Lessons and More Lessons

My friend Conniedee and I are headed to the Appalachian Trail in West Virginia next week. I had planned to continue training with my loaded backpack, but instead, I am nursing a hurt lower back with pain in my right hip and knee.  I tried out a new massage therapist and he was wonderful. I felt great when I left his table, and was rejoicing with the thought that I could get back at my training. I also had a chiropractic adjustment and I felt like I was really back to my good ‘ole self.  I came home and did some tooling around on my computer.  Then I stood up.

It was as though I never had any treatments. Pain and more pain.

Now, I am usually pretty good about asking Papa what the lesson is, but this time, I was just kind of stubborn about it. Maybe I could walk through the pain?

I went on a normal walk in my neighborhood and could not wait to get back home. Did some stretches, some time on the inversion table, and felt good enough to do some cleaning.

I haven’t really cleaned the upstairs since the last time we had company at Christmas time. It also wasn’t a great cleaning because I had a broken arm at the time.  Needless to say, some cleaning was definitely warranted.

Jon has a service dog. He is a sweet boy, but he is a black lab and it is shedding season. All of my white woodwork and carpeting are covered in a never-ending sheen of black fur. I was trying to clean the woodwork on the stairway, and it seemed all I was doing was smearing black hairs over the white trim.  That is when it hit me. All of my plans, are really just futile.

I have to reckon with the truth that the cleaning is just not going to get done the way I want it to. Between the back and hip pain, and the constant flurry of doggie fur swirling everywhere around me, it is an impossible goal at the moment.

Now I am taking stock. How important is it to clean? Well, since I am the only one who does clean, and I don’t do it often, I would say pretty important. Okay, then what will happen if it doesn’t get clean enough to meet my standards? Ummmm…. I will be embarrassed when my friend comes next week?  And how good of a friend is she? Does she really care if every dog hair is removed? Nope! 

So, who is this for?  Me, and only me (remember, my husband Jon is blind and can’t see it anyway).

This is me, letting go. Ahhhhhh!

Thank you, Papa for helping me to stay in Your presence. There is nowhere I else I want to be. I’m sure you don’t mind a few stray dog hairs.

Return to Sender

I am taking a course with Patricia King and she shared a story today that has so deeply resonated with me that I need to retell it. She spoke about dealing with bouts of depression for many years. Then this last time, when she felt the beginnings of the feelings of depression coming on, she started to lean into it as she had in the past. But this time, God asked her if she was going to receive it or turn it down. She stated that she didn’t know that she actually had a choice. 

Then God gave her a vision of a postman with a package from Lucy Fur (I love that!). She said the package made note of its contents: depression. When the postman asked her to sign for the package, she wrote, “Return to Sender” instead. Thus, she was able to defeat the feelings of depression, and each time they come back, she reminds herself to “Return to Sender.”

I love this so much. I am so grateful for her life and her example, and I am so encouraged by her experiences.

I will forever now have a buffer against the fiery darts aimed at me. I will sign them, return to sender and not accept them into my life.

What’s In a Name?

I am enrolled in an eight months long workshop to help me refocus my purpose. Our first assignment was to learn our identity by examining the origins and meanings of our names.

I never really liked my name. I always knew that Linda meant beautiful in Spanish, and since I never felt very pretty for most of my life, I sort of disowned my name from my identity. But digging deeper, I learned that in some other languages, Linda also means soft and tender.

I absolutely resonate with these meanings because I have always been more tender-hearted than most people that I know. I can’t watch scary movies, and even most action-filled movies these days are simply too much for me. I find myself stressing in an activity that is supposed to be entertaining.  I chalked it up to just a quirk, but now I see it is because I am so tender, that I cannot help but feel the angst of the characters in the movies.

My middle name is Sue. I have found that this is a derivative of Susan or Susanna, which means lily. A lily stands for purity. Of course, I haven’t truly been pure, but when I step outside of those boundaries, I have always felt enormous guilt and anguish. It makes sense to me now, since being pure is part of my identity. When I am outside of purity, I am out of integrity with who I am.  I always wondered why others could cross the line so easily when I could not. I am beginning to understand.

In the Jewish culture, it is typical for families to also give a Hebrew name to their children in honor of family who have passed away. My Hebrew name is Hannah, meaning favor.

I think I like this name most of all. I have always felt Papa’s favor on my life. I have known for many years that He loves to pour His favor into my life. I also know the enemy hates it when He does, and thus I have been caught in the midst of many battles on this front.  It is here where I have learned my most valuable spiritual lessons—God’s favor vs. the enemy’s desire to steal it from me.

I am loving this new learning about my identity, and I am so grateful that I now adore my names because they were chosen as part of my journey and my destiny. As I grow more into my purpose, I see that it was no accident that I am Linda Sue, (and Hannah), tender and pure, graced with favor. And that really is beautiful.

The Hardest Part

I don’t want to believe I am a perfectionist. But what other name would one call it when I tell my blind husband that I really don’t want his help with the dishes because I will just have to redo them.  I know I hurt his feelings once again.

The right thing to do would have been to allow him the joy of helping me. Yet, I knew it would take me longer to clean up after him than if I just did the job from the start.

I didn’t want to hurt him. I know he wants to feel like he is helping, but the reality is, he doesn’t help me in the kitchen.

Maybe my expectations are the barrier. Maybe my standards are just too high.

Maybe I don’t have the patience I need to just let him do his thing and then clean it up later.

I want to do the loving thing.

But that means I have to sacrifice myself again.

Why is that so hard?

This was a weak area in my parenting skills when my children were younger as well. I knew I should let them try, but I just couldn’t stand the mess.

I love to bake, and I wanted to share that love with my kids, but when I would let them pour, and it went on the floor, I would just take over. I did not give my children the joy of working in the kitchen. I left them with a bad taste in their mouth instead. The message I gave them was that baking is messy and clean up is more important than the joy of creating.  I gave them no gift there, even though in my heart, I knew I wanted to.

Here I am again. Same spot. Same dilemma.

I have to let it go, but that means letting go of part of me too.

That is the hardest part of all.