From Eden's Dirt

Hope through despair. Faith through fear.

My Snowy Day

February 16, 2019 / / 0 Comments

Have you ever read The Snowy Day by Ezra Jack Keats? It’s a beautiful picture book that I loved reading to my children when they were younger. In all of Keats’ books, both the art and the story reflect the joy and wonder of childhood in their simplicity, while also showing the struggle that a child must navigate as he begins to encounter his own need to adjust emotionally to the world’s imperfections.

In The Snowy Day, a little boy named Peter is overjoyed to wake up to find a deep covering of snow blanketing his urban neighborhood. As you might suspect, he is immediately drawn to the magic of the snow, running out into its depths in his little red snowsuit. He plays alone, performing the little scientific experiments that young children use so openly as they explore their world. He whacks a snow-covered tree with a stick until a pile of snow falls onto his head. He makes footprints in patterns. And, of course, he rolls snowballs.

Yet, after some time, Peter grows tired of his games and uncomfortable in the cold, and wants to go back to his warm home. Yet the snow is precious and new and fun, and he doesn’t want to leave it either. In his dilemma, he decides to roll a small snowball, just big enough to fit in his coat pocket, and then he goes inside. After a warm bath, however, Peter is dismayed to find that his snowball has disappeared, leaving only a wet coat pocket behind.

This weekend, by the grace of God and my husband, Eric, I am spending time alone at a retreat center located near the beach in San Diego. (I’m not going to tell you where exactly. This place is my secret piece of heaven, and I don’t want to share.) I’m here to rest, read, pray, and recharge my batteries, and I get to be here all the way until Monday. This, to me, is the ultimate measure of selfcare, not quite a vacation, but an indulgence in my own inner world, with time to fill only with the things that feed my soul. But the hard part, the damper on my private party, is that, on Monday, I will, in fact, go home.

I came here once before not quite two years ago, and it was one of the best things I’d ever done for myself. Solo retreats are an amazing way to get in touch with God and listen to the leading of the Holy Spirit, and the idea is that, after my God-and-me honeymoon, I can return home with a fresh outlook and a cleansed spirit. And, after my last visit here, that did happen. But my launch back into reality didn’t feel too good after my return home. I pulled in the driveway with an indescribable peace in my heart, and I was anxious to embrace my kids and my husband, to give them the new, best self that I’d uncovered. Then I opened the front door.

All three kids and my husband were home, and all 3 were in full, energetic swing. My elder son had an appointment that day to tour a meterological station in partial fulfillment of a Boy Scout merit badge. When I walked in, he needed to be there in ten minutes, and the station was twenty minutes away. Eric was trying to help him focus on what he needed to wear and bring along, as well as the types of questions he should ask, and in the midst of this my younger son was playing, chattering, and requesting attention. My daughter, who attended an online middle school at the time, was using her school-issued computer, struggling to complete her work in all the commotion. I was dismayed to say the least. All of this was (is) just a typical day in our crazy family life, but after my three days in solitude, the impact of this uproar on my sensory systems was overwhelming. I was able to greet everyone with hugs and kisses and listen to their reports of events that happened while I was gone, but within a few hours, my mind and body shut down. I ended up in bed with a multi-day migraine.

As I sit here again now, the discomfort of that reunion and the frustration I felt toward myself and toward my normal life sits in my mind, and I know I want to avoid that shock on Monday. But I don’t know how to translate the peace and tranquility I experience in this environment into the everyday life I lead. My precious snowball of solitude and quiet can only survive under the right conditions. When I take it out of its natural environment, it will melt. Like Peter, all I’ll have left is a wet pocket.

Learning to balance caring for others, caring for myself, growing my relationship with God and allowing Him to determine the values I will live out, and trying to enjoy the whole process is a never-ending balancing act. I am constantly questioning where and when one of these priorities should stop and another should begin. Ultimately I should be living them all out simultaneously, and certainly I am, but the time factor eludes me. When I need to practice my care for others, should I be sitting down, playing a game or having a talk with my kids? Going on a date with my husband? Keeping my house clean? Cooking a favorite meal? Planning and executing a family outing? Am I really caring for them if I’m cooking a meal and they’re in the other room? Since I’m pretty much the only one in the house who likes things clean and organized, is sweeping the floor an act of caring for my family, or caring for myself? When I’m feeling tired, sick, or resentful, should I continue sweeping the floor because I love them, or should I take a break? Is it too self-indulgent to take a 3 hour nap on Sunday afternoon? Is Eric out there in the living room thinking I’m lazy and growing resentful because I’m napping and he’s not? I definitely see the wisdom in putting on my own self care oxygen mask first before helping others, but I never seem to get enough air. Perhaps if I stopped overthinking it all I could breathe more deeply.

Like Peter, I want to keep my snowball. Having just the snowball isn’t quite as great as having all the snow, but keeping it means that I have a piece of that joy to hold onto any time I want. But, just as Peter wasn’t able to keep the snowball from melting in the warmth of his house, I can’t seem to carry the warmth and peace that I receive in solitude into my active life and my relationships. It disintegrates.

I want to know the secret to keeping the snowball. I want my self care practices to enhance and give depth and meaning to my work and my relationships. Instead I feel like the busyness of life too quickly drains my supply of inner peace.

For now, though, I will stop worrying about how to hang onto the snowball. For the next three days, I’ll just enjoy the snow.

Photo by Aaron Burden. Pictures by Ezra Jack Keats.

Essentials of Self Care: Own Your Time

January 20, 2019 / / 1 Comment

This is the third installment in my Essentials of Self Care series. To view the earlier installments, choose a link:

Essentials of Self Care: Sleep

Essentials of Self Care: Breathe

I’ve written a lot about self care in the past. It’s important to me because I want others to know what I didn’t. I believe that one of the reasons I now suffer from chronic illnesses, mental and physical, is that I didn’t make time for self care in my earlier years as an adult, and especially after I became a mother. It wasn’t until I developed chronic migraines and other pain that anyone told me that self care needed to be more than remembering to eat right, brush my teeth, and take a shower once in a while.

In the fall of 2016, after several months of extreme anxiety, constant head and muscle pain, dizziness, and nausea, I saw my current primary care doctor for the first time. She asked me about my life, and the first thing I told her was that I was the at-home mother of two teens with autism. I didn’t get to tell her any more. She stopped me, saying, “No wonder you have migraines. I think all of this is happening because of constant stress and anxiety. Your body can’t manage it anymore.” I don’t tell you this here to make the claim that all chronic illness and pain is a result of stress. But stress is a big complicating factor, and it seems like so many people, myself included, feel stressed, but don’t feel like they have the time to relieve it. It’s not that I don’t want stress relief, it’s that any time that I spend caring for myself is time that I don’t spend doing something else that’s important. Like so many other women, I put my own needs last.

Self Portrait

I made changes after that, but I’ve come to the conclusion that, while self care allows me to cope with and enjoy my life, it’s too late for me to be completely healthy again. God may work a miracle for me, and I pray for one often. I am not discounting His desire and ability to make me well. But accepting that my body is tired helps me feel like my self care is worthwhile.

I don’t want others to get to this point where I am. I’m 37 right now, but I often joke that it feels like 87. I’m tired to the point of exhaustion almost all the time; in fact, if I don’t feel tired I tend to worry about what might be wrong. I take 10 pills every morning. While many other women are in much worse condition, I can emphatically tell you that I regret not allowing myself the time for proper self care, especially the kind that provides a release from tension and anxiety.

Here’s What I Wish I’d Known:

You own your time. Every hour of every day in this comparably short life is yours to invest. God has entrusted us with years of life here, and those years are made up of hours. I may be stating the obvious here, but this is something I didn’t know, or chose to ignore, for most of my adult life, and especially after I had children. But I chose that. Or it could be said that I chose not to own my time, allowing all the things around me to own it instead, and in my mind, I had no choice but to be dragged along behind the flow of my own life.

But there are 3 things you can accept and act on if you’re going to make the minutes of your life purposeful and healthy.

Time will pass whether you’re mindfully living your life by faith or allowing the flow to sweep you where it will. In Ecclesiastes, Solomon writes, “All the streams flow to the sea, yet the sea is never full; to the place where the streams flow, there they flow again.” Don’t get caught in the cycle of the tides. Instead, try this:

1. Know your values.

If you can’t clearly define what you value, chances are you aren’t valuing those things. Our values are what shape us, and without them, our efforts are futile, or at least misplaced (Ecclesiastes 2:21).

Spend time in thought, prayer, and meditation, asking God to show you what is most valuable to you and what putting these things first would look like in your life. Give this time. I suggest several days of thought and prayer. When you feel like you know your answer, write down 3-5 values that God is calling you to live your life by. It may help to post this list somewhere where you will see it often.

2. Examine your current investments.

Take out your planner, datebook, Google Calendar, or whatever you use to keep track of your personal schedule. Page backwards. What did you spend most of your time on over the last days, weeks, and months? What values do these things convey? Think about the things you don’t write down as well — sleep, meals and meal preparation, self care, child care, carpools, and commutes. Where is your time going? Do most of your activities accurately reflect your values, or does your calendar represent your preoccupations?

Come up with a way to ensure that the majority of your time is used doing things that contribute to and build upon your values and the things you most love.



3. Leave a margin.

Even when you’ve adjusted your schedule and your lifestyle to properly invest in what you most value, it’s essential to plan for down time. It sounds a bit paradoxical, but if you fill every hour of your time and don’t leave plenty of blank space in your life, you’ll burn out. Leaving margin in your schedule allows a space for the unexpected, whether that ends up being taking your kids out for pizza or sitting in unexpected traffic. Down time is also a great way to ensure that you can invest in self care when you need it most.

God calls us all to intentionally live in a way that reflects His love to others, and also to ourselves. You may believe that certain actions are valuable, and are what God intends for your life, but if your day-to-day activities don’t reflect that, it means that you’re putting other things ahead of them. Just as important, if you’re spending all of your time chasing after what you value, and none of it caring for yourself and enjoying what you already have, you’ve missed the point.

Allow God to show you where He wants you to invest your precious energy, and when He wants you to rest and recharge. He doesn’t call us to a life of endless toil and striving. He calls us to a life of peace.

Photos by Kristopher Roller, Daoudi Aissa, Mikito Tateisi, and Milada Vigerova via Unsplash.

“In Any and All Circumstances: Beth March, Bungee Jumping, and Finding Contentment”

January 4, 2019 / / 0 Comments

I haven’t written any posts in quite a while, and it wasn’t a planned break. It wasn’t anything traumatic that stopped me, or perhaps, depending on the perspective I take, it was a whole season of trauma. I am always full of contradiction.

Sometimes I tell people it’s all physical. I tell them that my emotions are currently unbalanced because my hormones are currently unbalanced. Other times I say that that my hormones are unbalanced and I experience varying types of chronic pain because of my emotions; I have a genetic predisposition to depression and anxiety, that, when coupled with many traumatic experiences interspersed across my lifespan, created a recipe for a body and mind that are more decrepit than the number of my years would normally determine.

But in my own private thoughts, I am dying.

Before I get concerned comments and emails, I am not revealing a cancer diagnosis or a death sentence or a desire to commit suicide. There is still no medical diagnosis, root cause, or overarching explanation for the pain I experience, mentally and physically. That’s what offers me the opportunity to alter my description of my physical and mental insufficiency. There is no name for this, and that seems to lend itself to a certain amount of poetic license.

A few months ago I found an old, tattered copy of Little Women. It was a relic I’d saved from childhood that came from a thick plastic zipper-bag one year for Christmas, ordered by my mother from my Scholastic Book Order. I received it along with many other childhood treasures, most of which were more precious to me than Little Women. Heidi and The Secret Garden and Anne of Green Gables are all still around somewhere too, and these three each experienced multiple readings over only a few years’ time. But Meg, Jo, Beth, and Amy sat on my bookshelf for a number of years before I had the courage to pick it up, and even then I’m not sure that I finished it. Coming-of-age stories were always a favorite, but I had a hard time relating to any of the four sisters, and the length of the book itself was daunting. Yet I understood its value enough to keep it.

When I found it again a few months ago I was eager to read it, and I did. I stayed up late to find out if Meg’s marriage would survive, despite realizing that Alcott’s perspective was way too optimistic for it not to. I grew frustrated with Amy’s selfishness and materialism, rolling my eyes at her as if she were my own sister. And of course I skipped ahead to see whether Jo and Laurie would end up together. What surprised me most, however, was that, at 37 years old, I did feel a connection with one of these young girls, even though she was perhaps the youngest at heart. I began to feel like Beth.

While the other sisters grow and change, Beth seems frozen in time, growing in knowledge and character, but not in ambition or striving. She’s happy to learn the womanly arts designated to her sex and rarely complains, but also shows great talent at various artistic endeavors, especially music. She never seems childish, yet plays with dolls well into her upper teenaged years, when her sisters are “coming out.” What I related to, however, was her illness. I couldn’t put a finger on why I felt such affection for her until late in the story, when she finally confesses to Jo that, even without an obvious medical condition, she knows that she will soon die. In her own words, she tells her sister that she has never had the desire or the willingness to look toward the future that the other three were now welcoming, that she felt no need to seek a husband or even to venture much beyond the house, because in some way, whether she chose to acknowledge it or not, she has always known that she would die while she was young. And soon after this talk with Jo, she does so, with no regrets, and with contentment of knowing that she is on her way to meet her Savior.

I’m 37, so I’m almost 20 years older than sweet Beth is at the time of her death, but I admire her contentment. I relate to Beth because I feel older than my years, and because I often find myself living under the assumption that my life will be shorter than average. There is a real logical explanation for this. Members of my father’s family carry (and carried) a genetic mutation that causes Early Onset Alzheimers. Like the more commonly known form of Alzheimers Disease, EOAD involves a gradual deterioration of the brain over time which results in the gradual loss of memory and ability, eventually disabling the immune system in a way that generally leads to death. Like the common form of Alzheimers, EOAD shortens the patient’s lifespan. Unlike the common form of Alzheimers, however, EOAD isn’t something that affects the elderly only. “Early Onset” means exactly what it says. People can get it in their 30s, and it’s aggressive, and fast.

Most of the members of my father’s family had symptoms beginning in their late 40s and were diagnosed around age 50. All of them were dead before they turned 60.

I’m not great at math, but that means that if I am a carrier of this gene mutation, I am now well past halfway through my life, and I may only have about one decade left before I begin my decline. Or I could even have Alzheimers Disease now.

I’ve had MRIs of my brain, and the various doctors that I see are aware of my propensity to develop AD. I am involved in a widespread scientific study of the disease that includes genetic counseling. I have not yet chosen to find out whether or not I have the problematic gene mutation. I want to know, but I’m scared. It’s been almost a year since I first met with a genetic counselor, and at that time I told her that I would probably follow through with the test as soon as I was ready. But every time I think I’m ready, I’m not. When I think about having this blood test done, I imagine myself like a bungee jumper standing on the edge of a platform, ready to jump. The platform is small, and there’s a lot of falling to do. But it isn’t the fall itself that’s risky for me.

The difference between me and the bungee jumper is that, until I jump, I don’t know whether or not I’ll come back up.

Saying goodbye to 2018 this week was a relief for me, because this has been a year of weariness. Weary was the word of the year for me. I am weary of my health problems, weary of worrying about them and about how much worse they may be. I am weary of my children’s struggles with autism, ADHD, anger, and depression. I am weary of listening to them argue. I am weary of feeling chronically and interminably tired. And I’m really weary of Fortnite dances.

I’m aware that turning the page on the calendar doesn’t mean any of this will go away. Fortnite dances, it seems, are a way of life now, and it certainly doesn’t do anything about my genetic status. But what it can change, if I act on it, is my perspective on my life. I am weary, yes, and that’s OK, it’s even understandable. But my complaint about my kids’ obsession with Fortnite applies to me too. My attention is in the wrong place. I am focused on my end game, on my misfortune, on counting the years I have left. I am focused on my tiredness and my inability to fix my kids’ problems or make them easier to handle.

Instead I need to focus on today, on January, on 2019. I need to see what I have and want it, and realize that what I don’t have I don’t want. I need to stop counting what I have left and start counting the days I’ve had, the blessings my Heavenly Father has rained down upon me. I need to stop allowing my exhaustion to frustrate me and start being thankful and proud of all that I’ve accomplished today.

I need to realize that I am satisfied. There is no need that I have that my God has not already fulfilled. If I believe that there is, then I am only dooming myself to feel that my life and I are totally, incurably inadequate. And if I’m going to die (and I am, whether it be at 37, 57, or 107), that’s not the way I want to feel in the end.

I want to greet God on my knees in praise and thankfulness, not weariness. So this year I’ve chosen Philippians 4:12 as my focus for 2019:

No matter what age I am when my time comes to meet my Savior, I want to know in my mind and my heart that my life was as full as He ordained it to be. I want to learn the secret of being content so that, no matter what the Lord requires of me, I am ready to give it. I want to walk in contentment. Beth March didn’t do that perfectly, and neither will I, but I will at least know that I’m going the right direction.

Photos by Thu Anh, Evan Kirby, Eugenia Maximova, and Eye for Ebony via Unsplash.

Emotional Constipation

October 30, 2018 / / 0 Comments

I’ve never been good at holding anything back. A big part of my life story involves my big emotions and my tendency to dump them on others. I feel the most guilt about negative emotions, of course. Emotional tirades have been an issue for me since childhood. When I didn’t get what I wanted I let people know. One of my earliest memories is of going, or maybe being sent to, my room crying this loud yelling cry that I’m really good at. (Yes, still.) As I made my way to my room after some kind of argument with my mother I heard my father say in a frustrated voice, “What’s the tragedy now?” And he was right. He was right that I acted like everything was a tragedy, and he was right to be frustrated by that. I know because this is one of those situations where my parents got some payback. My kids do it too. My boys in particular are both especially good at building entire mountain ranges out of a few mole hills.

              Of course as I’ve grown I’ve learned that people don’t want to hear my tragedies. Frustrated comments like the one my dad made peppered my childhood, but when I got older and my problems got bigger, and I still threw my big emotions around, the emotions themselves became my problems. I had no problem crying loudly in the hallway in high school when my boyfriend broke my heart, but the snickers and mocking remarks of passersby still sting to this day, and I doubt my presentation was very attractive for my boyfriend either. Yet whenever I tried to hold back, whenever I just kept the feelings inside, or wrote them in my journal without telling someone else, I kept feeling them twenty-four hours a day. I just carried them around with me and I was constantly aware of them. I’m not someone who can pretend these things aren’t there. So then, when more bad things happened, I added more big emotions to the heap of others sitting inside me, and I felt ALL of them at once. Over time the emotions became impacted. I’m not talking about years of piling these things up; I never lasted that long without exploding. But the emotional constipation hurt like crazy, and when I finally got it out, it felt great.

Until it didn’t, of course. Because no one wanted to hear how bad I felt. I get that. It’s never comfortable when someone unloads a pile on you, even when nothing you’ve done is in the pile. The problem is that because I feel every emotion in a big way, when those big emotions get impacted, those hurts start telling me what to do and who I am. I start wanting to hurt people, sometimes even physically. I start thinking about how much I hate certain types of behavior that hurt me, and then I see it in everyone I meet. I become paranoid. Why is he looking at me like that? Does she think I’m too fat to be wearing this? Maybe my husband is cheating. I bet he is. That’s why he doesn’t like it when I rummage through his bags. I’m so ugly. No one should still get zits at 37. I know it – I’m sick. I have cancer, or an auto immune disease. I have psoriasis, so it’s definitely auto immune. WebMD says I need emergency treatment. But the people in the emergency room always send me home. I irritate them. They don’t care about me because I suck. I’m a waste of oxygen.

              The problem with emotional shit is that it can talk, and the more of it there is sitting inside me, the more it tells me. Nothing it tells me is good, and nothing it tells me is truth. But that doesn’t stop me from believing it. The messages my piled up emotions send me are like those radio commercials for car dealerships. They always make sure to include a catchy jingle that you’ll hate, but will still become an ear worm, repeating itself over and over in your brain. Emotions love to talk shit about me, and I’m the only one they talk to.

Why am I writing this? Why, for goodness sake, would I ever want to write this out and give this information to the general public? Who cares? Anyone who reads it will think I’m a wacko.

I’m writing this because I’m not wacko. I’m human.

“Finally, we begin to see that all people, including ourselves, are to some extent emotionally ill as well as frequently wrong, and then we approach true tolerance and see what real love for our fellows actually means. It will become more and more evident as we go forward that it is pointless to become angry, or to get hurt by people who, like us, are suffering from the pains of growing up.”

 

This is not a quote from a famous blogger or a motivational speaker. As far as I know these words have never appeared in a TED talk. Those words were written by a member of AA, in a book originally published in 1952. This is not new information, and it wasn’t written by a millennial.

When you find information like this, information that is timeless, it’s easier to trust it as truth. Emotional backup isn’t my condition; it’s the human condition. There’s a post that bops around on social media that says something like, “Be kind. Everyone you meet is fighting a battle you don’t know about.” That’s the truth. Kindness, politeness, humility, and open-mindedness can take us a long way, and so can being carefully honest about our true feelings.

I’ve done a lot of thinking and research to learn how I can be emotionally open and honest without getting myself into trouble, along with how I can avoid interpersonal troubles in the first place. I know what works for me, but that’s for another post. Here’s my encouragement to you: Be honest about what you are feeling, but be prudent with your honesty. Practice boundaries. Think carefully about how another person will react to what you need to say, and judge accordingly. Don’t let it all out without being mindful about when, where, and who hears it. I’m not suggesting you develop emotional diarrhea. I’m suggesting that we all learn to express our feelings, that we learn how to do it in a way that enables us to begin healing but without indiscriminately hurting those around us. I’m also suggesting that, if someone close to you dumps their emotions, try not to take it too personally. Recognize that what someone else says, even in an attempt to intentionally hurt you, reveals more about the speaker than it does the audience. Give them, and yourself, some grace. Life is hard.

I’m suggesting a steady diet of emotional fiber. I’m suggesting tolerance of other people’s emotional digestion. I’m suggesting that, if you know you are emotionally constipated, take that load to an open-minded friend, a mentor, or a therapist. Don’t take an emotional dump on the person that hurt you.

              Shit stinks. So do painful emotions. But when they’re flowing in a healthy way, and when we encourage others to keep them flowing in a healthy way, we’ll all feel a lot more comfortable.

 

Photos by rawpixel, Jason Roswell, Anna Dziubinska, and Hien Olviera via Unsplash.

Faith is a Verb.

October 23, 2018 / / 0 Comments

I’m a control freak. I’m 37 years old, and I should know better by now, but in my heart I still believe that if I work hard enough everything will work out exactly the way I want it to. If I scold the kids the right way, take away the video games one more time, spend the right amount of quality time instilling in them my infinite wisdom, and pray really hard, they’ll start to show more respect, do all their homework, and go to bed on time all on their own. And if I see the right doctors, get the right tests, take the right pills, and do the right self care , I’ll be healthy and vibrant and happy, right? Yeah, I know.

I am way too old to believe this crap, but I’m out here hustling like it’s true anyway. Maybe that’s because what I really believe, and what I really fear, is that the opposite is true too. If I don’t use the right kind of discipline, don’t take the right pills, and don’t have the right kind of faith, my life, and I, will fall apart. And that’s when the really scary shit will happen.

Faith in Christ is about believing, not doing. But faith is this nebulous thing I can’t pin down. Telling me to “have faith” when I’m struggling is worse than telling me to just love my kids while they are literally trying to kill each other. What does it even mean?

I can show love, I can feel love, but how do I show or feel faith in a way that actually changes anything? It’s so easy to tell someone to pray, to take one day at a time, and to trust that God will work it all out when you’re not the one taking a suicidal child to the ER. When you are, one day at a time isn’t fast enough.

I’ve been an avid reader of She Reads Truth for about seven years now, almost from the beginning of the ministry. I follow along with their series of Bible passages and daily devotional readings as a matter of course now; they are the key component of my private devotions and quiet time each day. Right now they are featuring a study of Hebrews, and yesterday we arrived at Hebrews 11, the famous “hall of faith” passage. If you’re not familiar with this passage, in it the writer calls faith “the assurance of what is hoped for, the conviction or what is not seen” (Hebrews 11:1). Pretty strong words, and a pretty high calling. But the writer then goes on to offer us proof —

“By faith, Abel offered to God a better sacrifice than Cain did, and he was approved” (11:4).

“By faith, Noah built an ark,” saving his family, and mankind (11:7).

“By faith, Abraham set out for a place that was his inheritance,” without actually knowing where that place was (11:8).

And it goes on. Fourteen men and two women make it into God’s list of legends. They’re impressive and awe-inspiring. But yesterday writer Claire Gibson drew my attention beyond the list of names to the verbs:

Abel offered.

Noah built.

Sarah received.

Moses refused.

Rahab welcomed.

I’m a huge fan of verbs. They’re often little words, but they pack a lot of meaning and information. As a writing tutor I often find myself encouraging students to choose active and specific verbs that concisely express the action they’re describing. “Instead of saying, ‘It was a sunny day,'” I tell them, “try saying, ‘The sunshine warmed my skin.'” After all, anyone can say how something was, but when I tell you that the sun warmed my skin, you can feel it too.

Verbs are action. These people in Hebrews, in the “hall of faith,” were people, and they’re not on this list because they have something I don’t. I have faith. But what am I doing with it?

I’m saved by faith (Luke 7:50), but what am I doing about that?

Actually, I’m doing a lot about it.

I’m getting my kids up and taking them to school, because I want them to have wisdom (Proverbs 3:13). I’m teaching them about Jesus, because He’s the light of the world (John 8:12). I’m loving my imperfect husband , because we are one flesh (Mark 10:6-9). I’m studying the Bible, because it’s God-breathed (2 Timothy 3:16), and sharing my faith, because Christ called me to (Matthew 28:19-20). I’m caring for my mind and body, because it is the temple of the Holy Spirit (1 Corinthians 6:19). I’m worshipping, because He is worthy of my praise (1 Chronicles 6:23-25).

Don’t make the same mistake I did when I read Hebrews 11. I looked at that list, all those people and what they did because they had faith, and I assumed I just wasn’t among them. They had so much faith, and they risked so much, because they trusted God.

But I do too, and chances are, so do you. I know that I’m doing my best to do the things He calls me to do. I know He calls me to these things because He says so in His Word, and because He encourages me when I pray. And I know I’m doing my best because I’m asking Him to work through me, and it’s His work, not mine, that performs miracles. I don’t need to be intimidated by the “hall of faith” because I’ve been inducted into it too.

By faith, Melanie lives her life as an act of worship. 

If you do too, smile. Relax. Be thankful. You’re doing life God’s way.

What are you doing “by faith”? Comment on this post by filling in the blank below.

By faith, _________________.

Life is Pain, Princess

September 26, 2018 / / 0 Comments

Optimism is great and all, but let’s face it, it’s not going to stop bad things from happening. As a perspective on life, optimism encourages hope, gratitude, and positivity. But as a method for preventing or surviving bad stuff, it sucks.

              As a writer I definitely want to give my readers hope for the future, but you’re not going to get happy sunshine unicorns from me. That would do you a disservice because it’s not realistic, since denying that we have bad feelings that come from bad experiences doesn’t promote growth and healing, it promotes naivety. And it’s not who I am either. I don’t think I’m rude or even blunt, at least not all the time, but I am honest, and I encourage others to be so as well.

I love Inigo Montoya’s character in The Princess Bride. The handsome face and cute accent are part of it, but his loyalty and honesty are uplifting and bring a piece of reality into the fairy tale. But Inigo also makes me sad, in an uncomfortable way. His character’s back story is a side-plot in the movie, told only through his own words as he describes his quest to find the six-fingered man who killed his father. He is an intense and lovable figure, but he goes through life seeking only revenge for a painful loss in his past.

I like Inigo Montoya because I once felt like he does. I wasn’t a total pessimist, and I was often a fun and loving person to be around. But beyond fighting my demons, there wasn’t much more to life. I’m not even talking about my life before I met Jesus, or not just about my life before I met Jesus. Up until about three years ago, my main motivation for my decision-making and my actions and my goals was fear, and there are days now where it still is.

It would be easier for me to blame mental illness. Or childhood trauma. Or traumatic experiences in adulthood. Or bad genetics. Or the struggles of family and work and technology and creativity. I could describe myself here as a tragic artist, and it wouldn’t be totally inaccurate. I did lay in bed and cry over Don McLean’s song “Vincent” before I even reached puberty, and I did go to graduate school for a masters degree in a field that like only like 200 people on earth have even heard of. But I’m not a tragic artist, and I’m not a poor housewife, deprived of her creative outlet and opportunities to follow her dreams by demanding children who disrespect her. I’m not a genius locked away from a world that confuses my intelligence with insanity. I’m not a victim of abuse.

I’ve been all of these things, and I’ve treasured each of these roles in my heart. Just as Mary treasured the promises delivered by the angel Gabriel, I have cuddled and nurtured the bad things in my life, like ugly dollar store stuffed animals to a child who has never had one. But I didn’t have to. I had lots of great things in my life, and I always have. Yet I clung to my tragedy because my trauma and my pain was what I used to define myself. It was how I found meaning.

My meaning and purpose in life now is to follow God’s will for me in what I do and who I am. Three years ago, and maybe even ten years ago, I may have said the same thing, but it wasn’t true. It was an ideal, but it didn’t play out in reality, because I couldn’t take my eyes off of my fears long enough for me to experience any of the comfort or redemption that God was offering me. I knew Jesus was standing there, I knew He wanted me to come to Him, but I couldn’t stop thinking about the waves and the dark water.

              Depression and anxiety are nasty little beasts, and this is what they do to me. Even when I have the knowledge that my fears aren’t reality and that the circumstances that created them are long gone, and even when I know that my brain and my feelings can, in fact, lie to me, that knowledge only goes so far. It doesn’t stop the fear from being stronger. The fear that maybe I’m dying or this or that. The fear that I’m gradually going insane, and that it’s happening so slowly that no one but me will believe it’s true until it’s too late. The fear that my life really hasn’t been very worthwhile, and anyone else who could have been put in my place would have done just as well, or better, than I have. The fear that my kids are damaged, that my fears and my genetics have doomed them somehow. The fear that my husband is unhappy, that my worthlessness has spread to him, a sexually transmitted malaise. When I think about it, how could a 2000 year old Jewish man overcome all that?

              Of course, He did, and that’s the whole point. His whole point. That’s the Bible. But here’s my whole point. Just because He’s Jesus, and He’s mine, and I’m redeemed by His blood, doesn’t mean that I’m immune to fear. Nor does it mean that I should be, or that my faith is somehow less-than because I experience fear as a huge factor in my life. Mental illness isn’t faith illness, guys. Faith is about what I believe, what I know to be true without having to see it. Mental illness is about my brain. I know it’s there. I’ve had an MRI. I have a brain, among other internal organs. It looks normal because I don’t have the kind of mental illness that’s detectable through imaging (yet). But I know my brain is the cause of my mental illness, and while I’d love for you to pray for me to be free of it one day, I’m not mentally ill because my faith isn’t strong enough. Let’s just get that whole idea out of the way.

On the contrary, actually. My faith is strong because it has to be. Because I have demons. Because I am Legion, for they are many. Some call faith a crutch for the weak. Yep. I didn’t choose to be weak. There were periods of life when I didn’t know I could be stronger than I was, but I’ve always been weak in some ways. But the faith-is-a-crutch people have it backwards. I don’t have faith because I’m weak and need a crutch. I have a crutch because I choose to have faith. And without that crutch, without my faith, I’d be flat on my face. A lot of people have had similar problems to the ones I have, and I’m sure some of them have gotten through them without the crutch of faith. But why would I want to?

              Here’s the point that I’m finally getting to: my faith is strong because I need it to be. Like a muscle, I exercise my faith when I’m strong so that it can support me when I’m weak. I cultivate my relationship with my God everyday because knowing God more means that I’m more confident in who He is in my life, and how much He loves me and supports me, and that I can have faith in that when my brain is telling me that I’m worthless. I have faith because God teaches me to practice it, to invest in my relationship with my Love. I need to trust God, because I need a power greater than myself to get through life. I need faith because optimism, without God, is a fairy tale.

It’s Finally September!

September 9, 2018 / / 0 Comments

Dear readers, I had every intention of posting this special surprise I have for you a whole two weeks ago, but life got in the way. I am really looking forward to spending this month focusing on taking care of our own bodies, minds, and spirits, but as it turns out, September didn’t come soon enough for me.

Sometimes it’s just so hard to admit our own limitations. I don’t necessarily want to keep my weaknesses a secret, but I do try to appear more resilient than I really am. While I truly believe that God places weaknesses and difficulties in my life to help me grow stronger in faith and show me my need for Him, I also believe that I need to take responsibility for my own wellbeing. When I’m tempted to believe that I’ll feel better if I just keep pushing myself I need the reminder that working harder can’t be my only plan of action for when things get tough. Even when I’m not sick I need to practice a consistent regimen of self care to keep myself from burning out. When I am sick I need to know what I can do to help myself heal emotionally, physically, and spiritually.

When we get on a plane we can always expect that the flight attendants will remind us that in an emergency we have access to oxygen from the masks that drop down from above our seats. But what would happen if they didn’t go through this explanation? If I’ve never been on a plane before I wouldn’t know what the oxygen mask was or how to use it. Even if I had flown before it’s possible that without that regular reminder I might panic and not remember what to do.

Self care tools are like the oxygen mask, and daily self care practice, even when life is going well, is like the flight attendants’ demonstration. Going through the routine of regular self care and learning what tools are at your disposal and how to use them to personalize your comfort is essential. Without self care you’ll still have oxygen, but you’ll definitely crash. It’s crucial. I know this from experience. 

It’s hard to know where to start if you’ve never made yourself a top priority. Chocolate and bubble baths aren’t everybody’s thing (and not mine either). But here’s where I can help you. I’ve put together a big list of self care activities for you to try — one for every day of September. And it’s completely free for you to receive right in your inbox. All this month you won’t have to think about what you can do to practice self care each day; it’s all there for you in a convenient little jpg file. I’ll be following along as well, and you can expect to get updates with ideas and encouragement throughout the week on Instagram and Facebook, along with weekly posts on my website to help you think more deeply and carefully about how you can make sure you’re able to be your best self for the people you love.

Yeah, I know, we’re already more than a week into September. It wasn’t my intention to leave you out to dry like this. The Self Care September calendar includes a suggested activity for all 30 days of the month, including the week that has already past. You have so many options on what to do about that though! You can pretend it’s September 1st and start there, giving yourself an excuse to carry your self care practice well into October (as you should). You can start on today’s date, whatever that happens to be, and plan on using the ideas from the days you missed to add in some extra self care time on the weekends or any day you find that you need it. It’s all up to you. All that’s really important is that you make this time for yourself.

Want to get started with me? Just type in your information below to receive your copy of my Self Care September calendar, follow From Eden’s Dirt on social media, and plan to interact with this community throughout the rest of the month. You are worth the time and effort it takes to practice good self care, and I promise that at the end of the month you’ll be glad you did.

Get your FREE Self Care September calendar and sign up for Self Care September updates here!

Slowing Down the Speed of Life

August 21, 2018 / / 0 Comments

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You blink, and then it’s over.

That’s what it feels like to me. Life. I just turned 37, and while many people laugh when I tell them I feel old, it’s not so much about the number, but about the speed of life. 37 isn’t old in the grand scheme of things, but those who laugh don’t know how I felt when I dropped my daughter off for her first day of high school last week. They didn’t see me standing on the school campus, lingering, worried that she’d have trouble finding her first class or get overwhelmed by her work load. They didn’t feel it when suddenly I couldn’t linger anymore; I had to leave as quickly as possible before I had the panic attack that it seemed like my daughter should be having, but wasn’t. They weren’t with me on the car ride home to see me cry.

It’s a dramatic, complicated feeling when you’re suddenly confronted with a mile marker in life. When did my daughter stop wearing her Dorothy the Dinosaur hat and start wearing makeup? When did my 7lb. 6oz. son get taller than me and grow constantly hungry?

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Why do these moments jar me so much? Why does it feel sudden and shocking to be driving my daughter to high school when I’m with her every single day and I know perfectly well how much time has passed since she was born? Because busyness blinds me to brevity of time. I plan out my day, knowing exactly where I need to be and what I should be doing at each moment, but then I become a slave to that plan, unable to stop what I’m doing long enough to know what matters.

Pastor Doug Kyle, lead pastor at Green Valley Church in San Diego, California preached last week on making room in our lives for what matters.  (You can watch that sermon for a limited time here.) He spoke to my soul when he said, “We can’t let the days blind us from the seasons.” We follow our to-do lists because we have to. We sign the kids up for lessons or soccer or scouts because we always do, every year. We drive 80mph in the 55 zone because if we don’t we’ll be late and then what would happen?

We just want to stop, but we don’t think we can. 

Our culture has turned busyness into a benchmark for success and leisure into wishful thinking. Pastor Kyle spoke about our need for “breathing room,” for a margin of time in our days, our weeks, our lives for — nothing. God actually commands us to do just that:

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Why do we need Sabbath? Why is it important enough to make it into God’s “top ten?” Because Sabbath is where we have our breathing room. Sabbath rest is about taking a break to regroup, to evaluate where we’re going and how we spend our time. It allows us to stop our forward momentum long enough to see what’s ahead on the path we’re on.

And Sabbath isn’t just for Sundays. Sabbath is a life rhythm, a perspective on the passage of time and life that gives us the opportunity to be mindful of where our choices are taking us and decide whether or not that’s where we want to go. Is my work allowing me to serve others in the way God designed me to? Do my parenting choices teach my kids the right values? Do I support my church with my gifts of time, money, and talent, and does it support me? This kind of evaluation takes time and clear-headed thought, and we can’t give it that in the carpool lane. In fact, we can’t give our faith and our values the attention they require without creating a space in our schedules for breathing room, self-evaluation, and self care.

The self care piece is critical. I know that I can’t accurately look at the big picture when my physical and emotional well-being is depleted. If I decide I’m too busy to eat lunch, for example, my body and mind suffer together. I become tired, get a headache, and can’t think straight or make choices very well. During moments of emotional struggle I predict only doom and gloom in my future and any positive possibilities seem remote at best. To prevent this I make self care a regular practice in my life on a daily basis. Granting myself the freedom to proactively care for my physical, emotional, and spiritual needs without guilt gives me the breathing room to evaluate the rest of my life and how I’m spending it.

Even though my daily self care time is comforting it’s never easy. Even after I say no to the kids, turn off the computer, walk away, and silence my phone, I also have to silence the cultural message of guilt that tells me I’m being selfish and unproductive. It’s there every time, even though I know that my self care isn’t selfish, it’s what allows me to be my best self for my husband, my kids, and my God. My self care isn’t unproductive, it’s what enables and motivates my periods of productivity to be focused on my main objective and the big-picture things that are most important.

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Guilt is just the first obstacle. Even after I absolve myself of the guilt I have to decide how I’m going to care for myself. There are a lot of appealing options available to me, but not all of them rejuvenate my body or refresh my spirit, so I need to determine what I need in that moment. It helps me to think of my self care options like a tool box. Although all the tools are at my disposal some are better for the job than others and it depends on my needs. Banging a hammer against a cracked pipe isn’t going to help much, and similarly, going for a run doesn’t do anything good for me when I have a migraine, though it might when I’m feeling frustrated. So I need to remain flexible about how I care for myself and keep track of the things that are particularly soothing in specific situations.

Of course, I’m trying to encourage you in your self care journey, and all of that makes it sound complicated. So let me help you get started, whether you’re new to the idea of intentional self care or simple need some new ideas and perspectives. In the month of September — that’s less than 2 weeks away! — I’m offering you the opportunity to begin or fine-tune your self care and build your self care toolbox. I’m offering a series of articles that you can get right in your email inbox that I hope will inspire and encourage you to resist the temptation of perpetual productivity and create a space in your life for breathing room. I’ll also talk about how my self care practice has blessed me and helped me become a better writer, a better wife, and a better mom. Plus, just for signing up, you’ll receive a Self Care September calendar that includes one self care activity for every day of the month. Try these activities to see if you can benefit from adding them to your own practice.

Don’t allow the speed of life to take away your opportunity to live intentionally and mindfully. By committing to daily self care for an entire month you will gain the breathing room to live by faith, to more clearly see God’s blessings in your life, and to truly hear His call to rest. Sign up and stay tuned.

Essentials of Self Care: Breathe

August 14, 2018 / / 2 Comments

 

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This is the second post in my blog series Essentials of Self Care. To build your self care tool box even more, read my first post in this series, Essentials of Self Care: Sleep.

There are some things in life that I find to be both exquisitely simple and deeply profound. Breath is one of those things. Within minutes or even seconds of our birth we are able to take air into our lungs and then exhale it, an act akin to a beating heart as a sign of life itself. We don’t think about breathing; we simply breathe because we are alive and are alive because we breathe.

Yet breathing is at once an involuntary impulse and a spiritual act of worship. Genesis 2:7 says that God formed Adam from the dust, but that he didn’t become a living being until the moment God “breathed into his nostrils the breath of life.” Life could not exist in Adam’s body until Adam received this breath directly from God.

Every inhalation is really an act of receiving, and what we are receiving is God’s gift of life.

Even as we work and think and love we are constantly receiving God’s life-giving breath, not just by a mere intake of oxygen, but by the gift of our need for it.

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Though my children have tried it a few times in the midst of temper tantrums, it is physically impossible to voluntarily hold your breath until you die. In an article that originally appeared on his blog, evolutionary psychologist Robert Kurzban explains that while science has yet to fully explain why we can’t willingly resist the urge to breathe, it is carbon dioxide, the naturally-occurring gas that we exhale, that necessitates the next inhalation. When I hold my breath my metabolic processes use the oxygen I take in, thereby reducing oxygen while increasing the pressure of the carbon dioxide in my body, and this pressure increase eventually induces the act of inhalation.

Our Creator has instilled in us a constant and undeniable need for Him. By the act of taking air into our lungs we acknowledge our need for God. We cannot continue to live without continuous supply of the omnipresent and eternal breath of life. And yet we rarely acknowledge this gift, this assurance of our health and God’s will for us to serve Him here, unless it is somehow interrupted.

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How is breath self care? Because we are continuously breathing we can use this involuntary action as a reminder of who God is to us, how He loves us, has a plan for us, and how He sustains us. The act of focused breathing and drawing attention to our respirations is widely recognized as an effective way to refocus our thoughts. Think of your breath as a self care tool that is always available in any moment. The sheer act of noticing and giving attention to your breathing has a powerful and calming effect on our thoughts and emotions.

Here is my Mindful Breathing Exercise to help you use breathing as a way to care for your body and mind:

  1. Limit external stimuli.

Take a moment to stop what you’re doing and take your focus off the things going on around you. If you can, sit down in a comfortable position and close your eyes. Take a minute to make a deliberate choice to take your mind off what you were doing or what you need to do.

2.  Clear your mind.

This is difficult because it’s impossible for us to stop thinking. Our brains generate both thoughts and internal bodily processes one hundred percent of the time. But while you can’t stop thinking, you do have some control over what you think about. Gently tell yourself that whatever occupied your mind a minute ago is gone for now, and that it is good and safe to take this moment for yourself.

3.  Pay attention to your breath.

Ask yourself, for this moment, to only pay attention to your breath. Notice the air around you as a physical presence in the room, invisible yet infused with life and meaning. Inhale slowly, gently, and deeply through your nose. Try to relax your body and think of the air going slowly into your abdomen, not just your lungs and chest. For some people it helps to imagine a balloon that sits just below their lungs, with its open end pointing up toward the mouth. As you inhale imagine the balloon slowly filling with air, beginning at the lowest end and expanding. Then, as you exhale, imagine the air flowing gently but fully out through the opening at the top of the balloon. Another option to help you visualize deep restorative breathing is to picture your breath as water filling a tall vase, beginning at the bottom of the vase near your stomach and slowly filling to the top, then slowly pouring out from the top as you exhale.

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Stay in this meditative state and repeat these deep breathing steps for as long as you’d like or as long as you need. Open your eyes slowly and restart your thoughts and activities slowly when you’re done. Take notice of how this deep breathing changed your physical body, your emotions, and your state of mind. This exercise can be shortened or modified as needed during moments of fear, anger, or stress to help you manage emotions and reactions in a more mindful and graceful way. It also works well and can lead to long term stress reduction when practiced on a regular basis.

In the midst of his vision in Ezekiel 37 God tells him to prophecy over a valley of dry bones, saying:

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The act of breathing offers us an opportunity to experience God’s power and provision for us in light of our most basic needs. My Mindful Breathing practice helps me refocus my thoughts and my energy and reminds me that my heavenly Father is as close to me as the air I breathe.
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Photos by Fabian Moller, Ian Dooley, Havilah Galaxy, Stefan Kunze with text from Word Swag, and Natalia Figueredo

From Eden’s Dirt

August 12, 2018 / / 0 Comments

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My dear followers,

I’m sure you may have noticed the change in the header for the blog, and if you follow me on Facebook you may have noticed that my page there is called Organic Compost. I’ve been praying about a title for my blog for several months now, bouncing around ideas in my mind and questioning if this site needs a title beyond my own name. The truth is, though, that I’m a big fan of names, even for inanimate things. Names give meaning and help me associate a concept with the concrete.

The journey I’m on is one of self discovery and God-discovery. I find life difficult; in fact, lately I am weary. I’m not just tired, and I’m not just busy. When someone asks, “How are you?” weary is the word that comes to mind. I have led and am leading a full life, and that fullness has included the good, the bad, and the ugly. But I’ve made enough trips around the sun now that I’ve noticed something — God doesn’t just let bad things happen to me. God uses those things to show me more of Himself, more of who I am in Christ, and to grow me closer to the unique person He designed me to be.

God uses the bad things to grow me. 

Besides names, I’m also a fan of analogy. Yes, those things we studied to boost our SAT scores. Similes, metaphors. By comparing the unknown to the known, or the conceptual to the concrete, I’m able to understand ideas more clearly and associate those ideas with something I can see and touch. That’s what happens for me in nature. By helping me see my worst moments as opportunities to grow in faith, God reminds me that He grows faith from pain just as He grows apples, zucchinis, and lilies from dirt. He shows me that even as organic matter disintegrates into the ground to provide nutrients that help new plants to grow and flourish, He can take my hurts, my mistakes, my pain, and my sin, and make it new again in a way that blesses me and others.

God can take the dust of Eden and use it to make dry bones rise, deserts bloom, and lions lay down with lambs. He can lead my dirty feet beside still waters, through the valley death, and onto streets of gold. 

I hope you’ll forgive my experimentation with not just the blog title, but with it’s content and with my voice as a writer. If you have any feedback please know that I welcome it wholeheartedly.

I pray that your Sabbath Sunday will bring you a grateful heart and dusty feet.

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Photos by Kyle Ellefson and Juja Han.

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