Kindness

I saw a video today that was made back in the fall of 2016 - or that's when it was originally posted on Facebook - but it was of this guy that set out to do anything nice or helpful for anyone he saw. The video showed people just ignoring him, getting away from him as fast as they could, saying no, hesitantly saying yes and questioning why he wanted to help. There was one that said to do something for the next person (pay the bus fare for that person) and one said they needed help with something but it would take longer than they had and he said no I have time. This got me thinking about some things. I have no doubt from the beginning of time to some degree there has always been that distance or hesitance when confronted with something like this but sometimes it feels like in a time where we have so many ways to be in touch with people and be there for people we are further away if that makes sense. Like we are literally beside someone or we have so many ways to contact people with that little phone in our hands yet it feels like people feel more alone and isolated now than maybe ever. I'm hesitant to write that because I don't want to get all nostalgic because that is a very, very tricky path. I don't want to glamorize the past and especially so much that I just add to the maybe not so positive things that we face today and further isolate and get to the point where I can't appreciate the good in the now. Nostalgia can be good but I don't want to focus so much on the past that I'm not in the now and I don't live and appreciate the now. But as I was watching that video I got the impression that it feels like somehow we fall in one or more of the category of wondering what the persons ulterior motive is to help us in the first place - that you aren't helping me just to help me, what do you want in return...or pride - that one can trip you up real good...or we seem to be afraid that it will make us look selfish or weak or even a bother if we ask or accept help and perhaps that's just the culture here in America - none of those are true, we're human and this life is difficult not only do we need help sometimes even it's just help carrying groceries in but we need that connection...we think we're wasting people's time, the being a bother - all of the best gifts I have ever received have been when people have taken their time and helped me by listening or helping with something. To me time is the most precious gift to give or receive. I don't think I am writing this like I want to to say what I really want to. In the video he wasn't going to be able to celebrate his friends birthday the following week so he made a little cake and went when he could go and celebrated her and her birthday early and her reaction to that was one of you could see that she was appreciative and someone in awe that someone cared and she was moved to tears. I like to think that there are more people out there that are showing these acts of kindness and it's just that the bad unfortunately gets more attention - it's not that there is more bad but it some how gets glamorized and more attention. Also not sure what that says. But it does seem like that there is a bit of a look of shock when someone has something nice done for them even if it's just holding the door open for someone. I guess if there was to be some kind of point to this is that you don't have to set out to do so many acts of random kindness to so many strangers, you don't have to have a degree, well known name or loads of money to make a difference. Some how it seems that it has even become a competition of how to up the acts of kindness - never should it be about that. There's studies that show social media has made people feel more alone and isolated than ever before. First don't ever compare your life to others - at all - but also for sure not on those few words and a snap shot. You know when I take pictures and share them the people aren't seeing all the ones I deleted and the ones that didn't turn out like I envisioned or wanted. One may be blurry, or it just didn't show the idea I had in my head like I thought it would, or another reason. Sometimes I wonder if I shouldn't post them too because though they aren't what I and many others would say is the perfect picture there is still something to be seen and learned from that picture. Same with life. Same goes for that book of how life is supposed to go that people refer to so often - which I think hinders and causes more harm than anything. Because to me that would be so boring if we all lived a life where at a certain age we graduate school, another age we get a dream job and another age get married have the 2.5 kids dream house and picket fence. That's awesome if that happens for you or you are working toward that. To be honest I think to many get lost in that and they think that's their dream and that they are a nobody if they don't have that and it's so far from the truth. You can make fun of me and I may be wrong in this but I think we all have something to offer and it's not all of the same thing, we each have something unique in some way and we all have different paths that we have walked and will walk. And part of that is so we can help each other out along the way. If we all walk the same path again that would be so boring, I hate repetition and stuff, like for me I want to see and do as much as I can there is so much out there. My path has and is different than yours and we each have something to offer and help each other along the way. I'm a firm believer you never meet or have anyone come into your life on accident and sometimes you're really fortunate to have those people that God knits into your life. And we need those passing strangers that offer to hold the door open or that stranger that paid for your coffee or just smiled and/or gave you a compliment but those are so important just like having those constant people that God knits into our lives. I'm so thankful for both. Sometimes life does get dark and lonely and you just feel crushed by the weight of the bad and you try to focus on the good but some days, oh some days you need that assurance. That one little act of kindness that sparks a light in the midst of your darkness and that little ember hits the wick to the light and it lights up the room or the path. I also like to think that those moments that someone comes to your mind and you want to call them or give them a gift or just let them know you were thinking of them, or that stranger that you feel this urge to help in whatever way, or so many other examples I think there is a reason for that and though it may seem silly to you, one should always just go with it because that just may be the thing that someone needed. You know I've had times where I just felt so alone and I thought God are you there, do I even matter and someone would send me a text or I would see someone and they gave me a hug, I had a stranger one time I was at Logan's eating by myself and was really struggling with some lies and just anxiety in general and there was a lady sitting at the table in front of me also eating by herself and I'll never see that lady again, she didn't know me but she paid for my meal that day and I'll never forget that. To me that was nothing small and I still can't believe that she did that but it meant so much. One she spent her money on me but also that for whatever reason she saw me that day and again for whatever reason decided to pay for my meal. But I've also encountered someone that just smiled and it encouraged me. They say you don't know the battle that someone you're standing next to may be going through and that is so true and I think that's why the best gift you can give someone is your time - the time to smile, ask how are you, just listen or give advice, give that shoulder to cry on. Or whatever is something that you are good at to help people cause again I think we all have some way that we are good at and best able to help. Cause there are so many different ways that the bad can attack and if we work together good wins. Good always wins and I'll believe that until I die. So don't ever get so focused on how many people you can or have helped or that you don't have the means to help. I appreciate all of the gifts and material things I have gotten from people and I may could repay them back in some way for that but I can never truly show my appreciation or pay them back for the time that they have given. There never has been or never will be a small act of kindness because showing kindness tears down walls, lifts people out of pits and helps us all take another step on our path in this life.

I love this song The One He Speaks Through by Mandisa (if you haven't yet you should definitely get the whole album Out of The Dark - it is amazing, such impactful, honest and uplifting songs). I've heard people say that when something happens to confirm or remind them of something that it's a God wink, which I love, and I love how this song makes you think what if those random moments of when someone comes to mind or you want to help that stranger or say something nice to them that what if it's God and what if that is that persons God wink.

Just Be

I have a feeling this post is about to be brought to you by lots of random thoughts, or that's at least what I call them, so if you are about to take this ride, well buckle up butter cup cause I have no idea where it's going or what kind of drive it's going to be. If I'm driving you'll probably want to throw up a prayer or two also. Haha!!

I think this first random thought has occurred to me before but it decided to pay another visit yesterday and that was have you ever been driving and see a house that the outside looked perfect. Beautiful landscape, fresh mowed yard, inviting little front porch with the chairs and the table just waiting for you to sit down with your glass of tea, and you just can't help but say well that is just the cutest little house. And as you see the outside and how perfect it looks you imagine how it looks inside and think it has to be just as cute and perfect. But what if the inside of that house was a complete disaster, the layout was no where close to what you imagine, it's cluttered and worn, it's a mess. This can't be the same house. Sometimes I think people can be like that first part of this random thought. See I think oftentimes we spend so much time making the outside look good, look perfect but inside, oh inside we have got a mess but we think if we make sure the outside looks good we can fool everyone. I've never even really had the outside looking to terribly good but good enough to maybe fool people and what I would do is keep the outside looking okay and anyone that came by to visit well how about we just sit out here on the porch. Can't let anyone in. And I have spent most of my life like that.

 Now little detour before I try to finish this thought but you generally don't have to drive far to see a road work ahead sign and many times when I drive through a work zone I try to imagine why they have done what they did just to make an extra lane or whatever they may be doing in that particular work zone. I usually can't even picture out how it's going to look in the end. It just looks like a bunch of piles of dirt placed randomly, places dug up, detours that make no sense, and just a mess that doesn't seem worth it to make an extra lane or whatever they may be doing. Fast forward to a later date and the road work may be finished or finished enough that you can see why or at least better understand why they made the cuts, detours, and excavated what they did. Maybe all the delays and such was worth it after all.

On my road I am currently at mile marker 2017 and have drove 33 miles and my goodness has there ever been some serious road work, detours and delays - or what I thought was delays on this journey so far. It occurs to me that I may have wrote something similar to this before but if I have please bear with me because I just may open a door that I didn't open before or we may find out that a part of the road just got finished. And I'm just buying time because I can't believe I may be about to write parts of my story that I think may be time to write.

Picture it, early 90's Kentucky and a six year old me. Because you see six miles in my journey of this called life I had some major road work that was started. My parents divorced around this time and thus began a journey that has been interesting to say the least. So as it would be I would come to live with my dad. Somewhere around 8 years old I decided two things and I decided them I suppose in part because it's the only way I could make things make sense and because it was a way to protect myself. I decided that I would never let anyone else inside my house if you will and give them a chance to hurt me again and I thought that though I wasn't sure what I done I must have done something for God to hate me so much. This is also the part of my journey that I will now dub the detour of lies. So growing up I've never really understood or known a mother's love or what it is to have a relationship with your mom or a mom. I am thankful that God allowed me to be around and spend time with my grandma because she was a motherly influence growing up and bless her for putting up with me because I didn't make it easy. Not much worth going into detail through these miles of the journey just that more seeds of lies was planted and boy how those things grow and they grow fast with some seriously deep roots. Fast forward to 2002, my senior year of high school, and what also proved to be one of the most difficult years of my life thus far. My grandma was in her last year of checkups from her larynx cancer that she had battled five years earlier and what ended up taking her voice away. In the summer/fall of 2001 my grandma found out she had lung cancer and there was nothing they could do about it, she was to small to handle any kind of radiation or chemo - that would have killed her. So from around October '01 until January '02 my grandma fought a good fight against cancer and though she was stuck laying in a hospital bed at her house she never once complained. She'd wince and have a grimaced look of pain but you ask her if she was hurting and she'd smile and say she was okay. Though she was tiny in size the woman had willpower and strength so big it would have made Goliath look like an ant. On January 30th some may say cancer won but I say my grandma won the fight and she got the ultimate prize for all she went through here on earth, my grandma got to make her journey to heaven that day. Me on the other hand started my journey to rock bottom. I am not proud that I said what I'm about to tell you I said, in fact I have great regret over it but when my grandma died, one it hit me and it hit me hard. Because not only was she forever gone but I felt cheated cause I didn't get to tell her goodbye. So it was at this time that I once again realized or thought this was more proof that yup, God really hates me and I remember thinking God, I have no idea what I have done to you to make you hate me so much but that's it, I'm done. And I really at that point and for quite some time after that did not want to hear, talk or think about God, he hated me. And to be honest with you I hit a very deep depression after my grandma died and it stayed for a really long time but I didn't fully understand what it was at the time. Now I was done with God and was convinced that he hated me - that lie had grown and the roots was so very, very deep that it would take me years to fully grasp the truth.  Because you see God didn't hate me and He was already working out ways to help me see this truth...or He had been all along. Because around 2003-04 I got to meet some cousins, under unfortunate circumstances but it started a relationship with them and they quickly came to felt more like siblings than cousins and I love them dearly. One of those cousins in particular helped me more than she will ever know and she allowed me to come spend many nights over the years, and didn't say anything when I would stop by late in the evening for what was meant to be a five minute visit just to see her but often ended up me not leaving until 10 or later that night. It was these cousins that started talking to me about God and I never said I didn't want to hear about him but I have no doubt there was times I only half listened hoping they'd move on quickly but following them listening to them sing and what they would say planted another seed, this one full of truth. I started occasionally going to church with one of my cousins on Sunday mornings and on one particular drive back home in the middle of this depression that I didn't know I was fighting but I knew I was sick and tired of being sick and tired because you see during this time I would have times where I would think of how I could die and I remember driving and the thought came to mind why not just drive into this tree or cliff or whatever because everyone would be better off without me anyway, why didn't I just go ahead and get out of the way and on this one particular Sunday morning on my way home while fighting this I thought, no I said out loud something along the lines of God if you really are real and if you're there and I've not gone to far either let me kill myself or you save me. I don't care which but something has got to end I can't go on I'm sick and tired of being this sick and tired. Nothing happened that day. Before I go on I guess I should say I always heard about God growing up but we never went to church from the time I was maybe 8 or 9 until my cousin let me go with her and I guess I was 19 or 20 at this point. So I really didn't understand praying or anything. Now I don't know how long it was between my little ultimatum with God until another Sunday morning I went to church but on my own this time and just so happened my cousin wasnt there that day, I was in the pew by myself. When I left church that day, oh and this brings us up to 2005, I didn't want to go home yet so I went the really, really long way home and I can't explain it but I can tell you exactly where I was on my drive that I felt I needed to pray and I thought but I don't know how to pray and I thought well I'll just start talking and I did and I had been holding in a lot! Now if you haven't already shaken your head a lot or laughed here may be where you do but at this point I asked God to forgive me and well to save me and I felt a weight lift that I knew I had been carrying but didn't realize how much it had been weighing me down. I will not tell you it was a bed of roses after that day and everything was perfect, far from it actually. In fact there was times before where I thought the road was rough and several times through my life I'd dare to say I felt like I was on a road that was right in the middle of hell and I didn't think I'd make it through but it started me on my way to the road we can call the voice of truth. So I had kind of sort of mostly got that God didn't hate me after all but we're still on that house that looks perfect on the outside but don't you dare come in. However, over the years God placed some great people in my life that have become more like family than friends and a couple years ago God decided to let me meet another person that would quickly become like that to me. Over the years I'm not sure how much I still try to make sure the outside looks perfect while the inside is a mess, more than I should but I have let some people in and realized it's not that bad to do so. I was always afraid to open the doors that were in my house to be safe had them all boarded up but someone once told me something along the lines of that it's not all bad, some of those doors well it's okay to open them and I've been trying to open more of them and when I realize they are the ones that have lies well I board them up and try to go on to the next door. Is it easy? Nope. Some days I feel like I'm surrounded by those flames and those lies screaming at me but I'm learning ways to drown out those things with the truth. I'm learning to fight. I'm learning to let people in and let them see and know me. Further more, I'm realizing and am so very thankful because I can look back and see and better understand all those delays and detours and massive pits because there's no telling what I was saved from having to go through or deal with and perhaps best of all because of all of it I have got to meet some of the best people, who have and are helping me in ways they'll never know, who I love dearly and am so thankful to have in my life. And I can say thank you to every person that had a part, good or bad in this journey and I can honestly say I am thankful and so very glad things happened the way they did. I don't really have a relationship with my birth mom - and that's nothing against her, there truly is no hard feelings, hate or unforgiveness there just to let that be known. And I am also thankful because God is showing me so much and He chose to place certain people in my life and they are showing me and helping me understand what a mother's love is and stuff. And one day the road may lead to where I not only have those women in my life that have been more of a mom to me but I may have a relationship with my birth mom but until then I wish nothing but the best for her and I'm going to keep working on me. Many times people say if I knew then what I know now I'd change a lot of things. I wouldn't. If I could go back I'd just tell myself to keep on because I promise you it's worth it. It's proving to be worth every lie I have had to fight to destroy, worth every single one of the many, many tears I have cried, worth fighting through the doubts and fears. So now if we just sit on the porch for awhile it may just be I like to sit on the porch and drink a glass of tea but please know that some days I may try to keep you out and some days when I let you in the house may be very messy, cluttered and worn you can leave if you want or if you so choose to stay well thank you and if you even choose to try to help me make sense of the mess please know that I appreciate it even when those days are you just sitting with me.

Now you may be wondering why I titled this thing Just Be and if so it would be because today I had an a-ha moment and decided today I am going to just be. I'll just be thankful for the amazing people God has chosen to place in my life, to be thankful I have survived every single bad day so far and for how far I have made it on this journey, and I will be proud of the person I am and continue to become and realize more and more truths and destroy more and more lies.

And that's my story - so far - for those that have been part and continue to be a part of it, I most sincerely thank you for all you have done and am so glad to have each of you be a part of it.

Titles Are Over-rated

I should probably title this post have you ever because I have a feeling I will be using that phrase a lot as I write this. I think it's safe to say at some point and to some degree we all wrestle with lies and fears and everything that falls in between those. I had a thought on that (which I have probably thought and wrote about here before) and in my weird way of seeing and understanding things I thought it's kind of like a dam in your head and on one side, the inside that not everyone can see, is where those lies just pile up over the years. Now on the outside it looks like nothing is going on, mostly, at least for me, because the lies are piling up and are so very loud and big that it blocks the view so much so that often I'm not even sure we realize there is a dam there. However, I like to picture it as there is the truth banging against the dam to try to make a crack big enough to break through and if you was able to see it you would see the truths just bouncing off and looking like it wasn't making any kind of progress but it is. And over time, be it short or what feels like forever, the truth does break through and now you have rubble laying on the ground, lies scrambling around trying to make sure you don't realize what happen and see the light, breathe in the fresh air and embrace the truth. Some of that rubble you easily pick up and toss far, far away and thus destroying a few of those lies but some of the pieces are a bit more heavier. We're going to walk on by those for the moment because we got some new territory to explore. This would also be the moment where one could say we're just ignoring them and sometimes that is true. However, sometimes it's just not the right moment to tackle those pieces, sometimes you just need to bask in the truth for a moment. For example, have you ever heard a song, tried to have a conversation or read a book and it was just a song, just a chat about the weather and other small talk, or just a book that you may have lost interest in and couldn't even finish. There's nothing wrong with the song, person you are talking to or book just at the moment that's all it is supposed to be. Then comes the day you hear a song, possibly even the same song you have heard several times and suddenly would you look at that it hit that big piece of debris that was still left and it just made that piece a little smaller. I don't know about anyone else but I'm quite thankful for those little a-ha! moments. Because sometimes when the dam is trying to get rebuilt from the lies and you try to fight the lies with some truths you know but they just are getting whipped by the lies and in those moments you can pull out those other truths that you have picked up along the way while exploring that territory that was blocked before. So I've been reading this book called Eve by Wm. Paul Young, I'm about half way through it but so far it's really good. It's one that has gotten me thinking about me and how I view myself and such. Actually it's one of those that I think has helped me take a few more steps away from the dam and see some things. I always seem to somehow find a character in a book I can relate to who often reminds me of how I feel or what I may have gone through which I suppose is weird. Anyway, in the book Lilly puts a front up so people don't see her vulnerability or at least so she doesn't feel vulnerable, she has a fear of people leaving, not good at trusting people, thinks if people knew what all she's done and such that they wouldn't even want to look at her, etc. There's a part in the book where she tells Eve to please not leave her and Eve assures her that she's not and at one point she sees Eternal Man and wants to run to him to hug him but she feels unworthy. And at one point she feels the loneliness that Adam feels and is that not the worst feeling ever, that feeling of isolation and even if you are surrounded by people you still feel alone. It feels like you are in a room so very dark and it feels so big and empty yet it feels like it is closing in on you. Terrible feeling. But there are little things and people that are helping Lilly see things differently, those little truths that are making an impact to get through that dam of lies. One part was when Lilly first meets Eve and Lilly says something and Eve laughs but it embarrasses Lilly so Eve draws her close to her side and tells Lilly you are not at risk with me. My amusement is because you said something funny. I will never laugh to shame you.' And I think another part is when John tells her she can always trust what he says and the time when she asks why he is doing all of this for her and he tells her that he believes she came into his life because God loves him. Which I love that it was written that way because though I absolutely believe there is always a reason we meet people and they have their time in our lives I always tend to look at it that it's a terrible joke on the person that has to put up with me. Somehow reading that kind of helped me see that I know that God knits people together but I never fully got that maybe me being in their life is helping them in someway just as much as it is helping me that they are in my life and hopefully not to just teach them patience that they probably didn't even ask for! One last thing about the book, where I currently am in it, Lilly was given a mirror and was told when she looked in it that it would show who she really was and when she holds it up to look into it the mirror pricks her thumb and then shows her, well it shows her lies of who she is but she starts to believe that's exactly who she is that there is no good in her and such. And it causes her to isolate herself even more cause she hasn't even told anyone that she has the mirror and looked into it. That's where we find ourselves in our comfort zone, which I find ironic that it's called that, I have never once been comfortable in my comfort zone. But it isolates us and keeps us away from others and from realizing who we are, truly are not what that mirror says or on those bad days what our heads are saying. Some days it's easy to win the battle and defeat those lies and some days it's not and you have to figure out a new strategy to go about attacking this lie and some days you need help and all of those are okay. I admittedly still struggle with asking for help on those days that I just can't win this one by myself but I'm getting better. Probably not a good thing to the couple of people I actually talk to though. (You can skip to very end for a chorus from a song that is to good for me not to share at this point if you so choose because from here on out I'm not even sure why or if I should write this but I will) But you know that is really the funny thing about life isn't it? How just the right people get placed in your life at just the right time. It is no secret how much I hate and struggle with Mother's Day, my piece of the dam/wall/door that seems like it is bigger than it is and over the years has and is not having the hold that it once had just sometimes it takes the truth a few tries to break through and from some of the most unlikely places and people. And it is to the point that it really isn't that big of a piece at all, not what my mind likes to try to trick me to think it is some days. Because there was many, many years that even right now I would not be in a good place just because of it about to be Mother's Day. However, I know and have some truths to hang onto and I've come such a long way with all that and the story that goes along with why I don't do well with that holiday. I recently heard Chonda Pierce say something along the lines of there will always be that sadness but there comes a day that you have to forgive that person and forgive yourself and that doesn't mean that you may have lunch with that person but you have a peace about it all. And she also talks at one point about this woman and her child that she just so happened to meet and they met each other just when they both needed to and so now that woman and her child is like a daughter and grandchild to her and she says at one point that God knew she needed that and she's so glad that God knew that and placed them in her life. And I can so relate to that, I think we all have those people in our lives that you just so happened to meet and somehow they have come to mean so much to you. It's a struggle for me to let people in and especially when I realize how close I am getting to people I have this fear that they will leave but I'm learning that it's okay to let people in and get close to them that they aren't going anywhere so enjoy the time that they are here. I really think God has placed people in my life and there are those that have come to feel more like a mom to me which again scares me and for a while I've struggled with if that's okay to be that close to them and such (that fear of they'll leave and such) but I've really come to realize that you know one I really do feel like these people are placed in my life to help me, to encourage me and just to be my friend (and hopefully I at least don't annoy or drive them crazy and maybe help at least in some way) but now I am seeing that it's okay because a mom isn't just a mom because they gave birth to you there is so much more to it than that. And I appreciate those in my life that have shown me that and they have become more like a mom to me and have been there to help me so very much in destroying these walls and helping me in so many ways and just taking the time to be there. So that's my Mother's Day spill and I will go ahead and say does that mean that come May 14th will I have no problems on that day, I don't know but I know that I will still have to do a lot of praying and reminding myself of truths so that any lie that tries to knock me down that day at the very least is going to have to work to knock me over.

So whether your dam/wall/door still seems impossible to be knocked down or it's been knocked down but there is a piece that seems just to big that you can never throw far, far away, don't give up. I recently heard a song called We Win by MercyMe (on their most recently released CD entitled Lifer) and I absolutely love the chorus which states:

This goes out, to anyone down for the count, it's not over, don't give up, don't throw in the towel, just remember who you belong to, let me remind you how this ends, we win..

So don't give up, today may be the day that that one more truth, maybe that person just giving you a hug or saying something that is the very thing that finally knocks those lies out for the count.