You're TOO emotional

"There is nothing to writing. All you do is sit down at a typewriter and bleed." 

~ Ernest Hemingway

It's 10:38 on a Wednesday night and I'm exhausted. My brain feels fuzzy, foggy, my body overwhelmed by the sheer magnitude and weight of what I've seen today.

I desperately want to go to sleep... but I can't. I need to bleed first.

I aspire to one day grow into the kind of writer that can write when it's convenient. The type of person that can schedule writing in, like a dentist appointment, or a vacation to the coast. I want to be the master of my writing, and control it, rather than it controlling me.

But as a trainer trying to tame an unbroken horse... I'm not there yet.

I'm controlled by my writing... it pushing and pulling me around... stopping me midway through conversations because when inspiration strikes I have to write, and I have to do it immediately. Otherwise, like a rainstorm in Africa... it's there one moment, and flows heavy and thick and fully... and then it's gone.

But my writing is controlled by something else... something that I've spent my whole life trying to bridle, tame, and break... my emotions.

My writing relies almost entirely on my emotions... one doesn't come without the other living in full swing... which is inconvenient considering emotions and I have been sworn enemies for years.

In third grade, I remember standing on the playground, near the foursquare court with my lunchbox in one hand, and my broken heart in the other.

Kids were being kids, and in that particular instance, I came up on the short end of the stick. My feelings were hurt and I was completely clueless as to what I had done to deserve such treatment.

And then my mom said a sentence that I have fought ever since. 

"Stephanie, you're just sensitive!" 

She wasn't saying it in a condemning way at all... she wasn't chiding me for not having a thicker skin, but instead trying to explain the cause of my pain.

But that's not the way I understood it. 

I understood 'sensitive' to mean that your heart hurt. And so 'sensitive' was something I was desperate to get rid of.

Over the years, a bit after puberty hit, the word 'sensitive' transformed into the word 'emotional.'

And as I got older, and life got more complicated, 'emotional' increased.

It increased until I felt like I was on the verge of just being certifiably crazy- a feeling that rose up in me, causing me to act in ways that I couldn't explain, nor excuse... and much to my dismay, could not control.

Things like excessive amounts of alcohol, destructive relationships and shallow friendships exacerbated the crazy. My emotions were out of control, mostly because I didn't have the ability to even identify them.

I sat on my bed in my sorority house one night, the phone pressed to my ear, the most painful words I can remember hearing coming from the other end.

"I can never date someone as high maintenance as you again." 

The first and possibly only person that I had ever let see the full breadth of my emotions had thrown them all into a bag, and kicked it back in my direction... like garbage. 

And there I was, left to pick up the pieces. 

Once the tears calmed down, and the searing in my heart subsided, I vowed to myself to get rid of my excessive emotions once and for all.

Once I met Jesus, things calmed down a bit... I was able to identify my emotions, and start to maybe even dig for a cause... but that didn't mean they went away. I still found myself fighting them with all of my heart. 

I didn't even want to HAVE emotions, because to me they meant one of two things... hurt because I cared more than I wanted to, or rejection, because the depth of my emotions were just too much to handle.

Sitting here, at now 10:50 on a Wednesday night, I know that I'm different. The exacerbating factors are gone, my feet are firmly planted on the most solid of rocks and my emotions have become a pretty accurate and legitimate thermometer for what's going on in a situation.  

But although the piercing insecurity, pain and most of the lies are gone... fear was left in its wake.

What if I can't control my emotions when I get home? What if they come back, what if I find myself caring too much, or even worse, BEING too much? What if I'm really too much to handle? Too much to love? 

I'm afraid.

I'm afraid of my own emotions, because they've always been looked at as such a bad thing. They're either the cause of my pain, or the reason for rejection. And so I've rejected them!

But sitting here tonight, WANTING to go to bed, I'm realizing that emotions definitely don't deserve the reputation they've gained in my life. And even more astonishingly, that they're important!  

First of all, although it is a commitment and an action... 'love' is also an emotion- a fantastic one at that. It's one that literally makes colors brighter, makes your steps lighter and brings hope into a world that can sometimes feel lonely and cold. 

Today I felt anger. I felt the kind of anger that I imagine filled Jesus as he walked into the temple, seeing it turned into a market place. 

I walked into a hospital room and saw an emaciated baby that was just moments from death. I looked into the mother's face and listened to her tell me that there was nothing wrong with her baby. I nearly screamed. I wanted to flip tables over. I wanted to jump up and yell... "THIS BABY IS DYING! CANT YOU SEE THAT!?" 

We fed the baby, educated the mom, and prayed with all our hearts for that little life, just hanging on by a thread. But still... righteous anger filled my chest today.  

And you know what?! I'm GLAD!

I WANT to be righteously angry when the time is right. Because it's that righteous anger that causes us to DO something about the injustice we see. 

On the opposite side of the emotional spectrum... 

I walked into the maternity ward yesterday morning and got to hold a two-day-old baby that had yet to be named. The parents looked expectantly at us, wanting us to name their child. So we did! We named him James Emmanuelle, letting them know that those names placed a big calling on their little boy's life. It was beautiful. I thought my heart was going to leap out of my chest with joy.

Those are emotions, and they're rich and beautiful and ridiculous. They're the spark that gives color to the world... they're the fire that gives meaning to situations and inspires action in a way that nothing else can.

And until I become more seasoned and maybe even a bit more disciplined, my art, my writing, my craft, depends on my emotions. And I love that! 

I love feeling something deeply and being able to transfer that feeling onto paper. I love being able to capture an experience in words that make you feel like you were actually there. 

I heard a quote once that compared emotions to a heart monitor. There are ups and there are downs... but when you flat line, it means you're dead. Emotions are the things that remind us that we're human. They're the color and the flavor and the dimension to our experiences on this earth. 

My dear friend Christian has had a front row seat the past seven months as I've dug through what it means to be a woman and what it means to feel.

Remembering the distain I've had for my heart, he sent me something that his friend, Drew Caldwell wrote... defending the value of emotions:

"If you have ever ridden a horse, then you know that horses are big animals. They are frighteningly strong. And yet for thousands of years we have ridden these beasts and used them to accomplish our own objectives.

Like riding a horse, the issue is not whether or not your emotions are too strong. In my opinion, the stronger the better. The issue is whether or not your hands are firmly on the reins. We want to be better riders, not to own weaker horses.

Inspirational figures like Mother Teresa and Martin Luther King Jr. did not accomplish all they did because of their lack of strong emotions. They did not gain a following by their stoicism or logic. They were emotional people, who demonstrated a high degree of control over where their emotions took them. Their powerful emotions worked for them, not the other way around."

This is something I'm still wrestling through. Emotions and I have been enemies so long, it's tough to overcome our hostile past. 

But I'm declaring... now and forever... that emotions are a beautiful part of who I am, a beautiful part of who we all are. 

I'm done fighting, and I'm done begging for a weaker horse. 

I'm just becoming a better rider. 

For my loved ones back home...

For my loved ones back home:

This last weekend, I was sitting under a cabana in a restaurant, surrounded by gorgeous red tile, lush tropical plants, and beautifully set tables. I was sitting across the table from one of my greatest new friends, Brittany, talking about a million things, and nothing all at the same time.

We were sipping crisp white wine, and scooping up chocolate cake a la mode with spoons... trying hard not to steal the other's portion as we savored every bite. 

And then it began to rain.

If you haven't had the fortune of experiencing an African rainstorm, I hope that one day you will.

That phrase, 'when it rains, it pours' must have been coined on this continent, because I've never seen an African drizzle. When it rains, it truly pours; drowning out sound, sights and this weekend I watched it completely hide the Nile from view (it was right in front of me). 

We looked around for our waiter, wondering if we should run for cover, but then stopped. Our cabana was perfectly large enough to protect just our table, our cake and our wine, from the pounding rain.

African rain is intense but it's refreshing, inspiring; it makes you take a breath and affords you a moment to reflect. 

I watched the raindrops fall on the petals of my favorite flower, pink hibiscus, and felt cool and clean and hopeful.

It was the perfect moment... made even MORE perfect by the perfect soundtrack.

With African rain surrounding us... Toto's Africa was clearly the song for the moment.

I whipped out my iPod and we put headphones in, laughing and singing and marveling at the unbelievable pleasure that was our life in that moment.

And then, with my insides lazily relaxing into my glass of wine, I began to listen to the lyrics... with fresh ears this time. 

"It's going to take a lot to take me away from you- there's nothing that a hundred men or more could ever do..."

And I began to think of you... my friends, my family, my loved ones... all those I left behind.

Although the Race has the makings of the perfect 'escape'... an escape from a past, from a present, from a future... from a life that looks differently than we had ever planned or wanted... that's not what it was for me.

My decision to go on the race had nothing to do with running away. It had nothing to do with escaping, and as I think of the people I left behind, I am filled with love and longing, nothing else.

I didn't leave to run away. 

As I was listening to Toto croon away- I was reminded of the process of leaving. And he described it pretty perfectly for me.

It took absolutely all of my strength to leave you. There's nothing that a hundred men or more could ever have said or done to make me leave.

I hate missing the moments that matter: weddings, funerals, baptisms, slumber parties (yes... those still happen), laughter, tears, hugs and kisses. I HATE missing those things.

It took SO much to take me away from you. 

It took exactly one man's voice.

He said; "Go" and I went.

"Go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age." 

~Matthew 28:19-20 

I went because Jesus asked me to. 

I'm saying this all to remind myself as much as to remind you.  

I don't want you for one second to think that you're forgotten. I will not come back someone unlike the person you knew... I will just come back a better version of myself. But I haven't forgotten you. I haven't stopped loving you.  

And I'm saying this for my benefit because here I am, now over halfway done with the race, yet sometimes although the end is drawing nearer, I still feel very far away. 

Sometimes, in the dead of night, bumping down African roads on buses, and staring out the window at the sleeping villages that pass by in a blur, it's easy to feel alone. It's easy to wonder what I was thinking in signing up for something like this. It's easy to miss home- even letting myself believe for just a second that I never should have left.

"After all, I haven't forgotten them, but have they forgotten me? Am I going to come back hoping to slip back into the role I once filled... only to find that I've been replaced?"

These are the fears that try to knock at the door of my mind late at night.

But it's days like this one... wine, cabanas, and refreshing African rain that remind me that none of those fears will ever come true. 

Matthew 19:29 says "and everyone who has left houses or brothers or sisters or father or mother or children or fields for my sake will receive a hundred times as much and will inherit eternal life."

I didn't go on the race to be rewarded... that honestly was never my goal, but that's what's happened... and it's not even over yet.

The reward isn't a far off, illusive sort of idea... the type of idea that if you tried to put a number on, or close your fist around would end up just being a puff of smoke.

Jesus has rewarded my sacrifice every single day that I've been gone.

And it was all tied together for me in one beautiful moment of understanding, while listening to Toto, in the pouring Ugandan rain.

Matthew 7:7-11 says that God is a great gift giver. He never gives us things to trick us... when we ask one thing of Him, he never gives us the opposite to spite us, or to vindictively 'teach us a lesson.' He's a good gift giver... all the time. Even when he IS teaching us lessons.

I'm learning an extraordinary amount of lessons right now, and I have been all year... but alongside this discomfort, this stretching, this refinement by fire, have been fantastic gifts.

And it's not just that He's made me into a secure woman, confident of my worth, sure of who I am, and to whom I belong... it's not that He's delivered me of hurts and wounds and scars, and in their place filled me with joy, beauty, peace and an anointing beyond my wildest dreams... it's more than that.

God, having taken me away from my family, my friends, my loved ones... has rewarded me in little, beautifully intimate ways... ways that only I would notice.

This last weekend I got to raft the Nile in Uganda. I got to get flipped out of a boat on a gigantic class 5 rapid, and float down the river wrapped in my life vest, only to look up at the sky and thank the Lord for being a God that loves adventure.

I got to stand in a gorgeous wooden bar that overlooked the river and watch as a rainstorm made the Nile completely disappear... surrounded by 43 friends and fantastic country music.

I even got to have a massage (8 USD) at the hotel next door!

God knows me. He knows my heart intimately, and he knows my love language for sure. He knows the gifts that make me smile, and make me feel loved and pursued. And he's filled this year with those little treasures.

He's filled this year with love and adventure and beauty beyond anything I could have even thought to ask for. 

God asked me to sacrifice my greatest loves... he asked me to sacrifice YOU. But his Word promises us that our sacrifices will be rewarded... today AND for all of eternity. And he wasn't kidding.

So yes... it took a LOT to take me away from you. I miss you always... but there is not one day that goes by where I don't trust the Lord with you in his hands. 

He's proving his goodness and his love and his faithfulness and his 'good gift giving' to me every single day out here... in big ways and small ways. He's good. All the time. Every day. And so I trust him. I trust him with today, with tomorrow, with this month and the next. I trust him with the little things, and with the huge things.

Because if he can take a weekend in Uganda and fill it with such incredible gifts... I can only imagine what else he has up his sleeve when we're truly obedient to his call. 

"I know that I must do what's right, sure as Kilimanjaro rises like Olympus above the Serengeti"  

a DARE to live fully

"When life is sweet, say thank you and celebrate.

When life is bitter, say thank you and grow."

~Shauna Niequist

My latest 'literary obsession' is a book called One Thousand Gifts: A dare to LIVE FULLY Right where you are. It's about a woman who found herself in a deep depression, her heart full of loss, sadness and despair. 

In a desperate attempt to break free of her depression, she dove headfirst into scripture, and emerged holding a nugget of truth that ended up saving her life. 

"Be joyful always; pray continually; give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus."

~ 1st Thessalonians 5:16-18 (emphasis mine) 

And then a friend presented her with a challenge that put this scripture into action.

"Write down 1,000 things that you love."

She found a notebook and began filling it with thanks. One by one, she would record each little gift that she received from the Lord every day. From big things, like her son surviving an accident, to little things, like the tinkling of the wind chime on her back porch, she named the gifts one by one. 

They were little gifts, little miracles... things that she had previously glossed over in her hurry to get from one moment to the next.

She noticed that as she named gifts... she gave them meaning. 

"To name a thing is to manifest the meaning and value God gave it- to name a thing is to bless God for it and in it."

~ One Thousand Gifts

(photo from Pinterest (obsessed)- I WISH I could take credit for this one!) 

This season of my life is a season covered in love, doused in blessing, and filled with grace. But I'd be lying if I said that there weren't days that I wake up feeling exhausted by pouring out day after day- tired of trying to get from point A to point B in foreign cities- and wanting to physically harm the next person who stares at me like a zoo animal, or yells 'MUNZUNGU' (white person), while pointing and laughing. 

On Valentines Day, we hit the halfway mark of the year. We have officially been on the race for just over 5 ½ months. 

And now, with 5 ½ left, it's amazing that it can feel like an eternity, and a breath all at the same time. 

I do not want to waste a moment of this trip (or this life, for that matter). I want to soak in every single moment. Because each moment is a gift chosen for us by our Father, a God who knows us intimately, who is the giver of the BEST gifts. (Matthew 7:9-11) 

And that's where One Thousand Gifts comes in.

"Giving thanks for one thousand things is ultimately an invitation to slow time down with weight of full attention."

~One Thousand Gifts

And what I'm learning is that regardless of whether the gift is instantly sweet on my lips, or whether it takes awhile for me to break past the bitterness to appreciate the goodness... they are both designed for my good and for my growth 

"In all things God works for the good of those who love him and who are called according to his purpose."

~Romans 8:28

So I too, found a notebook, and began to fill it with thanks. One after another, recording every little gift and blessing I could think of- some of them sweet and in naming those I celebrate... and some of them bitter... and in naming those, I grow. 

38. Feeling beautiful.

Before coming on the race, it was more obvious than ever that I was drowning under the weight of some serious and debilitating insecurity.

It wasn't specific insecurity... more of an overall termite problem in the foundation of my identity and my worth.

It ate away at everything. Joy, peace, love, confidence... it was all being destroyed by insecurity. 

But in the past six months, Jesus has absolutely transformed me. 

It HURT...a lot. It was not quick, and it was not easy.

But it was incredibly worth it.

Jesus untangled me from chains that I didn't know weren't actually a part of me. He dug down into my heart and dug out insecurity so that it has not, and will never come back.  

Now, I am tall. I am confident. I am secure. I know who I am because I know who loves me, and who created me. And I know that because of him... I'm perfect.

There's a confidence that glows from the deepest part of your heart when you know you're loved by the Creator of the universe. And I can say, without shame, hesitation, or fear of being thought cocky- that I am beautiful, loved, cherished, chosen and adored. 

THAT is my identity. 

92. Actually KNOWING who I AM.

99. Inspiration 

I am, by nature, a dreamer. But in the past few years... my dreams have been on the small-ish side, as I was just unsure how to dream without stepping outside of God's plan for my life.

What I'm learning is that God's desire for me is much larger, much better (and sometimes much more intimidating) than anything I could come up with on my own, and in dreaming... I'm stepping INTO that, not stepping OUT. 

And to drive that point home, in the past month God has begun to whisper some pretty crazy dreams into my heart. 

They are dreams that make NO sense. They are the riskiest, most terrifying, most EXCITING thoughts to ever cross my mind.

Sometimes they take over my brain- filling my heart with doubt and fear. They keep me up at night as I try to iron out the logistics- wondering how in the WORLD this is going to feasibly work.

But as much as the dreams have me tossing and turning for fear of falling flat on my face, they also keep me up at night because I couldn't be more excited.

(Ugh... Pinterest- why do I love you so much?) 

My heart pounds, and I can barely breathe. I don't want to fall asleep because getting lost in the possibilities, God's possibilities, that swirl and dance in my mind, is so much better than anything that my mind can dream up in my sleep.

Plans and dreams and talents and degrees even (YES I may actually use my college degree) are falling into place in the most perfect way- in a way that has my heart and my passions stamped all over it. 

129. The development of kingdom dreams.

163. A Father who is patient with me no matter how long it takes me to learn a lesson.

I used to think that 'faith' was one of my spiritual gifts. The past month or so would beg to differ.

Reading my prayer journal is a joke because it is full of me fighting, wrestling, and arguing with God over things that I have laid in his hands, and then want to snatch back, convinced that he's not going to do a good enough job with my precious treasures. 

In response to my lack of trust, he has started doing something that I find incredibly annoying. 

He's proving me wrong... over and over and over again. 

God has made some pretty hefty promises to me. Ever since I realized that I could actually hear him speaking to me, he's been telling me a lot of beautiful and wonderful things that I just find a little hard to believe.

So in a way that I am sure has Him laughing a little bit at his cleverness, he is showing me that I'm wrong- that I DO hear his voice, that what he says DOES happen, and that I CAN trust him. 

It's like he's trying to prove he's good or something. Whatever. 

159. Watching prophecy come true.

On Valentines Day, I told Jesus that I really wanted the program, Photoshop. As my mind has become a hotbed for inspiration/color/photography/writing/design and anything else creative you can think of- I thought that Photoshop would be an appropriate next step. 

So... figuring it was worth a shot... I asked him for it. 

And this was his response: "I'll get you a copy of Photoshop baby. Maybe for Valentines Day." 

Trying to make him look good, I considered asking my parents for a little 'love day gift.' However, I figured that asking them for a $500 gift, when they're already generously stocking my bank account this year... probably wasn't my best idea. 

Yet a few hours later, I was the proud owner of Photoshop. A friend of mine had a copy of it and was happy to give it to me. It didn't work on his computer- yet somehow it worked on mine. 

Jesus gave me Photoshop for Valentines Day. Just like he said he would.

Every day, Jesus tells me something, and every day it comes true. 

Exactly like he says it would.

161. Being reminded over and over that I really HEAR God's voice. 

I don't mean to sound ungrateful, and I know that I do. But this is the bitter gift that I'm being handed. Situations are flooding my life that I have zero control over, that I care about more than I want to, that I have to trust Jesus with... completely.

I'm angry that my heart is on the line in a place where I can't touch it. I am angry and frustrated, and the easiest person for me to take that out on is Jesus- mostly because I know that he'll continue to love me through it. 

Yet, despite my immature, and childlike behavior right now... I know that his insistence that I learn to trust him is the most beautiful gift he could give me. 

And I also know that hearing the voice of the Lord is an enormous gift as well. 

It's just one of those gifts you wish could have come in a different package. One of those lessons that's bitter to swallow.

Yet, whether the gifts are bitter or sweet, you can be sure that every single day of my life (and yours) is jam packed with gifts from the Lord. 

Some days are sweet, and I say thank you and celebrate. 

122. Good friends

125. Long walks on red dirt roads through beautiful jungle-y mountains

155. Living in GORGEOUS Rwanda

142. Zooming through Kigali on the back of motorcycles, everywhere we go.

23. Realizing that my French lessons actually worked... and that I actually SPEAK FRENCH. 

And some days are bitter, and I say thank you and grow.

52. Learning to trust. 

67. The comfort of God's truth and word. 

31. The fact that God will never leave me or forsake me- even when I'm a brat.

"Daily discipline is the door to full freedom, and that discipline to count to one thousand gave way to the freedom of wonder and I can't imagine not staying awake to God in that moment, in the joy of now."

~One Thousand Gifts

"I want my every day to make God belly laugh, glad he gave life to someone who loves the gift!"

~Cold Tangerines