10 Things I Learned/Am Learning at 30

Oh, hey there, blog.  Long time no see, old chum. 

Last year, May was a monumental month.  We released our album on May 20th, I turned 30 on May 29th, and we played our release show on May 30th.  Turning 30 is one of those milestones people meet with many different attitudes.  Some feel it's an ancient number and curse the idea of growing older.  Some have a mini-crisis of all the self-imposed life things that were supposed to happen by that age.  Some simply deny it, publicly celebrating the anniversary of their 29th birthday for the rest of their days.  Some don't care.  Others are all about being 30. 

Tangent: I was probably 28 when I saw this movie for the first time, and I bawled my eyes out faced with a story that played out the possibility of living life apart from the man you both like and love best.  We are talking ugly, hiccuping cry.  I may or may not have trouble separating movies from reality.  
And I may or may not have a flair for the dramatic.

I probably fell somewhere in middle of these extremes - I thought about it a lot, so I felt rather introspective about completing my thirtieth year on the planet.  I mulled over the ways I had grown and the things I was learning, thinking I wanted to write it all down sometime.  I continued to mull, continued to want to record all the thoughts, some haphazardly scrawled in a journal, some trapped in the hamster wheel of my brain.

And then I turned 31 this past Friday.  Oops.  No time like the present!  Oddly, I prepared a lot for 30, but 31 caught me way off guard (it sounds so much oooolder).  It was not until late in my birthday celebrations that night that I realized I have to remember a new number to tell people when they ask my age.  Now that I'm officially "in my thirties" (WHAT THE WHAT. WEIRD.), here are 10 things I've learned and am learning a little over three decades into this life journey.

Amen, Michelle.  

Also, numbered lists are the thing now, thanks to Buzzfeed and the like.  

So I followed suit. 

1) Perspective is key. Some of our social groups have gradually shifted away from a good bunch of folks younger than us meeting many societal milestones before us.  We now hear friends and fellow musicians in their mid to late thirties and forties that find out I'm 31 and say, "Oh, you're BABIES!"  I'm not gonna lie, it's a refreshing perspective.  Some days, it feels like there are SECONDS before I will be too old to do anything in my life.  And then other days, I see decades that stretch out before me like the sea.  Mixed ages and places from the people I surround myself with give me a more mixed and healthy perspective.

2) On that note, comparison is one of the devil's best inventions.  Far too many days have gone by with me curled in an incapacitated heap, using other people's stories to judge my own life.  "So and so started doing music full time at 22, so I'm way too late."  "That girl wrote an incredible album at 17. What am I doing with my life?!"  "She reads books by candlelight and is always poetic and fabulous.  I just wish I did.  I fail."  LIES.  Who am I to tell God that He is not creative enough to write a story for my life that is completely original and different than others I've seen??  When I measure myself by their stories, all growth and motivation stops.  When I start living my own, God can move.

3) Speaking of perspective, I'm not the first person to feel what I feel.  God so gently emphasized this at a women's gathering called IF in February 2014, where I was self-deprecatingly pouring my heart out to answer one of our dinner discussion questions and the 70 year old woman beside me matter-of-factly said, "Oh, honey.  You're way too hard on yourself.  It's not as bad as all that."  Most of my relationships for a while had been either peer or in a mentor-like relationship with a younger woman.  Now I've finally followed through and reached out to some older women who have already navigated some of these life stages, and go figure, it's completely relieving and they have wisdom and grace and can speak into my so-called hot mess.

4) I'm more aware of trends.  More specifically, I'm more self-aware of finding that I like things because they have been strategically marketed and are part of a trend.  When I find myself totally crushing on owls, and also hear other girls gush to me "Oh my gosh, I LOVE owls too!!" it is no accident.  This is notable not just in awareness, but in life and purchasing decisions.  I may like owls now, but I might not like them nearly so much five years from now.  So maybe I don't need to buy that precious owl-related piece of home décor.  It sounds kind of obvious, I suppose, but I was oblivious to this for a while.  It's okay to enjoy things in the moment, but if I can better discern what's truly worth investing in, then that's progress in my book.

5) I'm a little less emotional.  A little.  Just a smidge.  Maybe not.  It may just be that I've been able to not let emotion fuel reactions as much - it's not always the driving force like it used to be.  Self-control is a fruit of the Spirit, and it's one that's finally growing more as I grow.  (Chris is praising the heavens.)

6) I am what I eat.  This is still a road with highs and lows... but curbing my sugar intake really does decrease the amount that I crave it, and I feel better when I eat more vegetables and fresh food.  This is not rocket science.  But eating whatever I wanted for years is a habit that has taken a long time to get away from.

7) Do I own my stuff, or does it own me?  Most of these personal revelations could be their own blog posts, and this one definitely could be.  For now, I will say it has been an uphill climb to start to release the grip I have on material possessions and to start to simplify.  But each time I gain a foothold and fill another bag of stuff I don't need, my spirit feels lighter and a sense of freedom starts to return.  There are lots of ways addictive personalities and sin can manifest themselves.  Becoming aware and vigilant about such things is hard but so worth it.

8) Forgiveness is a [daily] choice.  This has been a big one.  Living into forgiveness in tough situations involves daily sacrificing my pride and taking my thoughts captive, rather than falling back into bitterness with the next offensive word or careless action from the person.  Forgiveness in less dire situations is more frequent and still requires sacrificing my pride and taking my thoughts captive, to not lose precious time holding out on those I love most.  It also requires not waiting for an apology.

9) Self-analysis is good, to a point.  I have gone through my mid to late-twenties phase of starting to look at my life dynamics through the eyes of an adult.  I see the actions of my parents in different light, I see cause and effect in past situations, I can trace back through patterns and stimuli.  Chris will tell you that I think about these things a great deal.  And it can be well and good and helpful...  But there comes a time when continuing to focus on the root cause and pointing blame is just looking backward.  If I want any kind of redemption in this life, I need to acknowledge these things for what they are and start to take steps forward and away from them. 

10) You get one step at a time.  I'm a planner.  I would like the entire life plan, the end game, the list of instructions, the manual, anything that will enable me to chart my course and go.  Unfortunately, this is not often how God works.  He told Abraham, "Go where I will send you."  He gives countless people in Scripture one instruction at a time.  When they follow and prove faithful in that step, they are given more.  I am finally learning to be content with the one step and to act on it.  Waiting for the whole set results in me not moving at all.

All this to say, it is comforting to know I'm a work in progress.  Amid the occasional panic moments of LIFE IS TOO DANG FAST, I'm grateful for the chance to know myself better, to know God better, and to mature.  There are lots of movies based around going back in time to when life was "better."  I wouldn't trade this life stage for high school, college, the twenties... any of it.  I am sure I will look back when I'm 41 and think, "Gosh, I knew NOTHING!"  It will be a sign that I kept growing and changing.  And I think that's the point.



Grace Isn't Always a Pretty Word.

I have recently (as in the past several years) learned to love the sound of the word "grace."  I think it's a good example of one of those words that sounds kind of like what it means.  Just hearing it, I can see the graceful arc of a ballerina's arm extending above her head, a river bird perfectly gliding onto the water, my grandmother's weathered and kind face.

God has been revealing to me, bit by bit, what His grace looks like.  And it, too, is beautiful.  There is such poetry in hearing the grace shown to the prodigal son, returning home and undeserving of love but being received with running, open arms by his father.  Each time Jesus shows his grace by looking at, touching, or healing a hurting woman, my heart melts.  Grace is wrapped in love, and when it is lavished, it turns our heads and we take notice.

In the past couple years, I would probably tell you that I've had many opportunities to learn what it means to extend grace.  Forgiveness is at the root of it - learning to let go and love again when I've been wronged.  God's lesson in this to me is the pillar that our marriage is built upon.  Chris and I dated for a while right after I graduated from college, and it ended in a horrible breakup.  There were a pretty miserable few months there.  Eventually, God led me past my grief to show me who I was without Chris, which I realized I had lost sight of.  And then one day, just as I was beginning to try to cleanse the anger from my heart, Chris called out of the blue.  He, too, had been growing in our time apart, and he came to me with apologies and acknowledgements of every wrong that had been done.  God intervened and took every ounce of anger I had carried on my shoulders in one breath - it was a physical feeling!  Forgiveness was not instantaneous - I learned that it is a choice, to choose into it daily rather than retreat into the past.  I certainly did not go leaping back into Chris's arms, and he was wise to not expect that, but he spent the next months faithfully, intentionally pursuing my friendship and then my heart.  With trust built up based on showing one another grace and forgiveness, we began to date in order to marry.  God's grace is the reason for our marriage today.  And while it was hard and ugly for a while, it's all part of a beautiful story.

HOWEVER.  The turning point in our story is when Chris came and sought my forgiveness.  He knew he didn't deserve it, but he came to make amends.  And while extending forgiveness when it is requested is not always easy, it softens my heart when someone humbles himself to admit his wrongdoing and begins to pave the way for it.

BUT... what about when someone doesn't ask for forgiveness?  When someone either refuses to acknowledge their sin, or truly doesn't even see it?  This the place I sit.  God is putting multiple people in my life who have no interest in trying to reconcile, to talk it out, to apologize for something.  One may just ignore me and the whole problem, another may just act as if nothing wrong ever happened, and then, horror of horrors, another actually might need something from me.

This is when grace feels ugly to me.

Everything inside me is injured, indignant, and wants to cry out, "Do you have any idea what life has been like for me?  How can you pretend everything is fine?  I'm hurting!  YOU hurt me!!  And now you WANT something from me?!" and on and on and on...  And I'm sure there would be many a person who would say I'm justified.

And this exposes my as-yet immature plunges into extending grace.  Because I'm willing to forgive... if someone apologizes first.  Until then, my tendency is to hold out.  I can even act kindly on the surface to that person, because it might make me feel good about myself, like I'm the "bigger person."

I once read in Timothy Keller's book Prodigal God that you can't truly forgive someone if you still think you are better than him.  It grabbed my heart at the time, and I conveniently managed to put it away and not think about it until just this second as I'm writing this.  I talked to Chris about one such situation, and indignantly pointed out the irony and injustice of it all.  He so simply said the thing that I knew deep down in my gut and didn't want to hear aloud... "Yeah, but wouldn't this be a really great opportunity for you to show grace?"  Cue the stomach plunge and watery eyes.

I'm pouring out my heart here because grace sounds like such a lovely word.  And looking at the aftermath of it being poured out, it usually leaves a lovely picture behind.  But sometimes, when you're the one with the choice, it doesn't feel lovely.  It feels hard and wrong and backwards.  And like it's the last thing you want to do, the last thing the world would tell you to do, because it doesn't make sense.  That person could go right on ahead and take advantage of you, and you would be the weaker for it.  And, frustratingly, you might never feel the benefit of what you pour out to that person.

"In the same way, any of you who does not give up everything he has cannot be my disciple." Jesus said this to his followers in Luke.  He's not just talking about earthly possessions.  He means my pride, my self-given "right" to be apologized to and to be treated the way I think I should be.  This is what grace is.  Lavishly giving when it is undeserved and feels absurd.  Forgiving and extending love when it hurts.  Sometimes there is no earthly reward for this.  If I'm waiting for a pat on the back, I shouldn't have bothered in the first place.

I'm sure a song will come out of all this at some point... On our first album, there's one I wrote about learning to apologize (seriously a difficult thing for me at one point).  I guess now God's got me on a different side of things, way more difficult to me than the seemingly easy thing of accepting an apology (and it once seemed so hard!).  I pray I can learn to do this because it's what Christ did for me, long before I thought of apologizing or trying to admit my own wrongs.

what looks like weakness can do anything 

and what looks like foolishness is understanding 

when what is powerful has not come to fight 

it looks like you’re going to war 

but you lay down your life 

but i give myself to what looks like love 

and i sell myself for what feels like love 

and i pay to get what is not love 

and all just because i see things upside down

~derek webb