Every Summer Has A Story

It’s true. Some of the stories are better than others.  Some we’d like to relive. And some we’d like to forget ever happened. But every summer has one…

I used to think that summer 2009 was the best summer of my life. (Side note: How was that ten years ago!?) In some ways it was and always will be.  It’s the summer where I fell in love for the first time, hard and fast. Late night swims, dates at the movies, and days down by the river; those memories, the good, the bad, and the ugly will forever be etched on my heart. 

This summer has a unique story of its own though.  Summer 2019:: I think it’s a story worth telling…

I knew this was going to be a good summer, because it started off with traveling to Israel for ten beautiful days.  I met the BEST people.  I walked where Jesus walked, prayed in the Garden of Gethsemane, and worshipped on the Sea of Galilee. It was beautiful. Everything. The people. The place. All of it. Something in me changed in those ten days, and I can’t quite explain what. But I came back different. More confident in who God created me to be, but also more aware that I didn’t love the person I was. (More on that later.)

 I came home to a classroom that still needed to be packed up and loads of grad school work. Real life. Adulting. The best of times. The worst of times.  Packing up my classroom was HARD. I was leaving a school that I LOVED and kids and families that I adored. With every box I packed I wondered if I had made the right choice to leave. (If you’ve known me for any amount of time you know how decisionally challenged I am so you shouldn’t be too surprised by that.)

Walking away from my job was by far one of the scariest and hardest things I’ve ever done. Everything I crave in life I gave up when I decided to take a year off from teaching. Consistency. Routines. Stability. All gone. But I truly believe that sometimes good is the enemy of BEST. I’m seeing that truth in so many areas of my life these days.

Remember earlier when I said that God awakened a confidence in my heart in Israel…let’s get back to that because I think that’s the real story of this summer…

I was struggling before I left for Israel. One of those quiet struggles, where sometimes you don’t even know you’re struggling ‘til you’re on the other side of it.  Struggling with my identity and self-worth.  Struggling with body image issues. Struggling with community. Struggling to find my place with certain friendships. Struggling to find a church to call home.  Struggling with not feeling wanted, included, or accepted. Just plain struggling.  

For a long time, I think know I’ve been consumed with what other people think about me.  Not publicly of course. I play it off as if I don’t care, but truthfully have been consumed with being wanted, love, and accepted by others. God rescued me from that while I was in Israel. I don’t know how exactly, but He did.

I came home and feel freer than I ever have. Free to be me. Free to no longer stay in situations that aren’t life-giving. Free to walk away from people and things that continued to hurt me. Free to change things about myself that I don’t like.  Free of other people’s opinions about me and expectations of me.  Free to invest in myself and in friendships with people who truly know and love me.  Free to share my heart and struggles with people I trust. Free to actually love others well. Free to live, really. I know it sounds cliché. I get it. Heather went to Israel and it changed her life. As cliché as it is, it’s true. I don’t think the important thing is where it happened, but that it did.

You see God knew exactly what He was doing when He prompted me to take a year off from teaching and finish my degree.  Taking this year to focus on my education is giving me SO much freedom.  Freedom that I didn’t even know I needed or wanted. Remember my love of consistency?  I thought that’s what I wanted, BUT God…He knew all along and had something far better than I could imagine.  He knew that as much as I love routines and structure, that I NEEDED so much more. 

Isn’t that just like God, to not give us what we want, but what we need?  He knew when I was scared to death to turn in my letter of resignation that I needed this year of freedom. 

So, what has this new found freedom looked like so far this summer?   It’s looked like being real and honest with people about how I feel and what I want. It’s me intentionally investing in friendships that I had neglected because “I was too busy” or “too tired.”  It’s having gut level honest conversations in the pool, and late at night with a sweet friend who’s walking through this lovely season of singleness with me. It’s looked like putting myself out there and taking chances that six months ago I would never had taken.  It’s looked like being comfortable in my own skin.  It’s been me crying out to God and being honest about where I’m at, what I want, and my heart.  It’s looked like planning a trip to Texas this fall to spend a week with some of my favorite people in the world.  It’s looked like spending days running Kallee to VBS, picking her up from cheer camp, and eating a ridiculous amount of Chickfila.  It’s looked like actually taking care of my body and exercising. (I know that doesn’t really jive with eating a ridiculous amount of Chickfila, but life is all about balance, right?)  In fact, just last night after I got home from a run, I was talking to my mom and she said “Who are you?”

I knew she meant that in regard to the fact that I decided to run 2+ miles which I probably hadn’t done since I ran cross county in high school. But the question went a lot deeper than that for me. “Who are you?” I don’t know. I still have a lot to figure out. I’m currently churchless and wrestling with what that looks like and how to move forward. I’m currently unemployed, and back in school full time after teaching for 8 years.  Everything that I used to frame my identity around is no longer there, which would normally terrify me. But I find it oddly freeing that I don’t know. 

Here’s what I do know…I know I like the person I’m becoming now. I know I feel more confident in my own skin than I have in years, maybe ever. I know that I’m excited about the freedom that I have and I’m expectant about this upcoming year. I know it’s okay to not have all the answers and not have it all figured out.

You see my life is a big, beautiful, mess currently and that’s okay. I have a lot that I need to figure out. I have a lot of decisions to make about my future in the upcoming year. I have a lot to work on in my relationship with the Lord and with other people. I have a lot of ways I want to grow personally and professionally.  And I don’t know what any of that looks like right now.  I just know that I’ve been given the gift of freedom and time to figure it out.   

So as my mom so beautifully put it the other night, “Who are you?” I’m not sure. But I can tell you this much, I'm not the girl I used to be and I'm confident that this will be the year that I figure it out.  So, here’s to this summer and the story it’ll continue to tell…