1000 Strands

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Posts Tagged ‘Love’

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Spring and Summer

Posted by Nicole on June 11, 2013

My daughter is at her last day of preschool. This is an incredibly big deal to the cells in my body. I feel them shrink today in preparation. Outside the hustle of the moment, quiet inside myself, I see her – all spunk and 5-year-old skin. I watch the families around me carrying babies, smiling, correcting, juggling – the ones in the middle.

This is the end of a huge season of my life. This season of spring. Our Spring. The beginnings of life.

SPRING

Baby Coco

Spring: Getting to love Miracles up close and have their love in return.

Spring: Feeling incredible pain and holding on for dear life to the factual importance of love. 

Spring: Seeing cherubs crawl around my living room, rolling in clean clothes and pulling the cat’s tail.

Spring: Experiencing love with all five sense.  Singing through chores, tears kissed on lips, sleepy hugs, hearts made with whole hands.

Spring: Spending months lost in a tornado of messiness and full-out joy, tantrums and hysterical laughter.

Spring: Knowing Tiny things matter.  Errands. Dishes. Smiles. Hope. Fingers, toes, touches, breath.

 

I will miss, miss, miss, miss these little years. Everywhere I went, whether I could see it at the time or not through sleepy eyelids and Starbucks hangovers, a community of babies and new moms and toddlers supported me. Smiles from strangers. Doors held open for strollers. Reassuring eyes making soft contact with mine while screams rang in my ears.

I hold the last 8 years as gently as I can in these desperate hands. They are a gift I struggled to appreciate completely. It is exhausting trying to keep multiple emotionally turbulent people alive all day long. Days felt like eternity, serious eternity, but the months went by in a snap.

I remember trying to brand memories onto my heart, hoping never to forget.

But I have forgotten most.

And yet, like my freckles from the sun… they are always with me, reminders of days in the warm light. I don’t remember the exact moments anymore, but these beauty marks all over my heart are proof enough.

The more we let life matter the more it hurts, because life is defined by loss and gain and loss and gain.  I feel it profoundly today.

All Seasons: Spring. Summer. Fall. Winter.
We love them each and then they leave.

So, today, we celebrate.  I will exercise and begin to reacquaint my body with its individuality. We will play at the park. We will hold open a door for a new mom. I will drink another cup of coffee (that’s not going away). I will tear up spontaneously when my girl mimics my hand gestures, sings songs by “Katy Perry Johnson” and tells me about her friends’ pets. 

I will enjoy sitting to eat a full, hot meal with my daughters and walking side-by-side with both my hands free.

And I will learn to love Summer.

iphone 186

 

Love and Blessings to all the parents in this graduation season!

-Nicole

 

Posted in Honest Home | Tagged: , , , | 2 Comments »

For you, I will. (a poem)

Posted by Nicole on May 31, 2013

For You

For you, I will

 

For you, I will get out of bed

freezing

and fetch a glass of water.

 

For you, I will sing aloud

alone

in a karaoke bar.

 

For you, I will dance

ballroom style

wearing high heels and victory rolls.

 

For you, I will strip

naked

with lights on and eyes open.

 

For you, I will

 

My unlost love

it’s been you here

all along,

but I treated you like shit

like the one who would always be there

always too there

always right here.

 

And it’s not poetic but it’s true,

I am sorry.

 

I’ve been lost and

I’m coming home.

No matter what it takes.

 

For you, I will storm castles.

For you, I will slay dragons.

For you, I will sail 1,000 ships.

 

When it’s all over

and with wobbly arms

we embrace,

listening to ships reach the shore,

I will be unlost too.

 

I will climb back in bed

hoarse from singing my heart out,

feet throbbing and eyes drooping;

wearing only these blankets.

 

And I will

for you

finally be home in me.

 

__________

Everything in me wants to explain this love poem to you, Dear Friend, but I will trust Mr. Rogers here:

What is offered in faith by one person can be translated by the Holy Spirit into what the other person needs to hear and see. The space between them is holy ground, and the Holy Spirit uses that space in ways that not only translate, but transcend.

 

What would you do for the one you love? “For you, I will…”

Posted in Beauty SOS47, Honest Home, How Can I Help, Love and Making It, Wonderful Wrestlings | Tagged: , | 16 Comments »

I was out deep and a big set of waves rolled in

Posted by Nicole on February 22, 2013

Faith. Joy. Optimism. Jesus being real and Him caring about me.

These are the things I have built a life on.

I built a life.

And I find myself in a season of fog, big waves, cold wind.

Where did that life go? Have you seen it?

Waiting for the water to bring back the Faith and Life.

Waiting for the water to bring back the Faith and Life.

I am a California girl. For most of my life, I have lived within three miles of the ocean. Had a hard day? Drive to the beach. Feel like life is too much? Drive to the beach. Bills, yells, disappointments, disapprovals pulling you down? Drive to the beach. … Park. Take off shoes. Feel sand rub your feet. Exfoliate the dead life away. Then touch the water and feel new living life seep in through your toes.

.RESET.

Feel better. Move on and Back to Faith + Joy + Optimism + Jesus being real

And, when I was younger, much younger… when I was still only 5′ tall but my insides were more elastic, I would swim away any tears. Underwater no one can tell if you are crying. Underwater, even if people surround you, they can barely hear you scream out your sadness. Tears can flow. Face can be red. Muscles can strain. And it all blends into a beautiful camouflage. Water pushing and moving, hugging back the way air just doesn’t care to.

Water pushing and moving, hugging back the way air just doesn’t care to.

All the sadness and frustration could leave my body and soul.  All flowed out of me and into the healing water.  I would feel empty and ready to be refilled by the Faith + Joy + Optimism + Jesus I’d come to trust would always come back. Hurray!

Recently, though… recently, I cannot find the healing water. I still live near the beach and pools in my California neighborhood. I touch the water both literally and figuratively in my prayers but nothing happens. My touchstone, my constant, my compass is no longer working. Up and down, north and south – they are meaningless.

I read other people’s beautiful blogs about how Jesus is finding them no matter how lost they feel – even in the trash. And intellectually, I trust it MUST still be real.  I’m just lost, God’s not, right? I believe Jesus believes in me even when I don’t believe in him – or however the saying goes.

In my bones, though, my bones tell the truth my intellect cannot.

In my bones, there is pain not trust.

 A burning.

Have you ever swam in the ocean? Swimming at the beach was a huge part of my childhood.  We swam in the ocean, played in the waves. In the infinite water up to my chest, swells came by and picked me up, lifting me off the cool sand under it all. One small body bouncing in anticipation, watching the swells come up from their source. The Pacific Ocean, my own beautiful mosh pit. Waves form and if you catch them just right, they lift you up – without any more than a tiptoe of energy from your own body. Lifted and weightless. Light and free.

But, the ocean is not just lightness and freedom and happy happy zen. It’s no joke. All that infinite water has a power and weight. The same power that lifts a little girl up to the sky, can suck her into a dark whirlpool. Vivid memories still sit at the front of my brain. A big set of waves could come in without warning. When you are out that far, the best thing to do when a BIG set of waves begins is to go under each one. Under the white wash. Under the sucking, thunderous breaks. But, once or twice, I didn’t get under in time.

Little head pops up to grasp a gasp of air but can’t get down deep again in time… and I’d get pulled into the swirling, spinning water.  The terror. The confusion. The fog. Especially in deep water, you cannot even find the sand.

It is a complete loss of direction – Up and down, north and south – they are meaningless.

I couldn’t find the sand or the air. I’d have taken either one. I’d pray, “Let me hit the bottom so I have some direction. Give me the sand so I can push up to the surface.”

Lungs burn hot; burning a hole in my chest so they can get to the surface, even if the rest of me never makes it.

I remember it so clearly.

 

This is how I feel now as I swim through life. The water I move and swim in everyday does not soothe me. I am not reset, home, camouflaged, soothed or free. Instead I burn.  I was out deep and a big set of waves rolled in.

I try actual, physical water on my burns but it has lost its touchstone connection to God.

I find myself giving up God for Lent without any choice in the matter. And it burns. It feels like drowning in the very place I found my life. Where I was once lifted up by a very present, big, loving  God  – without any more than a tiptoe of energy from my own soul – Now, I find pain and confusion in that same spot.

Death where there was life.

All I can do now is wait and swim. Jesus, who is real and cares about me – my intellect says, is still here. And my brain reminds my bones that this is how it works. Life to Death to Greater Life.

Resurrection.     

Life where there was death.

Everything must die so that new life can spring up. Even Faith. Maybe I can believe that even faith, like other things, must die to be reborn. My faith must doubt & die.

Faith like a mustard seed, right? Seeds die before they grow giant trees and climbing vines. Death is the beginning of a much bigger life for the seed. Maybe, just maybe, this is part of what Jesus meant…

Luke 17:6 “If you have faith like a grain of mustard seed…”

+

John 12:24–25, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit.”

What if I put the two together? I have faith like a mustard seed and it’s time to let it fall into the earth and die so that it can bear much fruit.

A tiny seed falls to the ground. Once the seed coat breaks, the seed begins to grow roots. Inside the seed is new life: Roots. Height. Depth. Reach. More seeds. More Fruit.

Death is the beginning of new life for a seed. Maybe it will be for me too. Maybe in a year from now, maybe in three days, I will be reborn with a bigger and more expansive faith.

Until then (and believe me I do not take lightly saying “Until”) I will just keep swimming.

…For anyone struggling with faith today. An offering, poured out.

-Nicole

  Just Keep Swimming

 

Hey Mr Grump Gills
You know what you gotta do when life gets you down?
Just keep swimming
Just keep swimming
Just keep swimming swimming swimming
What do we do we swim, swim, swim

Posted in Free Flying Faith, Wonderful Wrestlings | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment »

Stop Hitting Yourself

Posted by Nicole on February 14, 2013

Stop throwing stones, please.

Stop throwing stones, please.

Walking around the world, feeling disappointed in yourself, is never fun.  It sucks, actually. And, I fully realize that many of you are just fine with your fine selves, but I have a sneaking suspicion that many of us are not…  Still not, even after looking through 100’s of motivational pins on Pinterest.

(it’s like dieting. i am not dieting when i read about diets. … and i am not actually feeling better about myself when I read how i should feel better about myself… you don’t lose weight by reading about losing weight…)

 

It feels impossible to hit the target in life – to reach that sweet moment of pure joyful success – when all you do is practice hitting yourself.

You learn to hit the target you aim at.

**********

“What’s wrong with me?”
“I wish I was different…”
“Why did I say that?”

**********

I know it’s the same for me as it is for some of you – The voices inside my head can be loud, demeaning, demanding.  All I can see is how I don’t measure up and I wish I did.  I’m guilty under the law.  So, I throw stones

………….. at myself.

Stoning: Execute (someone) by throwing stones at them.

We stone ourselves. Without a proper trial, we sentence ourselves to a painful execution.  Each nasty thought, a stone.  Each critique without care, a stone.

I pick up each rough, dirty stone – each rough, dirty thought – aim and throw.  Pick, aim, throw. Pick, aim, throw. Pick, aim, throw.

But, in the black-comedy turns of life, we are too close to ourselves to properly execute the guilty. I chuck a stone at my own head and it bounces off – painful but not deadly. Another. Another. Bruises form. Wounds appear and build on top of each other. It’s an incredibly slow, painful death.

Hundreds of stones thrown by me at me.

You learn to hit the target you aim at.

And, I’ve discovered that I spend entirely too much time aiming at myself.

(I say this to you as I say it to myself….)

It’s time to Stop it. Drop the stones. DROP IT.

What do you actually want to be good at?  Practice that!

Every time you catch yourself picking up a stone, drop it before you even aim to throw. Don’t spend your life practicing self-stoning. Stop hitting yourself.

You learn to hit the target you aim at. So… what target DO you want to hit?

Take long enough away from chucking stones to hear yourself answer the question. Give yourself time to answer, you jerk! 🙂 What do you want to aim at?

Start small. Focus and aim at getting out of bed and smiling at yourself in the mirror.  Maybe you just need to practice setting the rocks down before you are tempted to throw them.

Focus and aim at saying kind things to yourself and others.

Focus and aim at doing one thing each day without caring what you or anyone else thinks about how you did.

Or, if you’re ready, go BIG. Focus and aim at a life-long dream.

I can promise you will get better at what you practice, so

Practice what you want to be good at.

 

Everything else… DROP IT.

 

Thank you & you’re welcome,

Nicole

 

 

Posted in Wonderful Wrestlings | Tagged: , , , , , , , | 1 Comment »

1000 Strands

Posted by Nicole on July 11, 2011

 

“…what we must do now is share everything. Everything! If one of us likes anything, there must be something to like in it – and the other one must find it. Every single thing that either of us likes. That way we shall create a thousand strands, great and small, that will link us together… And our trust in each other will not only be based on love and loyalty but on the fact of a thousand sharings – a thousand strands twisted into something unbreakable.”

– A Severe Mercy

A thousand strands twisted into something unbreakable.  Unbreakable.  I want to have unbreakable relationships.  I want to have the things I care about matter to someone else too.  Life can be made of unbreakable stuff when we tie ourselves, knot ourselves, anchor ourselves to the eternal God who made us and is here already making everything new and unbreakable.

 

Have you ever read something in a book or article and it just hit you hard? You laughed til you cried. You just cried. You spoke out loud back to the book, “Holy @*#! I’d never thought of that!”  Your soul moved a few inches … permanently.

Whatever it was, it mattered to you in your core, and you just HAD to share it with someone. When a friend matches your enthusiasm… that’s bliss.

Each of these little encounters changes us.  This is chemistry.  Falling in love.  Making a friend. Bonding.

“The actual thing – inloveness – requires something like a spark leaping back and forth from one to the other becoming more intense every moment, love building up like voltage in a coil.”
-A Severe Mercy

Love requires sharing. Mutual sharing. This is a core truth of life. In this place I will share the things and thoughts that connect with my life.  I believe there’s a God who wants that same kind of “spark leaping back and forth… love building up like voltage in a coil.” And, He wants it with us.

Feel free to share back. Let’s create electricity … and a thousand strands of sharing twisted into something unbreakable.

-Nicole

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