:: getting myself sorted ::

courage - 'cor' - the latin for heart. "to speak one's mind by telling all one's heart".

she could never go back and make some of the details pretty. all she could do was move forward and make the whole beautiful. - terri st.cloud

my story matters because i matter.

i have a messy, imperfect, wild, stretch-marked, wonderful, heartbreaking, grace-filled and joyous life. i am fueled by the freedom that comes when i stop pretending that everything is okay when it isn't. i acknowledge the call that rises up from my belly when i find the courage to celebrate those intensely joyful moments even through i've convinced myself that savoring happiness is inviting disaster.

the essential thing in heaven and earth is...that there should be long obedience in the same direction; there thereby results, and has always resulted in the long run, something which has made life worth living. - nietzsche

choosing authenticity and worthiness is an absolute act of resistance. choosing to live and love with my whole heart is an act of defiance. i'm going to confuse, piss off and terrify lots of people - including myself. one minute i'll pray that the transformation stops, and the next minute i'll pray that it never ends. i'll also wonder how i can feel so brave and so afraid at the same time, but at least i will be very, very alive.

blessed is the man who trusts in the lord, whose confidence is in him. he will be like a tree planted by the water that sends out its roots by the stream. it does not fear when heat comes, its leaves are always green. it has no worries in a year of drought and never fails to bear fruit. - jeremiah 17:7-8

:: through a glass darkly ::

The first half of life is about “light” (order, meaning, clarity, explanations). The second half of life is where God leads you into “darkness,” which is actually a much better teacher than what seemed like light. Now you learn through waiting, trusting, praying, and “through a glass darkly” (1 Corinthians 13:12).

God has to work on your soul “in secret,” according to the saints and mystics. If God gave you any idea of what God was doing, which is always radical surgery, you would do one of two things: you would try to stop it, or you would try to engineer it and take control of the process. God has to operate in darkness to get the job done.

It is sort of humiliating, isn’t it? Yet it is also deeply consoling, because even on your seemingly empty and unexciting days, even then, you can trust that God is working in you, with you, and for you.

Richard Rohr