WINSday on Wednesday--Recovering a Sense of Strength (And not Being Afraid to Ask "What's Next?")

Heart pounding.
Racing.
Shaking.
Can’t sleep.

Have you ever felt so anxious you just didn’t think you could face another day?

At college last year, that’s how our daughter felt. I am her mom, and there was nothing I could do to make the pain stop. Some boo boos need more than a band-aid and a kiss. I didn’t know if she’d ever come back from that dark place. Where was the brave little girl I raised? The one who was unafraid, who was a runner, and who loved art? In her place lived a paralyzed, scared, and lonely shadow of the girl I knew. When would my daughter return?

Isn’t it funny what we tell kids about college?

We tell them it will be the best years of their lives, that they will make the best friends they’ve ever had, and that they will enjoy freedom unlike anything they have ever known. And then we pack them up, set up their dorm room, and say good-bye. Our promises float away like little thought balloons. It takes nearly 200 hours of time spent together to make a new friend, and new experiences, even good ones, are an adjustment. Learning to live on our own, forge new study habits, and navigate the complicated relationships inherent in dorm life are no picnic.

No one tells us about these things.

And Christiana wanted to come home.

Truth be told, I didn’t want her to come home. I wanted her to tough it out and figure it out. But she couldn’t. She was paralyzed and traumatized and so coming home was inevitable. Thankfully, she stayed enrolled and this fall she moved into a new apartment with new roommates at a new school. I think she’s spent the night at our house maybe twice this entire first semester. Last year, she was driving from home to school (nearly two hours away) several times a week and sometimes having a panic attack before she even arrived.

Since then, a tremendous amount of growth has happened. In the fullness of time. When she (not me) was ready. (This did not happen overnight, and it did not happen without a lot of intervention, prayer, and help from a wide array of sources.)

Today’s WINSday on Wednesday is inspired by her journey and the path she’s taken to becoming the woman she is. Twenty years old, and I couldn’t be more proud of her. Rather than allow her past disappointment become a barrier to future success, she has instead decided to ask, “What’s next?”

These are her words from her heart for 2020.

2020 Goals

I woke up in the middle of the night with these four words on my heart:

1. Renew.

2. Peace.

3. Courage.

4. Significance.

All week I had been praying for God to give me a word for this New Year—something to work on or just a word that could be my focus for 2020. He wasn’t telling me anything. But then out of nowhere, these four words were my answer.

I have just come out of the hardest season of my life. Renew is a good word considering there is a lot that has been instilled in me that needs to be renewed. In the past year I struggled with so much anxiety. I am just coming out of this hard season, and I still harbor more fear than I’ve ever had in my life. I need to renew the peace and courage I used to have. I don’t want to live a life of fear. Fear is not from God.

I also want this next year to be peaceful. I am ready to renew that peace. I’ve been diagnosed with generalized anxiety disorder. Everything stirs up fear. Things that used to be so easy for me, like traveling to a new place, have become hard. Right now, I would rather stay at home where everything is familiar than embark on something new. If you asked me right in this moment to go love on people in Kenya (a place I love), believe it or not, I might actually say no. Traveling around the world has been something I have loved my whole life. Kenya is by far my favorite country. Two years ago, I would have told you I was never coming home from there.

I am saying right now that I am committed to no longer living in fear. I am starting the journey right now to renew the peace and courage that once was thriving in my heart. I know my God can do that. He raised Jesus from the dead. That same spirit that turned death to life is alive in me right now. Imagine what all He can do in me!

The word significance is going to be my word for the decade. In this next ten years, I want to graduate college, get married, start a family, and who knows what else. I want to make sure that I am living a life of significance. Yes, I want to be successful too, but who cares in the end if I made a lot of money and did a lot of stuff for things that don’t matter. I want to change the world. I want to make a difference and the only way to truly do that is by living a life of significance. Day by day, I am committed to renewing my heart, to ridding it of fear and asking courage and peace to take its place.

Here’s to 2020!

If you missed our interview on Mission Driven Monday last year, you can catch up here.

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WINSday on Wednesday--Make a Memory

Father Time waits for no man.

Or woman.

“I thought getting older would take longer,” I often moan.

But here we are, smack dab in the middle of middle age.

The sands of time must be made of quicksand.

And it is in that quicksand that we grownups find ourselves admitting to being “stuck,” “in a rut” or just plain “set in our ways.”

(Ouch.)

Did I just say that?

Because I don’t want to be a boring old person!

And neither do you.

Harnessing the power of the moments we have is the key to combatting the curmudgeon living inside all of us.

Today’s WINSday Wednesday inspiration comes from my friend Ginny Starr. She knows how to make even the most ordinary day feel like a celebration. If you ask Ginny how she does this, she’ll say she’s a curator of memories.

• I’ve watched her create special moments for the teachers at her kids’ school.

• I’ve watched her create special moments for the staff at our local church.

• And I’ve watched her create special moments for the people in her regular life—the friends and family who pass through her welcoming front door every single day.

I’m not talking about the “carefully curated” moments we see plastered across our Instagram feeds.

I’m talking about the kind of real-life intentionality that leads to real powerful visceral responses.

So what does it mean to be a curator of memories?

The word curate comes from the Latin cura, which translates “to care for.”

When Ginny says she want to be a curator of memories, what she’s really saying is “I want to care for you.”

In caring for people, we’re not just manufacturing special moments; we’re literally making them feel special.

“People will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.”

— Maya Angelou

You know why I love going over to Ginny’s house?
It’s not because she makes delicious soup (although she does).
Or because she always has a pot of my favorite tea (although she does).

It’s because when I’m at Ginny’s house, she makes me feel like I’m the most important person in the world.

And I know it’s not just me.

Everyone who spends time with Ginny feels special, and that is because while they are with her, they are being cared for.

And being cared for with intentionality and purpose is transformative.

There’s real power in the moments we spend together.

Chip and Dan Heath wrote a book called The Power of Moments, and it’s an excellent guide for anyone seeking to create more value with the time they have.

In the book, they describe four types of moments (using the acronym EPIC):

• Moments that Elevate: Creating moments that rise above the everyday.
• Moments of Pride: Helping people feel proud of accomplishing milestones.
• Moments of Insight: Helping people understand an important truth.
• Moments of Connection: Forging transformational alliances among people.

Curators are noticers.

To create memorable moments means you’re going to have to start paying attention. No more “this is the way we’ve always done it kind of thinking.” Curators gather the best of what they have, then safeguard and share their art with the world. It is both tedious and magnificent, a gift to those who experience it.

An easy way to slow down time is to shake up the status quo, to do something a little different than you’ve done it before. That’s how memories (and friendships) are often formed.

I want to live a life punctuated by happy moments spent with dear people. When I think about the sands of time, I don’t want the picture in my head to be one of me falling through quicksand. I’d rather think about the me that lives among the sand on my favorite beach, windswept and frolicking in the waves. happy and free and smack dab in the middle of a MOMENT IN TIME.

This week, take a page from the Ginny Starr handbook and make a memory.

1) Invite a friend over. Use the good china!
2) Write a letter—on real stationery!
3) Have sundaes on Sunday—your kids will love you!

Who do you know that needs caring for this week?

Ready to take it to the next level?

Wednesday WINSday--TAKE THE FIRST STEP

Some people say the first step is the hardest because it’s the scariest.

Some people say the middle steps are the hardest because they can be the most challenging.

And some people say getting to the end is the hardest because the end is never really the end. By the time we get there, things have changed so much, it’s time to start again.

For over a year, I’ve been recording Mission Driven Monday, a weekly video-cast series. I interview women I admire, and we chat about our proudest accomplishments, the things we’re learning in our current season, and the legacy we want to leave. It’s been a lot of fun, but one thing I’ve learned is that people have short attention spans, so I’m trimming the fat and spending the next 52 weeks sharing the best little nuggets from every conversation.

Meet Amy Phelps!

My friend, Amy, was my first interview subject. She’s a mother and a wife, a former teacher, and a current autodidact.

Don’t know know what an autodidact is? If I was a teacher, I’d tell you to look it up so you would remember it better. You probably should look it up anyway because an autodidact is a self-learner.

I met Amy in the way that all young moms do—in the preschool carpool line. All the minutes we spent together at birthday parties, mother/daughter teas, and school programs, added together to create a beautiful friendship.

I say this a lot, but none of us are JUST moms. We make PB&Js AND we make art. We give baths AND we give time to causes that matter. We do homework AND we do both paid and unpaid “job-type” work.

All these responsibilities can leave us feeling both full and empty at the same time. Our kids don’t need us less as they get older, but they do need us in different ways. Nothing stays the same, and so we must do the very thing we tell our kids to do—adapt to change.

Amy, a former Biology teacher, is learning how to do photography and web design, a strong departure from her former world of plant physiology and animal dissection.

She says, “All you have to do is start. And then you realize you’re not alone.”

There’s this song I love from the 1960s, a turbulent time in the United States for sure, but I also think it fits here.

These lyrics of “The Times They Are A Changin’” are as relevant today as they were more than fifty years ago.

“Come mothers and fathers
Throughout the land
And don’t criticize
What you can’t understand
Your sons and your daughters
Are beyond your command
Your old road is rapidly agin’
Please get out of the new one
If you can’t lend your hand
For the times they are a-changin’”

— Bob Dylan

It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to know that getting anywhere in life requires taking a step. I need to be reminded that while taking steps is good, the payoff isn’t always at the end. Who we meet along the way is usually the best part of every adventure.

My friend Amy knows that. College ends, and life with family begins, children grow up, and the things that worked for us in the past may no longer be the things that sustain us as welcome the future.

I’m grateful for our friendship. And it wouldn’t have happened if we both hadn’t taken steps toward each other nearly a decade ago. As our paths crossed, so did our work.

If you want to see our full interview, you can watch it here.

Want more GOOD STUFF?

I wrote this FREE GUIDE, and it’s just for Mission Driven Women. Fun fact: Amy did all the design and layout! You can get it free here:

Take the first step

You don’t have to know what you want to be because there’s so much joy in discovering WHO YOU WANT TO BE.

All you have to do is start.

And then you realize you’re not alone.

WHO ARE THE PEOPLE WHO HAVE BEEN INSTRUMENTAL IN HELPING YOU BECOME THE PERSON YOU WANT TO BE?