From Her Heart to Mine...

My Dear Friend, Cara, and I decided to join in on this beautiful study at A Holy Experience, on loving Jesus and others with our words. Perhaps you would also enjoy this!

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Thank you, Cara, for thinking my very thoughts
...and writing them in a letter to me.

Hey Jenn,

Last Monday, on my way home from small group, I was coming onto the interstate at 1-19 and Valencia and as I merged onto traffic, I was playing back in my mind a phrase I heard myself say a few minutes earlier…“crappy wife”. I said, “Today was just one of those days when you realize you’re a crappy wife”, to which my friend replied, “Oh Cara, you’re not a crappy wife.”

And the reality is, I don’t think I’m really a crappy wife either. I said it in response to the fact that I had an ah-ha moment that morning where I realized that, while so many of the things I do seem so important to me in the moment, crafting, canning, sewing, knitting, reading, I have begun to realize that they serve only to gratify my sense of fitting into a version of motherhood that I aspire to based on what I see other places, but they don’t, in most cases, help ease my burden or my family’s burden at home. They don’t create a welcome home where my husband feels comfortable. They don’t allow me to spend more time with my kids. They don’t necessarily help us save money or pay off debt. So, in focusing on these things all the time, I end up actually feeling less dependable and worthwhile as a spouse and mother, and truly, making more work for both myself and Ricky.

I’m sure there is so much in that realization that I could analyze but what really struck me was how I chose to communicate it. I never actually talked about what I had discovered. I could have embraced the beautiful truths in this discovery;

1. I want to take care of my family,

2. I want to ease my own burden around the fact that there is never enough time,

3. I see the places I could improve and am willing to go there,

4. I believe I am hearing the Holy Spirit direct me as a parent and a wife.

But I didn’t. These are all great things. I should have focused on these things. Instead, I went all bad on myself and projected it out like I needed to promote the broader negative.

I think that sometimes I am so afraid of being successful or of positive growth, which I know sounds strange…but is very true, that I deflect the specific good with general negativity.

I should have said. “I realized this morning that there are some specific things I can do to begin to value Ricky more in my everyday choices. “ not “Today was just one of those days when you realize you’re a crappy wife”

Our pastor, on Sunday, was talking about simplifying the language we use to respond to situations. I would like to try to simplify how I project out what I see or hear in my head, using only truth. It is only in recognizing and embracing truth that we begin to see freedom and growth.

Whaddya think?

CARA