Stay Tuned...

I started reading a new book. It's called Bittersweet by Shauna Niequist. I love this book already. I am somehow finding myself connecting with it on so many levels. The book is about the idea that in all things there is both something broken and something beautiful, that there is a sliver of lightness on even the darkest of nights, a shadow of hope in every heartbreak, and that rejoicing is no less rich when it contains a splinter of sadness.

I think these may be words I need to hear. A truth that my heart needs to learn.

Lately I have been finding myself living under the cloud of "the bitter state". My life is in what I would call a waiting stage right now. If you would rate life in the categories of lived it, living it, or waiting for it, most of the things I desire for my life would come under the waiting for it stage. If I'm being totally honest, which I will be, the waiting stage or the land in between (not where you were but not there yet either) can be a difficult one. It becomes easy to question God's faithfulness and His plan while I feel like I'm wandering around aimlessly and waiting for something I'm not sure is going to happen. I think I'm learning that the land in between can feel like the loneliest place in the world because it feels like everyone has arrived or isn't in the same place as you.

So my new question that I'm asking myself is how do I find the something beautiful in the something broken? How do I find the sweet amongst the bitter?

I don't have this answer yet.

Shauna says that "bittersweet is the practice of believing that we really do need both the bitter and the sweet. Sweet is nice enough, but bittersweet is beautiful, nuanced, full of depth and complexity. It's courageous, gutsy, audacious, earthy."

It doesn't really feel like my circumstances are very beautiful right now. The phrase above says bittersweet is the PRACTICE of believing that we really do need both the bitter and the sweet. Perhaps this is key....I need to practice believing this until I do?

So...

Stay Tuned....

I'm going to Practice! :)

Yours Truly,
~The Kindred Spirit