tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-33304371143645841992024-03-04T23:27:03.501-08:00little victories...and if you're like me, you need hope, coffee and melody.Shannonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07237017992280813612noreply@blogger.comBlogger196125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3330437114364584199.post-40793984276468341032013-01-08T21:59:00.000-08:002013-01-09T12:42:40.392-08:00I love a good ending<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Courier New', Courier, monospace;">I was up late the other night with my mind just running wild. I wanted to sleep but it was clear that wasn't going to happen anytime soon. I saw an old journal sitting on the shelf and I thought maybe I'll write for a while. Of course I got distracted and started reading old entries from a couple years ago. I'm reminded that I love journaling more for the looking back than anything else, to see how things have changed and grown. </span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Courier New', Courier, monospace;">I just finished reading The Brothers K this week, and for as heartbreaking as the story is, it all comes together just so at the end. Authors are incredible like that. They move you from strangers of the characters to dear friends, through so much life and loss and deep sorrow and pain. I found myself yearning for redemption towards the end, for something good to come out of so much sorrow. As my fingers held those last few pages, I braced myself for the end, reading slowly and letting every word and sentence sink in. </span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Courier New', Courier, monospace;">The way things were going had me pretty sad. Here I was getting to the end of things and my heart just ached for all the characters. I wanted something good for these characters, so much more than they had received in life. I wasn't sure how the author was going to turn things around and I doubted that he even could at times. But, you know what? He did, and ever so beautifully. In the web of story and family that he had spun and the intricate and seemingly unimportant details, he brought goodness and redemption and hope. It's like he shined a light in the dark so we could see how all those little bits and pieces fit together just perfectly so. When I read those last few pages I felt so good and pleased and grateful for the ending. Those kinds of endings are my favorite.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Courier New', Courier, monospace;">I so often wish for that kind of perspective. My last entry in my journal was craving that kind of light in the dark, to see if there was good that came out of my own sorrow and pain, because it sure didn't seem like it at the time. I wanted to see my life spun into something beautiful and good, to see that it doesn't end there, that God will redeem what was broken. I often think that when we die we'll get to see how everything fits together. That's my hope anyway, and that I'll let out a big long sigh of relief.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Courier New', Courier, monospace;">I think God, the author of our lives, does give us glimpses of our lives in the shining light, that allows us to see how he's been working in us and weaving his goodness into our broken stories, into our sin, and into our sorrow. He says he will give beauty for ashes. He will rebuild, repair and restore what was destroyed. I see that. He has given me beauty for ashes in Brian, the one whom my soul loves. I remember when my friend Kirby, who I hadn't seen in a year came into the cafe and said, "wow, you look great, you're glowing" All I did was smile, and he said, "you're in love, I can tell, what's his name?" Somewhere in that time I began to feel again and it felt like a miracle. Love was growing where I once that it never could. </span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Courier New', Courier, monospace;">Looking back on both Brian and I's stories that have both been through times of great sadness and sorrow, I see that God has woven goodness into our stories, in the form of each other. And in that, I feel so good and pleased and grateful, much like I felt at the end of The Brothers K. Not that this is the end, there is so much more life to live and joys and sorrows ahead and it's not just my life in this story. I will wait and yearn and hope for redemption, beauty for ashes, and restoration and goodness to come out of the pain and sorrow. </span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Courier New', Courier, monospace;">And I know it will, because I know the author and He promises that. </span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Courier New', Courier, monospace;">And I trust Him.</span>Shannonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07237017992280813612noreply@blogger.com9tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3330437114364584199.post-65537112780152519852012-12-11T21:45:00.001-08:002012-12-13T22:20:30.624-08:00lean into the discomfort<br />
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brene brown reminds me that we social workers say, <i>lean into the discomfort.</i> </div>
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what that's always meant for me was leaning into <i>other</i> people's discomfort. i can do that all the live long day. but lean into <i>my</i> discomfort. that's a whole other story. it takes being okay with not being okay. i've discovered that i'm okay with not being okay. but i don't want other people to know that, especially those closest to me. i don't want to lean into that discomfort or lean on others because that's vulnerable and scary. </div>
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i was reminded this weekend that a trait common in my family is avoidance. conflict, guilt and shame all signal alarms inside screaming "avoid, avoid, avoid". so you can just imagine the sound of conflicts being resolved in my family,<br />
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oh right, they aren't being resolved. i see this trait like a neon sign in some members of my family. i see the hurt that avoidance has caused my family and the ways it has affected me. and i think, oh right, I too, avoid conflict at times. i don't want my action or inaction to hurt other people the way i've been hurt. knowing this, i've been trying so hard not to run from conflict. the thing is, resolving conflict requires vulnerability which is scary. </div>
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for me, vulnerability is wrapped in fear and sometimes all i can do is repeat an inner script until it's all okay. "don't put up your walls. don't put up your walls. don't put up your walls." it's similar to my inner-script when i'm faced with my other fear, throwing up. "don't throw up. don't throw up. don't throw up." and most of the time, in both cases, they work. it's not comfortable. it's not easy and i hope that someday it becomes second nature someday but until then, there's always the inner script.</div>
Shannonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07237017992280813612noreply@blogger.com13tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3330437114364584199.post-28902473799396046992012-11-01T22:06:00.001-07:002012-11-01T23:37:03.864-07:00These daysSo...it's been a bazillion days since I've blogged anything. I was going to blog about some deeper ponderings of the heart, but i'm going to save that for another day and just ease back into blog world with some current happenings.<br />
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Life these days has been filled with much photo editing as I finish up wedding season. I do realize that wedding season has been over for a good month in portland but editing kind of drags behind, kind of like trailer taking turns every which way. I do love this one from my dear friend's Mark and Allison's wedding in september.<br />
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I love taking pictures and capturing moments for people. It's such a privilege to be a part of someone's life in that way, even if it's just for a day. I feel the same way about social work and crisis counseling. it's always been a privilege to bear witness to another's life and struggle, to walk through life with them for however long I'm able.<br />
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It's officially fall, or maybe I should say it was fall and now it's basically portland winter, with all its rain, wind, and cold. In the winter I get out of bed and it's freezing and I'm mad that I have to get out of my warm bed and angrily brush my teeth and ever so slowly wake up. Whereas, in the summer and fall, I wake up with the sun, the colors are glorious and I'm just excited about life and getting coffee. I already miss the sunshine and the fall, it sure was delicious.<br />
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I've been reading a lot more lately, blame it on the cold weather that makes me want to curl up and read and drink coffee all day long. It's been an interesting change for me. My usual approach to reading went like so: go to Powells, buy six books, start reading all six books at same time, finish one book six months later. Fail. Turns out some people (okay most people?) read just one book at a time and then finish in a timely manner. I'm trying to be one of those people. It's good to finish things, especially a good book. My favorite book of the summer was hands down <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Art-Fielding-Novel-Chad-Harbach/dp/0316126675">The Art of Fielding</a>. I know it's good if I start rationing my reading to make the book last longer; some characters are so hard to say goodbye to. I'm currently loving <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Cutting-Stone-Abraham-Verghese/dp/0375714367/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1351830338&sr=1-1&keywords=cutting+for+stone+by+abraham+verghese">Cutting for Stone</a>. I already love the characters so that's a good sign.<br />
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I've started running a bit, which for anyone who knows me, knows that I kind of hate running most of the time. I usually find myself running when I've had too much coffee and the energy just has to go somewhere or it's a rare beautiful fall day and I want to run in the brisk air and look at pretty trees. That was kind of the case when I went running in Colorado a couple weeks ago with my friend Mel. We ran around Wash park and it was a beautiful day, the trees were stunning and there were a lot of other runners out. I loved it (minus the altitude factor which had me fighting for breath after a 100 yards). I came back and found myself wanting to run (rare) and choosing the treadmill over other machines at the gym. The other night, the tv screen on my treadmill was broken and I just stared at my face for a half hour, which I don't generally do.. It helped for a bit though, because I pictured myself as being in a running commercial, like a Nike ad, where the girl is running for days through the countryside, the mountains, the trails, just running for-ev-er. I even had the focused face too, haha. I haven't been running very far or very long but it still feels good and the little part of me that has always wanted to love running is jumping for joy.<br />
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I'm loving the new <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Babel-Mumford-Sons/dp/B008NW67E0">Mumford & Sons album, Babel</a>. I love the energy of their music and their lyrics, gah, I love their lyrics so much. I catch on the them slowly too. I'll love a song and then a week or two later realize a few of the lyrics and right then and there declare my love for the song ten more times. The song that did it for me this week was their title track, Babel. So good.<br />
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and i will do my bloody part to tear, tear them down</div>
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and i'm gonna tear tear them down</div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">This here blog is starting to run on and on and on, so I'll leave you here for now. </span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: small;">Cheers.</span></div>
Shannonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07237017992280813612noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3330437114364584199.post-35000143083861549272012-03-30T19:48:00.001-07:002012-03-30T19:48:48.195-07:00love anyways<p class="MsoNormal">It’s kind of amazing to me that you can know someone your whole life, even be related to them, yet know so very little about them. <o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">As I sit here at my laptop this evening, full of red wine and pasta, I remember that today is my dad’s birthday. Or is it so I think. Every year I second guess myself, is it the 30<sup>th</sup> or the 31<sup>st</sup>? Tonight, I took to googling my dad and finding that there is a record of my dad being 66, which would make his birthday today. Great, problem solved. I send a text shortly after wishing him a happy birthday and wonder about calling. The fact that I wonder about calling my dad on his birthday makes me so very sad. I hardly know him. He hardly knows me.<o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">My heart sinks and I know this is not how it’s supposed to be. Family is a tighter unit, at least my definition of it is and I wonder how this piece of my family has drifted so far. I was thinking about a sermon I heard a couple weeks ago. Our pastor talked about the love of God as being a love that initiates. I have such a hard time initiating love. How will I know that my love will be returned? What if I am hurt? Those are the questions that stop me from initiating love and the very ways in which I wish I could love more like Christ loves. I guess that’s where I am for a reason and that is precisely what I am learning these days in this here rainy city. How do I love despite the great risk. It’s easy to love when I feel confident of someone’s love for me but impossibly difficult to love in a moment when I doubt or question that love. I am thrown back to the beginning. Love anyway. Trust anyway. Love because you were first loved, not by a mere human, full of flaws and imperfection and fears, but by a mighty God who knew He would be rejected by many and yet, still He loved. <o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Instead of hoping for a fatherly love that initiates. I want a heart that will love anyways, that will love first, even if it feels impossible. <o:p></o:p></p>Shannonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07237017992280813612noreply@blogger.com17tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3330437114364584199.post-6786165647571373752012-03-19T20:58:00.007-07:002012-03-20T21:58:46.132-07:00Sometimes, you just need to see the ocean<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjK554CDbMS0hlJAy1Tlvc3tF3OUAE8Bl5S0iFAyAYyXCOgw5CIzmojQuFIiRctEjQBgHCb1xAMJr1OLwDXL0FY7yuBIVF1GHZQz4L1Ky0tm7CcdKRKkudPEUB0gSj1FPmTW7VKyW99wRB3/s1600/%25281+of+1%2529-2.jpg" style="font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; "><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 320px; height: 214px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjK554CDbMS0hlJAy1Tlvc3tF3OUAE8Bl5S0iFAyAYyXCOgw5CIzmojQuFIiRctEjQBgHCb1xAMJr1OLwDXL0FY7yuBIVF1GHZQz4L1Ky0tm7CcdKRKkudPEUB0gSj1FPmTW7VKyW99wRB3/s320/%25281+of+1%2529-2.jpg" border="0" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5721824055171381202" /></a><br /><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-style: normal; "><span>The ocean has always scared me. I love it but it scares me. </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-style: normal; "><span>I love the water. I can’t live without it. I’ve always said, I would never live where there was no water nearby. I grew up on an island surrounded by water in the middle of the Puget Sound with coves and coastlines every which way. However, the Puget Sound never scared me*. It was a protected body of water or at least confined by cities and towns. It wasn’t unpredictable and wild like the ocean. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-style: normal; "><span>The ocean, I have always loved from afar, or merely from the shore, just my toes in the water. The giant waves and stories of rip tides and jelly fish always terrified me. It was all very unknown and unpredictable. Even now, the ocean scares me, but I still need it; I still crave it. I have days, fairly often too, when I wake up and I just need to see the ocean and be near it. When I can, I just jump in my car and go. I don’t know what exactly it is in me that needs to see the ocean, but seeing it up close soothes me. Maybe it’s seeing nature in all its fury and power, being reminded that this life is not mine to control and resting in a power much greater than myself.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-style: normal; "><span>I woke up the other morning with this quote running through my head.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span><span>“Love is tricky. It is never mundane or daily. You can never get used to it. You have to walk with it, then let it walk with you. You can never balk. <i>It moves you like the tide. It takes you out to sea, then lays you on the beach again</i>. Today's struggling pain is the foundation for a certain stride through the heavens. You can run from it but you can never say no. It includes everyone.” –Amy Tan</span><span><o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-style: normal; "><span>That part about being moved like the tide, being taken out to sea and laid on the beach again, that resonated with me all day. Love is just like that. I am finding parallels more and more often lately between the ocean and love and God. I love the ocean. I love God. I love love. I need those things but at the same time I fear them with all that I have in me. I can’t predict any of them. There is a power in all three that I can’t ignore and it scares me but at the same time I find comfort in knowing it is not my role to control them. Each one has the power to take me out to sea and lay me back upon the shore. Just like there are times when I need to see the ocean, there are times when I need to be loved and I there are times when I need God (which let’s be honest, is all the time). </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-style: normal; "><span>It's not easy being moved by something more powerful than myself and it's scary. I can't predict when the tide will pull me out or lay me on the shore. Yet, I still choose it. I hope I always do. </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-style: normal; "><span>I trust that it's building something greater in me and shaping me more into the woman I am created to be. </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center; font-style: normal; "><span>"A ship in port is safe, but that's not what ships are built for." Grace Murray Hopper</span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-style: normal; "><span>*Though, I will forever be terrified of the largest documented octopus <span style="font-size: 100%; ">in the world, which is said to live in the Puget Sound (shudder). </span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Georgia, serif; font-style: normal; "><o:p></o:p></p>Shannonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07237017992280813612noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3330437114364584199.post-79282167588888397412012-02-29T19:44:00.005-08:002012-02-29T22:26:52.250-08:00Presies!<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEilD1Zmmk4l0Lnx81pssxmFaqrJKFRivTBjwz1bIjzsRB-bMuKhdg4eW_GeGUK50_BDNS_rcGXQg8Cf2dKMvrcX_7He6ZzyGuV6-Fkw7n7wldrI25afc5AKKp_qn5jJQ5pmmKJRpl-H2oSG/s1600/1330573612635+%25281%2529.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 240px; height: 300px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEilD1Zmmk4l0Lnx81pssxmFaqrJKFRivTBjwz1bIjzsRB-bMuKhdg4eW_GeGUK50_BDNS_rcGXQg8Cf2dKMvrcX_7He6ZzyGuV6-Fkw7n7wldrI25afc5AKKp_qn5jJQ5pmmKJRpl-H2oSG/s320/1330573612635+%25281%2529.jpg" border="0" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5714773344242921778" /></a><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: 100%; ">Short and sweet story for you today; it made me smile anyway.</span></div><div><br /></div><div>I was working at the coffee house this morning, not totally thrilled to be working, but I was hanging in there. In walks this cute old man. I have a thing for old men- they are so sweet, usually in stylish old man attire and filled with random bits of wisdom. I just eat it up. Anyway, he ordered his coffee and out of his old book, peaked a new page of stamps. I also have a thing for stamps, I love going onto the USPS website and ordering cool stamps because that just tops off a hand-written letter, making it THE coolest thing, sure to bring a smile to the recipient's face. I commented on his new stamps and my love of stamps and how cool his were. We shared our love of stamps and talked about whether it was the year of the dragon or not while we poured his coffee. He went and sat down to his table of envelopes and letters and wrote away. A little while later as he was packing up his belongings and stamped envelopes, he walks over to me and holds one stamp out to me with a big smile and says "for you!" I smiled big and questioned, "for me? really??" and he smiles even bigger and says "presies!" I probably smiled as big as I could because this cute old man was giving me one of his cool stamps AND just said the word "presies" (short for the word presents, if you're late to the word shortening game). </div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">Oh my goodness. He made my day.</div><div style="text-align: center;">Folks, it's the little things.</div>Shannonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07237017992280813612noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3330437114364584199.post-50820878130462559882012-02-14T13:25:00.000-08:002012-02-14T22:59:04.224-08:00to persist in love<div style="text-align: center;"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); color: rgb(51, 51, 51); font-family: arial, helvetica, clean, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px; text-align: -webkit-auto; ">"And when you get down to it, </span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); color: rgb(51, 51, 51); font-family: arial, helvetica, clean, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px; text-align: -webkit-auto; ">Lily, </span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); color: rgb(51, 51, 51); font-family: arial, helvetica, clean, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px; text-align: -webkit-auto; ">that is the only purpose grand enough for a human life. </span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); color: rgb(51, 51, 51); font-family: arial, helvetica, clean, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px; text-align: -webkit-auto; ">Not just to love but to persist in love."</span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); color: rgb(51, 51, 51); font-family: arial, helvetica, clean, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 16px; text-align: -webkit-auto; "><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span ><span style="font-size: 14px; line-height: 16px;">Could there be any truer words? </span></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span ><span style="font-size: 14px; line-height: 16px;"><br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: -webkit-auto;"><span ><span style="font-size: 14px; line-height: 16px;">I think about this a lot. And given that it's Valentine's Day, I thought I'd write some thoughts on love. As I hear story after story of love lost or just plain given up on, I can't help but find myself heartbroken over and over again. Once that feeling of "in-loveness" is gone (and it will come and go as all feelings do) relationships are just left behind and it makes me so sad. I was talking with my best friend (of 25 years- nobigdeal) over wine last night and we talked about how one can make that feeling last, how to keep the intensity and passion. I thought for a moment that of course it can last but I only let the idealist in me believe that for a fraction of a second. Of course that intensity of "in-loveness" can't last. We'd all be crazy fools in love, surviving on 10 cups of coffee a day and bumping into things and day dreaming all day. It would be crazy to think one could sustain that intensity of feeling and emotion (any emotion for that matter) for the entirety of their lives. Ha, I mean we would never get anything done. All of our other relationships and work would suffer and we'd never sleep a wink. Just because that "in-loveness" goes away or comes and goes in waves does not mean that love is gone. Love can be very much alive and strong but in a quieter deeper sense of the word. A love rooted not just in feeling, but in trust and commitment, grace and forgiveness. </span></span></div><div style="text-align: -webkit-auto;"><span ><span style="font-size: 14px; line-height: 16px;"><br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: -webkit-auto;"><span ><span style="font-size: 14px; line-height: 16px;">That's when choosing to <i>persist</i> in love comes in. When we make the decision to love not just because we <i>feel</i> like loving someone or because we feel especially loved in that moment, but continuing to love when it's hard to and in moments when that feeling of "in-loveness" isn't felt. </span></span></div><div style="text-align: -webkit-auto;"><span ><span style="font-size: 14px; line-height: 16px;"><br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: -webkit-auto;"><span ><span style="font-size: 14px; line-height: 16px;">We should all strive to love, to be in love and to persist in love. </span></span></div><div style="text-align: -webkit-auto;"><span ><span style="font-size: 14px; line-height: 16px;">And always, always, always be grateful for it.</span></span></div><div style="text-align: -webkit-auto;"><span ><span style="font-size: 14px; line-height: 16px;"><br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: -webkit-auto;"><span ><span style="font-size: 15px; line-height: 16px;"><br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: -webkit-auto;"><span ><span style="font-size: 14px; line-height: 16px;"><br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: -webkit-auto;"><span ><span style="font-size: 14px; line-height: 16px;"><br /></span></span></div>Shannonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07237017992280813612noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3330437114364584199.post-40635582828881233632012-01-31T16:49:00.000-08:002012-01-31T16:56:21.087-08:00On love and letters<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:12.0pt;line-height:15.75pt;background: white"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;color:#333333">I read this article a couple nights ago that a friend had posted on her facebook wall. John Steinbeck, one the most well-known authors was also a prolific letter-writer. A book of Steinbeck's letters to family, friends and the like was just published called <u>Steinbeck: A Life in Letters</u>. I love letters, especially those of the handwritten variety, but I took to this letter especially. It's a sweet response to his eldest son, who had confessed to have fallen desperately in love with a girl named Susan while at boarding school. I couldn't love Steineck's response any more, we could all use these pearls of wisdom, I know I can.</span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:12.0pt;line-height:15.75pt;background: white"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; color:#333333;letter-spacing:-.75pt"><i>New York<br />November 10, 1958<o:p></o:p></i></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:12.0pt;line-height:15.75pt;background: white"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; color:#333333;letter-spacing:-.75pt"><i>Dear Thom:<o:p></o:p></i></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:12.0pt;line-height:15.75pt;background: white"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; color:#333333;letter-spacing:-.75pt"><i>We had your letter this morning. I will answer it from my point of view and of course Elaine will from hers.<o:p></o:p></i></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:12.0pt;line-height:15.75pt;background: white"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; color:#333333;letter-spacing:-.75pt"><i>First — if you are in love — that’s a good thing — that’s about the best thing that can happen to anyone. Don’t let anyone make it small or light to you.<o:p></o:p></i></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:12.0pt;line-height:15.75pt;background: white"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; color:#333333;letter-spacing:-.75pt"><i>Second — There are several kinds of love. One is a selfish, mean, grasping, egotistical thing which uses love for self-importance. This is the ugly and crippling kind. The other is an outpouring of everything good in you — of kindness and consideration and respect — not only the social respect of manners but the greater respect which is recognition of another person as unique and valuable. The first kind can make you sick and small and weak but the second can release in you strength, and courage and goodness and even wisdom you didn’t know you had.<o:p></o:p></i></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:12.0pt;line-height:15.75pt;background: white"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; color:#333333;letter-spacing:-.75pt"><i>You say this is not puppy love. If you feel so deeply — of course it isn’t puppy love.<o:p></o:p></i></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:12.0pt;line-height:15.75pt;background: white"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; color:#333333;letter-spacing:-.75pt"><i>But I don’t think you were asking me what you feel. You know better than anyone. What you wanted me to help you with is what to do about it — and that I can tell you.<o:p></o:p></i></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:12.0pt;line-height:15.75pt;background: white"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; color:#333333;letter-spacing:-.75pt"><i>Glory in it for one thing and be very glad and grateful for it.<o:p></o:p></i></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:12.0pt;line-height:15.75pt;background: white"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; color:#333333;letter-spacing:-.75pt"><i>The object of love is the best and most beautiful. Try to live up to it.<o:p></o:p></i></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:12.0pt;line-height:15.75pt;background: white"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; color:#333333;letter-spacing:-.75pt"><i>If you love someone — there is no possible harm in saying so — only you must remember that some people are very shy and sometimes the saying must take that shyness into consideration.<o:p></o:p></i></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:12.0pt;line-height:15.75pt;background: white"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; color:#333333;letter-spacing:-.75pt"><i>Girls have a way of knowing or feeling what you feel, but they usually like to hear it also.<o:p></o:p></i></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:12.0pt;line-height:15.75pt;background: white"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; color:#333333;letter-spacing:-.75pt"><i>It sometimes happens that what you feel is not returned for one reason or another — but that does not make your feeling less valuable and good.<o:p></o:p></i></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:12.0pt;line-height:15.75pt;background: white"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; color:#333333;letter-spacing:-.75pt"><i>Lastly, I know your feeling because I have it and I’m glad you have it.<o:p></o:p></i></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:12.0pt;line-height:15.75pt;background: white"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; color:#333333;letter-spacing:-.75pt"><i>We will be glad to meet Susan. She will be very welcome. But Elaine will make all such arrangements because that is her province and she will be very glad to. She knows about love too and maybe she can give you more help than I can.<o:p></o:p></i></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:12.0pt;line-height:15.75pt;background: white"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; color:#333333;letter-spacing:-.75pt"><i>And don’t worry about losing. If it is right, it happens — The main thing is not to hurry. Nothing good gets away.<o:p></o:p></i></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:12.0pt;line-height:15.75pt;background: white"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif"; color:#333333;letter-spacing:-.75pt"><i>Love,<o:p></o:p></i></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height:15.75pt;background:white"><span style="font-size:10.5pt;font-family:"Arial","sans-serif";color:#333333; letter-spacing:-.75pt"><i>Fa</i><o:p></o:p></span></p>Shannonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07237017992280813612noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3330437114364584199.post-56008770120518239452012-01-16T19:26:00.000-08:002012-01-16T19:29:46.866-08:00fear is a beast<p class="MsoNormal">Wouldn’t you know that just days after I write about my yearly resolution to be brave, I am reminded that to become brave you first have to be scared. Brennan Manning writes about people that aren’t prepared for their prayers to be answered. He says people pray for humility but they don’t prepare themselves to be humiliated. Every time I pray for courage and bravery, I forget that we don’t just receive these things, we <i>learn</i> them. We experience things that cause us to encounter humiliation or fear in order to learn humility or courage. <o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Fear is a beast <o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">always lurking around every corner and always present in my peripheral vision even in my most contented moments.<o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">After all this talk about how I feel a little more brave, I’m reminded that I have much farther to go and I am learning still. <o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Fear steps in, steals my breath, hollows me out and leaves me with just enough energy to close the curtains and lock the door. I am amazed at how quickly I throw my walls up when fear enters the room. I’ve had a lifetime of training in self-preservation and turns out, it’s not so easily unlearned, go figure. Once I feel that fear, it’s hard to choose courage; my words, my actions, my demeanor all turn themselves over to fear. Everything in me desperately fights to protect itself-and it gets ugly.<o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">I’ve found that half the time I don’t even know the root of the fear in the moment. Fear knows my weaknesses and my wounds and knows just what will trigger that automatic response to sound the alarms. I’ve buried those things away. I have to dig and dig until I get at the root of the fear. It’s then that I have the choice to be hurt by it and bury it away again or I can acknowledge it for what it is, feel the weight of it and let it go. There’s a quote that I love that reads, <o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">“the rain of grace pounds the dirt until life breaks through the mud and reaches for the sun”. <o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">I just love that. It’s digging down deep, finding the root of the fear, letting grace in and allowing life to come out of it. It’s work. It’s not easy. It’s like soul gardening; it requires using mental muscles that I never use or haven’t used in years and at the end of it, I’m left feeling sore and tired, much like real life gardening. But, what I love about gardening is that sure I’m sore and tired and dirty at the end of the day but I can step back and look at the progress I’ve made. I can see something grow where I once thought nothing could and that is something to be thankful for.<o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>Shannonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07237017992280813612noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3330437114364584199.post-41781839420574281222012-01-09T11:34:00.000-08:002012-01-09T12:48:15.896-08:00this is the new yearAnd cue, Death Cab for Cutie’s song…this is the New Year. It’s funny how different markers in life or the year almost warrant a reflection, a mandatory looking back of sorts. I always feel that way anyway. I like that though. I am a reflective person and any excuse to look back on where I’ve been and where I’m going refreshes me. In fact usually when I sit down to journal, without fail I spend a majority of the time re-reading old entries and transporting myself back, remembering how my heart was at a certain moment in time.<br /><br />What did I learn this year? How did I grow? What did I do? How did I spend my moments? So many questions that I ask myself-maybe one or two that I actually have an answer to off the top of my head. Without fail, every year I am just amazed at how much can happen in a year. It’s been a really hard but really blessed year. If you had asked me a year ago what the year would look like, I could not have predicted or forecasted this year in the slightest. Time goes so fast but so much life and healing can happen in that amount of time.<br /><br /><span style="font-style:italic;">This year I was a bridesmaid in two of my dear friend’s weddings. I went to Haiti for the third and fourth time to complete a portrait project and teach a trauma support seminar. I co-founded a non-profit for Haiti. My best friend and I held our very first photography show together in Seattle. I showed my Haiti photography at the Dragonfly and shared my love of Haiti and photography with my community in Portland. I started my own photography business. I started dating and am still dating the most amazing man I’ve ever met. I shot five weddings. I helped shoot a destination wedding in Mexico and rung in the New Year shooting a dear friend’s wedding in Spokane. <span style="font-style:italic;"></span></span><br /><br />Every year, I make the resolution to be brave. Perhaps not the most specific resolution and most of the time if one doesn’t make a specific and achievable goal, it’s just not going to happen. But you know, even with my vague resolution or prayer, I feel a little more brave. Brave in work, brave in relationships, brave in faith. I In those little or big steps toward bravery, I’ve found that it’s worth it. A year ago I would have stayed safely where the risk is minimal or the reward assured and that only takes you so far. I always fall back on the quote, <i>“may you always do what you are afraid to do”</i>. The best things in life are a little scary because there’s risk involved which means it’s <i>worth</i> something. I think back on this year and think of all the amazing experiences and people I would have missed out on if I hadn’t said yes to those opportunities. This year has been rich and full and I am so very thankful for that.<div><br /><span>“But in the books again, great joy through love always seemed go hand in hand with frightful pain. Still, he thought, looking out across the meadow, still, the joy would be worth the pain– if indeed, they went together. If there were a choice– and he suspected there was– a choice between, on the one hand, the heights and the depths and, on the other hand, some sort of safe, cautious middle way, he, for one, here and now chose the heights and the depths." (A Severe Mercy)</span></div><div><br />As I look ahead to next year. I can’t tell you what the year will look like, I was never any good at making a plan anyway, but I can tell you that it will surely be really rich and full, full of both joy and sorrow as our days always are, I just hope that I keep a thankful heart through it all. <i>Here’s to the heights and the depths.</i><br /></div>Shannonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07237017992280813612noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3330437114364584199.post-21666474229015920802011-12-20T21:47:00.000-08:002011-12-20T22:09:53.994-08:00perspectiveRemember building the best fort ever?<br /><br />And then how the dog charged through the living room and across the pillow and how the blanket slid out from the stack of books holding it down, and how the whole thing fell apart, but also how this broken down mess was what got you outside, out to that wide field where you found some jacked-up old wood and a random shoe, and then how you found yourself starting again, building something altogether new.<br /><br />How you sat there with dirt under your finger nails, digging away.<br /><br />And how the sun was setting and you looked up to see a new view emerging from across the wide field and over the lake.<br /><br />A world that was waiting for you, but which you wouldn’t have seen if the dog hadn’t charged through the living room. <br /><br />- Sabrina Ward Harrison<br /><br />I thought about this little story tonight as a group of us talked at home community. It's such a quick story but the message to me is massive and hopeful. Things in life may not turn out exactly how I plan or hope but often times what comes after the collapse of one plan is something new and beautiful and different and good. I hope I always have the eyes to see that new view and the goodness that can be born out of loss.Shannonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07237017992280813612noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3330437114364584199.post-78530181140505012862011-11-15T22:07:00.000-08:002011-11-15T22:30:20.836-08:00little bits<span class="Apple-style-span">i saw an old man on the street corner yesterday blowing great big bubbles from his bike just as it started to rain and it made me so happy. </span><div><span class="Apple-style-span"><br /></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span">lovin' the song, <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JzIK5FaC38w">'your hand in mine'</a> by explosions in the sky. the couple who's wedding i helped shoot this past week in zihuatanejo, walked down the aisle to this song. it's so pretty.</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span"><br /></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span">also lovin' the song, <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tHWiY73Qcbw">'never let me go'</a> off the new florence + the machine album. btw, this album is so great.</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span"><br /></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span">i want a dog more and more. while i was in mexico. on our beach stroll, this street dog just walked with us down the beach and back and then sat under our feet as we stopped for a beer-that cost one whole dollar (ohsogreat). reminds me of my beach walks as a little girl on the island. by the time i got to the end of the beach there'd be seven dogs by my side that joined me along the way. i just love 'em.</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span"><br /></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span">painful experiences are awful and i wouldn't wish suffering on anyone, but nothing connects people the way pain does, and i find that to be one of the most beautiful things. the redemption, if we have the eyes and privelege to see it is amazing and breathtaking, makes me heartfull and thankful and ultimately more faithful.</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium; font-family: 'courier new'; line-height: 14px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">“Out of suffering have emerged the strongest souls; the most massive characters are seared with scars</span><b style="font-size: medium; font-family: 'courier new'; line-height: 14px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">.”</b></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); "><span class="Apple-style-span"><br /></span></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); "><span class="Apple-style-span"><br /></span></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 14px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); "><span class="Apple-style-span">and lastly, love this quote. </span></span></div><div><p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span">"To laugh often and much; to win the respect of intelligent people and the affection of children; to earn the appreciation of honest critics and endure the betrayal of false friends; to appreciate beauty; to find the best in others; to leave the world a bit better, whether by a healthy child, a garden patch or a redeemed social condition; to know even one life has breathed easier because you have lived. This is to have succeeded."<br />-Emerson</span><o:p></o:p></p></div>Shannonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07237017992280813612noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3330437114364584199.post-41541811127293747002011-11-02T21:42:00.000-07:002011-11-03T13:23:39.683-07:00quote.<p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span">"Charles Dickens tells us every heart is a profound mystery to the heart beating nearest it." Don Miller</span><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal">and if you're curious of the original quote like I was...</p><p class="MsoNormal"></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span">"A wonderful fact to reflect upon, that every human creature is constituted to be that profound secret and mystery to every other. A solemn consideration, when I enter a great city by night, that every one of those darkly clustered houses encloses its own secret; that every room in every one of them encloses its own secret; that every beating heart in the hundreds of thousands of breasts there, is, in some of its imaginings, a secret to the heart nearest it!" - Charles Dickens</span><o:p></o:p></p><p></p><p class="MsoNormal">just marinating on this little gem today.</p>Shannonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07237017992280813612noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3330437114364584199.post-84969081904787105302011-10-24T22:32:00.000-07:002011-10-24T23:05:01.301-07:00hot potatoSometimes an emotion will hit me upside the head, just right out of left field. After all this talk about sitting with pain and working through it. I definitely have those days in which I do that very thing and it's hard but it's also good. Then I have other days like today where it's like I'm playing that hot potato game, where you throw the potato around to others as fast as you can and you lose if you hang onto it too long, only it's my emotions that I'm tossing around. Throwing it right back before I even have the chance to be with it for even a moment. All I know is its discomfort, and the logical thing in the moment is to throw it right back before it has the chance to burn me.<div><br /></div><div>I find myself thinking back to one of the first sermons I heard at Imago dei Community and the voice of a 92 year old woman saying the words, <a href="http://shannonhannon.blogspot.com/2008/11/seasoned-people.html">"hang on and hang in"</a>. You can listen to the sermon <a href="http://www.imagodeicommunity.com/sunday/sermon-archive/jesus-loves-me/">here</a>.<br /> <div><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 19px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); "><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center; ">I want to know<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center; ">if you have touched<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center; ">the centre of your own sorrow<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center; ">if you have been opened<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center; ">by life’s betrayals<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center; ">or have become shrivelled and closed<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center; ">from fear of further pain.<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center; "><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center; ">I want to know<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center; ">if you can sit with pain<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center; ">mine or your own<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center; ">without moving to hide it<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center; ">or fade it<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center; ">or fix it.</p><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center; ">(from The Invitation)</p></span></div><div><br /><div><br /><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div></div></div></div>Shannonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07237017992280813612noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3330437114364584199.post-63178928154641605732011-10-16T11:16:00.000-07:002011-10-16T11:19:58.638-07:00the long way around<p class="MsoNormal">I woke up this morning earlier than anticipated. I tried to curl back into sleep for rest’s sake but my stubborn mind wouldn’t rest. I stayed nestled in my bed (which continues to be the warmest place in the house since we as a house have refused to turn on the heat) and turned on some music. I found myself reflecting on life and faith and reading old journal entries. I sighed as I remembered so many moments just like this a couple years ago, I call it “cocooning”. <span> </span><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Cocooning was that time I gave myself to just be still and give myself the space to process and grow and the cozier and safer that space was the better. I had just bought this book, When the Heart Waits randomly on a sale table at Powell’s Books purely because she was the writer of my favorite book, The Secret Life of Bees. In this spiritual memoir of sorts she writes about butterflies and cocoons and waiting. I took in her words like a desert to rain. I related with so much of what she had to say but especially to the cocoon. For a time, she recalls being inundated with images of butterflies and cocoons. One instance, she recalls a poster of a butterfly against a great big sky, on it were the words “Your soul is your greatest work of art” and right down in the corner is the husk of an empty cocoon. A painful reminder that bright wings and works of art don’t just happen, they require courage and letting go and a time of becoming. I think the most fascinating thing about cocoons is that on the outside it looks as if nothing is happening and it looks like the caterpillar inside is hiding, but on the inside, change and transformation are taking place. The butterfly is becoming. The cocoon isn’t an escape but a transformation place.<o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">It got me thinking about this season of life that was so painful. There were ways to escape pain sure, but I was making an intentional decision to face it and sit with it. <i>Funny how easy that sentence was to type out but so incredibly difficult to actually do. </i>I think it’s a natural desire to run from pain, to numb out or pretend it’s not there. It’s so easy to want to<i> arrive, </i>to be at a point where it doesn’t hurt anymore, where everything is perfect and <i>just so. </i>I had spent most of my life thinking if I don’t look at my pain then all would be well. Sure, it worked for a while but you know what? <span> </span>I still knew it was there and my fear of it just grew. When dealing with our wounds, it takes time.<o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">“We went onto heaven the long way around.”<span> </span>-Henry David Thoreau<o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">I love this quote, so much.<o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Makes me think of something I find myself saying often. <i>The most rewarding things in life take time to build and grow. </i>Most people want heaven now, like every other pleasure in life, instant happiness. Taking the long way isn’t seen as desirable but I would argue that it’s the only way to truly live. It’s long and arduous and oftentimes painful, but there is so much more wisdom to gain and grace to receive along the way. Every day I wake up and commit to taking the long way and I think my soul will be all the better for it.<o:p></o:p></p>Shannonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07237017992280813612noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3330437114364584199.post-76951041275921762212011-09-18T17:03:00.000-07:002011-09-18T17:12:11.538-07:00a woman of strength and softnessa friend of mine shared this poem with me when i was in malawi a few years ago. i scribbled it down in my journal then only to reread it this week. i think it's so beautiful and had to share it.<div><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">A Woman of Strength and Softness</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">Surrendered heart, not surrendered identity</div><div style="text-align: center;">a strength to be reckoned with</div><div style="text-align: center;">She does not demand respect</div><div style="text-align: center;">but you want to give it to her</div><div style="text-align: center;">Her presence invites you to rest</div><div style="text-align: center;">in fact she is like a tree</div><div style="text-align: center;">holding forth nurturing branches</div><div style="text-align: center;">not a spiderweb, trapping you for her soul food</div><div style="text-align: center;">Her vulnerability is so lovely</div><div style="text-align: center;">you cannot keep your soul out of hers</div><div style="text-align: center;">She is marked by genuine kindness</div><div style="text-align: center;">of one who has already forgiven you</div><div style="text-align: center;">for how you will fail her</div><div style="text-align: center;">She exudes the kind of strength </div><div style="text-align: center;">that trusts and waits and suffers</div><div style="text-align: center;">as unto God's purposes, not her own</div><div style="text-align: center;">She lays her own life down</div><div style="text-align: center;">like a lamb, not a dog</div><div style="text-align: center;">Her surrender flows from her love</div><div style="text-align: center;">not fear or desperation</div><div style="text-align: center;">Her surrender is a chosen thing</div><div style="text-align: center;">She lives in the vulnerability of her longing to be treasured</div><div style="text-align: center;">her longing to be known</div><div style="text-align: center;">her longing to be invited in</div><div style="text-align: center;">But she lets her disillusionment </div><div style="text-align: center;">tenderize, not toughen her heart</div><div style="text-align: center;">She does not hold the objects of her love captive</div><div style="text-align: center;">She does not make them pay</div><div style="text-align: center;">or tie them to her with guilt</div><div style="text-align: center;">or keep them in terror of her critical eye</div><div style="text-align: center;">But rather lets them fly free</div><div style="text-align: center;">Enjoying all the more the reunion </div><div style="text-align: center;">They get to choose to be with her</div><div style="text-align: center;">She lives at the mercy of no one</div><div style="text-align: center;">She is captive only to the Father</div><div style="text-align: center;">Thus she is free to love</div><div style="text-align: center;">Even if it means she loses</div><div style="text-align: center;">She chooses doing love over getting love.</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">Written by Lottie K. Hillard</div>Shannonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07237017992280813612noreply@blogger.com9tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3330437114364584199.post-84796202073276748042011-09-12T14:23:00.000-07:002011-09-12T14:24:21.649-07:00The Impossible Dream<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><o:p> </o:p>To dream the impossible dream </p><p class="MsoNormal"></p><div style="text-align: center;">To fight the unbeatable foe</div><div style="text-align: center;">To bear with unbearable sorrow</div><div style="text-align: center;">To run where the brave dare not go</div> <div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">To right the un-rightable wrong</div><div style="text-align: center;">To be better far than you are</div><div style="text-align: center;">To try when your arms are too weary</div><div style="text-align: center;">The reach the unreachable star</div> <div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">This is my quest, to follow that star</div><div style="text-align: center;">No matter how hopeless,</div><div style="text-align: center;">No matter how far</div><div style="text-align: center;">To fight for the right</div><div style="text-align: center;">Without question or pause</div><div style="text-align: center;">To be willing to march into hell</div><div style="text-align: center;">For a heavenly cause</div> <div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">And I know if I'll only be true</div><div style="text-align: center;">To this glorious quest</div><div style="text-align: center;">That my heart will be peaceful and calm</div><div style="text-align: center;">When I'm laid to my rest</div> <div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">And the world would be better for this</div><div style="text-align: center;">That one man scorned and covered with scars</div><div style="text-align: center;">Still strove with his last ounce of courage</div><div style="text-align: center;">To reach the unreachable star</div><o:p></o:p><p></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><o:p> </o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">I was sitting in a coffee shop editing wedding photos and listening to Pandora this morning. Patty Griffin’s sweet and soulful voice was singing “top of the world” and at the song’s end came silence and then she continued on with “to dream the impossible dream”…<o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">I felt my heart tug and I stopped, wondering why those words struck me so. Then I remembered that it was one of the songs that my Grandma would sing, just out of the blue or sometimes she would sing it to me over a voicemail on my birthday. It’s been a song that has woven itself into our relationship all these years. I’ve been hearing her sing those words since I was just a little girl. I don’t think I’ll hear her sing them again in this life. Dementia has taken her captive and she can scarcely remember anyone in our family. As I listened to those words, I’m taken back to a few years ago when I was visiting her in the nursing home and she kept telling me every other sentence how proud she was of me and how she loved me “to the max”. <span> </span>She was her sweet self, so full of joy and kindness. I took a bunch of hold-out pictures of us that day and we laughed and laughed at our own silliness. Then she walked over to the piano and played Impossible Dream and sang for me and it was so beautiful. I didn’t realize what a gift that day was. That was the last visit I had with the Grandma that I knew all these years. She’s different now and the disease has laid claim over her mind and body, but I am so glad I have that sweet day to remember her by.<o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">I am a lyrics girl when it comes to music, so I was surprised that I had never really thought about the words to this song. Now, as I sit here reading the lyrics, I love the song even more. What a great life anthem; I may need to adopt this one as my own. <o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">May we all dream the impossible dream.<o:p></o:p></p>Shannonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07237017992280813612noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3330437114364584199.post-31939145623414291132011-09-06T21:58:00.000-07:002011-09-06T22:14:01.240-07:00quotage<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span class="apple-style-span"><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51); "><span class="Apple-style-span" >"We are undefinable. We are shades of masculine and feminine looking for someone to bounce life off of, looking for someone to give when we need to receive, to receive when we need to give, and when it's done right both get done at the same time. Being to being, here let me hold that soul for you because you've been... drowning in labels for so long you've grown tired of survival. Here is a moment of bliss, a moment of aliveness. All day long I expend. I hold together, I lift up, I give out, and sometimes... I just take in." ~ Lauren Zuniga</span><span class="Apple-style-span" ><o:p></o:p></span></span></span></p>Shannonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07237017992280813612noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3330437114364584199.post-45318544512326560892011-08-19T00:50:00.001-07:002011-08-19T08:36:27.579-07:00I will not wait to love as best I can<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgPrXKc6ztEtZOAgXODUM1Z_kqvb9BgBOrzYRjvR6DDMGSGOG3Qnqa1FijiF75odn_bp-ydm-i-jLVhV-bhHsGEyQAunoZKjkllPmIU6RbcIodxpvZXd1CsRiIsFcwbkwoAJL_jqwUWa197/s1600/%25281+of+1%2529-5.jpg" onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 320px; height: 214px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgPrXKc6ztEtZOAgXODUM1Z_kqvb9BgBOrzYRjvR6DDMGSGOG3Qnqa1FijiF75odn_bp-ydm-i-jLVhV-bhHsGEyQAunoZKjkllPmIU6RbcIodxpvZXd1CsRiIsFcwbkwoAJL_jqwUWa197/s320/%25281+of+1%2529-5.jpg" border="0" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5642471494752698898" /></a><p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" >"I will not wait to love as best I can. We thought we were young and that there would be time to love well sometime in the future. This is a terrible way to think. It is not a way to live, to wait to love." - David Eggers</span><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">I read this quote a while back and remember being taken aback like I had been smacked upside the head but was in a rush so I just jotted it on a piece of paper and shoved into a journal to remember to look at and reflect on later…then I forgot about it, until just recently when I decided I felt like writing again and found it in an old journal I hadn’t written in for ages. I unfolded the edges and read it again. And there it was again, that same smack upside the head.<span> </span><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">I’ve always been a bit of a perfectionist when it comes to random things like writing papers and baking cookies. They always needed a little something extra; they were never quite right. The biggie of the bunch was love. To be able to love, I always thought, <i>I</i> needed a lot of work and I did and still do. I kept the thought in my head that if I can just fix this bad trait or this lack of trust or my fears, if I could <i>just </i>get my act together-then <i>maybe</i> I could love someone or someone could love me. If everything could be <i>just so</i> then…it could be great. The problem is, everything will never be <i>just so. </i>If everyone thought this way, nobody would ever love anybody. It would be a world without love, which is the saddest of all thoughts. Sure we may be not be the best at loving people, but it’s a process. All the great things in this life are a process; it’s like taking the long road, getting lost along the way but seeing so much more beauty in the meantime.</p><p class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">Recently, life and the circumstance at hand have me marinating on this whole idea of waiting to love. The thought I’ve kept coming back to over these past few weeks is that faith and love are a choice. We wake up every day and choose to love this person and this God. We arrange our lives in a way that will support them and grow those relationships. We strive to better them. But in the end, we’re human and flawed and we mess up and we make mistakes and we don’t love well. And in those moments, thank goodness for grace and forgiveness. We soak and sit in that grace. I love how Anne LaMott puts it, <span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(24, 24, 24); font-size: 15px; line-height: 18px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); " >"I do not understand the mystery of grace -- only that it meets us where we are and does not leave us where it found us."</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(24, 24, 24); font-family: georgia, serif; font-size: 15px; line-height: 18px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); "> </span>We grow and learn and we wake up to another day and we try again, to love fully and well. It's a process we learn to embrace and fall into the rhythm of. We will never love perfectly, not even in the future. But we can love the best we can, knowing that we are imperfect and it will be ridiculously tough at times. We can acknowledge it for the process that is is, and we will be all the better for it in the end.</p><p class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></p> <p class="MsoNormal">It is not a way to live, to wait to love.<o:p></o:p></p>Shannonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07237017992280813612noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3330437114364584199.post-6084637307071200342011-08-09T23:31:00.000-07:002011-08-09T23:56:32.026-07:00trust<div style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; line-height: 14px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">"how glorious the splendor of a human heart that trusts that it is loved." -b. manning</span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; line-height: 14px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">
<br /></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; line-height: 14px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">
<br /></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; line-height: 14px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">trust is one of those things in life that is so incredibly beautiful yet so impossible to quantify. </span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; line-height: 14px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">i hear it so often.</span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" ><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 11px; line-height: 14px;"><i>trust in the lord. trust me.</i> </span></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" ><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 11px; line-height: 14px;">it's so easy to say and yet so hard to live.</span></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" ><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 11px; line-height: 14px;">
<br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" ><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 11px; line-height: 14px;">it's so hard to trust when i can't see the road ahead.</span></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" ><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 11px; line-height: 14px;">it's so hard to trust when i don't know if the reward will outweigh the risk.</span></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" ><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 11px; line-height: 14px;">it's so hard to trust when i fear my heart will get broken.</span></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" ><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 11px; line-height: 14px;">
<br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" ><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 11px; line-height: 14px;">yet,</span></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" ><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 11px; line-height: 14px;">somehow, in spite of the risk and the unknown</span></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" ><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 11px; line-height: 14px;">i choose to trust.</span></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" ><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 11px; line-height: 14px;">trust my intuition</span></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" ><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 11px; line-height: 14px;">trust that still small voice</span></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" ><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 11px; line-height: 14px;">trust that i am loved,</span></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" ><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 11px; line-height: 14px;">so dearly loved.</span></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'lucida grande', tahoma, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 11px; line-height: 14px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); ">
<br /></span></div>Shannonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07237017992280813612noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3330437114364584199.post-67501174919824226482011-07-25T22:49:00.000-07:002011-07-25T22:58:53.881-07:00on love<div style="text-align: center;">"When you're in love, you can't stop smiling, yet you can't smile enough."</div><div style="text-align: center;">-My Aunt Cathy</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">On Saturday, my cousin Brian got married to Jennifer, the love of his life. I couldn't be happier for the two of them and their new life together. Brian is a smiley guy to begin with but he was just beaming and giddy all day. </div><div style="text-align: center;">In the car as we were driving back to the ferry, we were reflecting on the day and talking about how happy B was and my aunt out of nowhere and so nonchalantly rattles off this beautiful but true string of words. "When you're in love, you can't stop smiling, yet you can't smile enough."</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">I just like that, a lot. </div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div>Shannonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07237017992280813612noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3330437114364584199.post-64345246405982101742011-07-05T23:41:00.000-07:002011-07-06T00:24:16.561-07:00perspective. perfectly so.I was at work the other day, doing what i do, making coffee and joking around with the friendly faces I have come to love like family, when out of the corner of my eye I caught sight of a little spider. I think I let out a little "eep" as it descended from the lamp right in front of my eyes. He was out of the way enough that I wouldn't touch him while serving customers and he didn't (to my knowledge) have the gusto to swing onto someone's date bar. <div><br /><div>I kept glancing at him here and there to see what he was up to, and all I saw was him climbing up and then climbing down, walking over here and walking over there.</div><div><br /></div><div>When the line ended and people had continued about their days, I leaned in close to the little guy and when I looked at a certain angle in a certain light, I caught a glimpse of a beautifully constructed web. Wow. I took a moment to be humbled and acknowledge the fact that in that past hour, I had served a few people some caffeine and some smiles while this little guy had been slaving away over a home and what a beautiful whimsical creation he made. I took in the moment, feeling like this little spider had taught me something, but I wasn't quite sure what.</div><div><br /></div><div>There was so much going on. I was distracted. Even when I glanced at the spider, all I saw was the spider, not the incredible web around it. Spider webs are funny like that. Life is funny like that. The light had to shine just right for me to see it. But man, in that light that lit up the web just perfectly so, I could see all the little intricate patterns that fit together perfectly. It was like a symphony.</div><div><br /></div><div>I'd like to think that if I had the chance to see my life in that same light that shines just perfectly so, that I would feel that same feeling of awe at the beautifully orchestrated symphony that is our lives. If only. Since I don't have the luxury of that perspective right now, I've decided to just live as if I did. Because, I do believe God is at work in every little intricate detail and I would be in complete and total awe if I had the eyes to see it all.</div></div>Shannonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07237017992280813612noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3330437114364584199.post-61211160678176200802011-06-20T18:00:00.000-07:002011-06-20T18:17:20.866-07:00verse<div style="text-align: center;">We don't yet see things clearly</div><div style="text-align: center;">We're squinting in a fog, peering through a mist</div><div style="text-align: center;">But it won't be long before the weather clears and the sun shines bright</div><div style="text-align: center;">We'll see it all then, see it all as clearly as God sees us,</div><div style="text-align: center;">knowing him directly just as he knows us.</div><div style="text-align: center;">But for right now, until that completeness</div><div style="text-align: center;">We have three things to do to lead us toward that consummation;</div><div style="text-align: center;">Trust steadily in God</div><div style="text-align: center;">Hope unswervingly</div><div style="text-align: center;">Love extravagantly </div><div style="text-align: center;">And the best of the three is love.</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">I Corinthians 13:12-13</div>Shannonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07237017992280813612noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3330437114364584199.post-70763971335933048872011-05-24T21:06:00.000-07:002011-05-24T22:11:07.241-07:00thankful, still.<div style="text-align: center;">"Thankfulness depends on what is in your heart, not what is in your hand."<br /><br /><div style="text-align: left;">I've been marinating on this quote all day. My friend Rachelle has it written on the signature of her emails and every time I read it I have to stop and let it sink into my bones. Thankfulness is a posture and an attitude that we control. It does not depend on what we physically hold. We can have everything and yet keep ungrateful hearts or we can have absolutely nothing and be thankful still.<br /><br />I've been learning how to be grateful in this season of looking for jobs. I have gotten my hopes up countless times only to be let down easy. It is so hard to put myself out there again and again, hoping that this one may be the one that works out, only to be brought to my knees again wondering why it didn't work out, why it wasn't the right fit. And that's where I find myself again tonight. I had wanted this one job to work out. It was perfect and I wanted it so badly. I let myself hope for it. I don't like to hope for things, it's risky and puts much at stake. I can't turn it off though- I am wired to hope. After a couple weeks of hoping, it was a blow to find out I didn't get the job. It bummed me out; it was an accumulation of all the let downs. I had my teary drive to work this evening, a blubbery phone call to my parents and a general bummed out attitude. And here I am, stuck on it. I'll let myself be sad for the night but I won't let it get me down. I'll wake up tomorrow and put myself out there again and keep hoping because that's the kind of girl my parents raised me to be, and I'm all the better for it.<br /><br />God has plans for me, I truly believe that. I don't believe it just happened to be the case that I was able to raise funds and get enough time off work to go to Haiti three times this past year- to help and serve, to use my giftings and strengths in a way that empowered and helped in the restoration and rebuilding of Haiti. That time was just what my heart needed and I don't think that's coincidence at all.<br /><br />I'm just waiting to see how God unfolds this little life of mine in His good and perfect timing.<br />And in the waiting, I am thankful, still.<br /><br /><br /><br /></div></div>Shannonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07237017992280813612noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3330437114364584199.post-86304758651384119592011-03-29T10:29:00.000-07:002011-03-29T10:41:17.971-07:00Hinds Feet on High Places<div>I've been reading this book, <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Hinds-Feet-Places-Hannah-Hurnard/dp/0842314296">Hinds Feet on High Places</a> for a few days now and just loving it. It's a beautiful allegory about spiritual journeys and highs and lows. Last night I opened it up where I had left off, a chapter on the desert. It's been so perfectly timed for this week and this season of life. Had to share it.</div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><i>They stayed at the huts in the desert for several days, and Much-Afraid learned many things which she had never heard before.</i><div><i><br /></i></div><div><i>One thing, however, made a special impression upon her. In all that great desert, there was not a single green thing growing, neither tree nor flower nor plant save here and there a patch of straggly grey cacti.</i></div><div><i><br /></i></div><div><i>On the last morning she was walking near the tents and huts of the desert dwellers, when in a lonely corner behind a wall she came upon a little golden-yellow flower, growing all alone. An old pipe was connected with a water tank. In the pipe was a tiny hole through which came an occasional drop of water. Where the drops fell one by one, there grew the little golden flower, though where the seed had come from, Much-Afraid could not imagine, for there were no birds anywhere and no other growing things.</i></div><div><i><br /></i></div><div><i>She stopped over the lonely, lovely little golden face, lifted up so hopefully and so bravely to the feeble drip, and cried out softly, "What is your name, little flower, for I never saw one like you before." </i></div><div><i><br /></i></div><div><i>The tiny plant answered at once in a tone as golden as itself, "Behold me! My name is Acceptance-with-Joy. </i></div>Shannonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07237017992280813612noreply@blogger.com4