Bloom.

In the last month God has been speaking to my heart about so many things, and to be honest, I haven’t heard God speak in a long time….a really long time. Not that he hasn’t been speaking, I think it’s more that I haven’t been listening. Or maybe God withholds his words from us sometimes to let us see things in ourselves we need to see? I’m not really sure I know about that, but that’s for a different blog.

Back to the point. I want to talk about dandelions. They grow just about anywhere. Have you ever noticed them growing out of the cracks in cement sidewalks? I have. And they do. They’re stem climbs through the soil in the crack and somehow amidst all the struggle they stay alive, they actually bloom beautifully. The thing about Dandelions is that they are incredibly resilient. Rain, snow, hail, or heat….they WILL bloom where they are planted. Pretty interesting to me. I can’t describe the thought this evokes in me without being cheesy, so I’m just going to say it. Here goes….I want to be a woman who knows how to “bloom where I’m planted”. There, it’s out. Cheeseball 1, Christin 0.

But let me be honest. The reason this analogy affects me so much is because I have a really hard time doing just that. I go along in life fearing and questioning and to make matters worse, looking to all kinds of circumstantial things to help me feel better about the fearing and questioning.

Sometimes I seem to live as though I need permission, to have fun, to create, to really live. I don’t think that many words can describe this pattern of living, but first, I can tell you what it’s NOT. It’s not brave, abandoned, exciting, or strong…..it is more……timid? No….(well it is, but that’s not enough of it) Sensitive? No. There’s a way to be sensitive without being….dare I say it? Cowardly….yep! That’s it. I’m a complete chicken. And now that I said it. There’s no going back.

So pressing on, I started by examining the reasons I tend to be afraid (that’s somehow and easier word to swallow than the word coward.) And the number one reason I came up with is this….I like to protect myself. Bottom line. I don’t like pain, I don’t like being uncomfortable and I especially don’t like being embarassed.

Somehow I feel like my self protection prevents me from ever experiencing pain, or being embarrassed. Realty check!! It doesn’t. The only result of hiding who I am and protecting is felling really alone when I do face hard moments in my life. Because hardships are unavoidable, they really are. As much as I want to believe that life will always go my way and I will never get hurt… I know the truth, in fact I think I learned that truth when I was a little girl. I’ve just been hiding from it for years. But alas, its is here. The pain, the heartache. Its all here, right on the surface and deep deep inside me. So I ask myself, what do I do with all this? And then while on running recently (I think a lot when I run). it hit me. I don’t DO anything. I learn how to BE, with myself, with others, with God. The thing about pain is that when we run from it, it only chases us down more and when its catches up to us (and it always will) its even stronger that it was 5 miles before. So the secret to “working on” this for me, is to be honest with it and with Jesus…..not for the purpose of fixing or finding the right memory or self help book that taps into my wounded heart. It’s being wiling to sit before God as his child. The God who is “I AM”. God who is good. God who IS love.

I think being with Him, in true intimacy, would in fact allow space to “bloom”. And I wonder what would happen if I bloomed wherever I was planted? If I let my God given strength and dignity be petals, and my dependence on him, the roots that run strong and deep? I think and hope my life could be (at the very least) and encouragement to others. I want to live with the freedom to say, “I don’t have it figured out”. So there we have it. I am on a journey. One that is at times......incredible, and sometimes very painful. But I’m on it. And I’ll do what it takes to just be on my path.

I pray. I seek. I trust you Jesus. Help me to learn to just be.