love fully.

Lately, I have this fear that if I start crying, I may not stop. And for those who know me, if you look up the definition of ugly cry in the dictionary you would find a photo of me. It ain't pretty. Not only is it not pretty, my ugly cry takes over any form of communicating that I may be attempting at that moment. I can't cry and talk at the same time.
With that being said, I have been trying really hard not to cry. It's not that there are not hard things that I am going through. Lord knows that there are many relationships that I avoid investing in recently because it just seems too hard. I recognize that this is not a good place to be. It is what it is.
That is, until my friends came over with dinner from one of my favorite local restaurants. As we sat eating rice and tacos and pointing out moments in our lives where we have experienced God's grace, I could feel the lump in my throat growing bigger and bigger. Crap. 'Snap out of it, Holly. Think of happy thoughts.' The pep talk was in vain. The damn broke and for the next twenty minutes I gave way to the ugly cry: snorts and all.
You maybe wondering why is this worthy of a blog post? It's purely selfish but I need to remind myself that God is still working even during the loud silence.
I am not sure how much my friends understood. There wasn't even a resolution to the hurt. But that's what made it so great. They allowed me to be me. We hugged, we cried, we blew our schnozes, we got mad and we laughed. It was real. It was honest. It was hard. It was so refreshing.
Those times when I hear people tell me that I am so strong, I will think back to this memory of sharing my ugly cry with friends eating El Rancho around my kitchen table.
These past few days has jarred the way in which we view life in light of the horrific tragedy that took place in Newtown, CT Friday morning. We will never be the same. Nor should we. I was watching an interview in which one of the people who was questioned about how we should respond to the evil simply responded, love fully.
Wow. Love fully.
Living with FA is becoming more and more isolating. But it CAN be so refreshing when I learn to love fully. I am so thankful that my friends lived out Romans 12:15 that says, " Be happy with those who are happy, and weep with those who weep." My ugly cry and all.

And they are total dog lovers...

RENEWED Hope

This week I met with four other women to discuss a devotional we are suppose to be doing as we are in the Advent season. Four weeks before Christmas. Anticipating Christ's birth with expectation and worship, all while we wait. Those three words hit me over the head with a brick: expecting, worshiping and waiting. This study is going to kill me. I am not very good at any of these "acts" in the world of Christianity. Frankly, I suck at all three.
I asked them if anything stuck out to them when reading the book. More specifically I challenged them to share one word that summarized what they took away from it. Without hesitation, one of the girls spoke up and said quite confidently, "Renewed Hope was what I took away." "SERIOUSLY??!!" is what I was thinking but instead I channeled a calm, reflective leader and asked her what she meant by that? This is the part that kills me. She expanded upon her thought by stating that God wanted her to be excited about what happened and stop being apathetic about her life. Okay, so I paraphrased it a bit. And I did what we are instructed NOT to do in a counseling session and made it all about me. Yes, there's a technical name for it but I can't think of it right now. I gave myself some grace and reminded myself this wasn't a counseling role. All in my head, of course.
Renewed Hope. It may be two words but man, they are two words I need to live by. I am weary of my apathy towards life. I am not sure what it looks like to discover a new outlook in life. Honestly, it's too overwhelming to tap into the very thing that may change my life. It's exhausting to think differently.
Extremely, tiresome that I need to head to bed. But tonight it's with those three words on my mind and a sense of RENEWED HOPE in my heart. Whatever that may look like.
Lately, it's been looking at these cute faces...

Yes, that's a bow from the tree that Barkley doesn't know that it's stuck to his lip. Pretty much sums up their personalities.