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Choosing Courage

I can't tell you how many times I've sat and stared at this blank screen.

I've actually written many posts over the past couple months...
...all which end up getting deleted.

The truth is, I've been processing...and taking my sweet time doing so.  I call it thorough...others just call it s......l......o.....w. :)
I've spent this past summer and fall in constant procesmode.

"About what?" you ask?

...everything.

You name it and it's probably spent it's time rolling around in this brain of mine.

...the crazy part is that after all this time mulling over things, you'd think I'd have a lot of conclusions.  My life should be wrapped up in a nice little package with a fluffy bow on top.  

But there is no bow...there certainly is no package...least of all, conclusions.

I've learned one thing through all this thinking I've done.  It's that I desperately long for conclusions...I want periods at the ends of sentences.

Living in a place of waiting, or as I call it, tension, is uncomfortable.

So with all this processing...I've thought, and I've written the end to many scenarios in my life...and I hate how the story ends...but sometimes, bad endings feel better than no endings at all.  

Do you know what I mean?

Because I long for conclusions, I find myself pushing for and forcing an end.  Is that right? Wrong? I don't know...but it's relief in any case...and sometimes hurt.  Sometimes not.

Am I the only one that does that?    

I see friends who long...
...to have a baby but they can't, so they wait.
...to get their referral for their adoption but they don't, so they wait.
...to see if this medication, diet, remedy will be what helps with the diagnosis given, but they don't see it, so they wait.
...to feel a deeper connection to their spouse, but they don't, so they wait.
...to feel affirmed in their job, but they don't, so they wait.
...to not be lonely, but they still are, so they wait.
...to hear something, anything, from God, but they don't, so they wait.

I find that it's easy to want to close-up shop and give up, move on...whatever you call it...anything but sit in that place of tension.  Anything for a conclusion.

Like I said, I have no bow.  I have no conclusion, except to say that there is something...I'm not even sure what...but something...that is very valuable about leaning into the tension...not. giving. up.

I think some of the best stories are because of the points of tension and not rushing to the end.

So with all this processing, I've concluded this one thing...I have no conclusion.  To force one feels like I'm cheating a more profound story being written.  But I also just have to be honest and say, it's not easy.  No, sometimes it's just brutally painful.  But I also believe that there is something really quite exquisite about living in that place with dignity and grace...not becoming bitter.

I think C.S. Lewis said it best when he said, "Courage is not simply one of the virtues, but the form of every virtue at the testing point."

So, if you are sitting at a place where one, two, or every. single. virtue. of yours is at it's testing point...if I could, I'd look straight into your eyes and say,
"Let's choose courage.  Just for today.  
Not tomorrow.  Today.  
Can you finish out this day with courage? 
If not, that's okay
We start again tomorrow...but the goal is courage.  
Courage and just a lot of grace."


7 comments:

Erin said...

Love This Tami! Thanks so much for sharing.
Blessings from Jamaica!

petite+grand said...

Fabulous, Tami!

Christen Leigh said...

Those waiting times are most definitely the hardest! Beautiful post!

Mindy said...

Love this Tami!

Rebekah said...

To quote Mommy...well Tami, you're a writer.

Kylene said...

I read this exactly when I needed to, thanks for having the courage to post!

leah said...

this is so great and hit me right where i'm at. thanks friend -- love you & miss you!

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