Comfort and Joy

I am being lovingly stretched beyond my comfort zones. As I drove yesterday, I thought of what a comfort zone actually entailed. It is fear, apathy, self-loathing, people pleasing, or whatever other painful wall we have built to protect ourselves? Or is it a border that we have been taught out of someone else's pain? If it is these stop-growth places, I want to smash them all. I want to be brave in my steps and pushing myself into newness. God is placing these opportunities in front of me and I do not want to waste them, ever.
This has been such a hard year but in the past few months the struggle has eased off and in everything there has been so much growth. I am learning boundaries but not in walls of pain- in healthy ones that heal. I am letting myself learn to be okay and not recoil or react. I am reminding myself to be truthful to the point and not catering to the pushers. It is both a wonderful and a hard place. It is a peculiar thing that happens when we try to protect others at all cost of our own selves. This distorted view of being loving, as we are abused into self-protection. Comfort zones.
I have recently found myself in a new season where some amazing women are lifting me up. It has been so long since I have been able to let go and not carry so much. It is undoing me, but I am loving the freedom in all these unsteady places. Stay tuned... there is a new year upon us....



A Haiku Poem

I have missed so much writing time as things stir in my heart but life flies by. There, however, is always time for a Haiku.

Winter's beauty falls
Reading by the Christmas lights
Tea and blankets warm