shorted out a bit in reactions. 

One of the things that interested me more than anything was that our brains can be emotionally hijacked - especially if we're processing traumatic experiences. When this happens, it's literally impossible for us to compute anything beyond basic functions. Sleeping. Eating. Walking.

Creativity is forgotten. Intelligence is hidden.

For however long our bodies need, we go into this stasis where the only thing we're worried about is survival.

//

One summer I took a course called the New Jersey Writing Project (it's called Abydos Learning now). For three weeks, I studied the brain and writing and how words can heal so much more than our bruised egos - it can open portals into other worlds for our kids.

While taking the course, we were to read a book (because reading+writing are explicitly linked). One of the books,The Female Brain, tackled the way we approach life as women. I wasn't nearly as obsessive about brain-based researched then as I am now, but some of her research enthralled me, specifically - when women have children, their brain can be completely re-written. 

So whereas before they may have been completely career or love centered, now, all they can process is baby.

//

Now, I don't know if I completely believe Brizendine's study because I'd like to believe women can be more than singular-minded regardless of their stage of life.

But I do know this week has been excruciating at best when it comes to focus. Every day has brought pacing, back-spacing and an attempt to not pull out my hair. I sit down to write, only to be lost to some type of anxiety attack, and every time my phone buzzes my heart jolts awake only to be severely disappointed when it's a friend texting. I mean, I love my friends. But they aren't who I want to here from right now. And, the chances of me being able to hold an actual conversation right now is slim. My mind keeps wandering. My thumb keeps hitting the home button. My heart keeps wondering. 

And all week long, as we wait for Little Lion Man to arrive, I keep thinking of these two moments in my past where I learned a little more of what our brains can take.

So, you know...being overwhelmed is a thing.

//

But creativity still moves me. This week, out of a certain desperation for distraction, my husband and I finally went to go see Gatsby. And as I sat there in the theatre watching Fitzgerald's tale of a lost generation I breathed in the inspiration. I remembered that before I am a writer, before I am a woman, before I am a mother I am a human and art speaks so much into humanity and where we hope to be in the future.

This week was hard. Words didn't come easily. Art journaling was brushed aside. But I have hope for next week. 

I also know this - even if this next week is hard, even if these next few months are hard, this dream still echoes deep inside my chest. It's not going anywhere. And more than the hard days and the easy days and the ones where I remember to keep my chin up because it's just another notch in my belt of experience, I want our son to see us pushing and believing and not giving up - especially when it seems all hope is lost. I'll look back on my writing and these dreams and remember they serve as guideposts for a reason.

As Fitzgerald said, we'll beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.

on caring for the human story.

One time, a church asked me to take my post down.

The specifics of the post don't really matter. What matters is that in my post, I was telling a story. My story. It included a few people in leadership and even though I didn't mention names, I was told that in writing the post I was trying to tear down ministries and that I was doing damage and essentially gossiping from a megaphone.

I ended up talking with someone from the church later that week. In all of my communication, this person was the only one who offered a listening ear without any accusation.

We met at a local coffee shop and I shared my story and he shared his and I left with a better understanding of the Gospel.

In that moment, I felt safe. Heard. 

A few years before, Russ and I had a similar situation. He wrote a post about food and community and mentioned briefly that we'd been let go of our position at a church and how devastating that was for us. But, God was molding us. Moving us. Showing us a bit of Himself in the breaking of bread with other people who actually sit and listen and share—something we weren't familiar with until that moment.

Within a few hours, we were contacted by the pastor who told us we were participating in slander. We never even mentioned the church or the pastor by name, but what resulted was confusion and hurt and bruised egos and a reminder that we all read into words what we will.

What makes this situation different?

We still met a coffee shop. We still shared our stories. But this time, I left with a broken heart. This time, I left with even more confusion and hurt because this pastor stared at my husband after he mentioned he was trying to keep his anger in check, let a slow grin cross his face, and said, "get angry man! Cuss at me if you have to - yell even - but say something! Just don't sit there."

And I wondered what is the Church if all we ever do is manipulate people into action?

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These two situations have left me with this: stories, however broken or fleeting, always trump force. Don't tell me if you're right. Don't tell me I'm wrong. Do sit with me and wrestle through our stories together because then I see a taste of the Church as it's meant to be: broken but living out something beautiful in our strengths. Because even if we disagree, if you're willing to hold my story in your hand with care it covers all the petty nuances of faith.

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A few years ago Russ and I found a community who approach human care—and every issue within—with the purpose of listening and sharing. What's resulted is more than a community, it's a family. And even though we may not agree on everything, we know we'll hold the stories shared with care. Because of that, we grow. We learn. We shift. We change.

The first time we showed up to IdeaCamp, people welcomed us with open arms (even though we were online). We were considered charter members. Part of the tribe. Equals. And the the ideas started to spread. One meeting turned into many - in DC, Las Vegas, Portland. We were finally able to attend the gathering in Arkansas, and that weekend completely changed the trajectory of our story in two ways. 

- I was there as a blogger. During a workshop on the orphan crisis in Ethiopia, I suddenly felt overwhelmed with the amount of people there who turned their skills into something tangible for aid on the ground. Dentists started organizations for dental care. Doctors created built in health care for the people in the surrounding villages where they adopted from years earlier. Finally I couldn't stay silent anymore. I spoke up - as a writer, I struggle. I can go overseas, but I don't have this burning desire or talent to engage in the community while I'm there. Only when I'm home, spitting the stories out on my computer, does my help seem anything remotely like those of the healthcare or education fronts. And then a doctor looked at me and smiled.

"Don't you see?" he said, "you are the luckiest of us all. YOU have the ability to share the greatest story - the only story - that matters. We share it with our tools. You share it with your words." 

And it was such a simple response but in that moment something within me shifted. My purpose crystallized. I was a writer. I was a writer. I was born to tell stories. I was born to tell HIS stories. Yes. This. This I knew in the deepest parts of my soul. I fit here. I belonged.

- I was also there as an adoptive mom. At the time, Russ and I planned to adopt from Ethiopia. However, every time I chose to hold a story with the question of ethics or of the importance of churches engaging in local care or the corruption within the foster care system, I broke a little more. It wasn't enough for us to do what everyone else was doing. Our story didn't match up with the glamorous picture painted of international adoptions and the rescue of orphans involved - the picture I latched onto before I traveled and met orphans with names. Orphans with homes. Orphans with no plans or need for adoption. And just like something earlier shifted within my purpose, another latch fell into place after participating in discourse and pushing and wrestling through the grittiness of the adoption care issue. Our story? Our story was meant for domestic adoption.

Our story was meant to be engaging in the messiness and awkwardness and brokenness of holding the story of a birth mother's pain in our hand.

Looking her in the eye. Not knowing what to say except thank you times a million. Not knowing how to hold or handle her smiles and you're welcomes times a million. And when the tears come, when her relief spills over in tears, I was meant to grab her hand. I saw it so vividly then, and I had no idea how accurate the picture was for our future situation. Now, two years later, we're in the midst of this very thing. Holding the story of our son's birth mother gently within our own hearts. Knowing the sacrifice she made. Knowing the difficulty involved. Knowing the breaking happening on all sides and realizing the messiness of it all doesn't allow for clean anything.

And I saw this first with Idea Camp.

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In September, Idea Camp comes to Austin. I've been wanting one here since the beginning. Those who've been with me can prove it. Wouldn't it be awesome to hold one here? I'd say. We could focus on story. How to tell one well. How to engage the Church in storytelling that holds the whole of it and not just the clean parts. 

And really, even though the focus is IC: Human Care, isn't that what storytelling is? Caring for the human involved? Truly listening to their side - however messy or different - and seeing where it may intersect with your own?

I've seen mountains of assumption moved within this tribe. People who would never be seen together sitting across from each other and working through what it means to participate in civil discourse. Answering questions with humility and openness. And everyone leaves with a deeper picture of what it means to live out the Gospel.

I'll be there, taking notes and soaking in the conversation. I hope to see you there, too.

considering the questions

I want to feel both the beauty and the pain of the age we are living in. I want to survive my life without becoming numb. I want to speak and comprehend words of wounding without having these words become the landscape where I dwell. I want to possess a light touch that can elevate darkness to the realm of stars.

- Terry Tempest Williams, When Women Were Birds

When Women Were Birds has been one of the most inspiring and influential pieces I've read this year. The first time I read this paragraph toward the end of the book, I sat at my desk with tears streaming down my face because this. THIS is what I want for my words - a light touch that can elevate darkness to the realm of stars. 

In this book, Williams works through the mystery of her mother gifting her with blank journals when she died. Written in essay form, she mixes memoir, narrative, and poetry as she figures out what the blank pages mean, what her mother was trying to say, and how a writer can find her voice. The chapters are sometimes short and rarely linear. This works with Williams' purpose of untying the knots of self-doubt and personal trauma. 

What works with this passage is the way she's proclaiming herself with clarity and strength. Earlier in the book, she asks what is the sound of a woman covering her mouth with her eyes wide open. Here, she pushes the hand away and opens her mouth. She speaks against society's reliance on numbing agents and shows willingness to write the hard thing without dwelling there. And then, as she always does, she dusts the sentences with a touch of poetry - creating a nuance in her writing that is specifically hers. 

Typically, writers tend to be introspective. We take in a lot and sometimes, forget to push it out through words. The questions, the tensions, the epiphanies - they all seem to fall into a hidden reservoir and if we aren't careful, become lost to our psyche. There's power in working out the questions in our writing. If done correctly and with care, we may even brush up against our own voice and poetry.

Practice: Consider the questions, tensions and epiphanies you've experienced lately. Work your way through one of these in words. Take time over the next few days and continue writing, chipping away at some of the thoughts and perceptions you've considered in the past. Write until you know something different or brush up against what you know to be your voice. Approach the words of wounding without dwelling in those spaces and see what happens. Break it down, polish the words, and push it out - make it known.

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on storytelling :: for freedom & healing

Editor's Note :: I received an email from my dear friend Morgan with this post attached on Friday and I couldn't wait to share with it you so I scheduled it for today. I've never met Morgan face-to-face (yet) but she is a soul-sister in ways that aren't really explainable. I can't wait for you to get to know her too. 

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“The Universe is made of stories, not atoms.” Muriel Rukeyser, Poet

I used to do  this thing when my preteen heart was breaking:

I would lean my back against a wall and invite my tears to come. And they would, slowly at first. I would rest my head in be in my hands, and dig my shoulder blades like daggers into the surface behind me. Then I would nurse the hurt until my tears reached impressive momentum. Then, at the perfect moment of anguish,  I would slide down the wall, all the way to my bottom and burst into weeping. Sometimes, for dramatic effect, I would pretend to take a swig of a bottle of liquire.

It was a fine performance. And one that always, for some reason, made me feel better.

Yes, I was a dramatic child. Yes, like many little girls, I fancied the dream of being a movie star.  But looking back on it now, knowing what I know about life and how we humans deal with it best, I know my little tragic scene was more than that.

It was storytelling.

“The Universe is made of stories, not atoms,” as the poet Muriel Rukeyser once wrote.  Poets, intuits of human experience, have always known the importance story plays in our life as human beings. Cavemen knew it too, arching narrative of hunts and love on dark walls for thousands of years. Storytelling has always been a fundamental form of communication.

Neuroscientist also echo the importance of story in our lives, sharing with us their research on how the brain learns more through story than through graphs and facts and figures. Of course, mothers and kindergarten teachers have known this for years. That’s why singing the ABC’s has always been more effective than giving toddlers flashcards.  And why in Sunday school to teach children about God we read from the gospel stories instead of Leviticus lines of rules.

I have found that story is tremendously useful intra-personally too. The stories I tell myself are the most important ones. Victor Frankl, a pyschologist from Vienna who came after Freud, said our primary motivation isn’t for pleasure (as Freud is famous for contending) but for meaning. Frankl says, above all, we want our lives to make sense.

“Life is never made unbearable by circumstances, but only by lack of meaning and purpose.”  Victor Frankl

A good story has a strong narrative and a narrative helps give us meaning. As a teenager, heart aching with emotion, my tame and padded suburban life didn’t match the wild and rough within.  So I needed a different narrative to validate the truth in my heart.

Breakdowns aren’t pity parties; they are a profound search for meaning.

If you are feeling lost, maybe you need one?

For me, pretending I was a down and out character who just received a final blow and was now a heap of tears on the floor somehow gave me hope. It brought me to a defining moment where I could stay on the floor and melt into the floorboards, or I could muster up the strength within and move on. I didn’t know Victor Frankl’s words then, but my soul was already wise to their truth:

“...There was no need to be ashamed of tears, for tears bore witness that a man had the greatest of courage, the courage to suffer.”

Suffering doesn’t sound like something we want to do. But I think Frankl’s point is that suffering is something we all are doing anyways, whether we acknowledge it or not.

Part of creating true romance and meaningful adventure in our life is suffering for the right reasons, not the wrong ones. Suffering for lack of meaning and purpose is a sad shame, suffering for truth and beauty is noble.

Don’t mistake me for telling you to be a martyr. I”m not. I don’t believe in diving headlong into suffering for suffering’s sake. No way! But I do believe in the sweet suffering that comes when we choose to fight the good fight for the people and the dreams that matter most to us; the good fight for our heart to come alive. The suffering that might look like a sacrifice of sleep, or a delay in gratification, or putting someone else’s needs above your own for a day.  Or the suffering that might look like facing the pain of years of neglect or disappointment to finally let it all go and get your hopes high enough to dream big dreams again.

Crying is good. A deep weeping is a new beginning, a wash where life can begin again. So maybe, at this awakening of your desire to live a life of romance and adventure, you need a good cry.

Take over the scene.

In the quiet of your closet slide down the wall, all the way down to your bottom. Be as dramatic as you can muster up the gusto to be. Wail in a way the Academy would be proud. Pretend you are a character who has reached her rock bottom and is about to find a strength she never knew she had to rise again.

This is healing. This is freedom. This is storytelling.

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Morgan Day Cecil is writer/romance revolutionary/maidservant of encouragement. She blogs about creating life with true romance and meaningful adventure at morgandaycecil.com.  She would love to connect with you on twitter and facebook and heck, why not , instagram and pinterest too.