testing.

Life has been a lot lately and I haven’t been as intentional in processing my thoughts on paper. It is a little surreal that this year is coming to a close, and yet the amount of life that has showed up in the past few weeks has been overwhelming to say the least. If I’m honest I haven’t been here in a long while. My body is weary and tense at the prospect of going through situations and scenarios it once came through worse from wear. Trauma brain is triggered, and my ticks have quietly returned. I find myself swaying and rocking my body just as I used to many years ago in an attempt to keep anxiety at bay. 

As I write this on a Friday night, I recognize the signs my body quietly shares with me as it releases the tension and weight of the week. Deep breaths become routine. Joy becomes an active choice not because it’s convenient but because it is necessary. I had a call earlier this week with a dear friend and leader, and was reminded of how easy it is for me to suppress the feelings I do not want to feel. I always make the excuse that I do it in order to not engage in emotional transference but the reality is that I’m so accustomed to rationalizing my way out of my feelings that it becomes a habitual response. 

Yet I am reminded through it all of the rest that comes in the shadow of the Almighty and how He dictates and directs my steps. Perhaps what I need to normalize in the next little while is the obedience and habit of surrender. Surrender in the recognition that there will always be things that I cannot control and that intentionally with purpose, I should find myself dwelling within the foundation of what is. To take each day with courage, one foot in front of the other. Not thinking about the things we could have done better, but the things we have done to get us to where we are, and that in the process of becoming, is enough. Excellence is perhaps found in obedience in the little things, and persistance. Courage happens not because things are easy but because they are hard.

And that is sometimes the greatest gift anyone could ask for.