So much on my mind

So, I have a lot to pray about and think about and work toward. As some of y'all know, my work is getting so stressful to the point where I dread getting out of bed every morning. But, I am thankful to have a job, in this economy, and I am thankful to have benefits and great co-workers...it's just other factors in it that are stressing me to the max and the fact that I am not able to be there for my kids as I would like. But...again...I am so incredibly thankful to have a job right now when there are so many who I know that are struggling to find one, and my prayers are with them that God will provide richly for them.

I love my secondary job with AdvoCare that I do from home right now and hope to turn that into full time within the next year or so. This past weekend they had "Success School" that I was unable to attend this time but they had over 13,000 people attend. On Sunday there was an optional church service in the Ft. Worth convention center. You might think that only a handful would show up. No, I was told that it was completely filled to capacity and I saw the pictures, and it was. Many of the key leaders in this company are very strong and committed Christians, several are pastors or involved in their church in some pivotal way. My team in Texas is extremely involved in their respective churches. I love that! They have tickets for 20,000 for the next Success School in February...less than 500 are left. Tickets just went on sale Sunday.

Additionally, when I went "home" to Iowa and Minnesota this past week for a family reunion – first one in 19 years that didn't involve a funeral – not only did Emily and Nate love it, I also started to feel the tug of maybe that's where we belong. Emily loved the small towns and wants to live in the country where life is slower paced, people know each other and everyone is more "God oriented" – this coming from a 10 year old who's lived in the big city all her life...shocking, right?! She loved it so much so, and the chance to be around family on the farms and in the small towns, that she started getting stomach issues (she has a nervous stomach) when we started heading back to Texas. She wanted to stay there. In fact, she wants to live in Dave's parent's farm house and on their farm. LOL!

Dave's family very much wants me/us/the kids up there, as well as my cousins...the ones who live in the area...and there are MANY. I think that all of us would seriously thrive up there, but it's scary as all get out thinking about it, especially when I've never moved from Austin and have lived there all my life. Then there's my church that I so greatly love... Plus, Dave just moved down to Texas, yadda, yadda, etc. While he and I are no longer dating, we are each other's absolute best friends, we do everything together, and yes, we still love each other with all of our hearts, it's just that the timing isn't right...but I'm pretty sure that if I moved somewhere else, he would follow. 

It seems that the older I get, the more mature I become, both spiritually and in life, and the less I find I have in common with my group of friends and I've been drifting from them for a while now. I don't love them any less, I just have much less in common with them than I did a few years ago. There's less tying me to Austin than there's ever been. The only negative is that my mom probably wouldn't move with us up there. She says she loves to visit, but she doesn't want to always have to "be on someone else's schedule".

I just have so much to bring before God in prayer...so much. And I have to make sure that I truly LISTEN to what He tells me. Who knows, maybe we'll be gone *in the blink of an eye* before then, but right now, I know that I have to do something to work on being able to be a work from home mom. The kids need me and I need to be there for them. Maybe that is here in Austin for the long(er) haul.

I posted the following on FB yesterday. I wanted to post it here too. It seems, to me that the more I talk about it, the more accountability I have, the more I am determined to make it a reality.

I have dreams...BIG dreams...that I've been thinking a lot about on this last week's family vacation and I have some hard work and dedication up ahead to turn those dreams into reality, but it WILL happen...make no mistake. I have my VISION, my GOALS, my DETERMINATION and most importantly my WHY. The only thing standing in my way is me. Change my mindset and I change my path. I change my path and I change my destiny. I change my destiny and I change my legacy and that of my family. Challenge myself, my mind, my body. Challenge myself to change my life.

I want that destiny and legacy for myself and my family to be a Godly one full of promise, and I feel maybe I'm being called from Austin to elsewhere in order to accomplish that in full. I just don't know where, but it might be back "home" to Iowa, specifically. At least that's where I feel a tug but God will guide me, I just need to listen, and listen with an open mind and an open heart, which is the hardest for me to do, when I'm so "self sufficient" because I've had to be in order to take care of myself and my kids. I have the utmost trust and faith in God that He will provide for us, but it's hard for me to step out on that faith because I can't see where it leads. 

A great analogy from a phone call that I was on last night at 9:00 with the national team put it this way. There is a difference between a front flip on a trampoline and a back flip on a trampoline. The front flip is so much more difficult, but that's the one that most people do because they can see where they're going. It's stable and predictable...but incredibly hard to do. The back flip is exponentially easier to do, but so few try it because they can't see where they're going.

It's the same way in life. So many people do the same thing, day in, day out because it's stable and that's all they know and they can see where the stable, predictable life will lead, even though it is harder to trudge through a job they hate, or a life that is lacking...life. They do it anyway. If they stepped out on faith, with God's help, even though it is scarier because they can't see where they're headed, it actually is easier to do the unknown and put that hard work into it in order to reap the rewards that will come.

Even when I was in gymnastics and did springboard diving, I always went for the back flips. So I guess I already have that ingrained in me. LOL! One thing I do know...If you don't focus on building YOUR OWN dreams for you and your kids and family, you will always be hired to build someone else's dreams. 

Just have to step out and do it if it is where God leads me. There are a lot of obstacles in the way to get there, but if it's where God is leading, then He WILL provide the way. 

It's about love, love, love...it's about love.

I've had a lot of time to think about the verb, the action, the definition of love lately. Andrew Landon summed it up pretty much perfectly here (with a few additions of my thoughts) so I will let him take over, for the first part anyway. This is probably one of the most important and well said definitions I have found yet of what love, the reality of it, is all about.

"Love is a funny thing. You expect it to be easy. You expect it to be a world of roses and laughs and perfect moments that you find only in movies. You expect them to always say the right thing, and always know exactly how you feel, or exactly how to react to it. You expect them to calm you down when you're yelling or to chase you when you run away. You expect so much that you feel entirely and utterly defeated when something doesn't exactly match up with all your plans. But that's the thing. Love isn't a plan. It doesn't have a certain beginning and it certainly has no end or visible finish line to those deeply in it.

Love happens; and it is so incredibly messy. People around you can't comprehend why you do the things you do, or why you fight so hard for something that seems to cause you so much pain, because simply, they can't see. They can't see the invisible ring of insanity that surrounds you when you're in love. It's inconvenient and painful and devastating at times, but we can't live without it. We can't breathe the same way or function quite right without it. See, that's the thing about love. You hold it up to all these images you've learned to attach to the word 'love' since you were little.

We learn so many things about love before we are even capable of falling. Don't rush in. Keep steady. Prince Charming/your Princess will fix everything. What you don't learn is how hard love is. How much work it takes. How much of ourselves we have to put into it. How it isn't worth it until we are complete and utter idiots about it. Don't rush in? I practically dove with my eyes closed; fully aware that I had drowned before. "Love is a battlefield." Never really made sense because it is contrary to everything we have been taught to believe how 'love' is supposed to be. But it is so entirely different.

Love isn't them calming you down when you yell. It's them yelling, just as loud, just as hard, right back at you, right in your face to wake you up and to keep you grounded. It isn't him bringing you roses everyday or pretty things that make your relationship appear more presentable. It's after a long fight, that drains the life and bones right out of you both, and yet him showing up at your door the next morning anyway. It's not her saying all the right things or knowing exactly how to handle you. We are human beings. We don't handle one another, and we can't be handled. We are mutable creatures that need something different everyday. Need something more or less to keep us going, to keep us believing that it's not all for nothing.

So no, it's not them holding you and telling you everything is going to be all right and will be sunshine and roses. It's them standing there, admitting they're just as scared as you are. You have to remember that with love, you're not the only one involved. You've unknowingly put your life, your heart into the palms of another person's hands and said, "Here, do what you will. Mash it into mince meat. Or forget I ever handed it to you. As long as you have it."

That's the thing about love. It makes us crazy. It makes reality invisible and it erases all the lines that we shouldn't cross. Because love isn't about fencing ourselves in; feeling safe, feeling sure about the future. It's about scaring the shit out of every nerve in our body, but pushing forward anyway. Because all the fighting and all the tears and all the uncertainty is WORTH IT. And it's a hell of a lot better than being 100% happy without someone to show us that there is a world of a difference between feeling 'happy' and feeling whole."

In love you don't give up when the going gets tough. Love can be simple, and it actually really is. It can be made to be so complicated though when people over think it. We have become a disposable, throw away society, tossing what doesn't conform perfectly to our idea of what we think love "should" be. There are a lot of "should's" in life, but rarely do they ever match up with that fairytale definition/vision in our head. "Should" isn't "IS".

We have become so conditioned to thinking love HAS to be a certain way. BS! What works for one, doesn't work for someone else, and so forth and so on. Love is not perfect. It IS messy. There are no perfect relationships or people. There are only perfect moments worth cherishing and treasuring that are created by two imperfect people who share love. If you know someone who thinks love should be a perfect story from beginning to end, tell them to go see a romance movie because that's the only place in life where things work out "perfectly"and in the span of 2 hours.

There will be arguments and misunderstandings in love, let downs happen and illusions are shattered, but love will mean that you will try your absolute hardest to get over any hurdles and issues together. True love isn't selfish and can bring people together in a way nothing else can, it is a soul connection, a commitment of the heart. Love is seeing the person for exactly who they are and loving them anyway, with all their faults, flaws and the things that annoy or irk you sometimes and that you may not understand because you know that they are so much more than those things. So much more than their past. They bring life to your life because of who they are.

Love is understanding that the differences, big or small, are ok because you know that those differences compliment each other. Where I am weak, you are strong and vice versa. Love is celebrating the similarities. Love is allowing the other person to expand your experiences and show you things you may have missed without them there to show you. Love is knowing that you can trust them with your deepest secrets and know that they won't look at you differently because they know YOU...and love you anyway.

Love should never be taken for granted, although often it is. Love is more balanced than the highs and lows that passion and frustration bring. Love can conquer all, but only if work and effort from both sides is implemented in order to not destroy love. Understand that it is not perfect, but it can bring perfect moments together, moments you want to capture in other ways, so you build and grow together.

If the person in your life makes you want to be a better person, if they challenge and motivate you and make you think, if being around them allows you to just "breathe" because you can be yourself, relax, allow yourself to be vulnerable with them...hold on to that. If they encourage and support you and don't laugh at your dreams, that is worth its weight in gold.

Love is feeling more right with a certain someone than you have ever felt with anyone else, regardless of the challenges or the differences. Because you know you belong. You know you, and your heart, are safe with them. Because they let you know in ways, big or small, that you matter.

Love is give and take and falling in and out of love several times...but always with the same person. And when the "out of love" happens, it's holding on because you know that those seasons in life come and go. So do the good times and the hard times. Having someone there with you to weather the storms and celebrate the joys is what makes all of it worthwhile.

Love isn't the fairytale we would all like for it to be. It, like life, doesn't come with an "easy button". It's hard, it's work, it's gritty work sometimes, it's fun, it's acceptance and understanding, it's bending so that it doesn't break irreparably, it's trusting the other person with your heart and taking care of theirs, it's mutual respect and honor, it's creating the good memories and the laughter to guide you through the tears and the sorrows and the not so good times, it's opening yourself up to hurt and pain and allowing yourself to be vulnerable, it's letting someone else in with all their baggage, their past experiences, and being unable to see your life without them in it...it's protecting and cherishing each other and what you have created. Love, as non-fairytale like as it is, truly is beautiful in all of its forms and inceptions. It's worth fighting for and working on daily once you have it.

Love, after all, is what they say makes the world...makes YOUR world...go 'round.