Today, I’m joining Kerrie Williams and Kerry Todd for their third Hello, My Name Is link-up, which gives women a place to come together and “make Him famous by letting others know how He is redeeming [them and] how He has renamed [them].”

Anxiety and fear–manifested in various delightful ways–have ruled me for much of my life. I didn’t have much stability growing up, so it started young. Yes, my parents stayed married and my family didn’t suffer any major tragedies, but we moved a lot. In between the moves, I changed schools. A lot. In 6th grade alone I attended a private school, was homeschooled a couple of months, and then attended a public school.

Any time I saw my parents with their heads bowed close together in hushed conversation, my stomach would clench.  Like many people, my parents would throw out “hey, what if we moved here/did this?” questions; BUT, they would actually follow through. Almost every single time.

In addition to the constant change, I was an awkward child.  I never had many friends, and I struggled with crippling insecurity and (what I now recognize as) social anxiety and panic attacks. I became very fearful–that bad things would happen to me or my family, that I wouldn’t get the things/life I wanted, that loss–of places and people–would be my constant companion. I also became a bit of an OCD control freak.  Did you know that control freaks are really just scared out of their minds?

Over the past few years, but especially in the last year, the Lord has been slowly healing my heart, knitting together the broken pieces and sealing them with a kiss. My eyes were opened to the fact that anxiety was killing me–emotionally and physically–and I began to run even harder after Him, because what other option was there? I can honestly say that I now have complete, peaceful-to-the-tips-of-my-toes trust in Him.  I have rest. Our adoption timeline? Our financial needs? My family members’ health? My job? Jon’s job?  My longing for deeper friendships?  It’s cool. He’s got it.  “Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom” (2 Cor. 3:17) is my jam, remember?  There is beautiful freedom in trusting Him completely.

My old labels were: control freak, insecure, anxious, fearful.  My new labels are: open, confident, trusting, safe.

Hello, my name is afraid secure.

Because His name is faithful.  And He is enough.

Have you been given a new name?

How often have you taken your grandparents for granted?  I know I’ve been guilty of it–of assuming they’ll always be there…

Since I’ve become an adult (blech), I’ve developed a new, deep appreciation for my grandparents.  One of my very favorite things about our yearly visits to England is sitting down with my grandparents over glasses of wine–beer for my grandad–and listening to their stories.  Stories about the beginning of their courtship when they were 14 and 15, the cycling trips they used to take around England in the 40s and 50s, my grandma’s days as a nurse, and my granddad’s rise from army private to the co-owner of a successful engineering firm.  I’ve come to learn just how generous and kind my granddad is and how wise and funny my grandmother is.

My very favorite stories though, are the ones about their experiences in London during WWII.  Until this most recent visit, I had no idea that my granddad was nearly killed by a German doodlebug–twice. My grandma’s story about ruining her new, pale blue coat by lying down on a dirty London street to shield herself from a bomb and both of my grandparents’ stories about witnessing the pain and grief of their neighbors, of watching women dig through rubble with their bare hands to search for their children, made the terror of living through the London blitz tangibly real to me.

I can’t believe I didn’t seek out their wisdom, life advice, and their stories years ago.

I love England, I really do, but I LOVE Cambridge.  As in, I feel joy-filled and cozy and comfortable and safe and home when I’m there.  My mother, for the most part, was raised on the outskirts of Cambridge, and I’ve been spending time there since I was 6 weeks old.  In college, I lived in Cambridge for one glorious semester, and I’ve been scheming of ways to become of permanent  resident ever since (Jon is now scheming, too).  I have regular pubs, shops, and market stalls I have frequented for years.  I have seen businesses and restaurants come and go.  Tragically, I’m now only able to spend a day or two in Cambridge each year (since my family moved an hour away, to the countryside), but every time I step off the bus and look around, I feel I’ve come home.

Today is Orphan Sunday.  Two years ago on this day, my heart was permanently wrecked, and adoption became the first choice for our family.

I have been drawn to international adoption since high school.  I always saw it as a far off, “maybe one day” thing–but, shortly after Orphan Sunday, 2011, we (Jon jumped on board shockingly quickly) began the process of adopting from Ethiopia, and we’ve never looked back.

Although I don’t know a ton about Children’s HopeChest, they seem like a pretty legit organization if you’re drawn to orphan ministry but aren’t able to adopt yourself. I love their video, Ethiopian Orphans, because it goes beyond the numbing statistics and shows you some of the kids behind the numbers.

Is there a child out there who is waiting for your family to say yes?

 

 

We’re back from England now, and I’ve begun the never-ending task of sorting through and editing hundreds of photos. For the next week or so, I’ll be sharing snippets of our trip with you.

After our weekend at Becky’s house, we headed to The Lake District, a dreamy area in the north of England (the county Cumbria, bordering Scotland, to be exact).  We spent one night in a B&B on Ashness Farm.  I highly recommend it–beautiful setting, kind people, and a delicious, home-cooked breakfast.

 

 

 

According to Becky (and some official fact source, no doubt), Manchester is the third most diverse city in the world–behind New York and Paris. Our weekend in “the north” was full of delicious food (including Indian and Spanish), political protests, and interesting people. I also saw a guy who is probably the best singer ever performing on the street.

Sorry that I’ve been blogging so sporadically lately! The past few weeks have been super busy; between the conference, my cousin Hannah visiting from England, planning our trip to England, and work/normal life responsibilities, I’ve been feeling a bit overwhelmed.

Jon and I arrived in England on Thursday morning (for all of you internet baddies out there: don’t get any big ideas–we’ve got people staying at our house). We spent one night at my aunt’s/grandparents’ house in a teeny tiny village in Norfolk called Garboldisham, then we headed to Manchester to spend the weekend with my cousin, Becky; next we’re heading to a beautiful area of northern England called The Lake District. I’m going to try to post throughout our trip, and there will probably be a weird mix of iPhone and DSLR photos (sorry about that).

England is my heart, and I’m so excited to share it with y’all.

Today in Manchester with Becky:

Blogging from Becky’s (right now):

I’m not a big fan of Halloween, but I love decorating with pumpkins in the fall.  I also love gold spray paint–it’s kind of a thing in my life right now.

The big creamy colored, um, thing is called a cushaw.  I’m kind of wondering if it would taste good, like spaghetti or acorn squash…

I didn’t want the stems to be painted so, I used painter’s tape to cover them up.  This was the most painful part of the process, and I wasn’t able to completely cover the bottom of the stems.  My OCD was twitching.

The finished product. Flowers in mason jars make everything better.

I’ve had some tiny pumpkins on our mantle for a few weeks, and I thought I might as well paint those, too, while I was at it.

How do you decorate for fall?

Ok y’all, so I know you’re probably super sick of hearing about The Influence Conference.  This is the last post on it, I promise.  I learned some fantastic, stronghold-shattering, life-changing stuff, and I really want you to benefit from it, too.

God created women to be vulnerable, to connect on a heart level, but our fear and the lies we’ve believed have led us to put up walls around our hearts, and many of us are living “small and scared” (as Haley put it), which is causing us to miss out on what the Lord has for us.  There is such freedom in vulnerability!  In addition to being vulnerable with another, there is sweet freedom in being vulnerable with the Lord, and trusting Him with our dreams.  In her session, Haley spoke about the huge difference between striving (1. To exert much effort or energy; 2. To struggle or fight forcefully) versus chasing hard after the Lord and letting Him place dreams in your heart and prepare the way for you to walk in (Eph. 2:10).  To use the same example Haley  used, think about pulling on a rope super hard to bring something to yourself, versus holding the hand of the Lord and walking peacefully and confidently toward that thing. When we release our expectations and hold our dreams in open hands before the Lord, vulnerable to Him, we become free and blessed beyond measure.  Lara summed this concept up beautifully in her session when she said “the Bible never says to chase our dreams; it only says to chase HIM.”  As we stay snuggled up close to His side, and walk hand in hand with Him, He will place His dreams in our hearts and will guide our steps so that those dreams are lived out.

Believing lies will make us live small and scared.  Lies make us weak.  Lies cause us to go off course.  Some lies I’ve believed that have made life unnecessarily difficult at times: I’m not seen or heard, my voice doesn’t matter, other people are more gifted than I am, so I shouldn’t even try.  One thing that really sunk deep into my spirit at the conference is that my good things will look different from other people’s good things and that I shouldn’t try to mimic what someone else is doing well.  Comparison is the thief of joy, y’all!  As we grow more confident in our identity as daughters of the King, we become liberated to shine, and we liberate those around us to shine, as well.  Your work (whatever that work may be) will be much more effective when you’re working from a place of freedom. 

Are you believing any lies that are causing you to live small and scared? 

(this post was inspired by Haley Morgan, Lara Casey, and Jessi Connolly)

“To name your fears is to destroy them… life begins at the end of your comfort zone.” Lara Casey at The Influence Conference

Girls/women have been a source of anxiety in my life since maybe second grade or so.  They have often hurt my feelings and intimidated me.  So, I obviously thought that attending a conference on my own with 300 women I didn’t know and sharing a room with 3 girls I’d never met before was an excellent idea.

I battled fear and totally had some freak-out moments before the conference; moments when I was frantically digging through my closet, convinced that all of the other girls would weigh 95 lbs. and have perfect top knots and be completely decked out in Madewell and Anthropologie–for free, of course, because their blogs are so successful that they have loads of sponsorships.  I feared they would judge me for being a little bit chubby and brand-new to blogging. Instead, I met women who have a passion for writing, for creating, for Jesus, and for one another–women who look at the world just a little bit differently, like I do. Women who, when they poured out their hearts and shared their dreams and struggles, made me exclaim “me too!!!”

                                                                        
 “…where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom” (II Cor. 3:17) has been my jam for the past several months.  I want to be completely, utterly free. I want to shake off the things that have been holding me back, and move boldly into the things He has for me.  One thing I’m learning about freedom is that it’s something you have to walk into, something you have to boldly pursue.  For me, breaking free of  being intimidated by other women meant pursuing freedom by being brave and stepping out in faith.  And that meant attending this conference and stretching myself to approach other women and doing the work to find the common ground that leads to friendship.

It would have been easy for me to stick with my roommates all weekend and not make an effort to meet people.  My roomies are lovely, loving girls, and after sharing a room together we got to know one another pretty well. BUT, I purposefully went to meals and sessions by myself, and approached tables filled with girls I didn’t know to ask “is this seat taken?”  I arranged to meet a sweet girl I knew only via Twitter and the Influence forums for breakfast.  I went to a dinner for adoptive moms where I met a wonderful woman who recently completed an Ethiopian adoption, and who I know will be a cheerleader and a source of wisdom and support in my life for years to come.  I saw a tweet about a group meeting in the lobby of the hotel at 10 p.m. to go get frozen yogurt, so I showed up and went along with them.  I met a few girls I really liked during lunch on Saturday, so I arranged to have dinner with them that night.  My bravery and momentary discomfort were rewarded with some sweet friendships that I pray will be lifelong.

There was a spirit of kindredness in the air, a sense of knowing that we are a sisterhood united by our creative and spiritual passions.  There was no competition, no snarkiness or backhanded compliments, just women cheering one another on and lifting eachother’s arms in support.  Jesus opened my eyes to see the hearts of my sisters, and He did a healing work in my own heart.

I found my people at The Influence Conference, my tribe of fellow writers and creators.  And I am so, so thankful.