Healing.

As many of you know (writing as if sooo many people read this... anyway), the last few months have been really hard. Warning to any seniors: graduating/leaving Athens sucks. It is really hard to leave such great fellowship and kind of just be on your own. It dawned on me though last week that when I had first started at OU God thrust me into instant fellowship but in Akron, I've had to find it on my own; not that God hasn't provided or anything, but when I started at OU I was definitely not as strong in my faith so I don't know how hard I would have tried to seek a good community. So, I've been searching for that & recently started going to a small group provided by the church I've been attending. The format is a little different, the whole church not just the group, so that has been an adjustment, but I am praying to be encouraged and challenged, to continue growing in my faith. I've had really good conversations with people both times I've gone, so that has been really great. Kind of going along with this and I mentioned it in my last post is I'm learning how to be a long distance friend. I think I had lofty expectations leaving Athens and I'm learning how to adjust those. You get so used to seeing the same people everyday, I mean with my roommates I knew how their entire day was going and now I get a broad overview of the week - which is still good, I still get the most important information. It is a transition though. There's also the concept of "out of site out of mind" which I think some people fall prey to, I've been out of site thus slightly out of mind. Everyone is busy and I completely understand that but I made a point to talk to some people last weekend at Rockbridge about how lonely I've been feeling... because a long distance friendship takes hard work and intentionality on both person's part. I also just really suck at asking for help and am going to try to be more vulnerable, people won't know I'm struggling with something unless I let them know. So, I'm working on being more intentional with people but also adjusting my expectations. The relationships won't be the same, because our lives are changing & we're in different places, but they can still be great friendships.

Some other areas of struggle and healing for me are some pretty big character flaws. I have an immense sense of pride, which truly disgusts me. I'll catch myself giving myself praise for something stupid, that I don't even deserve credit for, because all I have to boast in is Jesus Christ (Galatians 6:14). At the same time, and I don't understand how, I struggle with self-worth and finding my worth in earthly things - which I think also plays into the loneliness & too high expectations for friendships, so I'm trying to remember my worth is in the Lord (Psalm 139). Lastly, I realized lately while hanging out with Josh & his family how little I think about my childhood. I have kind of just summarized it as crappy & an obstacle to overcome, a way God brought me to him. I have not really considered it all, not just the bad, but also the good. I haven't embraced the pain, but I am still bitter. So I'm trying to reflect on it and to embrace it all and to let go of this bitterness.

This is a new season in my life and it has been a rough transition but God is revealing to me some of His plans for me, to help me grow in my faith. One of the things I took away from the speakers at Rockbridge was to have a good foundation (Wise and Foolish Builders) in the Lord and I'm creating goals to build that.

This was a really long post.... so if you've read all of it, thank you, it means a lot.