My One Word for 2015 {with NEW song debut!}

So... a two-month blog silence!  Read on to find out why... (I wrote this post last week on our return journey to Central Asia, but I couldn't post earlier due to Internet issues.)  Remember to click the Soundcloud link at the bottom to listen to my NEW song!  

Queenstown & the Remarkables, New Zealand South Island

As I write this, I am sitting in a place called “Caffé Béne”, in the bustling heart of an Asian metropolis, sipping a barista-brewed latte - my last for a while - absentmindedly staring at the cafe’s weird East-meets-West decor, and thinking about rest.

Right now we’re in a few days of limbo between two months of “Kiwi-leave” in New Zealand and returning to our current “home” on the field in Central Asia.  Home-leave offers a welcome break from the pressures and tensions of life overseas, but while returning to a western country is restful in that I can function in my heart language and I don’t have to cook every meal from scratch, the short times back in our passport countries are usually packed with people to see, places to go, and opportunities to share what God has been doing.  

This time for us was no different.  We’ve rested as we’ve been ministered to in prayer by faithful saints; we’ve rested as we’ve drunk deeply of New Zealand’s natural beauty, and as we’ve enjoyed the delicious, relaxed hospitality of treasured friends.  But we’ve been busy, and it’s taken its toll.  We’re tired, our kids are tired, and our family is running a bit ragged.

I snuck out this afternoon while the kids are napping to write you a note in this little online space which I’ve devoted to exploring the art of this sojourning life.  Most of us are no strangers to feeling fatigued, so I’m especially excited to share with you my word for 2015! 

Lake Pukaki, New Zealand South Island

Last year, I felt God calling me to listen.  If you’re interested, you can read some of the things I learned here… and after 12 months of exploring and experimenting, I am fully aware my lessons in real, true listening have only just begun!  

This year, flowing on from listening, I’ve been invited by God to 

rest 

for a while.  

To rest from striving, from filling my life with effort and strain, to rest from the internet rat-race I’ve been unwittingly running.  

I’ve been invited to rest from my own agenda, from compulsively planning and preparing.  God is inviting me to go with the flow.  To surrender.  To submit to what each day brings.  To submit afresh to my husband.  To surrender afresh to my Lord.  

To rest in the care of my Good Shepherd, and let this little corner of the web lie quiet for a while, while I listen to His voice.  

This year, the word God is giving me for 2015 is rest.  

Milford Sound, New Zealand South Island

I am so happy about this word.  Whew!  What a relief!  

Towards the end of last year, I noticed myself struggling with the tension between wanting to develop and promote some sort of personal “brand” online and the actual reality of my tiny snippets of free time.  The worst part was, no matter how much time I spent tweaking, planning and writing, I never felt like I measured up to all the other amazing blogs and writers I love.  Frankly, I fell into the comparison trap, and it isn’t very restful!  I’ve also noticed that, instead of providing a satisfying outlet, blogging seems to feed a fever inside of me to reach for more ambitious projects than my stage in life will allow - things like writing a book (or two!) which would require me to sacrifice time my children need with me right now. 

I was sharing these tensions with a friend, and her quiet, wise response stopped me in my tracks.

“Maybe you could write your blog on the hearts of your children.”

You know?  Maybe I could.

I feel God inviting me to rest in the presence of my children.  I’ve been so busy managing them I’ve forgotten how to enjoy them.  Over these past couple months, as friends and loved ones reconnected with our family after a 2-year absence, seeing and hearing their comments and watching their joy in my kids jogged me into realizing I need to rediscover their preciousness all over again.  I need to tend their souls.  I need to observe their needs attentively and bring them to Jesus.  I need to rest my soul in prayer for them, carrying them to the heart of their Creator.  I need to seek wisdom as I try to do my part in shaping their character and their hearts.  

So, as this fresh new year unrolls practically speaking, among other things

I am taking a six-month blog break from January to July.  

Instead of writing for this space, I will be journalling about rest - and whatever else the Lord lays on my heart.  

I want to explore the beautiful theme of rest running through the Bible.  

I long to explore new - and old - rhythms of Sabbath rest, to learn how to rest well with my family… alone… in God’s creation… and in conversation.  

I’d love to increase my margins, create more whitespace in my life.  Earlier bedtimes, earlier rising times, more pausing, more looking around, more awareness.  

This year, I want to feed my soul creatively while feeding my family creatively (the end of last year saw us in a pretty monotonous menu rut!). 

I want to enjoy bringing my kids joy, and learning how to help each of them rest in the way he or she needs most.  

Every time I think the word “rest” to myself, I feel a delicious sense of ownership and anticipation.  Rest.  What a wonderful word.  I am looking forward to exploring it, doing it, experiencing and living it.  

I am anticipating discovering the rest of God.  

Do you feel a tug on your soul to join me?  If you do, will you pray for me, as I pray for you, that these next six months will be filled with refreshment of the soul and a rest we have never known? 

One verse God has laid on my heart for this year is from Exodus 33, during one of the most remarkable conversations in the Bible.  It takes place between God and Moses, right after the people of Israel have sinned greatly and God has punished them with plague and the sword.  Then, He pronounces the worst punishment of all: He is sending them on ahead, but He is not going with them lest He consume them on the way, for they are a “stiff-necked people”.  

(When I see that phrase, I feel the stiffness in my own neck - a trait my two-year-old daughter has certainly inherited!) 

Moses begs God to go with them, on the grounds that it’s His presence that sets the children of Israel apart from every other nation.  It’s the fact that God travels physically in their midst, leading and guiding them Himself, that marks them out as God’s chosen ones.  

Moses reminds God that He has said, “I know you by name, and you have also found favor in my sight.”  Then he pleads, “Now therefore, if I have found favor in your sight, please show me now your ways, that I may know you in order to find favor in your sight.  Consider too that this nation is your people.”

And God’s answer takes your breath away: 

“My presence will go with you, and I will give you rest.”  (Ex. 33:14)

There’s a lot more to this passage, and I’m planning to dive into it more and more deeply as this year unwinds, but for right now, I’m savoring those beautiful words tucked away in the middle of the conversation: “My presence will go with you, and I will give you rest.”  

Rest from our enemies.  Rest from the desert.  Rest from being alone.  Rest from slavery, from wandering, from the monotony of manna.  Rest from bickering and quarreling and complaining.  

Rest.  In the presence of God.  

Mmmm.  Doesn’t that sound good?

So.  I’ll see you in July.  In the meantime, I’ll tuck myself away in our little Central Asian village, enjoy my children, love my husband, cook some yummy food, and explore rest.  

P.S. I recently wrote a new song around Exodus 33:14, called “Rest”… click here to listen on Soundcloud.  May you be refreshed!  

What’s your word for 2015?  What about it excites you?  What about it is challenging?  What do you hope God will do in you this year through this word?

for when God calls your bluff

I have a confession to make.

I usually write and re-write each post several times, trying to get them word-perfect, thinking through everything to the enth degree to make sure I sound really profound...

I hardly ever write unscripted, directly onto the screen, like I'm doing now.  Part of my reason for writing and editing posts ahead is our usually frustratingly slow Internet (which seems to have picked up this afternoon).  But mostly I do it because I like to look perfect.

I like looking perfect.  I like to have my act together, do life fast and efficiently, never drop any balls.

Well, God called my bluff.  

Here's a grainy PhotoBooth picture of my two feet, currently stretched out on our veranda couch, and my latest acquisition: kasteli, in Russian.  

And here are a few thoughts on my two days so far - out of thirty - which I will spend on crutches...

Top Ten Things My Broken Foot Has Taught Me (so far):

#1 - Using crutches really hurts your armpits.

#2 - Not being able to do things fast - or at all - is driving this efficiency-craving person crazy.

#3 - Sara Groves' latest album, Invisible Empires (which I listened to in the car yesterday on my 2.5 hour journey - each way - to and from the city to get my foot x-rayed and casted) has taken on a new and deeper meaning.

Especially this song... (shown here live)...

and this one... her video had me grinning wide...

"promise, that just when love grows cold, you'll make it precious again..."

#4 - The book I started reading today and can't put down, Behind The Beautiful Forevers: life, death and hope in a Mumbai undercity (Katherine Boo), has put my entire life into perspective in a way I could not have absorbed before Friday.  If I am feeling inconvenienced and frustrated by a tiny crack in a toe-bone, how do I have a right to complain when so much of the world lives in poverty and agony and mark their good days by whether or not they had to eat rats for supper?

I have so. much.

I am so. blessed.

#5 - Being forced to slow down is good for me.  (You'll notice this is almost a repeat of #2, except here? It's positive.  See?  I'm learning already.)

#6 - Being required to rest shows me how bad I am at it.  This is not a good thing.  Which makes me thankful for the chance to learn how to do it better.

#7 - Having to depend on others for the simplest things (like toilet paper to blow my nose) is both humbling and life-giving.  The truth is, I am dependent, whether I like to admit it or not.  Hobbling around on one leg requires me to acknowledge that truth.  Which said acknowledgement is healthy for my soul.

#8 - Realizing I have the best husband in the world is making me fall in love with him all over again.  (As I type this, he's humming in the kitchen while making dinner.)

#9 - Depending on other people makes me depend on Jesus more. (see #7...is there a theme here?)

#10 - Breaking my foot earned me 8 hours in a car by myself (well, if you don't count my wonderful local taxi driver, who patiently ferried me all over the hot city from place to place).  It was a unexpected but oddly satisfying break from the routines of home, a chance to reconnect with God through music, and through meeting brand-new and surprisingly helpful and compassionate images of Himself.  I'm not saying I'll go out and break another bone just to have time to myself (ok, the thought has crossed my mind) - but every cloud does have a silver lining!

Extra Credit: #11 - Crutches can be used for all kinds of things, including machine guns and electric guitars.  

So... there you have it.  God called my bluff, and I'm now asking Him for the grace and patience to make it through another 28 days of hobbling, being needy and dependent, and asking for help.  

Pray with me?


With love,

Carolyn-on-crutches

how to ensure your words endure {June lessons in listening}

{My one word for 2014 is "listen"... Each month I'm posting the lessons I'm learning - find the rest of my posts on listening here!}

As a writer and an artist, I want to be heard.  I long for none of my words to fall to the ground.  

But as a human, I know that’s impossible.  The limitations of my sin nature, my personality, my background and my experiences ensure that at least some, possibly all, of my own words will eventually disappear. 

I’m still mulling over Mark Buchanan’s thoughtful and refreshing book The Rest of God.  He describes his life as an author, pastor, and speaker, and admits his own similar desire for his words to endure.  

“Either God, God alone, keeps our words from falling and scatters them wide,” observes Buchanan, “or else there is nothing in them worth keeping and scattering in the first place.  Our concern, our responsibility, is simply to hear and heed God…”

John’s gospel begins, “The Word became flesh and dwelt among us and we beheld His glory…full of grace and truth” (emphasis mine).

The only Person whose words are sure to endure is the Living Word Himself.  So, it follows that the only way for me to ensure what I say endures is to make my words the words of God.   

“Our speaking comes out of our listening,” Buchanan continues.  “What we say comes out of what we hear. We have to be people who listen, day and night, to God.  Our utterances ought to be as Jesus’s were: an echoing of the Father, an imitation of him….”

That’s a tall order.  When I read those words for the first time, my heart sank.  Given that I am not Jesus, that feels pretty much impossible!

But the word “echo” stood out to me: I might not be Jesus, but I can surely echo Him.  I can repeat back - pass on - the words I hear from Him in my own heart, the words I read from Him in the Bible, the things He shows me through experience and circumstance.  And if hearing God happens best when I am still, then the practices of Sabbath and listening are essentially connected. 

God is always speaking.

The Psalmist says, “The heavens declare the glory of God… Day to day pours out speech… Their voice goes out through all the earth, and their words to the end of the world.”

God is always speaking, but we’re not always listening.  

“There are so many voices,” says Buchanan.  “And there is such little time to listen, to truly listen: to winnow and test it all, to heed and reflect and respond...

“Sabbath is when we stop.  We slow down.  We play, we rest, we dream, we wonder.  We cease from that which is necessary and turn to that which gives life.  And in the hush that descends, we listen.”

The times when I can hear most clearly are times of stillness and quietness: in other words, when I’m cultivating a Sabbath heart. 

“God isn’t more likely to speak on your Sabbath than on any other day,” says Buchanan, “but you are more likely to listen.”

On the day the apostle John saw the Voice and the vision which became the book of Revelation, there are two key contextual details which Buchanan highlights: 

“One, he was in exile on Patmos.  He was, in other words, under an enforced silence and aloneness, a season of inactivity.  Two, it was Sunday, the Lord’s Day.  It was his Sabbath.  These conditions - the silence, the aloneness, the stillness, the Sabbath - might be beside the point.  Then again, they might just be the point.  It’s possible that they are mentioned because they form the necessary backdrop for true listening.”

~Mark Buchanan, The Rest of God, ch 12 "Listen: Stopping to Hear God"

It is only when we’ve first heard from God ourselves that we have something worth hearing to offer to our listeners.  

In one of Ann Voskamp’s recent posts, she urges her readers to take time every day.  She says, 

“Daily disciplines are doors to full freedom.

“Everyday take time. Everyday take time to feel the sun and the wind and the rain and feel that you are loved — and then let your life overflow with that love so that a thousand others feel that love. 

“Everyday take time to live loved — and live so others feel loved. 

“Everyday take time. Time is there for the taking. For the unwrapping.”

This daily unwrapping of the gift of time, the gift of Sabbath rest, frees us to truly listen, first to God and then to others.  

Ann continues, “Give someone the gift of listening… linger and look into their eyes and really listen and this is free and nobody can buy it and what is better than paying attention to someone with all of you fully present?”

Give yourself permission to receive God’s gift of Sabbath rest - not just the 24 hours once a week when you stop and play and revive your soul - but every day.  

photo credit: I. Winsley

Take time every day to rest, to still your soul and listen.  

In learning to be still enough to hear God, we will learn how to be still enough to listen, truly listen, to others.

photo credits: I. Winsley

of Bill Murray and keeping Sabbath {an unsolicited book review}

I recently finished reading one of the most restful books I’ve ever read.  It is, coincidentally, a book on the spiritual discipline of Sabbath; but whereas many “Christian” books leave my recovering-perfectionist-self feeling guilty and depressed about all the spiritual disciplines I’m not practicing or the good, Biblical things I’m not doing, this book left me feeling refreshed.  Life-filled.  Invited.  Excited about unwrapping the gift of Sabbath in my own life.  

Mark Buchanan’s The Rest of God is a beautiful and, for me, timely invitation to explore the Biblical command to keep Sabbath rest.  His pithy, insightful writing opened my spiritual eyes to see how keeping Sabbath and developing a Sabbath heart enables us to discover not just actual rest, but the rest of God - the things of God’s nature and presence we miss in our busyness.

“In a culture where busyness is a fetish and stillness is laziness, rest is sloth,” Buchanan muses.  

“But without rest,” he continues, “we miss the rest of God: the rest he invites us to enter more fully so that we might know him more deeply.  ‘Be still and know that I am God.’  Some knowing is never pursued, only received.  And for that, you need to be still” (p3).

Being still has never been easy for me.  I like to be doing, getting things done.  I tend to measure the “success” of my day by how many items I’ve ticked off my to-do list.  I struggle to live in the moment and I often resent interruptions.  I find it difficult to lay down my task and look the person full in the face.  

So this book was a much-needed breath of fresh air (and a kick in the pants) to show me how crucial Sabbath is to healthy, Biblical living.  And how much more expansive our potential for true productivity becomes when we joyfully keep Sabbath.  

One of the things that struck me was Buchanan’s differentiation between drivenness and purposefulness.  

He noticed that “the truly purposeful have an ironic secret: they manage time less and pay attention more” (78).  

He follows this up with an invitation to live generously.  Buchanan says that you actually generate “more” time by extravagantly giving your whole self, and all of “your” time, first to God and then to others.  

I wonder... is this really true?

Can I really generate “more” time by extravagantly giving time away?

Giving my time away definitely doesn’t come naturally to me.  I like to hang on to my time, count the seconds, hoard the minutes, and frugally dole out my hours.  The trouble with that approach is (hoarse stage whisper) - “It’s not really mine!”

If my time is not really mine, why do I hang on to it so tightly?  

Sabbath is about trust, Buchanan points out.  “[It] is turning over to God all those things—our money, our work, our status, our reputations, our plans, our projects—that we’re otherwise tempted to hold tight in our own closed fists, hold on to for dear life.” 

Oh yes.  I like hanging on for dear life.  It feels comforting to me.  Secure.  The trouble is, it’s exhausting! 

Buchanan continues, “[Sabbath] is letting go, for one day out of seven, all those parts of our identities and abilities in which we are constantly tempted to find our security, and discovering afresh that we are his children and that he is our Father and shield and defender” (98).

Is any of this hitting home for you like it did for me?  Doesn’t the idea of Sabbath sound delightful?  Just imagine: we’re offered - by God - 24 hours out of each week to take a break from our worries, our insecurities, and our drivenness, and just bounce joyously on the trampoline of the Everlasting Arms for a while?

In one of my favorite movies, “What About Bob”, Bill Murray plays a neurotic hypochondriac who relies on his psychologist for sanity and reassurance.  After Bob compulsively follows his psychologist and his family on vacation, turning up unexpectedly at the door of their cabin getaway, the irritated psychologist finally comes up with a way to get Bob to leave him alone: he tells Bob to take a vacation from his problems.  

“A vacation?” Bob is incredulous.  “From my… problems?”  A look of sheer joy spreads over his face, as the suggestion sinks in.  “Hah!  A vacation!  From my - problems!!”  He backs away happily, hands in pockets, and strolls off whistling. 

Dr. Marvin is overjoyed that his brainstorm worked so well and settles in to enjoy his family vacation - until Bob shows up bright and early at his screen door the next morning wearing a local t-shirt, and announces, “Good morning, Doctor!”  The speechless psychologist quickly pulls him around the corner and demands in a frantic whisper, “What are you doing here?”

Bob happily replies, “I’m on vacation! I’m just dropping by!  How are you, Doctor?”  

Flabbergasted at how his plan has backfired, Dr. Marvin proceeds to concoct a series of elaborate plans for getting rid of Bob, while his family gradually falls in love with Bob - who, on vacation from his problems, turns out to be a normal, likable guy.  

That’s what I want to do, once a week.  (Or every day?)  Take a vacation from my problems, and live in the realization that I am free from the power of sin over my life, and I have been invited into the rest of God.  

What about you?  Do you need a vacation from your problems?  Aren't you curious about the rest of God?

Stay tuned for more thoughts on Sabbath rest, coming soon… 

He is risen!

He is risen indeed!

one word for 2014…

Snuggling under a cuddly blanket, I’m savoring my mid-afternoon patch of “renewal”… I’ve read my snatch of devotional, eaten three squares of dark chocolate, and had my eyes closed now for about ten minutes.  

A familiar word starts to throb quietly in my brain.  

It’s become familiar word over these last two months of 2013.  I’ve heard it whispered in my heart on the way to a conversation, before picking up a book, before stepping out the door.

Now it swells to an urgency under my breastbone, an ache in my chest.  

Listen.

LISTEN.  

I obey.  Snuggled under the blanket, I let my thoughts slow, still.   I listen with my ears, with my heart.  

The hum of the furnace in the basement.  The soft rustle of my own breathing.  The ringing sound of silence.  The beat of my own heart.  List-en.  List-en.  

This moment swells into the continuous Now.  

He’s here.  It’s His voice breathing “Listen!” in a stage whisper.  It’s His urgency I feel - He doesn’t want me to miss something.

Miss what? I ask, burrowing further under my blanket, further into the widening moment.  Miss what, Lord?

Miss this.  Here.  Now. 

Miss Me.  

I almost did.  I almost had chocolate, inspirational words, cuddly blanket, and doze… and no Jesus.

But He’s here.  He's here.  And now my blanket, chocolate, words and rest are more than just a weary mother’s reward - they are His actual arms wrapped around me.  

Gratefulness swells.  

Listen.  I have so much more to show you.  There’s so much for you to learn.  Keep listening.  Stay close.  Don’t miss it.  

My one word for 2014 is… you guessed it - listen.  

Jesus is inviting me to listen to Him deeply, quietly, consistently, through each moment of each day.

He’s also inviting me to listen to people - His children, His art - in new, deeper, honest, sensitive ways.  

He’s promising me I will deeply enjoy Him, deeply enjoy people, and deeply enjoy being me if I simply take the time to… listen.  

The Scripture He’s giving me for 2014 is a promise I’m revisiting after 10 years.  In the spring of 2004, at the end of my first year overseas, my loving mentor, Patty, gave me this verse in a note written in graceful script on pale green paper.  Through her words of encouragement, I felt Jesus wrap His arms around me as I headed into my next challenging season.

Now, I sense Him re-gifting this promise to me again for 2014, even more directly this time:

“The Lord God has given me  

the tongue of those who are taught, 

that I may know how to sustain with a word  

him who is weary. 

Morning by morning he awakens,   

he awakens my ear   

to hear as those who are taught.” 

Isaiah 50:4

In this promise, I see His gift to me - the tongue of those who are taught.  I do have a tongue (that's for sure!), but... "one who is taught” implies a Teacher - and God is offering Himself!

I can see the why of the gift - in order to know how to sustain the weary with a word.  This is already the desire of my heart: to come alongside, to bear with, to feel with, and to bring others with me to the Source of soul-rest.  

Most importantly, I can see the how - how I am to receive this gift, how I am to be taught: listen.  Morning by morning, God promises to be my alarm clock, awakening my ear to listen and to learn.  Good thing, because I am not a morning person!  But once I’m up, I love the stillness of the house, and the quiet thrum of expectation that stirs in my heart.  And when I miss a morning - usually due to lack of self-control to go to bed the night before! - I crave that deep connection time with Him I’ve forfeited.

So.  That’s my word...  

What’s yours?

change poking through

When we moved into this house, it was a mess.  


The owners have a passion for fruit trees and were lavish in their planting: rows of pears all around the house perimeter, six huge walnuts by the back fenceline, tall leggy apricots in the side yard, cherries by the abandoned chicken coop.  The crowning glory is the small apple orchard that fills the backyard: thirty small apple trees planted in narrow rows with sturdy low-spreading branches.  

My husband, the farmer, was thrilled.  I, the musician-bookworm, was overwhelmed.  “It’ll be your thing,” I tell him, warning.  Abdicating.  What is this choking thing in me that makes me hesitant to try anything I don’t feel I can succeed at?

None of the trees had been pruned or tended in several years, and when we moved in last summer and looked out our back porch windows, all I could see was a jungle.  Where are the kids going to play? I wondered.  And then, with a sinking heart, How am I ever going to deal with all this fruit?

Nothing goes to waste in this culture.  Letting fruit drop off trees and rot on the ground because it’s too high to reach easily (or because you just don’t have the energy) is frowned upon.  There’s always the option of opening the gate wide and letting the neighbors in to pick (which I still might do), but all my overwhelmed-ness hadn’t counted on one thing: the rest that pruning brings.

Last fall, James cheerfully went out and bought a chain saw.  Every day when he came home from work, he went out to the backyard and I heard the engine revving its masculine roar while I cooked dinner.  He lopped off heaps of branches, whole tops of trees, even whole trees in some instances where they were half dead or just too crowded.  Our neighbors happily dragged away mountains of branches to feed their cavernous, ravenous bread ovens, leaving us with…. Space.  Open sky.  Lopped off trunks pointing stumpily in all directions.  Breathing room.

Part of me was happy about the tidying of the jungle; part of me grieved the amputations.  The part of me that wants to be a competent local housewife was thrilled to realize that ferocious pruning meant a much smaller fruit harvest this year… less for me to deal with!  

And then yesterday I made a startling discovery: if a tree is alive, it never stops growing.  (It sounds so basic when I put it like that, but I just haven’t grown up aware of nature, and each discovery is astounding.)  Right through the thick, scaly bark of those lopped limbs, some as thick around as my calf, the trees are pushing out new life.  I had no idea trees do this.  Tiny green shoots struggle to emerge, their frailty emphasized by the girth of their home limbs.  How in the world are they strong enough to get through those barriers? I wonder.

Just now, while I was peeling potatoes, I asked God if there’s anything he wants me to learn from this picture of new life.  Immediately, this thought began moving through my mind: “No matter how ingrained you think your habits are, or how neglected an area of your life may feel, or how discouraged you might feel that you’re not seeing growth, with my life in you, change is always possible.  I AM the growth-Author.  But - sometimes it might take some vigorous pruning to make way for new things.”

A mundane example popped into my head: I have never been a good flosser (of teeth).  My whole life, every six months at the dutiful and much-dreaded dentist visit, the hygenist would ask me that innocent and terrible question, “So, are you flossing?”  And I would always fudge and answer, “Weeeeelll… not every day (meaning, never)...”  So last year, my last year of my “twenties”, I decided to put “flossing” on Ann Voskamp’s daily “Do It for 100” form, along with “reading a verse with Will” and “get up before the kids to have devotions”.  And guess what?  I can count on one hand (ONE HAND!) the number of nights I missed flossing last year.  And my gums are pink and healthy and thanking me for it!  It took me 30 years to get around to making a new habit, and a whole year to hammer it in, but now I can’t imagine going to bed without flossing and if I forget, it feels weird.  

Change is possible.

At a deeper level, I can feel new growth emerging quietly in my soul this spring.  As tiny and frail as those green shoots, it’s poking through nonetheless - the result of epiphanies from Transformed Into Fire and a new, quiet awareness of resting in God’s presence and receiving his love.  It’s not every day yet that I create the space and time for intentional communion, but it’s oftener than before.  I’m starting to feel my soul (not my body, mind you) longing to get up half an hour earlier, and sit outside under some of those breathtaking trees to listen and absorb God’s presence.  

Maybe this will be the year of finally letting go of busyness and performance - with some vigorous pruning? - and allowing new green fronds of awareness to quietly lengthen into bloom.