First Things, First

Do you ever stop and think about "the firsts" in life?  I did... today. 

As I contemplate going  a new direction and taking on new adventures with someone, you don't want all of the firsts with that someone to be that lasts that you had with another. 

I love mornings and coffee and being along side the river.  I've never shared that with anyone ~ someday perhaps I will. Seems that is something I have saved for the right someone.  My time along the river is rather personal... I go to think, to get over things, to give thanks for the many blessings I have.  I don't just take up space there, I engage in all that it offers.  I stop and watch the water, listen to the birds, notice when the water has risen or fallen.  It is a time for reflection and gratitude ~ it isn't just a place to go, it is a place to be at. A destination.  No one has been so deserving of sharing this, up to this point....

 And there are places I've never been, that I contemplate sharing with the right someone. Like a trip to Palouse Falls in Washington.  It would need to be shared with someone who appreciates how simple life can be, beautiful the surroundings are and how deep the conversations, or silence can go.  Someone you can just be with, enjoying fully.   Someone who shares your taste in music ~ so on the drive up you enjoy great tunes and fun conversations!

And there are firsts such as being so comfortable with someone that you can be open, raw, true and comfortable in who you are. Secure in how you look or what your thinking. Knowing that this person accepts you baggage, flaws and all that is wonderful with you... To share all that you are, inside and out.  To be good in your own skin ~ to want to put on a bathing suit to sit on a beach, or take a long walk along a shore line..talking about everything or nothing at all and not wanting run for cover. To feel so secure and safe with that one person... there is something wonderful just in the thought of that.   And something very scary as well ~ putting yourself out there, it can be difficult. Maybe not with the right person.

This is what I know.  God has been preparing me, for who he has prepared for me... I trust that. I trust that all that one goes through in life, it all has it's place, it's reason, it's tools for teaching.  And if there is someone, and I believe there is,  He will come into my life at the right time. He will come in God's time. Because I have this thought - the RIGHT GUY at the WRONG TIME isn't the right guy.  It all has to line up just as God has planned it.  You can't force it or push it or manipulate it.  You have to allow God to guide it.

I'm being guided in a wonderful direction in life right now, open to opportunities and meeting new people. I'm at a very good place, happy with who I am and where I am ~ surrounding myself with amazing family and friends.  I have a home that keeps me busy with fun projects and a job I truly enjoy. I have a faith that is unshakable. 

Life is good.

Anyone who happens to come into this picture won't complete it, but compliment it.  That's a very good place to be!

I am a Pinterest person... yep, I log on and I search for ideas, messages, giggles and style inspiration.  And some of those things I MAY actually utilize someday ~ I have the best of intentions!

I was on the site this morning and clicked to view my boards.  Just looking through them says a great deal about a person; their likes, their desires, their hopes and their thoughts.  Amazing really how much you can grasp from boards filled with "ideas".

My boards are FuN!  InSpIrInG!  CrEaTiVe!  GoDlY!  FaMiLy OrIeNtEd! UpLiFtInG!

Just seeing what fills my thoughts, my life made me smile and realize that for all the lemons that have come along.. meaning BAD DAYS..My HAPPY DAYS trump them 100 to 1.  I am blessed ~ blessed indeed!

Silliness

Getting it

Humorous

Inspired by it

At a time of technical age, where we spend more time on a computer talking than in person, more time on a lap top reading than grabbing a book, more time typing than writing ~ It is nice to see that you can still fill your life with things that inspire, encourage, teach and make you laugh. And we can utilize this technology to share it in ways that reach beyond our own grasp, into the world.. AMAZING!     Today I will go forth and share what I am filled with .. HAPPY JOYFUL GRATEFUL BLESSINGS <3  

Morning Inspired

Life is simply too short to waste my time with the drama, hurts & disappointments of this life... take them, embrace them LEARN FROM THEM ....  I CHOOSE TO LIVE,  FULLY!!!! : )

God Is Preparing Me

God is preparing me, for who HE has prepared for me....

God is preparing me, for WHO HE has prepared for me....

God is PREPARING ME, for who He has PREPARED FOR ME

It is so easy to sit and be sad, pouty, mad and frustrated. But it is much easier to be grateful.  Grateful that through life's journey God puts small mercies in our lives that allow us to grow. Grow in our own self, and grow in God. To GROW.

I want to be like that seedling today, that you place in the soil, you nurture and you wait. And wait and wait, and then.... you see something!  There is a small tiny itty bitty something that appears to be coming up through the soil. 

You wait, you wait and you wait.  Oh yes, there it is, a glimmer of the top of what appears to be a seedling.  You water, you make sure there is light and you wait, and wait and wait.  Days go by and that little, tiny itty bitty seedling begins to realize, it is alright to poke through the solid. It is good to stretch and grow. 

And as you turn away just for a moment, that seedling POPS through the solid and the seed, which you genitally laid within the soil, has changed. It has completely changed.  There is something wonderful about it now.  It has life.    And as you watch, you see that as it begins to push through the soil it continues to change and grow.

ohhh the excitement.

 

And then you wait, and wait and wait.  In time that seed that you placed within the soil has become something beautiful.  It grows and it takes on a new shape, and it is exciting. Oh the changes, the colors ~ oh my the colors.   And just when you thought you were experiencing the most exciting part of this growth process from that little seed, it bares fruit. 

Awe, the fruit.  You took the time to nurture and be patient.  You cared, you watered and you gave light.  And now, there is something beautiful bearing fruit, something wonderful to be shared. Something you weren't even expecting.

I want to be that seedling. I want to grow. I am going to nurture myself and seek the light, God's light.  And I'm going to wait.  And wait. 

And I'm going to emerge from the soil, a bit scared perhaps at times of what might be ahead, but excited because I know that there is something exciting happening.  I know that in time, with patience and trust I will bare fruit.  I will bear the fruits that God has placed within me.    And I will wait.  I will wait for God to place the right gardener in my life.   The one who will continue to be patient, to nurture, to water & give me light.  

 I am going to wait on God to bring that person, the gardener into my life, the one who he has been preparing for me.   Because I believe

 GOD IS PREPARING ME FOR WHO HE HAS PREPARED FOR ME.

L A U G H T E R

 

Relationships are complicated.  We all come into this world with nothing, and we pull pieces and have pieces removed as we interact and have relation with others.  Some pieces are full of love, joy and hope.  So pieces are full of pain, anger and doubts.  You spend an entire lifetime picking up and putting pieces back into place.  One must find the person who is willing to stand beside them, both arms filled with all the pieces.  It is the person that says, lie them down and let's sort through them that you must appreciate and realize, they are it.  They are the one who is worthy of risk.  The one who is willing to sift through the pieces, and to share with your their pieces as well ~ and this isn't just the brokenness, this is everything.  The love, joy, hope, pain, anger and doubt all of it.  No holding back.   When you find that person, hold on.  

I have pieces.  I have many pieces, many happy pieces.  And I have brokenness in my pieces.  I am a work in progress.  I am willing with the right person, to place my pieces out and sift ~ as we sift together through our lives, finding in the mix of this a friendship that brings a bond, that brings a relationship, that brings laughter.  Because ultimately that is what I am longing for in life.   A life full of laughter and a love that should be a happy ever after.  

Relationships really are not so complicated, we simply complicate them.   Here is to pieces to be laid out, hearts that find happiness and lessons along the way that bring you to a place where you can reflect and see that everything happens for a reason.   

God is good.  I woke this morning and while saying my prayers came to the understanding of many things that took place over the past few months, due to the relationship I was in. There were blessings in having him in my life for that short period, God used him as a vessel to guide me to healing in other areas.  For that I am very grateful.    

Filter In Filter Out

So I have an amazing circle of friends!  I do, incredible really.  And they are often sharing how impressed they are with my positive attitude and strength when it comes to coping and dealing with things.    Can I be honest ~ it's my blog, of course I can : )  And I should!  

I have not always been THIS way.  Ohh for years I've been optimistic and positive and shined a happy light on things, but shhhh don't tell anyone, it was a big fat fake front so I didn't have to deal with the reality I was facing.  Ugg...   I was in an unhappy place and it was easier to fake it than deal with it.   Lesson learned years later, it is much easier to face the beast head on and move on than put on a pretty face and fake it!

So today, I am positive. I am happy and I am surrounded by positive, happy, wonderful friends!  I have 'decluttered' and removed the negative people from my daily life.  I didn't really REMOVE them, just put distance between us so that their toxic attitudes and behaviors wouldn't taint my beautiful happy let's get a lil' silly sometimes waters.   And each morning when I wake up I spend at least 45 minutes filling my mind with positive words, my eyes with happy visuals and my heart with uplifting verses.  I am a believer sincerely that filter in filter out. There it is..THE SECRET, I've let it out. 


Oh and I think sprinkling in a nice mixing of KLOVE music, or whatever your favorite Christian music .. do a HAPPY dance in the morning before you hit the door and if you get real adventurous, grab a pen and doodle on yourself ~ Yep I'm serious! Or put your hair in pig tails, wear a tee with a silly quote or picture just because you can, jump on the rope swing and sway a little, grab your child's bike and take it for a spin or spike your hair.   Step outside the comfort zone and do something silly.... you've got it... see you are already smiling thinking hummmm what should I do.   Atta kid ; )

Healing to Happy.... it's not a race!

When transition side swipes me & I find myself reeling in something I don’t completely understand, I tend to shove it all inside, put on a happy face, pull up my positive big girl panties and trudge forward.  I’ve always thought this was a great way of “coping”.  Who am I fooling?

Today, I’m going to be completely honest and raw ~ if the transition comes up from behind and knocks your world off its axis, well it just sucks.


I was in a relationship, with a great guy. Intelligent, fun, nice looking, kind hearted, thoughtful and a certifiable “commitment phobic”.   It’s not me being funny; it is a real deal technical term.  This isn’t something I have ever encountered and I am having a very difficult time wrapping my head around it.  In a “nut shell” kind of way, I’ll explain.   A commitment phobic wants, desires, craves a relationship.  They want a great relationship.  When they come to a place in a relationship where things are there, at the point of “great”… they freak out.  The anxiety of being at that place of complete happy and great in a relationship, what they desire most, scares those most.  Often times the one who desired this relationship the greatest is the one that does the most to sabotage it.  They start to pick it apart and break it down, causing it to end, and then the quickly move on, or not, to the next relationship.  Another way they “cope” when the relationship reaches a comfortable, happy and secure point is they completely disengage. You may have a fabulous date on Monday, ending it with conversation about how great you are, how happy you make them, how things feel so right and how they can’t wait to talk in the morning, to wake Tuesday and you hear nothing.  They completely leave the map and you are left behind, no answers, no explanation, nothing.

I will share it is an awful, terrible rotten feeling.  When you finally open yourself up to the possibility that there is someone out there who understands you, who ‘gets you’ who truly cares about you, to have it all come crashing down so quickly you’ve no idea what just happened.  And to be left standing there, pieces of your heart scattered throughout your body with nothing to justify or even begin to justify the situation of abandonment.   Abandoned, left there standing alone in a world that was so together and incredible ~ in a moment notice, gone.    

I’ve had a few, ok MANY long talks with myself about how I’d like to “fix this” and have come to the sad conclusion, that this is something more than I am emotionally capable of taking on.  I loved him, truly I did. I do. But not in invest myself fully, to be losing all sanity along with more broken pieces kind of way.   I don’t comprehend forcing myself onto someone who runs from happy? I can’t do that.  And I’m still reeling in the fact that as far as a real commitment goes, it was never insinuated, mentioned or assumed on either of our behalf.  We never talked about it. I was under the impression we were still getting to know one another, taking it one day at a time.  I was good there.

That brings me to this day, five days later after receiving a text which was our final conversation “I need time to think about us”   YES, you read that correctly a text.  I picked my phone up to call right back, nothing. So I text and inquire did I do or not do something? To which I received the reply “You didn’t do anything”…. And that was Good Bye.    OUCH! OUCH! OUCH!

I am going to open up the possibilities for a new way of life – to be honest when I’m hurting and say OUCH out loud. I’m human, humans get hurt..  I’m certain that God uses these hurts for grown and learning tools, but today I am wanting very much to stick my tongue out and say THUUURRRPPPPP … but I won’t.  I won’t because He also gave me the gift of reflection.  And when I look back over the past 5 months I see positive seeds that were planted and personal growth that took place.  Ohhh I’m not saying that it makes it all better, NO I AM NOT.  What I am saying, is that it makes it a little bit easier to swallow in this moment when my heart is hurting.

Happiness is a muscle that you exercise and a way of thinking that is not only practiced with daily positive influence but also with a healthy sense of humor.   Transition, it is a special place that can either make or break you ~ depending on your outlook.  I tend to find myself trying to find humor in this, any of this, but its impossible. There is nothing humorous about it. SO, I intend to let it MAKE ME… make me appreciate the people in my life who frustrate me, but cause me to grow…. Make me stop and reflect on my own attitude & gratitude and realize that all the bumps in the road make for a stronger me.  And to let it make me, take a step back and realize that what we hope for, what we receive and what happens along the way are sometimes unintentional road blocks along the way.

I truly believe that everyone comes into our lives for a reason, a season. You are given gifts through growth, through sharing heart ache, joys, happiness, madness, insights and big fights.  What you do with those gifts is up to you. Today, I’m taking all the little gifts that were shared over the past months, putting them inside my little broken pieces of heart and I’m going to do one thing with them – heal from them.    A new day, it is up to me what I will make of it… and I have every intention of making it BETTER!