LovingHim-RaisingThem

Desire is such an interesting, rich subject. Theres been books written on it and I could say so much, but this a blog so forgive my oversimplification but here are my main conclusions. Desire is inherently good, it is God given, placed deep within us, and something we need to be awakened to if we want to uncover the trueness and fullness of who we really are. Like all good things it goes astray when we put our brokenness and ego into the mix. That doesn’t mean we should avoid it or bury it, nor is it licence to act out on all our desires if they bring harm to ourselves or others.

So slightly for fun I wrote a fast, unedited list of all the things I desire, I haven’t filtered it down to what is coming from a place of trueness and wholeness and what is coming from a place of brokenness. Ive done that on purpose because we are all, always going to be on that journey. Ive yet to meet a person whose ‘arrived’

So even though I know my list is probably ‘too big’ and ‘too much’, thats where I’m at, a work in progress. One of my biggest struggles is seeking the approval of others to validate me. So for years I crushed my own desires and just morphed into whatever I sensed was expected of me by those around me, and trust me that is not the better option here.

Our desires point to deeper truth. Beneath my very long list I can see a mix of healthy and unhealthy desires. The desire to be good is there right along side the desire to live selfishly. The desire to love others well is there right next to the desire to over self protect. But at least I’m awake to it, and its a starting place for growth and making choices. For example I might want to go to bed late and get up early….but I don’t! I know those desires come from a part of me that is never satisfied and Im learning and growing in that area, but Im only able to do that because I’m honest enough to admit it to myself…..so anyway

Here’s my list I hope it makes you smile and maybe encourages you to make your own list and see what it reveals…..

I want 

Time on my own

Time with my husband 

Time with all my kids

Time with each of my kids one on one

Time as a family

Time with my friends 

I want

To wild swim

To hike in mountains

To practice yoga

To practice pilates

To do cardio

To do breath-work

To have a massage

I want

To serve the charch

To build my business

To write 

To help others

To have time off

To get up early 

To go to bed late 

To have naps

To never waste a minute

I want 

To have fun

Rest well

Make love 

Make memories 

Go on adventures 

Spend money

Save money

I want 

To bake bread

Make food from scratch

Eat healthily

Eat so much junk food

Shop ethically

Support local

Organise my house

Ooh and I want

To learn

To read

To study

To grow

To improve 

To never miss anything 

And to miss lots of things because I’m at home in my pyjamas!

So that’s me, the woman who’s always felt too much and not enough all at the same time.

I want to do enough and be enough and have enough. Enough to share with the world around me. But mainly, scratch beneath it all

I want 

To be loved

To live a life of love

And 

To surrender into the arms of the One who can fulfil my every desire.

Emma x

We all have fears.

And thats ok.

Sometimes we are fearful in a real life situation, and that fear can save our lives. This type of fear is essential and it puts us into our sympathetic nervous system releasing stress hormones such as cortisol and adrenaline, getting our body ready to protect itself. It can help us flee from an attack, run fast to pull a child away from danger, or sharpen our minds in an important meeting.

Problems begin when we live too much in this hyper alert state and it begins to take its toll on our health. Our brains are very advanced but they have a hard time distinguishing between real threats and perceived threats, and this where our work begins.

Like I said we all have fears, a lot of them can be expressed by worrying over the past or fearing about the future and potential outcomes we can’t control. Its true that we cant always control everything that will happen to us or how people respond to us, but we can become more aware of our thought life and when we putting ourselves under stress because of these things.

Contemplative practices are a concrete way I am growing in this.

But still there are always fears to be faced. This week is Holy Week and we’ve been lingering in the scriptures that lead towards the cross, Jon noticed this little passage and gave it me when I was stressing out and panicking about being misjudged over something.

“Many people did believe in him, however, including some of the Jewish leaders. But they wouldn’t admit it for fear that the Pharisees would expel them from the synagogue.  For they loved human praise more than the praise of God.” John 12:42-43

It made me smile so much, people having been stressing out over what people think about them for thousands of years!

After Jon shared it with me I went for a shower, my mind endlessly ruminating over and over my dilemma. I was just at the point of my body being covered in soap and my hair full of conditioner when the hot water started running out. I began to rush frantically trying to get all the soap off as the water got colder and colder. My eyes were wide and my already panicked heart was pounding even faster when suddenly I felt this invitation from God

Would it really be so bad for the water to go cold? Or is your fear of it worse that the reality will be?

God is so sneaky, with these back up lessons!

So I chose to slow down and to stay in the discomfort. I actively relaxed and deepened my breathing resisting the urge to flee. I continued slowly rinsing my hair and body is the now absolutely freezing water. My brain focused, my heart rate settled and all feelings of panic and anxiety left. I had successfully come into my parasympathetic nervous system.

The cold water was nowhere near as bad as my fear of it was.

I stayed in the freezing water completely at peace for another couple of minutes and stepped out feeling grateful and empowered. We do have an incredible amount of choice over these parts of our physiology. But it starts with paying attention.

Yesterday I faced the silly little fear of a cold shower

But today maybe I will be that little bit more ready to face some of my bigger fears

The fear of misjudged

The fear of being disliked

The fear of being unsuccessful

The fear of making mistakes

The fear of …………………fill in the blank for you

I would love to invite you to spend a few minutes in your journal seeing if there are places that fear has a hold in your life, and see if you can begin to let that fear go. The link below follows to a short practice that you may find helpful.

Emma x

My body and my mind are tired today, my muscles ache, I’m sluggish and a bit grumpy. The kids are moaning about jumpers feeling funny and wrong lunch boxes, arguing over the bathroom and the pain in my tummy is pulsing. I pull my dressing gown tighter around the cold in the kitchen, even though the heating is on. Im supposed to be sea swimming at 9am and I don’t want to go. Its about -5 with the icy wind chill and the north sea in march isn’t really appealing to me right now. I want to hide from the cold not get colder!

I walk heavily up the stairs and put my swimsuit under my clothes…just in case. I see my swim friend and her smily face at the school gate and I know its going to be worth the fight.

I choose to fight.

We get to the beach and walk across to the low tide sea chatting about our lives, the sun is shining and the wind is almost knocking us off our feet, we are pulled sharply away from our chat as we realise…. our stuff is going to blow away.

We choose to fight.

A bit of a walk around and we find a wet rock that we can shove our stuff behind and peg down with our boots, we decide without a lot of confidence it will probably hold. My side is still hurting but Im determined now. I take my boots off and my already numb feet sting as I put them down on wet sand, I pull my leggings off and laugh at how cold my bum is in the wind. We undress quickly and shove everything in our bags before we change our minds.

A shift is occurring, Its no longer time to fight.

Its time to surrender.

Unless you want to be overcome by panic, you don’t fight gale force wind and freezing water, you surrender to it. I do a couple of handstands on the way to the water and begin to run with joy. We breathe deeply preparing ourselves to enter this wild world. No time to lose we are submerged and swimming within 10 seconds. We don’t want to risk hypothermia so we know we have about 2 minutes in our swimsuits. We are each lost in our own internal journey now. I yelp and squeal very loudly in wild worship surrendering everything to the God I love, I feel completely alive, completely free, completely myself. Its over so quickly, humbled we exchange a knowing glance and big, slightly disappointed grins, our time is up, we are not the masters of this place. We surrender to that fact and get out before either of us want to,changing quickly and chatting away. I notice in amazement that the pain in my side is gone, not for the first time after a cold swim. I got my friend to take this picture, I wanted to remember today.

I needed to swim. I had to fight to get there, and then surrender to the elements. I needed both. I believe life requires us being willing to do both. We don’t want to live so hard and rigid that we are always fighting and we don’t want to live so surrendered that we stand for nothing. I cant help but think of Jesus…. fighting for the oppressed, yet surrendering to this death. Obedient, attentive, willing to be interrupted, compassionate and soft, wild and strong. The sea made me feel close to him today in a way I have no words for just a deep knowing and peace within.

I wonder, is there something you need to fight for today?

Or maybe something you need to surrender to?

Lets be people living awake and humble enough to do both!

Big love to everyone who takes the time to read my blog, and let me know if it sparks something in you!

Em x

 

 

This is our beautiful young apple tree, planted last year in our garden. Today was an emotional time for me and the tree.

Today was pruning day.

Today I stood in the rain and slowly picked every single tiny baby budding apple off, all 137 of them. Every one made me sad as I carefully removed it from its branch, ending its life prematurely. I remembered back to our trip to the garden centre to get the tree deliberating endlessly over which one to choose. I remembered back to the rock hard ground we had to use a pick axe on to plant the tree.

I did this pruning by my own free will even though it means no fruit this year. No watching the kids run out in the garden and eat an apple straight from the tree. No collecting and harvesting them,no turning them into crumbles and pickles to share and enjoy. Just nothingness in its place. It felt senseless, counterintuitive and painful to pick the healthy fruit from the healthy tree and put it straight in the compost.

So why did I do it?

Firstly the tree is too young and its branches too weak to support the weight of its fully grown fruit. The apples would have broken the branches they grew on, destroying the tree for future years to come.

Secondly it takes an incredible amount of nutrients for the tree to produce fruit which means those nutrients are not going into strengthening the roots and branches, maturing the tree and enabling it to grow and enjoy a long healthy life.

John 15 Jesus famous passage about the vine and branches that this blog is rooted in (excuse the pun!) tells of this very process. It says that God the gardener prunes every branch that doesn’t bear fruit and even some of the good fruit in our lives so we can be even more fruitful.

How often do we resist this?

Ive been avoiding pruning the tree for weeks. Today I struggled to do it. I kept thinking, ‘maybe it will be alright it doesn’t look too thin’ ‘maybe the man at the garden centre was being a bit extreme when he said prune ALL the fruit, maybe I will just leave a few..’

In my own life it’s even harder to remove things, lay things down and let things die, especially the good stuff. Im in a season of pruning now and its so painful. But just like the tree I want to grow strong roots and branches to bear the weight of the fruit that my life produces. Ive seen people over and over bloom too quick and break, its not a path I want to choose. In our world of instant gratification and overnight success stories the temptation to skip the maturing process is massive… Lets just be honest here, I planted an apple tree because I wanted apples! I exercise because I want to be strong. I write my book because I want it published. I don’t want to wait for these things and many other things in my life! But the Kingdom works in seasons and we must not be afraid of the pruning and fallow ones….A life that only wants to bear fruit is not sustainable.

So I leave you with a couple of questions to ponder;

Where might God be leading me to do some pruning?

Could a so called ‘loss’ or ‘failure’ actually be the kindness of the Lord in your life?

One day in years to come Im sure I will plant another tree and go through this pruning process again. I know that the experience will be less painful because I will have watched my current apple tree flourish because of the pruning I did today. But for now Im a young inexperienced gardener and its hard, I only the stories of those more experienced to spur me on. I only have the hope of what my little apple tree and little life will be in the future.

But today I picked all 137 apples off my tree, because I want it to have a strong future and provide fruit for many years to come.

Today that unseen hope was enough.

 

 

 

 

 

Earlier this year my husband and I went on a 4 day retreat in North Carolina called the 18 inch journey, a head to heart experience of who God is and who we are in him. When we came back naturally lots of people asked us ‘how was it?’ which was a hard question to answer about something so deeply personal that has impacted us so profoundly.

But now almost 6 months months later I want to share with you one simple thing that I learnt. Im ready to share it now because for 6 months Ive practised it consistently, and its starting to bear fruit….

Own it.

Own your life, your story, your victories, your sins, your failures, your disappointments, your joys and your frustrations. Because until you own something you don’t posses it, and if you don’t possess it, you can neither keep it or give it away.

Being aware of things is not the same as owning them. Lots of people are well aware of their limitations, damaging behaviours and bad habits. But finding true breakthrough and freedom from these things doesn’t come easy. Well it hasn’t come easy for me thats for sure.

It goes back to the garden. I was afraid, because I was naked, so I hid.

We’ve all been hiding in one form or another since then. An example of my experience would be something like this. I shout at the kids over something minor, then I feel a pang of guilt and shame ( I was afraid ) I feel embarrassed to have acted out in front of my family ( I was naked ) So I either ignore it or blame someone else ( So I hid )

Owning simple moments like the one described above is simple but not always easy to do. It means coming out of hiding, saying no to pride and being humble.

‘Im sorry for shouting guys’. Full stop. No buts…. ‘Im sorry for shouting guys, but you are driving me crazy’ Doesn’t count as owning the behaviour thats just blaming someone else for it.

We use wonderful excuses to validate our thoughts and behaviours, we think or say things like:

‘Oh well, you know what I’m like I just can’t keep quiet about anything’

‘Im just an angry person I can’t help overreacting’

‘I hate confrontation thats just how I am so Im not going to say anything to my coworker for publicly disrespecting me, I don’t like to cause a fuss.’

‘they always push my buttons and make me respond like this, if only they pulled themselves together I would never react badly’

Judge. Blame. Run. Hide.

So basically my major spiritual breakthrough this year has come from saying sorry. A lot.  I can literally feel myself softening and changing every time I say no to pride and yes to humility. Im starting to become less critical and judgemental of others as I do the simple and profound work of owning my life.

And today something incredible happened, it was small, invisible if you weren’t paying attention, but joy exploded in my heart as I watched one of my kids reject pride and own something. This small thing was the fruit of the spirit growing in our home right in front of our eyes.

They had misplaced something for a while and found it this morning. ‘I found my thing’ they shouted up the stairs ‘it was in my bag, someone must have put it there’. ‘no one really goes in you bag, are you sure it couldn’t have been you’ I responded ready for the battle I was sure that was coming about everything being someone else’s fault. He responded ‘ You’re right, I must have put them in there and forgot’

Jon and I just looked at each other in shock, ‘did he just admit something was his fault….’ For this child this is a big deal.

You better believe we celebrated this victory with him and Im happy to share it with you. Part of breaking down pride and owning your life is being able to share both the failures and the victories…otherwise you get false humility….and don’t even get me started on that!

The way I live my life and respond to things affects people, and yours does too. Our children particularly are unconsciously absorbing the way we deal with life and learning from it. Thats a fact.

I could have shared with you 1000 stories of failure in this area of my life but Im choosing to share this tiny victory because it works. Owning your life works!

Maybe saying sorry isn’t something you struggle with but just fill in the bank. Cant accept a compliment? Why is that? Cant have anyone disagree with you? Cant accept criticism? Cant let things go? Go silent and passive in the face of difficulty? Flip out every time you make a mistake?

The list is endless, and Im here to break the news that just trying really hard to act right doesn’t bring breakthrough. Thats just a recipe for a pressure cooker, I shouldn’t be angry, ram down the emotion, I shouldn’t be angry, ram down the emotion over and over smiling sweetly until one day a lady treads on your toe at the bus stop and you explode like Hulk. Theres a better way;

One of the kindest and wonderful gifts of the gospel is repentance. Super religious word with some weird connotations. But honestly I love repentance, don’t know what Id do without it. The freedom and joy that comes from admitting stuff, saying sorry to God and any people if applicable, then turning away from that thing towards freedom. Thats all repentance is and its amazing.

Anyway there you go, heart on my sleeve

I pray it helps you today

Love Emma

 

I’m sat on my bedroom floor surrounded by utter chaos. Actually I’m sat right in it, in piles of clean clothes (and a few dirty ones) so I can keep my iPad on charge and write this quick unedited post while the kids are all content.

  
I woke early today after a late night and dragged myself out of bed, the need for a bit of solitude greater than my need for sleep. Groggy and grumpy I sat with my bible and journal and tried to connect, it was hard going at first and I ended up flicking through an old journal and reading. 

What I found brought me to tears, I saw myself and my striving through an unusual lense of kindness and mercy, instead of my usual critical and ‘try harder’ lense. I saw how much I try and fail and try and fail to have everything together. I sensed the Fathers smile and warmth over me and my efforts to live in relationship with Him. I ditched my agenda and just sat accepting that I am loved just as I am, room full of chaos and all.

Life has been really full recently. Full of trips, visitors, possibilities and challenges. Within it all I’ve lost any sense of rhythm and the care of my spiritual life, my home and my body have dissolved. Slowly and silently little foxes come in. I let worry and anxious thoughts run riot in my mind, I scroll mindlessly on my phone, I go to bed too late and sleep poorly, I speak and react without thinking, I don’t tidy properly and walk around my house in frustration at the chaos that is everywhere. 

Order leaves and clutter and chaos come and fill the void.

Sometimes we try and climb the mountain and put all the good stuff back in before we clear out the bad… It never works.

Sometimes a cleanse is needed.

We all know it In a physical way after lots of partying or over eating our body needs a cleanse, our houses sometimes need a cleanse, a sping clean. So do our spirits. What does that look like? 

For me it looks like going to bed early so I can get up early. It looks like order and routine. It looks like ditching the internet on my phone. It looks like treating myself with kindness and mercy, taking it one day at a time and embracing the messy process. It looks like time outside and time alone. It looks like repentance and intentional thought towards my thoughts, words and decisions. It looks like love.

It also looks like cleaning and decluttering my home and body, because we are one. Body, soul and spirit, mind, will and emotions. One affects the other.

How about you? Is there an area in your life that feels like chaos and could do with a cleanse? If so pray, start slowly, embrace the process and be kind to yourself like you would a friend or your child if they were struggling. Reject overwhelm and just begin.

I’m starting where I am. I’m starting with sorting and putting away clothes….

If this encourages you today, let me know your start point and I will be praying for you

Love Emma x

I’ve been making sourdough bread for about a month now.

Mostly I love it! I love the steady 3 day process, I love the simplicity of bread made from flour, water and salt. I love the smell that fills our house when it bakes. I love that no two loaves look the same. I love holding in my hands something I’ve created with love and care. I love giving it away to friends or inviting others over to share it. I love wrapping it up in a beautiful cloth, taking it out on our family adventures and eating it, feeling for a moment that we live in a more simple age.

But do you know what I don’t love?……

I don’t love how I’m not great at it already. I mean come on, it’s been 4 weeks why doesn’t it look like the one I buy at the bakery! I’m following the instructions, where are my perfect results! Patience and ‘the long road’ aren’t really my happy place. Recent explorations of personality tests and enneagram tests reveal what I’m already painfully aware of. I give myself a hard time and want everything to be right and just and fair all of the time. I can never achieve the ridiculously high standards I set for myself and therefore nor can anyone else around me. Grace is a lesson I’m going to have the learn the long and steady way, just like baking my bread….an overnight success this will not be.

A familiar call to john 15 and the vine and branches. (Read the whole chapter, it’s amazing)

Soaking not striving

Soaking in God often doesn’t feel dramatic or cause spectacular overnight results. Sometimes I pray first thing in the morning , declare a couple of scriptures and am disappointed that I haven’t turned into mother teresa by lunchtime. How can I have just shouted at my toddler for accidentally dropping milk everywhere, I chastise myself! I prayed this morning where is my self control. The fruit of the spirit is more of a slow and steady, day by day, glory by glory situation. We don’t eat a salad one day and have lost a stone by the next…..transformation takes time. Slow steady obedience brings transformation. It isn’t glamorous but it is real. And real change stands the test of time. As you faithfully abide you will be transformed. You’re gonna need a lot of patience and a lot of grace for yourself, but the fruit will come in due season if we do not give up, fix our eyes and keep going.

One of my loaves got stuck this week and the beautiful bottom crust got ripped off the bread and stuck to the tray. I pushed away initial disappointment and made a choice to be grateful. I ate it this morning and smiled.

It’s real, I made it with my own hands and I tried my best. 

Give yourself grace today in the midst of everything you do, and one day you will wake up put the bread in the oven and out will come a loaf like the one from the bakery.

  

Where I am right now is Home.

Home Alone.

  
Those two words above deserve there own line because its rare I get to say them. I love being at home raising our kids and working just a few hours, its the path we have chosen as a family. But that doesnt make it always easy or without cost. As an individual I thrive off time with my friends and family, but also time alone. There have been seasons where this has been naturally impossible with a large, close in age family, but I have come to realise it is unsustainable for me to have this continually, and to live my life well.

As most of you know we are approaching a year since we left family and friends and relocated to Scotland for the next stage of our journey. Within that year I have come to understand and accept myself and my story a lot more. We are travelling back tomorrow for our first visit back and it has thrown a lot of old emotions back to the surface. 

They say that “comparison is the theif of joy”

They are right.

Moving hundreds of miles away places you in a unique postion to really take stock of who you are away from the pressures , expectations and opinions of others. Real or percieved. I have found it easier here to explore and express my true nature and am finding peace with my slightly introverted personality, and need for time alone.

However Jon and I made a decision recently which really exposed how affected I am by “mum guilt” for any time away from my kids unless Im working. I figured if I’m battling with guilt over this then lots of you are probably battling with your own version of it. Most of the amazing mums I know are normally giving themselves a hard time over something or other. 

We have paid for Sophia to do an extra 4 hours in nursery from August which will give me an entire school day without the kids when im not working….and I am racked with guilt. Even though logically I know she will be fine and I will be a better wife, parent and general human being because of it. 

Yet I can’t shake the guilt and comparison….and I am suprised at myself for it.. I thought I was past this.. I know its bad because Im normally happy to share my heart and I dont want to write this. As I type I’m  worrying what certain people will be thinking!! That in turn makes me feel paranoid, silly and exposed, which I do not enjoy.

The truth is we are as mums we are all so different, and we have different pressures and coping thresholds.  But the one thing we share is our love for our families and the fact that we are all trying our best. So lets be champions of each other and find peace with ourselves on a true and deep heart level.  We all need time to recieve life from God and just have fun, and its worth fighting and planning to find it. 

Jon and I are big believers in investing in marriage. So term time monday mornings are going to become date morning! and monday afternoon will be time to finish a writing project for me. I hope I can embrace it with thanksgiving and find a way to let go of the guilt….

I pray my vulnerable rant will inspire you to take stock of some of the things you get ‘mum guilt’ for, and for you to see if thats some baggage you can throw overboard!

Heres to the journey towards freedom

I will leave you with these lyrics from Jared Andersons song  “where i am right now’