A story of the good the bad and the ugly. We have all been there at least one time in our lives…I am sure. An unhealthy place , a place we struggled to get though…Story of my life, but I am here to say it is possible to see your ashes become beauty.
It has only taken twenty years. Years of counseling, a bazillion self-help books later, a whole lotta Jesus, and I am finally sitting on the horizon of: “I think I get it…I will never get it.”
It is a place between insecurity and confidence that quite honestly feels amazing. Typing that makes me sound prideful, but I mean it in the most humble way. I don’t think I am better than you, or anyone else. I haven’t master an Everest of things. I just, in this moment, can see my ashes for what they are and I get it.
I don’t know how long this feeling will last, or if I really get that I don’t get it, but I am going to be grateful for the moment. We all have ugly. We all think…Will it ever get better? I am here to tell you it will. Our hardships can shape us. We can learn to let go. We can find peace in the midst of the chaos.
It is not easy, and sometimes it looks like a snotty faced child who can’t catch their breath. In fact, I am sure if you are a woman you will look like something out of a horror movie as your mascara streams down your face, but push through it, feel those feelings, and get them out anyway you can. Write a journal, or one of those letters that you burn.
I felt lost. All I had known and thought was upside down. Oh, my goodness I was in the upside down!!! (Stranger Things Refernce!) It was awful! And then all became quiet and I felt like I was in new skin. I didn’t know myself. Now what?! I was asking friends…what is wrong with me?!
I had to once again admit powerlessness over my life and give it all back to God. I am not a child anymore. I am not out of control and in need of someone to constantly keep me in line. I don’t need to be afraid to live in the moment of life.
I can trust God with all the things I can not control. I can trust myself and love myself for how far I have come. I can quit beating myself up for my past mistakes. I can trust God to help me when I can’t help myself.
There are times in life when we can’t be who we are anymore, and we are faced with a choice. The choice is to stand up, or lay there, but to say to God, “I don’t have this, but You do. I can not fight it anymore.” Then we get up and make the decision to move forward and trust God, mustering up the faith to move past the spot in which we sit.
I am trading in my ashes. I am laying down my fears of yesterday, walking away from the things that once made me ugly, the things that try and hold me back, the things that tell me I can’t.
I am going to face the things I don’t want to do. I am going to accept the woman I have become, and I am going to walk in the beauty God has offered me. You can too! Let’s turn in our ashes.
Tabs Window 