A week slipped into two, a month and then two weekends in Atlanta, a wedding, several beach trips and a work trip led me to here.
Months - plural - without writing. And also to these boots:
Sigh, but back to writing.
Who would have thought the thing that lights sparklers inside my chest is the thing that I have buried in the bottom dusty dresser drawer? Under faded sorority swap shirts and the tap shoes I still cling to in the event my career as a Rockette takes off, I hid writing.
In actuality after shoving that drawer shut, I sprinted away from it.
But passions have a way of finding us.
And I know I have some sliver of meaning in writing. Many of you make numbers into beauty (bless you child) and many of you have the patience of Job with a classroom of bubbling, talkative 1st graders. Several of you know medicine well enough to heal people.
For me, beauty is words woven into art. And I have neglected them enough to be rendered wordless.
Have you ever been here? Stuck? It’s quite scary, no?
Whether it be in a career, in a relationship, in your spiritual life - we all fight seasons of quick sand. Ankles to calves to knees, we involuntarily sink deeper.
What is our rescue plan when we feel lassoed in a pit?
We dig and dig and dig. Deep into Truth. Until we “know, believe and understand” who we are in the Lord. Until we know that we are not stuck because we are lavishly loved children of a purposed-filled God - whose unruly love knitted you in the womb, sings over you in the night and promises new joy at the break of daylight.
Until we are knelt down, bowed low, we dig deep.
I believe the purpose-less days come from drawing WHO we are from this side of heaven. When we seek definition from a broken world instead of from our very-present Savior, it never feels whole. That is why Paul tells us to “fix our eyes on Jesus” because everything else loses it’s luster. Businesses fail, people leave, jobs flop, money disappears.
Pursue, fight, change, be, grow. Several of my favorite people call this season “becoming” and I readily raise & clink my glass to that. Because I’m living this becoming. I’m living this here and there, this watering your own God-ordained patch of grass and trust ME, follow ME, lock eyes with ME.
Because despite the feeling, you.are.not.stuck. In fact, you sink faster in quick-sand when you a panic. Experts say to relax, breathe deeply and take your time - anxiety makes one lose buoyancy and sink quicker. Tis true, no?
You are becoming, my dear.
Becoming more grounded, more lovely, more alive. Relax, breathe deeply and take your time. There is pain in shedding and regrowth, but is new life not always, always, always for the better?
Do the thing that lights the sparklers in your chest - when they burn, you glow. And baby you’re a firework.