The Privilege of Painless History.

This year I’ve read a lot of books about WWII. It’s not something I planned or sought out when I made my book list for the year. I mostly intended to read books by Black authors about African American history and African American stories but of course things never quite go as we plan.

Through random happenstance and my inability to reject my librarians book suggestions I’ve been recommended a lot of books that take place in either Paris or Germany sometime between the years of 1939 - 1945. Even though they have all been fiction they’re still based in truth and have led me on adventures in my imagination that have enlightened, saddened and surprisingly at times, encouraged me.

A dear friend of mine was recently talking to me about the fact that she’s also been suggested a lot of books this year about World War II. At first she said that she read them to be kind but now she explained that she has had to say no because they’re a bit too much for her. My friend is Jewish and reading about WWII for her is more than just a world history, it’s a reminder of her family’s painful history.

That conversation got me thinking about history and how painful it can be to read about. Not just because it makes you sad but rather because it’s a glimpse into the past of your lineage, the pain of your people.

I’m not reading a lot about Slavery or The Civil Rights Movement these days. I’m at a place in my life where despite the progress that came out of those eras, the reality of it is still painful at times for me to read about and to imagine. Maybe it’s because I know that my mother was a teenage during the Civil Rights Movement and she’s seen first hand the racism and prejudice of this country. Maybe it’s because my husband is white and when I see images of white men in America beating and abusing black and brown people I can’t help but think that some of them could be ancestors of his. Or maybe it’s a combination of those things and more.

Those thoughts and the conversation with my friend got me thinking about how much of a privilege it is to be able to read about certain big events in history (Slavery, The Holocaust, Rwandan Genocide, Apartheid, Japanese Internment) without feeling the pain of it. Sure we all have that privilege in some regard but some of us more than others.

Can you watch movies about slavery without feeling the pain of someone in your lineage and that looks like you being in bondage? Can you read about the holocaust without imagining your great grandparents being herded in to concentration camps like their lives didn’t have value? Can you read about Japanese internment and think “wow that’s awful” but not feel the pain of looking down at your own skin knowing that, despite being an American Citizen, you also would have been seized and removed from your home?

History is painful and I think it’s human nature to imagine how your life would be different if you were born in a different time or era. If I was born 100 years ago my life would be drastically different than it is now, from the occupation I have and the place I live to the person that I’m married to. It all would be different.

For some, no matter how far you go back in history, you would still find yourself and your people in a position of power and of the oppressor not the oppressed. I think that there’s a certain amount of responsibility that comes with that stance in history but maybe it’s naive of me to think that a lineage of colonizing and oppressing others isn’t painful. Is it?

This is a topic that I’m excited to think more about and to have more discussions around. Is it something that you have ever thought about? If so, what are some of the conclusions that you have come to? If it’s not something that you’ve ever considered, what are your initials thoughts now that the topic has been brought up to you?

I look forward to hearing your thoughts around this and continuing the conversation around The Privilege of Painless History.

Xoxo,

N.

The One About Marriage Counseling.

Patrick and I have been married for almost 4 months now. It’s crazy to think that two years ago today we hadn’t even met yet but here we are married.

Marriage is quite the beast. It’s this beautiful, scary, powerful force that is so glamorized in the media but so often the truth of how intense it is isn’t shown. I feel like the shows I watch either portray flourishing and thriving marriages or it shows couples signing divorce papers. There’s not a lot about the in between. Today I want to open the door for a conversation about the everyday, the simple, the moments that aren’t necessarily Insta and FB worthy but are the foundation of the moments that are.

When Patrick proposed to me in April we immediately started talking about marriage counseling. We’re both from two parent homes and grew up seeing the fruits of a healthy and thriving marriage but we didn’t exactly know all the steps that got our parents there. I have a strong relationship with my parents now but when I was younger I didn’t ask a lot of questions. I wasn’t the type of kid that asked my parents how they met, or what their first date was like, I was mostly focused on myself and navigating what felt like the hell of adolescence.

So when we got engaged, we knew that counseling was a non-negotiable. We talked to our Pastors and they agreed to do our counseling and to connect us to the resources we needed. Before we started, both Patrick and I had to take an assessment. We were told not to discuss our answers with each other and it essentially evaluated our personalities as well as our love languages and argument styles. The assessment also looked at the ways that we’re different from each other and how those differences worked in our favor or could be areas of contention in our relationship.

After we got our results we went through the book, that matched the assessment, with our Pastors. The whole process was simple, at times predictable but undoubtedly helpful. To be completely forthright with you the first few weeks of our marriage were kind of miserable. We argued a lot and the meshing of lives was not as smooth as we both would have hoped but I KNOW that it would have been a lot worse if we wouldn’t have gone to counseling. Counseling helped us to understand that the differences that we see in each other are not things that we need to aim to change but rather things that we need to celebrate.

One of the focuses of our counseling that really impacted me and the way that I continue to navigate in our relationship was the piece on love languages. Patrick and I talked about our love languages for the first time on our second date and it feels like we’ve talked about them a bunch since. I thought that I knew what Patrick needed to feel loved but I hadn’t fully grasped how important it was for Patrick to receive verbal affirmation. I think that one of my greatest flaws is that I’m not always verbal with the people closest to me about how much I love them. I try to show it in the way that I treat them and the thoughtful things that I do for them but it can be difficult for me to verbalize it. I learned in counseling that it’s important to Patrick that love is not only shown but verbalized.

So now I have a reminder on my phone to tell Patrick that I love and appreciate him every single day. Not just when I’m saying goodnight or when we’re heading out the door for work but in the moments where he’s not expecting it. I don’t always get it right, sometimes I don’t have my phone and at times I’m being a brat and I don’t say anything but when I see it and I follow the prompt I can tell that it means the world to him. Counseling put us in a space where we had encouraged vulnerability which made it easier for Patrick to open up and express how much he values and needs that affirmation.

I also learned a lot about myself in counseling. I realized how stubborn I can be and how much I enjoy being in control. We talked about my need to feel safe and how detailed talks about money and creating a plan for the future helps to create that sense of security for me. When we were deciding on where we wanted to live after we got married, I just wanted to pick the first place that we found that was nice and within our budget. At the time I couldn’t verbalize why but post counseling I can identify the reason and it was because the unknown in regards to where we would live made me feel unsafe. Now Patrick knows that and in times where the unknown is unpreventable he does whatever he can to make me feel safe and secure in our situation.

Marriage counseling, paired with a relationship with Christ, gave us legs to stand on in our marriage. Marriage is a ton of fun and it’s also very hard and I’ve found that my life experiences didn’t give me the tools and resources I needed to be able to handle everything. Marriage counseling isn’t perfect but it definitely gave us some of the tools that we need and will continue to need to be able to navigate this journey.

When I think about my marriage I know that the goal is not for us to have a life free of arguments or disagreements. Rather the goal is to make sure we always come out of every trial and tribulation together and stronger than we were before. That’s why Patrick and I are committed to having at least one session with a counselor every year. So that we can continue to invest in our marriage and each other, not just when things are bad or on the rocks but rather all the time.

Until next time friends!

Xoxo,

Nicole

The Proposal!

Where do I start? Sunday was one of the best days of my life because my best friend and partner in laughter and joy asked me to spend the rest of my life with him. It was the sweetest proposal, so simple and lovely. I can't even believe it's real and that I have this beautiful ring and this amazing man and that I'm a few months away from getting a whole new set of amazing humans added to my family! I'M SO EXCITED!! 

Patrick and I met on November 21st, 2016, became a couple on December 5th and by New Years Eve of that year I had a feeling that we were going to end up going the long haul. I remember being at a party with a group of my friends, Patrick was in Fort Collins with his family and telling them that I was going to marry this guy. Half of the room ignored me, a few of them laughed but two people tuned in and their opinions were on opposite sides of the spectrum. My friend Isaiah looked at me and said "I know you will. I think you really will marry Patrick," and then continued drinking his whiskey.

While another friend looked at me and said "You can't be serious, right? You sound crazy. I mean, you just met this guy! Sorry to be the one to tell you but that's not going to happen." I remember feeling so embarrassed and looking at the ground and Isaiah tapped me on the shoulder and whispered in my ear, "she's wrong." 

Growing up my siblings and I attended a home school group at Cheltenham Church in Maryland. We would go there every Wednesday and when I didn't have a class I'd go outside with my friends and play in the cemetery that surrounded the church. We would play out there week, after week, after week and eventually I developed a deep fondness for Cemetery's. One that led me to seeking out graveyards in every new city I visited and eventually deciding that it would be a dream come true to one day be proposed in one. 

When I visit a cemetery I don't think about death or ghosts or anything scary. Rather, I think about the joy of being a kid and being surrounded by the people who love you the most. When I visit a graveyard I reminisce on my childhood and how the fun seemed endless. Now when I think of a cemetery I'll think about April 29th, the day that Patrick asked me to be his wife. 

Everyone keeps asking me if I was surprised and the truth is, not really. Patrick is HORRIBLE at keeping secrets and as soon as he bought the ring he told me and leading up to the day he was dropping hints like a mad man so I knew that the proposal was going to happen. I'm not disappointed at all that it wasn't a surprise. The fact that I knew it was going to happen took the pressure off of both of us and instead of me always wondering when we were getting engaged I could just be excited about HOW he was going to do it instead of WHEN. 

On Saturday afternoon Patrick told me that we needed to leave right after church on Sunday and that I'd have time to go home and change but I needed to be ready by noon. So after church I rush home, take a quick power nap (Lord knows I can't function without a nap) picked out my clothes and was ready just in time to be picked up. Patrick picks me up and he can barely keep it together. His eyes are all watery and he keeps saying how excited he is and that we're about to have our biggest adventure yet.

 At this point I'm beside myself with excitement. I'm dressed super cute and Patrick has on a T-shirt, so I'm like ughhh okay, what's happening here? He just laughs and tell me to be patient. We get in the car and before I know it we're pulling up to Patrick's parents house in Fort Collins. We get out and go inside and it seems just like a normal visit, we all sit down on the couch and start talking and hanging out. 

After about 30 minutes Patrick says he has to run an errand and leaves. 45 minutes later he comes back and he's now dressed really nice and he's telling me to grab my things because we're leaving. I jump up, because by now I'm SOOO anxious to see how he's going to do it and I hustle to the car. We get in and go for a little drive and he takes me to this area where we're surrounded by rolling hills and he pulls off to the side of the road and says that we're getting out. 

We get out of the car and there's a fence next to us but I can't really see much, all I see is the fence and the hills. He takes my hand and walks me over to a gate where I see the sign 'Bingham Hill Cemetery.' The sign is white and really old and it's attached to this beautiful thin gate that zig zags and we have to enter one by one because it's so small.

He tells me that we're going to be walking somewhere and on our way there are going to be a few things that I have to find. As he's talking I'm trying so hard not to cry because I'm so happy and excited and Patrick looks so handsome and everything is so beautiful, I'm just overwhelmed. We walk down this path and over a small bridge and there's a creek next to us and we have to duck under a tree branch and walk over weeds and with every step more of the landscape is revealed and it's gorgeous. 

Within like 30 seconds of walking up the hill I see a pair of legs hiding behind this information wall and it's my dear friend Shallyn (the taker of beautiful pictures) and we all start laughing and she tells me to pretend like she's not there.

 Patrick takes me to a spot where I find flowers with a note wrapped around them. Since we first started dating Patrick has been writing me notes. These notes range from being super silly and random to being amazingly thoughtful and sweet. I've kept every note that Patrick has ever written me. So I find the note and it's beautiful, just like everything else about this moment and we keep walking and I find two more flowers with notes wrapped around them. 

Once I've read the last note, Patrick decided that this is a great moment for him to make one of his lame jokes and he says "well that's everything, I guess we can leave now."  But since you know the ending, you know that wasn't everything. So then he reaches into his back pocket and pulls out a red box and gets down on one knee and asks me to marry him. 

The whole thing was so sweet and so US. I couldn't have asked for a better moment with a better man and I'm so unbelievably happy and also overwhelmed. I'm overwhelmed by all of the kinds words and messages that people have sent us this week. Overwhelmed by the excitement of all of our family and friends as we embark on the huge task of planning a Pennsylvania wedding from Colorado. More than anything I'm overwhelmed by God's tremendous grace towards us and the fact that he brought us together not through church or friends but through a dating app. 

God is faithful and I feel so blessed to be on this journey of faith with such an amazing man by my side. Patrick, I love you so much. Thank you for planning such a special day filled with laughter and tears and so much simplicity. You're not the man of my dreams cause never in a million years could I have dreamed of finding someone as selfless, loving and gentle as you. You're the man that has surpassed all of my expectations and I can't wait to be your wife. 

Xoxo,

Nico 

Love Does.

Patrick said 'I love you' to me for the first time on January 6th (yes, I remember the date) It was exactly a month and one day after we became official and it caught me only slightly by surprise. We were sitting on the big comfy couch in my house and we had just had our first big disagreement and he turned to me, looked me in the eyes and said it. 

It took me a moment or two to process it all but after I got myself together I hugged him and told him that I loved him too. In that moment I felt like I loved him and like he loved me as well but looking back I can say without question, at that point in our relationship the love was purely audible, it wasn't doing. 

I'm currently 22 chapters deep in the book Love Does and I've been reading it for over a month now. It's a small book, with short chapters and I'm a fast reader but there's so much, so much to take in, that I have to digest it slowly. 

Bob Goff has a beautiful writing style one which I've seen bloggers and authors alike try to embody. He uses a story to draw you into an idea and drives it home by attaching it to a relatable and clear concept. In my opinion the book is both genius and simple and has the potential to really impact the way people view love and most importantly Christ. 

One of the reasons why this books speaks to me so clearly, is because I am very skeptical of simply audible love. A love that you can hear but not yet see, one that is relayed through words on a page or lyrics in a song but has yet to bear fruit in your life. Which is why when Patrick first told me he loved me and I said it back, I believed him and I was sincere when I responded but I had yet to see how that love was working in our lives.

I think that in order for love to be real, it has to be a living, breathing, declaration that makes a difference in the lives that it touches. Love Does is filled with stories of action. Stories about a love that shakes tradition and social norms. A love that reaches out to the lost and hurting and aims to do more than just rest in it's comfort. A love that is reckless in it's abandon but yet grounded in the way that it's consistent, it's tried and it's true. 

A love that does. 

Seated on that comfy couch, on a cold day in January, Patrick and I thought that all of those feelings and emotions were true love at it's best. Little did we know the months to follow and the actions that filled them would take our declarations and feelings and solidify them. Our love for each other went from being just words dancing in ears to an active ingredient, visible in every part of our relationship. 

"That's because love is never stationary. In the end, love doesn't just keep thinking about it or keep planning for it. Simply put; love does." 

Boy meets world.

This past weekend Patrick flew home with me and met my family for the first time. It was a weekend filled with laughter, ease, joy and so much peace. It ended with two exhausted twenty somethings on a cramped Frontier flight, headed back to good ole Denver, Colorado. 

As I sat there, two hours deep in a four hour plane ride, I was exhausted and pretty uncomfortable in that awful chair but yet so happy. Patrick, who struggled to sleep on the plane ride there, had his head rested in my lap and was out cold. I'm not sure if it was me letting him have the aisle seat or the nerves of the first trip behind him but on this side of the trip he seemed to fall asleep with ease.

I was extremely nervous for Patrick to come home with me, more nervous than I think is maybe normal. The months leading up to our trip I felt a strong sense of protection over my family and the short few days I'd have with them. I think it's safe to say that I have a healthy but very real air of jealousy in regards to my parents and my siblings and who is around when I get to spend time with them. 

I can't express fully how much I cherish the time I get to spend with my family. After high school I took a year off before college to work and that was the last year I spent at home. After my gap year I went away to college and traveled the world for a few years after graduation before ending up n Denver. So when I go home it's not just to relax or for vacation it's the short and rare window of quality, in person time, I have with them throughout the year. 

I feel kind of selfish admitting this but I think a large part of me was nervous to bring Patrick home because I didn't want him to take away from my time with my family. I didn't want to have to spend the entire weekend facilitating introductions and conversations and making sure he was having a good time instead of just having a good time myself. 

I often leave home feeling like the time flew by and I didn't get to fully soak in each moment with the people that I love. That fear, I hate to say, heavily outweighed my excitement for Patrick to finally meet everyone. Underneath the weirdness, there was still excitement but it never came without being quickly followed by the thought that one of my few trips home could potentially not go well. 

Of course, none of my fears came true. Patrick was wonderful with my family and having him there 100% added to my experience. Patrick is self sufficient, brave, personable and so easy to be around and all of those qualities shined brighter than ever this weekend. 

On the plane ride back to Denver I spent a lot of time pondering the idea of family. I thought about my parents and my siblings and the huge impact that they've had on my life and my happiness. I also thought a lot about Patrick and his family.

Patrick introduced me to his family within the first few weeks of our relationship and it's been such a joy to know them. His family is welcoming and kind and so loving and I cringe at the thought that if he was jealous of their affection and selfish with their time I'd have missed out on so much.

This weekend I was reminded of something simple that we all learned in preschool, "sharing is caring." Patrick shares his family, whom he values so very much, with me because he cares about me and being able to do the same thing for him this weekend was amazing. 

When you start to share the things and people who matter the most to you, I realized this weekend, you gain way more than you lose. I guess family is meant to be shared and before you know it the small knit group, you never imagined would change, is bigger and more special than ever. 

As Patrick and I left the plane and entered the terminal he grabbed my hand and familiarity and relief washed over me and all of a sudden he felt a lot less like an intruder and a lot more like family. 

Who am I?

When I sat down this week to start writing about graduates and graduation a lot of ideas popped into my head. I thought about writing something about the importance of always being a student, seeking to learn and grow from every person that you meet. Though an interesting idea, it didn't quite feel right.

Then I considered writing an open letter entitled "dear graduates," with advice and tips and tricks for navigating the world outside of the four walls of school. This idea felt better than the first but the words just didn't flow, a clear indication that I was on the wrong track. 

All of that idea tossing and brain storming led me to what I'm writing about today, identity.

I don't know about you but all of my life I've been heavily defined by and tied to titles related to my education. For all of my K-12 years I was the home schooled kid and that was a badge that, once I stopped being ashamed of, I wore proudly. My post secondary track led me to a small all women's liberal art's school and for those four years I was the college student attending a strong all women's college. It was a time in my life that I was so proud of and shared with others quickly.

After finishing college I joined the global education program Up with People and for years it was the first thing I would share about myself when meeting new people. The fact that I got to travel the world performing, volunteering and living with host families made me feel like my life was such an adventure.

Then before I knew it, I wasn't connected to any of those things anymore. I was living in Denver, working in an office and staying in my host family's basement. 

My life it seemed, had gone from unique to unique to all of a sudden strikingly average. My identity was so tied to my circumstances and how they made me stand out from a crowd that when my circumstances became seemingly normal I felt like I as well had gone from someone that was special to someone who just blended in with the crowd. 

My first few weeks of living in Denver were harder than I imagined they would be. As I  began to settle into a routine; wake up, work, workout, sleep, repeat, I also began to settle into a cycle of self doubt and lack of identity.

"Who am I if I'm not the world traveler?" I thought to myself one day as I boarded a plane from Denver to Pennsylvania to visit my family.  Whenever I would come home to visit, my dad would always proudly introduce me to his friends as "his daughter, the world traveler,"  I was terrified at the thought of how boring his new introduction may potentially be. 

That weekend when we went to church, I walked into the building with my parents and immediately from across the room one of their friends, with a huge smile on their face, came bounding in our direction. They greeted my parents warmly and then turned my way and said "Is this the daughter that you've been telling us about?" and then wrapped me in a warm bear hug. As I stood there, hugging a stranger I was taken aback by the reality of my identity. 

To my parents, regardless of where I was studying, living or traveling I was always first and foremost their daughter. 

It's so easy for us to tie our identity and our worth to the things that we do and the circles that we run in. Do you find yourself doing that? Introducing yourself and first mentioning where you work as if our jobs are able to give people an all encompassing snapshot of who we really are. As if the fact that you're loving, kind and compassionate are secondary to the fact that you work for a non-profit or a large corporation.

Ted Dekker once said "Life consists of cycles of remembering and forgetting and I, like you, still forget far too often...and in that forgetting, my view is clouded once more until I remember who I am and surrender who I am not." 

That day, at church with my parents, I was reminded of who I am. I began to tie my identity to the factors that will always remain and not to the circumstances that are constantly ebbing and flowing through my life. I began to stop looking to my job, my friends and my situation to tell me who I am and started to embrace the truth of who God says that I am.

I willingly began to surrender who I am not and with a peaceful heart rested in the truth of who I am. 

My first 40 days

This year I decided to do lent for the first time. For some reason when the opportunity presented itself and I had the chance to give up all of my favorite things for an extended amount of time, I took it.

For 40 days I gave up coffee, candy, social media and alcohol. I wish I could say that the hardest part was the no coffee but lets be real, it was giving up candy.

Before this year I didn't really know much about Lent. Growing up my family wasn't big on Easter, we would go to church the weekend of but besides that we wouldn't do Easter egg hunts, or baskets or anything. I grew up with the sense that Easter was another holiday that society capitalized on but didn't truly understand.

The last 40 or so days have changed my entire view of this season. Easter is more than just another day out of the 365 that we get each year. The concept, the truth behind Easter, is the foundation of the Christian faith.

For those who aren't super familiar, the 40 days leading up to Easter, lent, is meant to model the 40 days that Jesus spent fasting in the wilderness. The bible says that Jesus was led by the Holy Spirit into the wilderness and he fasted for 40 days and 40 nights and when it was over he was tempted by the devil. Hebrews says that because Jesus suffered and was tempted he is able to help us when we are tempted.

On Easter Sunday, as I sang a set of worship songs to a congregation full of people the truth of Easter reverberated in my soul. I realized that regardless of what we add to the day, how we enhance it and make it marketable, Easter is and will always be about Jesus.

Lent for me was not about just taking a break from things that I enjoy. It wasn't about forcing myself to stop going on Facebook and to lay off the candy for a few weeks. Lent helped me to be able to narrow my focus, It took away the heavy distractions and clutter that often fogged my view. Lent pulled away the junk in my life and pointed me straight to the giver of life, it pointed me to Christ.

Easter is the celebration of the resurrection of Jesus Christ. It's what happened after the disciples saw Jesus hanging on a cross, crucified. Jesus, their hope for the future, was gone. The messiah had seemingly been defeated and death had won.

The truth though is that death is defeated and Christ is risen. He rose again on the third day and renewed the disciples hope in him as their savior and as the savior of all mankind. The darkness of the weekend and the sight of him hanging from a tree was erased by the joy of seeing him again in all of his honor and glory.

Easter is so much more than just pastel colors and packed church services. Lent reminded me that the resurrection is the Christian story. It's the three years that Jesus spent preaching and reaching out to the lost coming to an abrupt halt and then beauty, glorious beauty, being born from the ashes.

Lent was the path that I needed to take to become truly connected to the Easter story. It was the defining moment that made Easter not just another bible story but rather the moment in history that makes everything that I believe in truth.

"If Jesus rose from the dead, then you have to accept all that he said; if he didn't rise from the dead then why worry about any of what he said? The issue on which everything stands is not whether or not you like his teaching but whether or not he rose from the dead."  - Tim Keller

The happiness of a patriots fan.

I've been a Patriots fan for as long as I can remember. Growing up my brothers, all 5 of them and my dad, loved the Redskins. It seemed like the Redskins were the Magloire family football team but I never seemed to develop a liking for them. Instead, I gravitated towards the team with a coach that never smiled and a sixth round quarterback draft pick from California.

Before I even knew what it meant to be a fan of anything I was a fan of the Patriots. I didn't really know what I was doing as far as being a football fan was concerned. Eventually, I figured that I just needed to model the behavior that my brothers displayed.

So I would look up stats and players names and I would watch games and make noise when we scored a touchdown and make noise when we got scored on. I figured if I was constantly making noise during a game I was doing something right.

Now that I live in Denver, I often get slack from people about the team I like. The most common things I hear are "But wait, you're not even from New England," or my personal favorite "Oh great, another bandwagon fan."

I love football and I love being a Patriots fan but during the Super Bowl I had a moment that forced me to take a look at myself and be reminded that it's just a game.

Picture this, there I was on Super Bowl Sunday, eight minutes left in the fourth quarter and I was sobbing. I was sitting there crying so hard, not at all embarrassed because I thought the Patriots were going to lose. My friends all laughed at me and called me ridiculous and I just sat there crushed. Feeling like the game was so important, like the Patriots really needed to win or my life would be affected in some major way.

For every game that is lost in football there's a coach, a team, investors and a few others that are greatly affected. It changes the trajectory of their season, whether they go into the playoffs or not and for some players it affects whether they're able to even stay in the league. When the Patriots lose, nothing in my life changes. I wake up the next day, the same as I did the day before and I continue going on with my life.

The truth is, for the majority of us Football fans, besides our emotional state being altered for a few hours, our lives don't change at all by the results of these games. Yet there we are, crying,  in a room filled with people we love because we think that a game might not end the way we want it too.

Super Bowl Sunday was kind of a reality check for me. It was like I had an out-of-body experience by seeing my behavior through my friends eyes. Is football really that important to me?The answer, is that it's not.

What's really important to me, one of the things that I want people to see me engaging in passionate conversations over and fighting for, is education.

So many of the students that I work with want to play in the NFL or the NBA. They want to be famous singers and rappers, they want to drive Ferrari's and live in mansions in LA and a lot of that is far fetched for 99.9% of them. What shouldn't be a far fetched dream though, is for them to be able to go to a high school in their neighborhood that offers them a rich education geared towards their learning styles.

I want to yell and raise a ruckus about things like that. About all of the thousands of  under served and disadvantaged youth in this country and my city, that don't have access to the opportunities they deserve. For kids from low income families that aren't able to get an education that gives them a chance to have a better life. One that is better than the one their parents had and equips them with the tools they need to break the cycle of poverty.

Football is often as simple as win or lose and maybe that's what I love about it. There are four quarters, a slight chance of overtime but regardless it always ends with someone winning and someone losing. Education, on the other hand, may not be as simple but it's undoubtedly more important.

I firmly believe that I was made to help youth. Made to support them in their struggles and provide them with the resources that are often just out of their grasp. Football brings me happiness but education and being a bridge for students in that way, that's what brings me real joy.

I'll probably still watch football next season. I may buy a jersey and even try to get tickets for the Patriots vs Broncos game. What I won't do, is forget how small it all is. In the grand scheme of things and the big picture of my life the Patriots are just a team and football is and will always be, just a game.

Lovely.

The other day I took a trip to my favorite coffee shop. Across from me was a young lady, about my age, with long red hair and clear green eyes and every time I looked up she was staring at me. It was kind of an intense situation because she was only sitting one table away from me. The more I tried to avoid her eye contact the more awkward and weird I felt.

I had just gotten to the coffee shop so I was still settling in and putting my things down and when I finally went to get a cup of coffee she spoke to me.

She looked me right in the eyes and she said “Hi, how are you?” I smiled and told her that I was doing fine and then asked how she was doing. She told me that she was doing well and then a huge smile spread across her face and she said “You are lovely, I noticed that when you walked in and had to tell you.”

I couldn’t help but to laugh. As far as looks were concerned I wasn’t having my best morning. I had gone to bed late the night before and woke up early to meet Patrick for breakfast before he went to work. My face felt tired and my body matched those sentiments. In that moment, lovely was not the word I would have used to describe myself. Yet there I was, surrounded by people I didn’t know and where I saw a frazzled hot mess this lady with flowing red hair saw something lovely.

How often do we do that? We look at ourselves and see all the flaws, all the things that are out of place and the things that aren’t quite right. We see the bags under our eyes and the air of exhaustion radiating from our skin and miss all the layers of ‘lovely’ that envelope us.

I took a break from blogging recently. My reasoning was that I thought I needed to refocus. I thought I needed space to clear my head and find the beauty in the ashes but now I think the truth is that I got caught up in the mess. I got so caught up, in fact,  that I was lost in the cobwebs and the dust and missed all of the gorgeous layers and hints of lovely.

The thing about commitment, real commitment, is that it’s independent of feelings. I won’t always feel like writing, I won’t always feel like my thoughts or opinions are valuable and I’m sure that I won’t always feel like I have something important to share. Commitment though, doesn’t really care about how I feel. Commitment calls out to my integrity and requires of me that I show up and do what I said that I would do regardless of how I feel.

Because when you learn to show up, even when most of you feels unprepared, unmotivated and even unworthy, that's when you start to realize that lovely things are all around you. It's in the follow through of our word and being willing to step into the uncomfortable places that we learn how to really see it.

So here I am. An inexperienced, passionate, joy filled and sometimes unmotivated writer ready to embark on a journey with you. One where I commit to the process and instead of being attached to the outcome I become attached to always showing up.

I encourage you to master the art of showing up, it'll be especially useful if you ever find yourself in the place that I found myself a month ago. Feeling like an arrow. Like I needed to pull back in order to be shot forward. Regardless of how you feel, show up and be committed to your word. You might be feeling like an arrow but maybe you're meant to be an anchor. Steady, unmovable, reliable, always staying in place even when the waves are rolling and the storm is raging.

So for now I'm committing to that. To being the anchor even when I feel like I'd much rather be an arrow. Maybe one day I'll run into you in a coffee shop. You'll be standing there thinking that you look frazzled, unwashed, and a mess and I'll be the one staring, trying to find the words to describe something so lovely.

Xoxo,

A Better way to pray.

About a month or so ago my older brother tagged me in a post on Facebook. It was on the page of a well-known Pastor based in Colorado Springs and it was reaching out to bloggers and writers to give them the opportunity to review one of his books before it's re-release.

I thought to myself "what the heck, it's worth a shot," emailed them a link to my blog and my Facebook and waited for a response. A few days later I got an email telling me that they had reviewed my content and believed that it aligned well with their mission and message and that attached I would find a copy of the book.

The book is called A Better Way to Pray and it's written by preacher and author Andrew Wommack. I was introduced to Andrew Wommack and his teachings years ago by my father and I've followed his work ever since.

I'm really excited to share my thoughts about the content of this book but also to share with you some things that I took from it that I think are beneficial.

Let me just start by saying that if you've never heard Andrew Wommack preach or read one of his books before, he has a very distinct tone. His words, though filled with love, are quite direct. He doesn't hold back with his use of exclamation points and he words things in a way that makes sure that the message is always very clear.

I often found myself laughing out loud while reading this book because I could hear his voice jumping out from the pages and I couldn't help but to giggle.

With that being said the message within the pages, though at times convicting, is truly life changing. While taking notes I found that there were so many things that stood out to me that to try and write about them all would take up too much space. So instead I decide to point out three keys thoughts that really stuck with me from the book and last but certainly not least how the book has affected my prayer life.

1. The importance of thanks.

Whatever we focus on is magnified. If we focus on our issues, they grow bigger but if we focus on our gratitude it becomes the biggest thing in our lives. Prayer is a time where we can lavish God with our thanks and gratitude towards him.

Does God needs to hear us say thank you? No, not necessarily but when we spend time thanking God for what he's done for us and acknowledge our many blessings our problems become so small in comparison. Chapter 5 entitled Make a prayer sandwich emphasizes the importance of starting and ending our prayers with praise and thanksgiving. It's through that process that we magnify God and all that he's done for us instead of magnifying our problems.

When we begin our prayer time by expressing our gratitude by the time we get to our requests we're not only reminded of how small they are but more importantly how BIG God is. I encourage you to spend  the first five minutes of your prayer time thanking and praising God. I think that you'll be pleasantly surprised by the outcome.

2. The primary purpose of prayer.

The primary purpose of prayer is not receiving from God, yes that is A purpose but not THE purpose. Prayer is a time of fellowship, intimacy and relationship with Christ. God knows every single thing that we need in this life. The Lord knows that we need to eat and make money and provide for our families, he knows these things. When we come to him constantly making requests, he's not upset but we're missing the true blessing that comes from prayer.

Prayer is a time for us to commune with God. It's a time for us to share our lives with him, to laugh, to cry, to simply invite him into the most intimate parts of our souls. This book reminded me that God is not just some magical genie waiting to grant our wishes. Rather he's a father, waiting to be invited into the lives and hearts of his children. A Better Way to Pray emphasizes the fact that God wants us to talk to him not only about our problems and our concerns but also about the things that make us come alive.

God wants to be our closest friend and most intimate relationship and prayer is a time for us to build that dynamic with him. I invite you to explore the beautiful relationship that you can have with Christ by spending your prayer time getting to know him rather than just getting things from him.

3. Loving God is all that matters.

We were CREATED for intimacy with Christ. It's almost to simple to grasp but it's the truth,we were solely created for the purpose of loving and being loved by him.

Of course, when you love someone, you desire to do their will and to do the things that make them happy but if all we ever did on this earth was love God, he wouldn't be upset with us. Through this book I was reminded that God is love and everything that he does and everything that he calls us to do comes down to that same thing. It is and will always be about loving God with all that we have.

God sent his son to die on the cross for our sins so that we could spend our days in fellowship with the king. When we realize that Jesus is not our escape route but rather our invitation to community, we are then able to enter into a life filled with love and a relationship with our best friend, Jesus Christ.

Ways that my prayer life has changed.

After reading this book, I realized that the majority of my prayer life and my relationship with Christ has been spent seeking things instead of just basking in his love. I realized that though I claim 'Christian' as the most important title to my name that I rarely take God at his word believing that he'll do what he says he's going to do. I realized that though I'm willing to walk away from relationships for my 'beliefs' that I don't even truly know the God that I'm claiming to have devoted my life to.

I didn't walk away from this book feeling condemned or bad about myself but rather I walked away from it feeling like I was about to embark on a life changing journey. I finished this book and I honestly felt so much freedom. This book equipped me with the tools, the confidence and the knowledge of who God is to be able to pray in a way that's not only effective but also a way that edifies and glorifies God.

Now the adventure starts to make this not just knowledge floating around in my head but rather something that I believe and know to be true in my heart.

I know that this post was EXTREMELY long but this book has truly given me a new thirst for God and who he is. It's made me realize that in John 10:10 when it says that Christ came that we may have life and have it more abundantly that it involves so much MORE than what I've experienced with him so far.

For those of you who are interested in checking out this book, I have an extra copy and would love to send it to one of you! Comment your name and email address below and in a few days I'll randomly pick a name and send that lucky person a copy!

Until next time friends.

XoXo

St. Mary's Glacier.

I wrote this last Saturday at 5:45am as I sat on a rock at St. Mary's Glacier. At the time I was feeling so much and I didn't know how to put it into words until I saw the view, until I felt the wind, until I got wrapped in the silence. Here's what I wrote, unedited and fresh. Know that if you feel too much or even if you don't feel enough...you may just need an unadulterated view, a pen and some paper to get to the heart of things.

- Sometime all it takes to get away from the evil and darkness of this world, is to climb a mountain and allow God to show you how loved you are. A place where the grass is so green that is could almost swallow you whole. A place where the silence is so rich that it pierces through the noise in your life and demands peace. Solitude.

I'm starting to find that it's in the solitude that we find comfort. It's in the secret place that we're found. That's where he meets us. Right there in the heart of where the darkness meets the light, I've come to find that's often where I meet God.

It's when the darkness breaks and dawn appears and the sun begins to creep it's way over the horizon that we're reminded that the sadness, the pain, it never lasts. When all of the hurt is gone and the tears have dried, what remains is his love. His glory. His truth.

The Lord says, in the end of Matthew, that he will never leave us nor will he ever forsake us until the end of age. It's in the darkness that we must remind ourselves of that truth and it's in the sunlight that we finally see it.

Denver, Colorado...year one.

A year ago today my whole world changed. I carefully packed my entire life into two suitcases, a backpack and a carry on and hoped on a plane to move from Pennsylvania to Denver.

At the time I genuinely had no idea what the future held for me. I  knew that I had a place to live and a job but the rest...well the rest I was hoping to figure out as soon as possible.

In the twelve months that I've been in this city I've lived at three different addresses, changed careers, bought a car, cried too many times, laughed till I peed and so much more. This year was unexpected, predictable, terrifying and exciting all at the same time and as I look back on it, it's hard for me to believe that I came out on the other side better than I started.

So right now, in this space, I just want to take a moment to reflect on this past year and how I've been impacted and forever changed by this city.

One of the first things I learned when I moved to Denver is that it's not impossible for things that you're excited about to turn into things that terrify you. My first night here, I laid in my bed on the phone with my best friend and cried for what seemed like hours. Unlike all the other times when I left home, this one felt permanent, less flexible and like I was forever leaving all of my family and friends behind. Very dramatic, I know.

I couldn't understand how I could be so sad about being there when just hours earlier I was beyond excited and ready for the adventure. My friend told me to give it more than 12 hours, to take it one day at a time and to know that I could always go home to my family. That night, as I drifted off to sleep on my tear soaked pillow I was comforted by the truth that sometimes new adventures can be daunting and that's okay.

Another thing that I've learned this year is that in order to build strong, healthy and life giving relationships you have to be willing to abandon your comfort zone. The first few months of living in Denver I was so lonely and disconnected from the city. Besides going to church on the weekend by myself I was not open to saying "yes" to new situations at all. Fear of the new and unknown left me feeling, for the first time in years, like I only had one true friend.

Thankfully, that one friend was someone who really pushed me to meet new people and to step out of my comfort zone and it made all the difference. Now, I not only have a community of diverse, passionate and talented people around me but I'm a more dynamic and well rounded human. It was by making myself uncomfortable and putting myself in awkward situations that I was able to meet people that pour into my life in so many ways and help me to be a better person. You'll never reach your full potential with people and relationships without jumping outside of what feels safe and trusting that the net that's supposed to catch you, will do just that.

Last but not least I learned that with each dark transition comes a sunny and bright horizon. It might seem cliche or corny to say but my darkest moments in Denver can't compare to the joy that I've found here.

Denver's magic far outweighs it's nightmares. It's a city where you'll meet people from all over the country and even the world. People that have made the same decision as you, people who have uprooted their entire lives to chase a dream, a job opportunity and even love. It's a city of music and art, of love and loss, of mountains and deserts. It's a place that's big enough to get lost in but also small enough to be found and it's with ease and excitement that I can say that for me, it's a place I call home.

You don't have to move to a new city or change your entire lifestyle to find yourself but for me, that's exactly how it happened. Whether you're in transition, feeling a little lost or simply searching for purpose in an ever changing world, know that with time all storms are calmed.

So cheers to Denver for embracing me, another east coast transplant, into it's lovely terrain. After one year of being on it's soil, Denver is deeply rooted in me. I'm connected, I'm invested, I'm here.

XOXO.