trenta

So, it's the day after my thirtieth birthday. I have been hoping to carve out a little time to click-clack my thoughts about these three decades, to hear the rhythm of the keyboard as I process how much I've learned and how much more I desire to see and do and experience.

To start: in the last decade I was a video game look alike, on MTV, came to follow Christ, met, dated and married the best of men, graduated from college, became a dog owner, put the aforementioned man through medical school, managed a Starbucks store, given birth (unmedicated!) to three amazing babies in less than four years, bought a house, ran two marathons, watched from the alter as my best friend married my husband's brother, lost some friends, gained some true ones, changed churches and learned more about myself and life than I would think possible. Yet I sense an aching truth that there still is SO much to learn, to change, to bend and flex to.

For my birthday Corey bundled, in pretty bows and envelopes, thirty letters from family, and friends I've made along the way. I've read twenty seven of them so far and many times I've cried, or laughed or both. Mostly I've just felt moved that so many would have such kind things to say of me. You know, I have just lived my life. I have wanted desperately to do it well, to not waste the uncertain time that has been allotted me, to open my heart and my mind fully to the potential that the world I'm in in each moment has to offer. What I learned most from reading these letters is that love and truth and acts of devotion rarely go unnoticed. Even if the person receiving your gift and blessing feigns to show gratitude, there is always some one watching and waiting to be inspired. We each make impacts and deposits in one another's lives, often without ever knowing it at the time, perhaps we even have forgotten the acts of grace we've extended, but they have been daily remembered by another. If these letters are all true, then I matter. My life, it has mattered. I can scarcely type that sentence with out feeling the warm swell of salt and emotion on my cheeks. I'm reading these kind words and insecurity bubbles up, I wonder if they are mere flattery, if there is truth behind the poetry of it all. I know then, in those moments of trial, that these encouragements must be truth, or the evil one would not be attacking the wisdom they are laying on my heart.

Growth is never sudden, and when it seems to be there is certainly falsehood woven within it. At least that's how the story has played over and over again in my life. The times that change seemed to come easily, quickly and abundantly I look back to see the deceit in my heart and how eventually the facade always fell. I know that I am a very different woman now, at thirty, than I was at twenty. I don't know that I'm much more confident or sure of myself, to my shame, but I do know that I'm getting there. That I'm starting to believe what God and Corey and those closest to me have tried to remind me all along. I am worthy of love. I am worthy of praise. I am finding myself.

So this year, this first of a new decade of life, I dedicate to being ME, the me that God is molding. To fighting insecurity in daily life. I will push with all of me past doubt and into a place where I listen closely to Holy Spirit and trust that who I am and the things I do are "good enough," because God is behind it all. I will be humble, I will share openly and in detail the extent of my life, I will trust my instincts and my God as I raise these precious children and support this indescribable husband. I will prioritize without second guessing because I know the hierarchy of importance that has been laid on my heart. I will never claim to have it all together, but I am determined to follow the leadings of the Lord in my life and trust that even the mistakes are his will and way of stirring the most in me. I'm weary of operating within a fog of insecurity. The wind of change is here. I am standing tall, facing it head on, ready to walk along the next path with a confidence that only thirty years of life could have sown.