Some things I want to do:

• spend a season on a coffee farm, working with the farmers and living off of their wages
• paint more, learn carpentry and pottery-making, design more things from fabric


• research people, cultures, their histories, their struggles



• write books about what I research



• always be an activist - fight for women's rigts especially in developing countries - help people find their voice



• take my family on some of my travels to show them glimpses of the world



• blog more and read more



• let my "home" (whether it is a hut, shack, janky apartment, or posh house...the latter not being very likely ; ) be a haven for everyone

someway, somehow

Do you know what it feels like to be 'set free' from something? And maybe not even in a bad way...just knowing that you had limitations and now the gate has been opened - wide opened.

That's kind of how I feel. I feel as though I can breathe fresher air; like I am more so on my own than I was even just earlier today.

Honestly, it feels a little weird...and new...like I am having to acclamate myself to a different environment. It's kind of like I had wonderful things with me the whole time, and I was at least relatively free and independent - that is, except for that gate. Rather than taking a look at life through glances past the bars of the gate, I can now walk through the doors and into miles and miles and miles of openness!

Imagine having something in your life that you were struggling with for months - for years, maybe. In that time, you barely had any relief...It was like the tidal waves kept hitting you, and kept hitting you, only giving you enough time for about a quarter of a second to take a breath for the next wave. So you pushed yourself as far as you thought you could push yourself to make it through whatever it was that you were struggling with for all of this time until you could go no more.

When you got to this point - when allll of your strength had expired within you - you feel yourself begin to slowly move forward again...How could this be happening if I have lost all of my strength? Well, it's not you. It is a friend who won't let you give up on life no matter what. They see how much you have struggled. They see that you cannot go on unless they carry you. And with unconditional love that friend embraces you in their arms, picks you up, and holds onto you no matter what. That friend sees who you are. They see how much you can truly offer to the hurting world. They see that you are truly worth so much.

Maybe there are times when that friend is carrying you that they begin to get tired, but they remind you that you mean far more to them than their brief moments of weariness.

Definitely there are times when that friend is carrying you that you regain some energy and strength and yet you fall down again - sometimes harder than other times. Ohhhh, the number of reasons that there are for why you relapsed!...but that friend let's you hold onto them again. Through the tears that the both of you share, that friend tells you, "I love you. You're gonna make it - someway, somehow!"

Some of you (whoever happens across this little blog of mine) might recall a time (or times) when you went through something like this. I feel quite a bit more optimistic now, although I know there are inevitably going to be things in my path to trip me up again. Until then, however, I don't want to think about those things! I want to breathe in this new air! I think that I need to do something spontaneous!

like joining these guys and go ice swimming!...

or just take a road trip with a friend when I am bored with nothing else to do...

Well, I'm not all that creative, so if you think of something, let me know and I will do it with you!!

As you read, I did not get this blissful feeling in my life alone. I had a friend who stuck with me even through the thickest of times (and only the Looooord knows why she did ; ) I am indebted to her and I will forever love her! I consider her my dearest friend. She taught me about love, patience, forgiveness; that we have tear ducts for a reason; that it's okay to take five seconds in life to breathe sometimes; to be confident in who the Lord made me to be; and through all of that, she taught me how to share that love with others.

You are worth it and there will always be a way! - someway, somehow.