Is your heart alive?
My heart feels like it is might burst; expanded to a capacity where I know something deep has taken place.
Why? I did something CRAZY!
I journeyed with a few women away to the mountains this past weekend and turned everything OFF.
Cell phone. Computer. Email. Social Media. OFF
MAGICAL.
Have you done that recently? Taken a day or two and unplugged?
Let go of the tangled web of comparison…
I can’t begin to tell you how clear-headed, clean and energized I feel.
Life comes at us at a million miles an hour.
Work demands our strength.
Family requires our attention.
Friends desire our time.
Daily tasks delay without attention.
But what about your heart, dear daughter? Is it alive?
Do you remember glimpses of YOU before the swirls of life took over with its needs?
Are you living from your heart?
In returning home from this weekend, I am pondering the idea, the notion, the audacious and terrifying longing of living from the WHOLE heart.
Not living from my daily task list, work demands or even family necessities. (They never seem to stop, do they?)
But the heart? I’m not sure I have time for all that…
In Biblical language, your heart is the center of the human spirit, from which spring emotions, thought, motivations, courage and action; thus it is the ‘wellspring of life’ (NIV Study Bible Note on Psalm 4:7)
Our heart houses so many beautiful aspects of our identity. It is the source of our thought life, what we feel and all of our deepest desires. How many of us feel like our heart is barely beating, our dreams have fallen under piles of laundry and the feeling of opening up brings up pain and heartache.
All too often we hear voices scream “Suck it up… You don’t have time to feel… You are too much and no one cares…”
Yet God, in the riches of His goodness, has called us to live wholehearted, alive in love with Him. He has crafted us to represent His glory and beauty, aspects of His nature that only women can display. Our heart is essential to our very being, the core of who we are. Without it open, tender and vulnerable, we fall into deception, confusion, isolation and despair. (Anyone else out there??)
Yet there is a Father who loves, sees and cares.
A Father in heaven who wants to take us on the journey to discovering how we can learn to love US.
To be patient with the process, gentle with the journey, humble in the breaking and loving what He intentionally made.
You, beloved, are not a mistake.
You, dear daughter, are not too much.
You are bright, beautiful, astounding, capable, tender, fierce, courageous, inviting, beautiful and life-giving.
You have much to offer and much to experience.
Find a safe place to sit in silence, even for just a few moments, and ask your Father to take you on a journey of discovery. A journey into the place of loving yourself, accepting your faults and patiently opening your heart to His love.
The adventure is worth it.
You have a huge part to play in the most beautiful of stories.
YOURS.
xox,
