the freedom that comes when we stop comparing

It's Sunday night and the lights are low. The drummer beats steadily and the guitarist strums along while people around me sing. Their hands are up and their hands are by their sides. Some of them are clapping, some are crying. Still others are sitting, praying. The guy next to me is standing barefoot, coffee in hand. I sing quietly and watch, taking each person in. The twinkle lights outside dance in the breeze, shining little bright spots upon us. 

This is our church. There are quiet worshippers and outgoing worshippers and there is everything in between. There is rocking, swaying and clapping. There is sitting, standing, jumping. There are hands up in the air and hands on hearts and hands being held. Everything goes when Housefires sings on Sunday nights. 

When I first started attending our church, I felt kind of nervous during worship.

At that point in my life, I'd always been a quiet worshipper - a stand and swing and sway type of girl. My friend Megan, who grew up in our church, said it best one night when she reminded me that, just because some people want to put their hands in the air and shout doesn't mean we all have to.

We don't all have to be the same or feel pressured to do it a certain way. Just because it's how some people connect with the Lord doesn't mean it's how I do.

I thought about it this week as I held out my own hands, more comfortable these days with a little bit more expression. I thought about how Megan's thinking is something we should apply to our lives more broadly.

When I stopped worrying about what the people around me were doing, my own experience became so much better. When I stopped looking around, comparing, wondering if I should be doing this or that, the entire process got a lot sweeter. I found freedom in it.

And this is life. When we stop looking at what others are doing and, instead, go where we're called, live how we feel led and let go of comparison, we find more joy. More sweetness. More freedom. We are awakened.

For some of us, that means living with our hands up and open. For others, it means sitting quietly in prayer. For some of us, it means we're probably barefoot.  For all of us, it means a life of more freedom and more joy. It means letting go of comparison and living wholly and fully in the life that was designed for us.

When Bad News Finds You at Ikea (&anywhere)

I'm so bad at Ikea.

I always tell my mom I blame her for the fact that mega stores overwhelm me, because she never took us into them when we were little (side note: who would take five children under 10 to a department store?). 

Nothing makes me shut down like a department store. Some girls wait for the Nordstrom semiannual sale. I hide from it.

A few weeks ago, I went to Ikea (for the fourth time in my life) to buy:
- 60 glass cups
- 60 cloth napkins
- 6 glass pitchers
- A 4-foot tall glass vase

That was the list. How did I begin my journey? With a yellow bag. Not a cart. A bag! Halfway through the trip, when I was in the very depths of the store with no cart in sight, I realized I'd made a mistake. 

As I loaded the last of the 60 cups into my yellow bag (I can't even), I got a call from Chris that I'd been waiting for all day. We were awaiting news that would determine a big part of the next year for us. I squatted slowly, lowering all of the glass in my bag to the ground, while carefully raising the phone to my ear, knowing he'd only have a minute between meetings to update me. 

As I squatted there in the store, I thought: This is how it happens. News - good and bad - can find us anywhere. In any moment, everything can change. This is being an adult.

Our parents can't shield us from it anymore - they can't wait until the big test is over to tell us something heartbreaking. They can't protect us with a little good and a little bad, softening the blow. They can't give us a present to make bad news seem a little less painful. 

I've learned that being an adult means a lot of things, but, on the floor at Ikea, I learned that being an adult means taking the news - good and bad - in stride. It means taking a deep breath, gathering the people that love you, and beginning again. It means linking arms with one another - believing that we're in it together. And it means we must, must believe that we weren't made to go it alone.

On Savoring Right Now

Often after dinner, Chris and I go for a walk. It's one of our favorite nightly routines - slowing us down a little more, helping us digest the inevitable post-meal fullness. A few nights ago, we walked into our cozy home and the smell of dinner poured out the front door. As I looked around the living room, the evening light dancing across our couch and the small, simplicity of our place making me smile, Chris took the words out of my mouth:

I'm going to miss this, he said. Someday, when we don't live in a place this small and life isn't quite as slow, I'm going to miss the way the whole house smelled like whatever we cooked and everything felt simple.

I understood exactly what he meant. It's funny how you can sometimes feel nostalgic for something even before it is gone. How a period in time can present itself and you know - almost instantly - that it won't last forever. 

We don't know how long we'll live in this place. We don't know when we will start a family or when job changes could make life more hectic. There was once a time when a little bit of stillness felt like a far cry for us as a couple - a time when we were constantly sending each other calendar invites and asking did you see my email about this and that? 

This season will likely be finite and I'm learning to drink every last drop of it, wishing I could bottle it up for later. 

I want to remember the way the lights in our rental are so dim that, at night, it always feels like mood lighting.
I want to remember the way the sun dances across the wood floors in the morning, pouring into the dining room while I write and Chris works, Housefires playing in the background.
I want to remember the sound of kids running to the bus on our wide street in the morning, moms trailing behind with coffee and backpacks.
I want to remember slow Saturday mornings, when we drink coffee on the deck and make grocery lists and a game plan for the day.
I want to remember laughing each night about our highs, lows and failures - how connected we feel and how easy conversation is. 
I want to remember quiet whirring of our bedroom fan while we lay there at night, unwinding from the day.

I'm reminding myself of this on the days when I feel eager to get to the next season. On the days when my ovaries are barking and the thought of mowing the lawn and painting bedrooms that we own sounds like a dream. On the days when a new adventure is tempting me to feel bored or unsettled. 

I'm reminding myself to embrace the stillness and savor the simplicity of this season. To find joy in the littlest of things and to soak up every bit of it. 

Social Media Detox

From time to time, I detox from things. Caffeine and social media being the primary contenders. Caffeine being the more difficult of the two by far. Target, online shopping and alcohol all made appearances in my early 20s, too.

When I was younger, I remember telling my sister I never wanted to use Carmex, because I'd heard you could get addicted to it. And, if I were addicted and it got discontinued, I'd be in trouble because I'd rely on it. 

So young. So wise.

Kidding. More like so young, already wrestling with anxiety and the need to be in control. 

Recently, I've taken a few weekends to do social media detoxes. I get frustrated by the way a tiny screen and even tinier heart can take over my day and spread their ink across the pages of my life - seeping into my relationships, focus and self worth. 

A few weeks ago, Chris and I heard Mike Foster speak at Plywood People in Atlanta. He was incredible and his story moved us both in different ways. 

Something he said that really stuck with me was that we're all in a hurry to matter. 

It hit home for me as I wrapped up my detox, realizing that social media does just that. It gives us a false sense of what really matters. It allows us to believe that influence over followers is more important than influence and connection with the people right in front of us. It allows us to believe that how much we matter online is tied to how much we matter as humans. 

This is dangerous. If our worth is tied up in anything external, it can be quickly taken away, leaving us wondering why we don't matter as much as we thought we did. Leaving us wondering who we are and what we're worth.

After two full detoxes, here are a few takeaways:

1. I am addicted to input

Once I took away the input of social media, I found myself trying to fill it with texts, email, podcasts and music. I realized how little space I reserve for silence, stillness.

2. I don't love my phone that much

Once social media was gone, it sort of felt like a hassle. Once I settled into the sanctity of silence, I realized I didn't want to check my phone as much. It felt more like a burden than play.

3. It's frustrating when you're not checking your phone and someone else is

I found myself wanting to say "no worries, I'll wait" a lot more when people would check texts while also listening to me. It's amazing how, a habit that I was employing 48 hours earlier became frustrating the minute I stopped.

4. I am more at ease without social media

I felt more focused on conversion, more relaxed and more balanced in general when I didn't have my phone with me all the time. I felt less anxious, too.

But!

5. I missed my friends

I noticed that, since we all document our lives online, we don't feel the need to update each other as much as we once did. Normally, I know what my long distance friends are doing on the weekends, because they're posting about it and sending me Snaps. I could have easily texted them to ask, but, I noticed we all assume we're caught up on each other's online lives. It gives us a sense of being in touch. 

6. The cool stuff we do still counts, even when we don't post it online

Did you really even go on a date if you don't share it online? Do all the cool things we do still count if nobody knows about them?

Yes.

But, it's easy to forget that when we constantly showcase our every move on the internet. It felt sort of refreshing to go on a date and not take a photo. But, I also missed sharing it, because I tend to love the likes.

//

Will I quit social media forever?

Nah, not right now. But, the detoxes reminded me to seek balance with it and remember that the real world is typically more exciting than the online world, if we open up our eyes to see it. Less is more when it comes to daily input and I don't think we ever regret simplifying. 

PS: If you haven't already, I highly recommend unroll.me to mass unsubscribe from emails. It's amazing! For a while, it stopped working, but it's BACK!