You've Lost That Loving Feelin'

First off, let me just share I didn't realize this song was that old. Funny how songs keep playin' on and fits where you need it too, when you need it too. Music is great! I dig this song.

When I was sitting here thinking, I decided to write a post about doing things we love and enjoy. I started to think about scrapbooking. The beginning of it, where its come from and where it is today. Then I started thinking about my life and how wrapped up I was in to it with all my supplies, organizational gadgets, a whole room dedicated, 30+ albums that I eventually threw away... It was a serious obsession. Life happened and I couldn't scrapbook anymore. I felt like my life was a lie and what I was portraying in my layouts wasn't all real so I stopped. Then life got decent, or so I thought and I started jumping in again, only to have it dwindle down to nothing yet again. The thing is, I just suppressed the creativity inside.

You see when life takes a turn ya just don't feel like it. It's like that piece inside of you just dies and you can't seem to make it work no matter how much organizing, re-thinking, re-doing is going to jump start it. So you walk away. That's what I did 2 times. I went from the "room" to a desk, to a smaller space, to a small desk that literally just sits there. I have dwindled down, parred down, and got rid of a bunch of supplies. I kept what I only really liked. I even organized too. And yet I still struggled. I made a few pages here and there but I wasn't in to it since life wasn't going so hot.  I just wasn't feelin' it. I lost that lovin' feeling (I know your humming it too!).

I was looking for a book for Alyssa to send in a care package to her. While I was in my secretary desk I looked up and saw this...

Project Life. Ah, I was going to start on it January 2015 and my life took a turn I did not expect. In fact, my life was in turmoil and so this cute album got put away.  Until today.  I saw it and smiled. Thinking about life as I know it in the right now, the middle of the year and what's going on. I pulled it out and stared at it.

Could I? Dare I? Should I? So I began to look up when a good time to start project life, monthly kits, how too's, suggestions, project life 101, opinions, more suggestions, rules, etc. It was overwhelming to say the least. Yet I started thinking that it may be good to document life right now. It isn't perfect, I don't know where I am going, or what I am doing but I am doing life and that's important. It's a way to journal my life. So I stopped looking at websites crammed full of cool ideas and just decided to jump in.

I've got 7 goals for it.

1. Have fun.
2. Just go with it.
3. It doesn't need to be the latest, greatest, perfect, album at all.

4. I have enough supplies.
5. I want to be real because it is my life.
6. Month to month works best for me.
7. My photos don't have to be the best, they just have to be.

That's it. First off, I dumped on to my dining table. I wasn't the least bit organized, and for now that's okay I liked it being just moment by moment kinda thing. It was SO much fun just grabbing supplies without any rhyme or reason and using them, it's been SO long!

I decided to start with this month (July. Which means my album will go from this month to July of next month and I'm okay with that!). July brought about big changes for me and my life but I kept the journaling simple this month by using bullet statements about things going on and decided to focus on my photos (all of them were taken on my iPhone 6 and printed out at home).  Here are three photos showing the complete page at a glance, the title page, and the frontal view of my first page too!

Supplies: Mambi Stickers, American Crafts album, American Crafts Thickers, Pounce Wheel, Twine, Computer font: Century Gothic/Courier New/Batang, Generic stamp Michael's $1 bin, Becky Higgins Project Life Kit materials (not sure from which one), Pebbles Inc, Zig black writer, Heidi Swapp, Corner rounder, Martha Stewart circle punch, Doodlebug Designs, Martha Stewart heart punch.

Like I said, it was SO much fun to be creative and just go with it! Hoping that it continues!

e.

Who The Hell Am I Anyway?

As I sit here drinking my morning tea, I realize that yet again I am morphing. Changing. Learning. Growing. Moving. Understanding. Letting go. Fighting. And of whole other slew of things I am feeling, or going through.

But the question keeps coming back to me as to who the hell is Elizabeth Paine? I get so upset at myself thinking that by now, at my age, I should have it all together this thing called life and here I sit thinking I simply don't. But isn't that what it's all about? I mean let's just be real here. If I had it all together there wouldn't be struggles, which in turn would be I wouldn't be seeking, which in turn means I wouldn't be trying so hard to rely on Him. Ya, Him as in Jesus.

I must admit, I've been one of those that when life is grand my prayers are few, my thoughts about Him are less. Yet in the turmoil I've caused and gotten myself in too I cry out to him. I feel guilty even doing so because now, oh the now, I am struggling and at my lowest point. I get disgusted with myself in it yet it is a constant battle I believe for myself and many of us.

You can tell or call me a child of God, but I am struggling. I still have this nagging feeling I am not getting it. I am missing what he's trying to show me and it's taking a toll on me. I am my worst critic, and so hard on myself. Who says really that at my age I have to have it all together? I do. And that's where I need to change my line of thinking.  Be more God focused instead of Elizabeth focused. Yet try as hard as I do, I still end up here in the mist of confusion, the sinking vortex of the sea. Let me just get this out there, I know what the scriptures say, what to do, what they mean, what to follow but tell that to my flesh that always wins out. Its why I am struggling.

I make mistake after mistake and choice after choice that isn't aligned with him or I think it is only to have someone else choose to go a different path than he intended and it leaves me in the wake of it. I grow weary of being strong, picking up the pieces, getting back up on my horse, being strong, being strong, did I mention being strong? I fight the very person he created me to be, strong. It kinda pisses me off actually being so strong.

Do not be afraid or terrified because of them, for the Lord your God goes with you; he will never leave you, nor foresake you. -Deuteronomy 31:5-6 

Lord if it is you, Peter replied, tell me to come to you on the water. Come, he said. Then Peter got down out of the boat walked on the water and came toward Jesus. But when he saw the wind he was afraid and beginning to sink cried out, Lord, save me! Immediately Jesus reached out his hand and caught him. You of little faith, he said why did you doubt? -Matthew 14:4

In both instances we see that Jesus isn't going anywhere, he's there in Deuteronomy and he's there in Matthew. In both cases he was talking to his people letting them know he's there.

In the mist of my struggles and how much I sink there is that tug. Because I can only waif for so long.  Look I will pull you out of the water regardless how much you try to swim by yourself and drown. I will not leave you. 

And in my disbelief that he really will, I yank myself up and create another chaos of mess. Because you see that strength he put in me? I use it for my own will thinking I got it on my own. I got in to the mess, I can fix the mess is usually my philosophy. But the reality of it all is that I can't do this alone, I am not supposed too. I often forget the plans he has for me, yet he is there through this journey. He simply knows every single thing and every single choice I will make.

And that's just it, the support is there, yet I choose to swim away from the arms of He, because I got it. Ya know, I thought I had dealt with this but I can see it will be a life long struggle of my flesh to let go and give the driver's seat to him. I hate that about myself. I yearn too, but honestly I don't, can't, won't, do it.

I am in the mist of change yet again, nd I don't know if I am coming or going. I don't even know where to go! Ugh. It is frustrating. The root? I just don't believe it. I am ashamed to admit that, after all I've been walking for 18 years you'd think I'd "get it", or "believe it" but some how in the mess of my life I simply can only see the sinking sea all around me.

Because I swam away. 

Then I feel this tug. To what I know to be true and right, and even just. It's there buried deep inside of me I can feel it. That tiny speck and glimmer of hope. Hope that I am completely wrong, have it wrong, and can't possibly remain in this vortex of raging sea forever. Can't possible keep swimming away, can I?

So, Alyssa leaves. She's off on an adventure of a life time and I am forced to take a hard look at myself. Who am I now that as a mom my role is different? What do I do with myself? How do I pick up the pieces of change? The last 18 years I've spent molding, encouraging, nagging, loving, worrying, praying, and shaping Alyssa. Here I sit, really at the end of all that because there isn't anything I can say or do that will mold her now. She's 18 and off on that adventure. But it's forced me to ask who the hell I am.  And instead of looking to Jesus as he's reaching out his hands I struggle, swim away and am left sinking. All because I chose too.

But I've flailed. I've drank a whole bunch of water. I've sunk down, I turned my back and viciously swam away, fighting every inch of the way.

Instead of looking at this like it's good change, I choose to see it as I have no purpose anymore. Its gotten me lost. I don't even know what direction to go in too. Do I stay here in Seattle and make a life? Do I move? Will I get a job that fits me? Will true friends come my way again? Will I find a church? Can I make a relationship work after so many failed ones? Which way do I go? What do I do?

The only thing I know too..  Cling. So tightly.

Because all this junk I chose to swam completely in the opposite direction. And here I am.

Yet as far away as I am, to the point where I don't even see his reach He threw me a floaty. A stinkin' pink polka dotted floaty. Uh-huh he knows me well. That tug? It was him all along, he didn't just reach out his hands he literally got in to the water and picked my poor lil ole self.  Because I can only waif for so long before there is this tug at me.. The tug inside that says, I created you this way, hey over here, stop fighting me, stop swimming away! Look I will pull you out of the water regardless how much you try to swim by yourself and drown. I will not leave you. in that pink polka dotted floaty. His word tells me this, yet disbelief. I am loosing my fight... 

We are out so far, I cannot swim any longer. The waves come crashing down as I bobble up and down over them. I am soaked. I am fearful. I am alone. I don't know where I am. Yet, he came all the way out where I fought to get too because His word tells me he won't leave me. He made it a point to literally come out to where I was because He is who He says he is. And it suddenly doesn't matter anymore. It doesn't matter the standards, expectations, frustations, or the lost feeling I have. Or any of the things I am confused about. I have no strength left on my own accord. It is then, he scoops me up...

And as he lovingly placed me upon the shore, I cried out, Lord who the hell am I? And he said, why Elizabeth you are mine.

Refined.

The funny thing is I was asleep, hard. Then I heard my cell phone ding and it woke me up. I wasn't going to look at who it was after all I was sleeping and it was late. Yet I laid there thinking about it and who could possibly have texted me that late at night, I finally caved. It was a co-worker wanting to know the horrid details of why I got fired.

Yes, you read that right, I did in fact get fired and technically she's now an ex-coworker to boot. It was one of the most devastating and shocking things to of happened to me to say the least, but not the most catastrophic in the bigger realm of life.  However, I've never been fired from a job and to be honest I've never been in trouble at any of the jobs I worked at either. But there the ding is, and so is the ex co-worker wanting all the deets. So it gets shoved back in to my face, yet again.

I've been dealing with this new life change since Friday right before I clocked out of work. It brought back up things I had been settling in to and dealing with and it make me sick all over again. Of course, I didn't give her anything to clamp her juicy ears on because there isn't much fruit in it. But it stirred in me all the things I had been coming to grips with, only to feel as though I took 80 steps backwards.  Where it has me up trying to reflect, learn, not beat myself up, feel like a failure, and understand the why of it all. The bottom line really is, I don't actually know. I got a "you're not a good fit for our company" statement, I signed some papers and walked numbly to my car.

The cool thing in it, if there can be any is that I didn't jump instantly to "fixing it". Folks, that's huge growth for me as I am a dust yourself get back up the horsey kinda chick and fix the wrong to right. But there wasn't much I could do at that very moment because I was too shocked to do much. I drove home in a haze and called my bestie.

 {That's the bestie Lori}

It all came to a head when I left her a message. I don't really know how I got home, I was crying pretty hard.

Then I went to a Mariner's game. What else is a girl to do? I mean come on isn't that what everyone does when they get fired from a job? It wasn't easy, lemma tell ya. The drive there and while we sat in the parking lot to catch the train was filled with tears, stupid words, and plain beating myself up. I did that pretty much the entire game, which is why I look like I do in this photo...

{That's Malcohm}

The game was awful, and that Mariners pretty much sucked, so we left early. It's now Sunday and while I thought I was doing "better" the ex coworker pulled me back in to the vortex of crapiness and yes, I allowed her too. I'd like to say bless her heart, but lemma be honest with you, she just wanted to hear the gossip and reason. I'm glad I stuck to my guns and now forced her to ask those that actually fired me if she really wants to know.

All this to say, its caused me to get out of my bed and come into my LR and read and write. I picked this book up the day prior to being fired, and I think it was a sign from the Lord...

 I know right.. Are you thinking what I am? Um, yeah... I read the first 3 pages and want to underline everything she's said because well, she was talking directly to me of course. And some where in those 3 pages I realize that I am self-loathing, beating myself up, and feeling much like a failure still..

Lemma be honest with you, I am a get-to-the-root-of-the-problem-kinda-girl and I know what's wrong. I was embarrassed, more than anything. I didn't want to tell my daughter, friends, or let any one know. Yet, being the media crazed people we are, I get on FB and ask for prayers. Which I do greatly appreciate. There is nothing like asking those people out there to have your back, when you simply need some prayers. I think we should be doing that more, but that's for another day

So.. The whole self loathing thing. The embarrassment of having been fired? Yes well there was that. But I start reading this book and I am amazed to realize that it doesn't matter what "it" is we have all been embarrassed, want to crawl in to a hole, and run away too. I also read a lot of stuff online about getting fired from a job and realize after its all said and done, it's okay. I'm gonna be okay and I'm gonna trust that Jesus knows what He's doing. He isn't surprised by this and has my back.

So I took the weekend to sort it all out, cry, talk, feel the prayers of those that reached out, and look at the ways that I need to learn some things from the job I had. Then I set about sprucing up my resume, and looking for jobs. It's such a difference in leaning upon the Lord, and trying to fix it upon my own I simply cannot do that. 

You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit and that your fruit should abide, so that whatever you ask the Father in my name, he may give it to you. -John 15:16 

The book talks about letting go. Impossible standards, perfection, and unrealistic expectations. In the face of the impending week, I realize just how much the past almost 6 months have been for me and the valuable things I've gained to be able to move forward. The author goes on to say that if we do not let go, we stay stuck and I am not about to stay stuck. Because you see, I've been learning things- sometimes as much from failures or life occurrences by trial and error.

This wasn't a set back, now that I can see it for what it is.
I have a choice, and I can choose to allow this to define me or I can allow it to refine me.
Tomorrow is a new day!

e.