Sometimes God removes people from your life.

"Sometimes God removes someone from your life because to leave them there would block your destiny. Let them go." 

Having someone removed from your life stinks. At the time it is painful. God has taken people out of my life throughout the years. I mean He must be so annoyed with me sometimes because He would take someone out and then I would turn to someone else who was just as unhealthy for me and He would have to turn around and do it all over again. But I truly believe that while I made those decisions I also learned from them what God needed me to learn. He used my bad decisions with friends and dating to mold me into the person I am today.

I do not like being alone. I do not like not having someone to hangout with. That doesn’t mean I never want to be alone because I need my me time too. (I’m a closet introvert.) However, I do always want to have the option of having someone to hangout with. I love having people in my life that genuinely want to hangout with me. The fact that I have friends that I genuinely want to hear from everyday makes me happy. Even better than that: the fact that they want to hear from me makes my soul giggle.

I now understand that the people I chose to be in my life were not uplifting in anyway and that was not cool. I have learned from each of them how to not be a friend, significant other, or really just how to not be an overall human being. I’ve learned how to not treat people.

I also now understand that you need to be careful of whom you yoke yourself to. Meaning: who you live your life with. Who are the first people you call when you are crying? Are they actually going to want to listen? Do they really care? Most of my life I could answer no. The people I would call first didn’t care so I bottled it up and hid my emotions and smiled like everything was alright.

After all of the people I’ve had removed from my life, I have finally found a group of friends that are uplifting. I did not choose them. God smiled that Sunday morning and answered my prayers for good friends in my life and they just sat right down next to me and said hello. Within two weeks God added to that circle until I was overwhelmed with joy. Although the dynamic has changed radically with a few of my amazing friends I know that God is opening up my pathway that is leading to this awesome destiny He has for me. And I know that as long as I allow Him to work in my life and I watch for the little signs then I’ll stay on His path.

I am still sad when I have someone removed from my life or even their role in my life is changed in a way that I am not happy about. I look to God and say “umm seriously? I liked how everything was. Why are you changing good things?” And then I remember, “oh wait His plan kicks my plan’s butt.” That doesn’t mean I will never hurt when people are removed from my life but I will never fall apart the way I used to. I will never crawl farther into myself and leave the world behind like I used to. I will cry, I will be sad, I will argue with God and then I will get up and be ok.

Sometimes God’s plan is blocked by our decisions and He tries to open up our eyes by removing those brick walls even if that means removing someone from our lives that we do not think should leave. Always remember: His plan is better.

What's your love language?

So I’m almost finished with “The 5 Love Languages: Singles Edition”. Naturally I skipped to the end and took the assessment test before finishing the last chapter to find out what exactly my love language(s) was. This is what I found out:

My primary love language is Words of Affirmation. I kind of already knew this one. I truly do feel loved when people tell me nice things. I remember the good and the bad that people say to me and it is hard for me to let the bad go. The good things however, make me feel like I have just been given huge hug. Which leads right into my second most important love languages (two tied for second): physical touch and quality time. I love getting hugs and giving them. I feel like someone really cares about you when they are willing to hug you because let’s be honest it really is a super awkward thing to do if you think about it: “hey lets wrap our arms around each other and press our bodies together real tight for a second.” Awkward. But for some reason we still do this and I love it.

Of course quality time tied with physical touch. I feel like if physical touch is one of your love languages then quality time definitely is too because to have physical touch then you kind of have to have quality time. I love hanging out with the people I love and truly getting to know them and understand them and learn what they are all about.

Now I’ve realized from reading this book that I feel loved differently from different people in my life but for the most part they are basically the same. I mean I would feel less loved and more weirded out if one of my friends tried to cuddle with me during a movie but it would be completely normal feeling for a significant other to do that. Learning these languages makes me think about how they have effected each of my relationships; significant others, friends, and family. I have learned why I’ve become so frustrated with people before because I felt unloved by them but really they were just not speaking my language. It was unfair of me to become frustrated when someone didn’t understand how I felt loved or hurt.

I have also learned that I need to be more mindful of how people in my life feel loved. I need to learn how each of the people I love feel loved and learn to speak that language even if it is not my own. I’m excited to see how my relationships with my friends, family and everyone else I come in contact with can be helped and even repaired by learning to speak their love language.

I challenge everyone to find out what their love language is. It is a discovery that can change your heart for. My relationships will never be the same.

Footprints in the concrete? Say what?

I guess I should explain the name of my blog. There is a poem about a man who is walking along the beach with God and he sees scenes from his life. In those scenes he sees footprints in the sand but he becomes hurt that during the lowest times in life there are only one set of footprints. He asks God why He left him during the lowest of times and God replied, “The times when you have seen only one set of footprints, is when I carried you.”

So you may be thinking “well then what’s up with the concrete in the name?” Well allow me to explain. I do not live in a world of sand. I live in a concrete jungle. When I think of sand I think of relaxing and life being easy just chillin on the beach and that is not how my life is. My life is hard and it is scary and rough. I need God to be strong enough to leave footprints in this concrete world that I live in. And I believe He is. Those footprints are harder to make but each step is worth more than the last and they become easier as I go along.

I am not afraid to admit that I struggle through life and sometimes I want to stop walking and sink into the concrete but concrete hardens and it becomes harder to keep walking once that hardening begins. There have been times when I have faced walls of Hell fire and I’ve stopped and let that concrete harden over my feet and it was a great struggle to break free, but at those times God picked me up carried me through. He has and will always make footprints in the concrete next to me and will scoop me up when I stop for a moment and start to let the concrete harden.

So you can keep your sand because I do not live in a world full of soft sand, I live in a world of hard concrete. I know that I will make it through this tough life because my God will never let that concrete harden over my feet.

How do you want to live your life?

My mom has given me the same advice for years: figure out how you want to live your life then the rest will fall into place. For years I thought I understood what that meant. I want to have a job and make a decent living, fall in love and eventually have a family. I want to be a good person that helps others. That’s a pretty broad idea of what I thought life should be, and until recently that’s about all I had.

As I mentioned before I moved away from my life and have jumped into an entirely new world. This transition has forced me to gain a new understanding of my mom’s advice. I don’t have an excuse to not consider how I really want to live. I’m not in school anymore. I don’t have the same church family. My life is new and different in every way.

Throughout my life I have seen high peaks and low pits of hell. I know where I don’t want to be. I know what kind of person that I never want to be again. I have tried on personalities like others try on clothes. I’m ready for the world to see me. I know who I am and I’ve always known but it was easier to try on those personalities. No one cared if I was me as long as I fit in. But everything has changed. Those simple words my mom has always said mean more.

So how do I want to live my life?

Well, I now have at least part of an answer: I want to be me. I don’t want to care what anyone else thinks of me because I know God created me the way I am for a fantastic reason. I want to love my God with all my heart and soul and I want that to shine through in my life. I want to help the world by showing people that politics is not scary and that not everyone in politics is terrible. I want to help people who can’t help themselves. I want to be a part of a revolution even if that means just writing about others in their fight for survival and bringing their fight and their courage to light in our country.  I want to be the best friend that I can be. I want to forgive and be forgiven. I want to laugh every single day. I want to fall in love. Most importantly I want to be happy everyday of my life, maybe not the entire day but at least part of it.

I know how I don’t want to live my life. I’ve already done that; I’ve already been that girl. Its time for me to take that advice to heart and live how I want to live and let everything else fall into place.

How do you want to live your life? It sounds like a simple question doesn’t it? Are you really living the life you want to?

7 Weeks Ago Today I Moved.

Seven weeks ago today I moved. I packed up my life with help from family and friends and moved to Atlanta, GA. It was the most terrifying decision I have ever made. I moved without a job and no prospects of one. Not my best planning. But for some reason I felt like this was where God wanted me to be. Since I’ve moved down here however, I have lost faith in God’s plan. Until today.

Today was the first truly blessed day that I have had in so long that I can’t even remember. Last Sunday I went to church alone for the first time ever. Now I’ve grown up in the church and love God but I’ve never really had to change my life for Him. Buckhead Church and all that has come since last Sunday has changed that. I walked through those doors terrified that no one would speak to me. I was more scared to go to church alone than I was to go on an interview (which I had the next day) but of course Satan is a little more worried about me getting a good Christian family than a job so the pressure was on for him to take me down. And my goodness did he work on it. He tried his hardest until I walked through the doors and wiped him off my feet and really learned what it meant to “let go and let God”. That for me was a major accomplishment. It ended up being just what I needed. And then God provided even more.

This morning I woke up and was tired and really didn’t want to get ready for church and go alone again but I did it anyway. I got there and sat down and God must have been giggling at my nervousness because He knew what was in store for me today. A group sat down next to me and spoke to me. Now this may not sound like a big deal to you but for me this meant the world. J and E introduced themselves and made me feel at home. But God wasn’t done with my day yet.

After an amazing lunch where I felt completely welcome and comfortable, two things I have not felt in quite some time, I ended up attending Passion City Church service. God was there. He was there in full force. God just overwhelmed me with how much love he has for me and showed me people that surprised me. These Godly people that love the Lord with all of their hearts and souls and are crazy enough to give up their entire Sunday to praise God. Where I’m from you go to church and then maybe lunch and then you watch the game. That’s not quite how these people work it seems.

God hasn’t brought me to tears in a while but He sure did tonight. He broke me down. Which was a little embarrassing I must say. The amount of praise for the Lord in that sanctuary could have brought me to my knees.

I thank God for these amazing new people in my life and for breaking me and reminding me that I can still be brought to tears by Him. Showing me that He has so much more to surprise me with. But most importantly He showed me in billboard form that He really will provide.

I’m not sure how my life will be tomorrow or in ten years but I want to be brought to tears by God’s amazingness over and over because He truly is stellar.