Grace Period

I've been a little quiet lately. It is not that I don't have anything to say, it's actually quite the opposite. A lot of the major changes in my life took place about this time last year including leaving the job, city, and friends I had for nearly a decade. With that, came the new husband, the new name, the new city, the search for a new job and friends, and the new life in the military.

Change is hard and personal growth is not always a pretty process. I know my original intent was to unveil all the ways I have learned to trust the universe. But I have to be honest, that motto doesn't leave much room for grace. That motto is more about being a super human and powering through whatever crosses my path. It is more about force than flow, and believe me, I wrote the book on forcing my way through life's difficult moments.

To me, here's the difference between trusting the universe and living with grace...

I am hiking along a trail and encounter a snake (I am terrified of snakes by the way). Trusting the universe would equate to forcing myself to walk right past the snake (fear and all) in hopes the universe did not want me to be bitten at that moment, or accepting that there was a lesson for me in being bitten. My response to this idea = OH, HELL NO!!!

By acknowledging my fear and giving my blood pressure a moment to normalize, I allow myself some grace and hopefully a more rational decision for moving forward.

There's a saying I like that is often found in books on spiritual growth, but it originated from Pierre Teilhard de Chardin. It says, "we are not humans beings having a spiritual experience. We are spiritual beings having a human experience."

While spirituality has been my guiding light over the past year, my hope for 2017 is to acknowledge my humanness and to allow for grace to flow more freely. I hope you'll join me in this journey.

With grace,

Jennifer