Yesterday I turned 40. No dread, worry, denial leading up to this big milestone. Maybe because I feel that I have aged a thousand years in the past year, or just that I feel so blessed just to celebrate. I spent the day with the girls, with my parents, Jason and later a dinner out with a few of my besties. Oh....and also I managed to take my self to the doctor and got diagnosed with shingles!! Constant burn and discomfort on my back, but thankfully without a rash...happy birthday to me!
So glad I did not cancel my evening out with Jason, because he surprised me with dinner with some of my closest friends. Throughout our many years together, he never stops wanting to surprise me and make me happy.
As I think about being 40, I mostly am just amazed with all the things I've accomplished, created, done with my life in what seems just a short amount of time. On paper to most I am sure it doesn't look like much, but for me it feels full.
I think about how incredibly brave and strong God has created me to be. How he took someone who felt always just so flawed and made her fierce. I am proud that I have maintained a solid loving relationship with my husband, throughout the ups and downs, twist and turns of our ten years. Way before Madeline and Clara, there was a very young me praying for God to change my life. Soon after I met Jason, and indeed he did.
I am also just proud to have made two beautiful little girls, who have taught me my biggest life lessons by just being their mom. Their determination inspires me. They will change the world, I just know it.
At forty years I have the best people in the world as my friends, mentors, family members. I do not tell them enough how much they mean to me. I hope in time I can make them all feel just as loved and supported as they have made me feel.
I have also had a wonderful career in education which has made me smarter and more compassionate. So glad I chose to be a teacher.
Before Clara...I was constantly seeking how to make myself better, how to keep up with others. How to give more, work harder. If I could just write a letter to my younger self, I would say what you are is enough. and give what you have.
It feels finally so great to feel comfortable with who I am. Sure I still strive to make myself better and healthier, but only to be more in God's image and no one else's. When I start to feel again that I am just not enough, and yes weekly that feeling resurfaces, I read and remind myself that "today I have everything I need through God and through him it's enough (gerth)!
"Hello Friend!
Because I clearly see the strengths and gifts of others, I’m also aware when I don’t have the same ones.
I wonder if I should try harder, work more,
tackle my weaknesses and transform them.
Then a story of a man in need leaps off the pages at me.
He asks the Apostle Peter for money but he has none.
He offers something even more valuable–healing.
His words, “What I do have I give you.”
Here’s the real miracle:
We don’t have to give what we don’t have.
That means you and I do have
everything we need for all
God is asking us to do today.
Woo-hoo!
We don’t need to be like anyone else
because no one else has the same to-do list from God today.
Be you.
Give what you have.
With Jesus, it’s more than enough.
XO"
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