How do you write the first sentence of the rest of your life? Is it a formula of 2 paragraphs a day, is it the wrenching of hands and endless hours of drafts never published? Is it the weekend in the mountains, free from restrain on time or emotion or expectation? How do you sit down and decide: the words I write next are the words I’ll remember forever.

It’s where time and space clash – neither existing in reality – neither denied their right to rule: where the words you stew in your head become the very breath you take next.

Like a hot coal that doesn’t burn, I’ve been carrying these words for most of my life: the fire never extinguished, but also never flamed.

I’m afraid of a lack of a plan. Afraid of failing. Afraid of disappointing my friends, family, Aaron. I’m nervous that it’s me speaking and not You leading me away … to quiet.

“There is no quiet in her life” – someone used this description today in a conversation and it hit me like a ton of bricks. There’s this question lingering over me “Is time a blessing or a curse?” and time = quiet. I’m afraid of the quiet – I’ve witnessed this first hand, how loud the quiet can be. Is it fear of missing out or just fear?

And the underlying issue with fear is trust.

That’s where I’m sitting lately. Full of questions, lack of direction, being drawn to the quiet but wanting the quiet to whisper instructions on how to feel the pleasure of being still.

You know what’s scarier than the quiet? When you give space to the words in your heart, they beg for oxygen. You have to speak them, deal with them, write them in your journal. They want to be set free. And once you let them go they’re not quiet …

but you finally might be.

There’s been a timeline in my life that looks like a fingerprint of restoration. Unlike any other, this story is all mine written in a language that I understand intimately. I used to wonder what it would sound like to hear from God. I wondered if he’d talk to me the way I did, like a stupid child incapable, incompetent. I wondered if he’d display my faults before me before he’d ever extend his arms to hold me.

Talking about a Heavenly Father is the wrong way to talk to me – instead, let’s just chat about God, like a guy (or girl). Let’s talk about awe and read poetry. Let’s not talk about him at all, let’s dance instead. Could we skip the part where I have to admit how uncomfortable I am and go to the part where we watch the stars, where we see a baby being born. Can we go to the place where the sun rises and where the water disappears into the horizon. Can we skip the part about the rules and memory versus, can we skip the part about how I haven’t done enough because I’m missing the tulip open for the first time. I’m missing the first snow flakes of the season, I’m missing the steam rise on the top of my tea and rallying in the simple beauty of the toast and jam on my plate, brought to me by the tiny hands who love me.

I don’t know how to talk about this without talking about it. I’m flattered every day by the sky. When it rains, it’s like a love story waiting to happen. The smell of the first autumn morning? God, I love that. The stretch of road on the way to the mountains in Washington State in late November on a foggy morning?

That’s spiritual. There’s a holiness to the narrative of my life and it captures me with daunting clarity.

When You told me to ask You – you weren’t giving me a Holy ATM card for happiness, health and wealth. You were asking me to consider You first. To just ask You. To invite You, to know You. To be with You.

Not more of me.
More of You.