with one glance of your eyes

I've always cried at weddings. I don't even care if I don't know the couple very well - I will weep like a baby. They are my favorite thing in the world. There is so much joy and so many nerves and it's just the most beautiful experience.

One of the strongest, most wonderful people i've ever known got married on Sunday and I was so honored to stand beside her as she became a wife. It was the start of a new life for her, one that she will share with her husband for the rest of their lives. I watched as they read vows to one another that they wrote themselves. They promised to stand next to each other in the worst times and they thanked each other for waiting. They proved that the wait is so worth it and that it is possible to walk through heartache and hopelessness, only to find someone who is beyond their wildest dreams on the other side.

The way he looked at her as he read his vows broke my heart. He never took his eyes off of her eyes, he never even seemed to notice the 200 people watching and hanging on every word. He didn't care about anyone more than he cared about the woman standing before him. I've never seen eyes look at anyone the way his did. Love, respect and admiration filled them in a way that I can't describe. It was beyond beautiful.

I don't know why some girls get to live this fairy tale so early in life. I don't know why so many of the most wonderful, honest, beautiful women that I call my friends are single. I could never explain why Danielle was single up until the last semester of college, when boys were constantly falling at her feet. I can't explain why the one person she loved would never choose to love her in return, when she could have easily had whoever she wanted. She rarely complained about being single or about being alone. She rarely talked about what kind of wedding she would have one day or what kind of man she dreamed of marrying (which, as a Southeastern girl, is a miracle) - She chose to wait.

I'm not very good at waiting. I've settled for men that I know are wrong for me in every way and I've given myself to them in ways I wish I could take back. I've agonized over men that abused me and treated me like I would never be worth enough to be with them. I want to know who I'm going to be, what he's going to look like, and when it will all happen. I want to know why I've had to suffer heartbreak and why I'm so awkward around boys I think are cute. I just want to be in control of everything, even though I know this is the one place where I can't be. Danielle taught me how to wait, and how to be gracious and patient while doing so. She taught me the importance of bringing a whole heart to the table when it comes to being in a relationship. She's taught me how important it is to be strong and complete before ever becoming capable of sharing your heart with another and I hope that I'm able to share my heart with someone who loves me and admires me just as much as Zack does for her.

I will be complete one day, and it will be worth everything that it took to get there.

Do you know who you are?

I struggle with many pieces of myself. I'm sometimes shy, and I'm not the most at home in my own soul. This is something I desire to change so much, but when it comes down to it - I'm afraid of the change.

I don't always love how I look. I'm 6'0" and most of the people I come in contact with are shorter (which reaffirms my need to start hanging out outside of NBA stadiums). I get self conscious about wearing heels, most dresses are too short for me, and I always have to stand in the back with all the boys in group photos. This is something that I started to work on about a year ago, when I bought my first pair of heels. Granted, they are only like 1.5 or 2 inches, but it's a start! Even though I have made major progress with this issue, it's still a huge part of me. Because I'm afraid to embrace my height as a gift.

In college, I experienced the worst heartbreak of my life. That experience left me carrying a huge amount of self-doubt and feelings of worthlessness. Even though it happened 2 or 3 years ago, I still struggle with feelings of inadequacy on almost a daily basis. I second guess myself, most of the time feel that I'm not smart enough, or pretty enough.. it's just a huge struggle for me. After it ended, that relationship continued for awhile - mainly because I was afraid to completely walk away from it. I was afraid of who I was outside of those feelings and that person. It's easy for me to not believe in myself, so I choose to continue being self-destructive.

This summer, I applied for 5 internships in my field. I was rejected from all of them. Last week, I applied at 4 restaurants and haven't gotten anything. Something inside me knows that there is a reason for this - but a huge part of me just wants to crawl into a hole and die. I can't even get a serving job. I have half a masters degree, and I can't even wait tables.

Last week I heard something that started to make me want to be different.

"Do you even know who you are? You are the living, breathing work of God

You are his kingdom and his creation"

If i truly believed this, wouldn't I be able to work past my insecurities? If i really knew who I was - wouldn't there be joy in spite of pain?

I think part of me does know this. I know who I am - or I am at least starting to - but how is it supposed to look? How am I supposed to be the living & breathing work of God with all of this crap I carry around with me? When I can't even get a job in the field that I thought God wanted me to pursue?

It just starts with a little. The choice to see the positive instead of the negative after I hang up the phone with someone who has rejected me for a job. The choice to be outside and to run, instead of wallow inside on the couch. The choice to smile at a stranger, to strike up conversation with an old friend, to be together and to be whole.

Just one ounce of goodness can erase a ton of darkness. I want to choose to be His now. To choose to be whole instead of a fragment. To be at home in my own soul. To be the living, breathing, work of God here on earth.

easter.

remember.

remember me.

remember the things i showed you, the words i spoke to you, the moments we shared in silence, the times we laughed together and the times we shared in sorrow, the places we saw, the people we encountered, the stories we told.

i remember you when you were broken, desolate, afraid and alone.

i was too.

you stopped breathing, stopped living, stopped hoping.

so did i.

but i returned. i rose and ascended. i walked through death and on the other side - a way for you to escape with me.

i rescued you out of the pit.

i sought you out. out of millions i created, i searched for your heart and i would not rest until it was mine.

i found you in your despair and i created a new life, one that was worth living.

i took away that rock you called a heart and replaced it with a beating one, made of flesh and blood, that beat for me and gave you a reason to sing again.

remember me, and celebrate me. celebrate the man with calloused feet and tired eyes. celebrate the heart that gave to the poor and the life that changed the course of history.

i am alive, you are loved, and you are not alone. nothing else matters.

the inciting incident

I recently re-read A Million Miles in a Thousand Years by my most favorite, Don Miller. It's just one of those books that will make you cry (literally borderline sobbing on the El one day), laugh, and dream.

I've always been a dreamer. It's a blessing and a curse, really. Mostly a curse, though, as much as I hate to say it. I dream and create in my head - but there is some sort of disconnect between my brain and my hands, and I end up never doing anything. I'm lazy and I'm incredibly insecure - so nothing ever happens in real life. And then I get anxiety about it. And then I can't sleep...

Blah, blah, blah.

Anyway, Don was much the same way in the beginning of the book but by the end of it he had hiked the entire Inca Trail in Peru, rode his bike across the USA for wells in Africa, fallen in love and had a devastating heartbreak, and founded a dream-propelled nonprofit after finally having his first encounter with the father who abandoned him as a child.

All of these things happen in his life because he discovers the meaning of story. He learns and embraces a way of life in which everything is just like a story - and he decides to live an amazing story, one that everyone else wants to read and participate in.

The thing that is so beautiful about story is that it's so similar to dreaming. Except the big difference is that in a story, things are happening. Things are moving, people are meeting, life is happening. When you're dreaming - you're just dreaming. You're sleeping, wondering, hoping.. but nothing is happening. I don't think there is much to show for dreaming, but everything to be said about living a story. You can still live in the fantasy - in a world in which you're not afraid to embrace whimsy (which is defined in the book as the belief that magical things can happen) but be AWAKE! Awake and living a wonderfully painful story that is full of blood, sweat, tears, love and hope.

One of the most beautiful stories that Don tells is the one of hiking the Inca Trail in Peru. He compares it to life and the journey we are on toward something we are longing for. Don and his team hike for days, part of which is a seven-mile stair climb.

Stairs. For seven miles. Holy Crap.

They hike and hike and finally reach the city of Machu Picchu and it's so beautiful and fulfilling. But the reason why it's so beautiful is because of the pain that they went through, the struggles, the exhaustion, the seven miles of stairs. There are other groups there who have taken the easier route, the shorter route, or just straight up drove through all the mountains. But, Don is sure that the other groups can't possibly be experiencing the same feelings that he is. Because he lived the pain, he lived through the struggle and the reward at the end is so much more fulfilling because of it.

Life is a story meant to be lived. The most important moments in my life so far happened because I intentionally sought out a story. Being in Mexico playing soccer with kids who lived in a trash dump, traveling to Israel because I couldn't keep living in heartbreak at home, moving to Chicago totally alone, embarking on a journey with the Father, road trips with my friends in college. These are the moments that have made my life joyful and worth something.

What I want most is to live intentionally and according to a story line. I want to experience and feel as much pain, hope, love, and exhaustion that I possibly can. In the end, when my heart is finally made whole again, those are the things that I want to remember because they are the things that will make the wholeness so much sweeter.

life's lessons.

I am learning..

- How to change my perspective.

- To become more positive.

- The importance of spending wisely, eating well and laughing often.

- How to live my life as a story and with the perspective that story can bring. (Thank you, Donald Miller, for changing my life)

- Who God is and what heaven on earth looks like.

- How to communicate hope and restoration in a seemingly unrestorable (i made that up) world.

I need..

- To learn to go to bed earlier and wake up earlier.

- To exercise more often.

- To pray more often.

- To continue learning what I'm scratching the surface of.

- To decrease worry and stress.

- To not get sick. I have way too much homework right now.

I am thankful..

- For the opportunity of education.

- That I was exiled to Chicago, because it has been beautiful and so difficult.

- For the opportunities that have presented themselves recently and the hope that they will work out

- That I have found an apartment that is half the rent I'm currently paying - unheard of in the city.

- For my friends and family near and far!

- For all my friends who are getting married soon or have gotten married recently. They inspire me.

you be you

my humanity is bound up in yours

for we can only be human together

Shalom.

"i will no longer be afraid. i am not worthless. there is a plan - a huge one! open my eyes and reawaken my soul. help me find joy again - real joy. help me breathe again - not on my own, but with you and through you"

two years ago today a huge, broken, mess of a girl got on a plane and flew to Israel. she spent five weeks truly living for the first time and all the broken pieces of her heart were mended. she experienced real joy, real life and found real hope in her creator.

i'm celebrating those moments for the next five weeks. hopefully reminding myself of the struggle and pain that is sometimes necessary for growth.

i cant believe where i am after two years and how dramatically my life has changed. i'm so thankful for ways i have grown and can't imagine what the next two years might bring..