Introspection and Thanks

This summer has been so strange, traveling at a snail's pace one moment and blurring past the next.  The last 5 or 6 days (seriously, it's already Wednesday!?) went by like light speed and I'm floundering a bit to process it all.  Even excitement and joy need to be sorted.

I thrive on rumination, introspection and processing my feelings and thoughts-- A pensive stance is home base for me, so when things happen rapidly in succession (though I enjoy it), I need the time to sort it all out within myself.  Which is perhaps why I write.

Big time praise is in order for #sandblast14 and the way God showed himself (as always) to be thoroughly trustworthy.  The weekend was equal parts wonderful and exhausting, lived alongside amazing and authentic individuals and feeling the Spirit move deeply. I walked in partially blind on Friday, but it's become increasingly clear since, how necessary the rock and hard place circumstances of the past few months of my life have been to the plans God had for Sandblast concerning me.  Which is why I say again, my favorite times of life are when I literally have no choice in the matter.  When options don't exist and straight ahead is all there is, at least I'm going the right way.

Usually, coming home from these things is somewhat hard because of the shocking disconnection from constant community.  This year, I found that not a problem at all!  Even my first day back was relationally and spiritually full-- coffee with a newer friend who understands my depths and later, dinner with a good friend who has helped me to laugh and pursue action in life.  I could not be more thankful for being right where I am.

Father, I can't praise, thank or worship you enough.  You've taken the broken shell of a girl I once was (and occasionally still am) and reformed her-- into me, the real, joyful, confident, vivid person you created me to be.  Sometimes I'm just completely awed by the amount of healing you have done in my heart, and the work you are allowing my hands to do.  So, so blessed.

Details

{top} - Thrifted

{skort} - vintage 60's, for sale at Curio!

{sandals} - Seychelles

Soft: Peices of Story

I have recently realized more than ever that it's okay to be soft, because truly I am.

I wear on my body every day, garments of softness, femininity and grace.  I'm beginning to wonder though, if my motives for that have perhaps been to find a balance-- an element to equalize the hard and silent way that I often automatically present myself to the world.

Growing up (in more ways than one) softness was not encouraged in my family culture, neighborhood or general reality.  Gentle figures were not respected, nor did they have control of their lives, so the small, blue-eyed girl that I was, watched and decided that softness was death.  But the young heart that beat in my chest was, as it is now, full of honest tenderness.  I cared deeply for people and animals alike, asking why that person was sad, or why that dog didn't have a home ("Mom, can we keep/help him please?").  

Some of my dearest and clearest childhood memories are of animal rescues, or hurting people. Led by my gentle Mother, we tended to a baby deer, a snapping turtle (yep), a baby crane, other birds and a couple of stray dogs.  One of the latter was a golden retriever that I spotted wandering our street and followed, only to discover that his paws were torn and bleeding, having run a long distance.  My family fostered the dog for a couple of days before he found a new home.  Around the same age (7 or 8 I believe), I had an encounter with a gypsy child while on a trip in Ireland, confused and distraught I implored my Father for money to put in his dirty, broken McDonald's cup.

The heart that God put inside me sang and wept in those moments.  Later in my life, though, I would desperately try to kill it-- first out of shame and then to survive the Cataplexy that crippled both my heart and body.

There is much more story there, but in the past few years my torn, neglected heart has thawed and revived tremendously!  God has allowed deep, infected wounds to heal, but re-training my brain to un-clench my heart is easier said than done.  I suppose I'm conditioned.

I'm quite well versed in the darker emotions-- bitterness, woe, wist, hurt, anger.  Learning to let myself feel soft things, however-- joy, humor, affection -- has been gradual and hard work but I've come a long way.  Oh the shell of a girl I once was!  Just last night, the church service I attended was on the loving-faithfulness (Hebrew: hesed) of God, and how we can remember and see it's reality in our lives.  Friends, my story is so freaking full of God's hesed!  Loyal to the end, even when I felt I was too far gone-- not so.  He has so redeemed and rescued my heart and will continue to.

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Photo credit to my lovely friend, miss Katie Dunbar.

Arrows

The grace I mentioned at the end of my last post is so desperately needed in this moment. 

I've been blessedly and painfully convicted tonight of a fatal flaw I've long battled with: my verbal tone. We all have things that we struggle to tame and grow out of, traits that have developed usually in response to hurt or injury sustained along the path we've traveled. Hurt people hurt people.

For a couple years now, I've naively believed I had the temperature of my voice under control.  No longer was I the snarky teenager who refused to be wrong and shot her syllables like arrows.  I had endured a large amount of humbling at the hands of life, a season I often describe as one in which every shred of self righteousness was "beaten out of me".  Morbid I know, but it illustrates the feeling perfectly.

Slowly the sounds that have left my mouth and shade my words have become sharp again. Gradually, like a slow bleed with no marked turning point. That sharpness has crept into my need to control, it's slithered into my jokes and even into my statements of concern or alarm, confusing and unintentionally inuring those I value. My words are not to blame, but rather the way I utter the sounds they are made of. Arrows indeed, and I'm just as bloody by them as my loved ones.

So here begins a new chapter (or perhaps a return to an earlier one) in which I breathe deeply, mourn and tend the wounds I have caused and decide to take my thoughts captive anew-- each day, moment and situation that I open my mouth.  Then sacrifice the shame within me as I allow the cleansing blood and grace of Christ to cover me (again, and not for the last time).

God, please keep making and growing me.

To Edit or Not to Edit

When I first started blogging, I came face to face with the issue of To Edit or Not To Edit.  It may seem hypocritical, but I decided to edit my shop photos but not those on my blog.  Here's why:

I have always edited my vintage shop photos.  I have some skin issues and the product photos I model in are a form of marketing.  In short: I want my customers focusing on the dress, not my face.  It didn't take me long though, to decide my personal blog was not a place for edited photos.  I don't take these photographs to market anything, I take and share them to express and document my sense of style-- even if (or especially because) it's flawed.  Authenticity is what it comes down to, and I feel that I can't be without exposing my flaws.

I find it funny that as humans we have this instinct to hide our flaws.  It's something I struggled with a lot in my teens, and have overcome mostly through frank openness about my weaknesses.  The reason I find it funny is that once we've exposed our flaws, we usually find ourselves strangely confident-- we no longer need to fear that others will identify our insecurities because we've fully acknowledged them already.  For me, it also boils down to the fact that I don't need to be perfect because the blood of Christ has made that unnecessary.  I can come as I am, bad skin and all.  Jesus loves messy people and I'm pretty glad of that.

I'd love to hear your take on this issue, especially if you have a shop or blog online.

{Peacock Dress} vintage '40's, thrifted

{Lace Tank} worn underneath Target

{MJ Flats} Lulu's

{Stone Bracelet} gift from friend

{Silver Watch} vintage, thrifted

{Steel Necklace} gift from Dad

{Blue Belt} vintage, thrifted