Thursday, May 27, 2010

Embracing the wind

Have you ever tried to hold on to your belongings when the wind is blowing hard? Whether you're at the beach trying to hold on to your straw hat or you're desperately clinging on to your umbrella on a cold rainy, windy day. Holding on when the wind seems stronger than your footing on the ground is tough and almost impossible.

I have felt this way in life. Circumstances blew away things that I was certain about. Even the things I thought I would always have a firm grip on. But life is like that. The more you live, the more you learn you really don't have control of everything. And many times when we let go we don't always get the things we surrendered back. Sometimes we do.

I recently met a strong godly woman who encouraged me to start pursuing the things that I shelved for a season of my life. She asked me to start dancing and singing again. You see, I stopped doing these things because life was tough. I stopped dreaming and I completely surrendered my life to the raging and often overwhelming winds. But now, I'm embracing the wind and asking for my dreams back. I'm asking for my life back.

This time around the wind seems gentler than before. And it's breeze is starting to feel kind of nice on my face.

Saturday, May 8, 2010

I hate the words, "Let go"



There are two words that I have come to detest more than any other words. “Let go.” I hate those words!

It seems the last four years of my life have been filled with those two detestable words. I have come to understand that if I really love or want something that I must “let it go” or release. Some of the things I’ve released have come back to me, and some haven’t. I don’t like letting go. It is easier for me to give money to a charity or to tithe at church than it is for me to give up something that I own. Maybe this is selfish but it’s honest. And letting go hasn’t just been a matter of releasing things.

I’ve had to release my life, dreams, and future to a destiny I have often been unfamiliar with. What else do you do when everything you hoped for and dreamed about as a little girl turns out the opposite? Sure, life doesn’t usually turn out exactly the way we think it will but for most it’s at least functional and bears some similarity to what you dreamed up in your mind. Not my life. I’ve been utterly surprised. For me it seems that destiny took over and painted a different picture. Life is looking nothing like I’d every predicted it to.

My life in the last few years has felt like sand running through my hands. As much as I tried to hold it tight things just seemed to slide through the cracks and before I knew it, it had slipped away. In the last five years, I have had to release just about everything in my possession, my marriage when it was shaky, the home I loved in TN, the friends I made on the journey, the promise of two great in-laws (hubby’s dad passed away in 2006), and there are so many more things that could make up a memoir that could end up on Oprah’s book club. Now, that’s an idea!

Just a day ago I had to “let go” again. This time I had to say goodbye to my German Shepherd dog. He’s just a dog people have said but to me he was more than that. He was a companion. He was my friend.

Basko was there during the shaky times in my marriage where I could feel my heart breaking within me. Basko was there during unemployment when my husband and I had to go to the local pantry to make sure we had food for the week. Basko was there when a terrible argument over finances reduced me to tears. He’d sit next to me with his back arched straight up as he always did as if standing guard next to me protecting me from breaking. Maybe it’s all in my imagination? Maybe I’m dreaming it all up. Maybe he is just a dog who will forget me in a matter of weeks. But I can’t help missing him. I can’t help feeling that my dog, who belonged to me not long ago will be someone else’s; that years from now he won’t even remember who I am.

Right now I’m crying and mourning his loss. Because even if he was just a dog he was there when I needed him. I’m praying this is the last time in a long time that I will have to “let go” of something that I love because my heart just couldn’t bear another surrender.