I’m a sea level girl and I certainly don’t have a mountain heart.

Being thrust to 8500 feet from zero in less than 24 hours makes simply walking from the dining hall to the cabin difficult.

I’m a fragile human, I’m quickly learning. At the top of the rail-tie stairs {huff, who built this camp on the side of a mountain, anyway?} I’m having trouble breathing. All the mountain girls say DRINK WATER as they shove plastic cups and bottles full of Colorado water in my hands. I obey.

Yet I still get the headache they say comes with the altitude change. I get the funny-stomach too and I have to sit because I get lightheaded.

I drink more water.

I’m delicate and breakable. I can’t even live on the side of a mountain for a couple days without betraying my weakness.

The mountain girls, they almost run up the hill. Ashleigh, who’s just lived here for a couple months isn’t even winded as we climb.

Their bodies, their blood is used to working harder to gather oxygen from the air. Mine isn’t. Because apparently my fat and lazy circulatory system thinks it should be lying on the beach somewhere in the West. These girls, they have mountain hearts.

My body is fragile. Yes I get that. We humans need so much to simply survive. Water at more than regular intervals, food at least three times a day, clothes to keep our bodies at a perfect 98.6 degrees, shoes so our feet don’t get cut and infected, pillows at night so us 35 year olds don’t wake up with a stiff neck. We spend the night in the rain: hypothermia. We have no water in the heat: dehydration.

Our hearts, the ones we tell our stories from, are fragile too.

They are woundable and crushable and defeatable. They can be torn, mutilated, stepped on, lost, forgotten, bruised, betrayed, abused and dismembered.

But our hearts can get stronger.  Every time I share my story, my heart becomes less vulnerable to the elements. In part because I’m exposing it to the very challenges that cause growth:  possible hurt or rejection, encouragement, hope or disappointment.

Just like running up a mountain in Colorado.

But not only that. The One who holds me in the palm of His hand, holds my heart gently, perfectly and protects it. He carries it. He cherishes it. He helps strengthen it so I don’t weary.

Together we work on strength and endurance. Me? I jump off into fear and push through it. Him? He lets me rest in His hand when I’m exhausted and can’t take another step.

I want a mountain heart. One that can sprint at altitude but also knows Who protects her.

Do you feel fragile? What strengthens you?

When my older daughter was born and I was a stay-at-home mom….

{Qualifying that, I’m still a stay-at-home mom but we aren’t home very much. I’d like to call myself a stay-in-the-car mom.}

When I was a stay-at-home mom, my husband said something to me.

“You are spending more time with Hope than any one person will ever spend with her until she has her own baby someday.”

I had to think about it. It was true. For years before preschool and Kindergarten I spent nearly every groggy, waking hour with her. My baby. My toddler. My companion.

Now, she couldn’t carry on an adult conversation. But she was my little friend that I packed up and took everywhere with me.

She goes to second grade now and comes home at three with the smell of playground dirt and pencil dust on her, but she’s still my companion. Her heart is broadened by both friendship and hurt, her mind is widened by words and numbers and her will is stretched by other adults both loving and disciplining her. These are things that are difficult for me to provide by myself.

Her sister, however, is the one I spend time with during the day. A few weeks ago, I caught Naomi, my four-year-old, up in my arms and whispered in her ear,

“Shhh. I have a secret for you. You are my companion.”

“What’s a companion, Mama?” she wondered?

It’s a fancy word for friend. A buddy. Someone you love.

She thought for a minute, “Then you are my companion too, Mama.”

And then I panicked.

What a big responsibility! You mean I don’t just have to teach them to brush their teeth and put their clothes in the hamper? I have to teach them about God, about love and marriage and about FRIENDSHIP too? It’s up to me, who has had life long issues with friends, to provide for my daughters the base measure of friendship and companionship that they might use as a compass for the rest of their life?

Companion.

She walks with me and I make her hold my hand in the parking lot. I don’t let her push the little cart in the market because she has a tendency to drive straight toward the wine bottles stacked on the end cap. But then we talk, and we laugh, and we make things together. She runs errands with me and sees me at my worst. We live life together.

Isn’t that what a friend is?

I think it is.

I’m a compass for a lot of what my daughters will use to measure the rest of their lives. And one of them, perhaps among the most important, is companionship.

And maybe if I live as a companion of Jesus like I should then my children will learn it as well. Listening to Him. Creating with Him. Laughing, talking, weeping and doing life with Him. Maybe, hopefully, my girls will learn what it is to be a companion to others and to Christ.

Lord help me to provide a healthy base for my daughters to form friendships with others; help me to be a solid example of companionship with Christ. Be my friend and help me to be a worthy friend to You too.

Who are your companions?

“I just want it to be easy”, He tells me.

“We aren’t easy people, Chad. This will never be EASY!” I fire back.

It stops him. It”s true and I didn’t even realize it was true until it left my lips.

This will never be easy because at the basic level, we will always have to fight for our marriage. And at a deeper level, we were never meant to settle for easy.

Today I’m writing about being made for something extraordinary over at (in)courage.

Something Extraordinary

I know I was made for more than this.

I’m sitting on my bathroom floor and he’s given me the third in a string of sarcastic responses in a “discussion” we’re having. My head is bursting and my words are frozen – I can’t verbalize any of what I’m thinking in a way that he’ll understand.

Pinching the bridge of my nose I hang my head toward the tile. This is too familiar.

Weren’t we made for more than this?

I can almost feel the physical weight of my writing projects, church projects and personal favors I’ve agreed to take residence on my shoulders. I’ll probably have to go the chiropractor after all is said and done. Once I finish one, I have another waiting to take its place. I’m in a perpetual state of worry and stress that what I have to get done will not get done.

I feel like Lucy on that episode when she and Ethel are trying to wrap chocolates.

Maybe I’ll freeze. Maybe I’ll just give up on it all.

I’m sure I wasn’t created to live this way.

To finish reading, come on over to (in)courage.

Were you meant for something extraordinary? Do you live like it?

They climb a tree on Monday afternoon and tell them to smile so I can snap some photos. My eight-year-old gives me a fake, school picture smile first.  My four-year-old just looks off in the distance. Then I say, LAUGH. Both of them, their whole faces light up with joy when they laugh.

The smile lingers on their lips as they jump off benches and roll in the grass. Their faces remember the laugh.

I haven’t been up for much laughter lately.

I know, I know.

Bummer to be around, huh?

Chad’s been telling me jokes and instead of laughing my eyes say, Really? Right now you are making light of this?

In my slight defense I’ve been super introspective, I’ve been struggling with some fear issues, and I’ve been quietly searching and seeking answers to a few questions I have. Sigh.  That can make for a quiet me and I guess, a grumpy me.

{those are poor excuses and an even worse excuse…}

Oh, and this morning I realized that I’m also paying more attention to the faults in those around me than the faults in myself.

That will always make me crabby because thinking about the failings of others is completely pointless.

Why can’t he {fill in your own blank}?

It seems like they are always {again, fill in your own special blank}.

I’m spending more than my share of time worrying about how my husband and my kids are falling short of my way too high expectations than about the ways in which I might need to change myself. Think about how the rest of the world needs to fix themselves, and I promise you, you’ll forget to smile.

So that’s been me lately: thin lipped, frowning, exasperated-sighing me.

Even I’m sick of me. I’m sure my family would rather see me smile.

So maybe if I begin to laugh, like my girls in the climbing tree, my face will follow suit. My heart will remember the posture of joy, my limbs will begin to feel looser with the prospect of happiness, and my mouth might naturally curl upwards in delight rather than toward the earth in sorrow.

And maybe if I focused less on the ways others affect me and more on the way I affect others I might be more prone to laugh. I might not complain as much about dirty dishes on the breakfast table or dirty socks on the stairs.

I’d laugh at the jokes.

I’d smile at the mess.

I’d linger and stop and rest.

When I focus on them in love rather than focus on their mistakes, it makes all the difference.

A link for those using RSS readers

{Note about the video: this is NOT one of my “fear” videos. This just happened to happen yesterday afternoon. But even so, watch how tentative I am in the beginning, but then by the end I’m all Grabby Grabberson.  And in keeping with the idea of laughter and joy, this might make you smile.}

Do you need to laugh more? What makes you smile?

When I was a young teenager and I was well old enough to be trusted with a book of matches, I never wanted to be the one to light the birthday candles at family gatherings.

The thought of holding a tiny piece of cardboard in my hand and trying to light it on fire was just something I could not get past.

It took me several years before I would be able light a match without worry. But it was a silly fear. I wasn’t going to burn my fingers. And if the flame got too close to my skin I would simply have to

blow

it

out.

If you’ve been reading my blog for more than a couple days, you’ll remember that I’m on a personal journey to overcome fear.

My goal is to be able to function well in the face of fear, to attack problems in spite of fear, and to move forward in my calling in obedience with knowledge that it will be difficult. Some fear is necessary, and if I’m not regularly facing uncomfortable situations and moving past them, there is something wrong. I’m not living a good story.

I’m not on a quest to kick fear completely to the curb, but to root out the need to be comfortable for comfort’s sake.

So I made a list. I promise I didn’t copy any other person who makes lists about fear, I just seriously thought I would write down all the things I’m scared of {both silly and giant} and then move forward with each of them.

It’s kinda like a fear bucket list.

I’m not going to tell you what’s on my list. At least not yet. But I plan on taking you all with me.

I’m going to make a series of {non-professional} video blogs chronicling me facing certain fears over the next couple of months.

What I want YOU to do is to begin to think about something scary that you’ve been avoiding. You hate thinking about it. You wish it would go away. But you probably need to do it. You know EXACTLY what I’m talking about.

Soon I’ll ask you to either write a blog post or make your own {short} video about it.

My first video will go up next week sometime.

After I actually do it.

The one thing I’ve been scared of for the last six years. And it’s not lighting a match.

What’s on your fear bucket list?

I never intended to sleep all night on the floor.

Last Thursday night began like all school nights do: bath and pajamas, a story and a song. “Lights out in five minutes,” I call as I leave them to look at books alone. And I walk downstairs. My husband and I begin the adult-speak that only bedtime can liberate in parents.

It began like most do but it morphed into a full evening of holding back the hair of my eight-year-old as she vomited the contents of her day into the toilet. It got later and later and I suggested we make her a bed on the floor by the bathroom.

“Mama, can you stay with me?” she asked me after her body stopped heaving.

The thought hadn’t even crossed my mind to crawl back up into my own bed. “Of course I will, honey. “ I was going to stay next to her all night so I could help her to the bathroom, wipe off her face and let her put her head on my lap on the cold, tile floor.

I tucked her into her sleeping bag near the door of the bathroom and at 11:45 pm I gathered non-essential bedding from throughout the house to make my night as comfortable as was possible. I crawled underneath the quilt, cool from the closet, and lay awake in the dark hallway. I’m sure from above we looked like refugees or slumber party victims, and my hips ached from floor-sleeping more than I ever remember them aching when I was eight.

But I wasn’t going to leave her. Not now. I couldn’t sleep. The unfamiliarity of sleeping in a place in my own house that I’ve never slept before and worry about my daughter kept me awake.

We spent a couple more times in the bathroom together before the night was finished. Finally, early in the morning, we both fell asleep. But I dreamed about her, I thought about her and I hoped that she would be well in the morning.

I never set out to sleep on the ground Thursday night, but I did. And I wasn’t going to leave her.

As I collected the bedding the next morning so that the family could move unencumbered through the hallway I thought about the God who never leaves us.

He crawled out of his home and made a home with us on earth. He embodied human flesh and walked with us, ate with us and smoothed our hair on the cold, bathroom floor.

He lied down to keep watch when we were sick and vowed never to leave us.

The thought never crossed his mind.

But unlike me, who finally gave into sleep at 2:40 in the morning, He is a God who never gets tired, never gives us and will always, always pay attention to our suffering. And also unlike me, He intended this from the beginning of the story: to send One who would rescue.

Psalm 121:4 {He who watches over Israel will neither slumber nor sleep.}

Have you felt God “sleeping on the floor” near you lately?

Since I got them super cheap from CBD, I ended up buying THREE books to give away.

A Million Miles in a Thousand Years by Donald Miller.

Melodee said

“Sarah, you rock!” {Thanks Mel. You rock too!}

Beth said

“afraid of… going wherever the Lord asks me to go. I’d rather it be a nice, safe, sunny, warm place. But I worry it will be lonely, cold, and scary.” {Um, me too. You are not alone on this.}

Makeda said

“I’ve been avoiding reading this book for fear that it will cause me to abandon everything about my life right now. Funny thing is the book keeps crossing my path. I’m guessing I might need to read it. So I guess the thing I’m most afraid of is having to change my ENTIRE life to chase a new dream instead of someone else’s dream (did I just say that outloud?).” {You can’t avoid it for long if it shows up on your front door!}

So, if you didn’t win you can buy it through Thomas Nelson here and CBD here.  You won’t be disappointed.

By the end of the day I’m spent.

At least my words are.

I’ve said all the words I have in me to say. It’s Thursday evening and this morning I led 2nd grade discipleship group, I met with Laura to talk about freelance work and then I left her to go teach Bible Study. This was all before ten o’clock.

I talked and I talked.

I answered all the questions the new pediatrician asked at our 3:30 appointment. School performance? Check. Reading well? Check. Does your preschooler know how to count? Check.

And then I struck up a conversation with two other moms in Chickfila this evening {SO unlike introvert me}.

I talked some more. I called my mother. I explained something to my children. I texted a friend.

When I walked in the door I felt like I needed to

take

a

breath.

My words are gone.  Flittered away throughout my day in every conceivable way.

Tonight I don’t have enough words to read a book to my four-year-old, to ask my eight-year-old about her interactions at recess today or to have a conversation with my husband. I don’t have enough words to write a blog post. I feel like I spent all my words before I even came in the door to home this evening.

As if words were like crumpled dollars in my 11 year old hand. My mother had budgeted souvenier money for sleepaway camp for me and I had to make sure I still had some left at the end of the week for things like key chains and vending machine corn nuts.

There are no ATMs for 5th graders in 1985. I couldn’t spend it all at once.

Like money, words are difficult to replenish once they’ve been used.

Listening more would probably quiet my mouth. Open ears would render my words less important. And simpler days might give me more words to use at night and on the people in my life who really count.

Lord, let my words be few. Let them be wise and chosen and let them be intentional. I want to speak truth but more than that, I want to listen to You speak to my heart. Let me be quiet today, tomorrow and let my soul breathe with You.

On what do you spend your words?

I’ve never considered myself a competitive person.

I don’t mind losing at Scrabble or Monopoly. If someone gets in front of me in line or cuts me off on the freeway, I’m okay. I don’t need to be first. I really, honestly don’t care about losing.

This is something I’ve prided myself on.

Go ahead, beat me! I don’t care. I think. I even say sometimes.

{And in this way, I’m winning at NOT CARING. I’m being competitive about who can NOT care the most.}

Ironic, isn’t it?

I’m learning that there is no room for competition in the church. At all.

I teach a tiny Bible Study. And I love those women. But when I hear about _________ teaching a women’s study that ____ people attend, it makes a little bit jealous. It does. I don’t have to win at card games but I somehow feel the need to do God-stuff better.

And I just realized that I am competitive but that I’m subversive about it. And I untentionally mask it with Christianity.

Someone ELSE gets the book contract.  Someone ELSE gets the speaking opportunity. Someone ELSE’s Bible Study is ginormous…

Instead of cheering on other groups or teachers or bloggers who are doing well and speaking truth and getting things done, I sit quietly back and wonder why it isn’t me. Only sometimes do I find joy in the success of others, and it’s only when they aren’t stepping on my spiritual real estate.

I should be rooting for them, like parents at a 6-year-old soccer game.

Thats RIGHT! Well done!

I’m so proud of you!

I can’t believe you did so WELL!

You are the BEST!

My thoughts and heart  should be populated with encouragement for others who are succeeding, especially in ministry, because we are all working for the same thing.

I heard Maya Angelou say something the other day, and I”m going to paraphrase. She said that all of us own one another’s good deeds, but that when we make poor choices, it is the burden of us all.  When we work for the Kingdom, for God, we all “win.” Not one of us. But all of us. And more importantly, God is glorified.

Shame on me for feeling like I have to be better than someone else in ministry. Shame on me for being jealous at another bloggers amount of comments. Shame on me for feeling less than because my stewardship is small. Shame on me.

I’m going to stop focusing on others and try to turn my gaze to the only One who deserves it.  And in the process I want to turn myself into the crazy, arms-waving, lung-screaming soccer mom who is rooting for YOU, for YOUR ministry, for the work of others who serve God.

You go girl.

Are you competitive? Do you cheer for others?

I always said that if I could have been a professional student I would have been.

{And I know there are some: people who just can’t seem to leave academia. They pile degree upon degree at the end of their names, initials that one must have a degree to recognize. My goal is not to offend any of you who’s name preceeds many, many letters. I do have a couple letters after mine as well.}

But I was really good at it. I was. I figured out early on how to study well, how to ingest information and regurgitate it on exams. I learned how to write really good papers, how to plan out times to read, to write and how to best uses study groups to my advantage.  It was environment I was very comfortable in and I knew how to make it work.

Which was why I {briefly} considered being a professional student.

What would I study? Not sure.

How would I make a living? Uh…

The final question, WHY would I do it? Because I was scared I wouldn’t be good at anything else.

But really, a person can’t go to school forever. I mean it’s possible, but at some point a person has to stop learning and start doing.

The first day of student teaching I sat in a twelfth grade classroom with my master teacher. Before the daily invasion seventeen- and eighteen- year olds, it was quiet and musty. The flourescent lights flickered. My teacher could smell my fear, I was sure. On the docket for that semester was Hamlet and King Lear and as much as I’d already studied the plays, I was sure I would be eaten alive by football players and cheerleaders.

Arms folded he looked at me. “You know what to do.”

Um, yes, I’ve taken Curriculum and Classroom Management and…

“No, you KNOW exactly what to do,” he said again.”You’ve sat in a classroom for HOW many years? You’ve watched other teachers succeed and fail over and over again. You KNOW what works. In fact, you are an EXPERT because you’ve been a student for so long.”

Right. I straightened my skirt and fumbled through my bag for my lesson plan. I put it on his desk and we both readied ourselves for the onslaught of senior smugness.

That semester, only a few years older than my students, I taught. I screwed up the Kings of England. I worried. I studied the Hamlet scene the NIGHT before I taught it the next day. I struggled. I was made fun of by students. I cried a little bit. I hid in the teacher’s lounge.

But most of all, I learned.

By doing.

I feel like I’ve been in a cycle of learning lately. I’ve listened to people speak truth into my life. I’ve been to conferences {more than my share this year} and I’ve listened to podcasts, sermons and speeches. I’ve talked and written and I’ve thought. I’ve studied and I’ve read. A lot. Books, blogs, newsletters. I’ve collaborated, I’ve said, “Yes!” and “Amen!”

I feel like I’ve been sitting in a classroom.

But now it’s time to do.

What? I’m not quiet sure yet. But I think it’s time for action.

By doing I will learn, I’m sure. By taking risks I’ll become more aware. And by jumping out of the classroom I might just learn something that isn’t written in any book or listed in any podcast.

What do you need to do?