Many times when I think about what I would like to write about, I always try to consider who is reading it and how what I am writing will make my readers feel. I want to make people laugh or feel better, or just feel validated. I stopped writing for me and it no longer was something that made me happy though. I started to get down on myself and tell myself that I was doing a crap job so what was the point.

Somehow that way of thinking crept into my everyday life.

In my walk of my new found faith, I have found that the hardest part for me has been remembering how God feels about me. It is reaffirmed constantly that He loves me but for some reason I have a hard time holding on the this concept.  I hear about it, read about it and quite frankly I should just know it… but part of the old self that I try to move on from constantly places doubt in my mind. Because of this doubt, I am constantly putting myself down when I really shouldn’t be. My days are filled with thoughts of self doubt and negativity and for the past couple months has been even harder to ward off. If I am being completely honest, I know exactly where all this stems from. I always thought I would be more than what I currently am. I am not sure why, but I guess I felt like being JUST a mom and JUST a wife is not enough. I compare the fact that many women I know are not only doing these things, they are doing more. They are working and crafting and planning and doing all these things that I am not doing… and they seem so much happier than me.

Don’t get me wrong, I love love love being a mom and a wife, and I know that I am so very blessed to have Luke as my husband and Mason and Avery and baby T. When I think about what my life would be like without them, I truly cannot see it any other way which is funny because I actually wanted something completely different before I met Luke. My main problem has been my thoughts. It hasn’t always been an issue, but more so lately my thoughts have drug me down into this hole of disappointment and I couldn’t figure out what was going on. I was always in my head.

I am not a good enough friend, I am not contributing to my home enough, I don’t have a good enough relationship with God, I am not a good enough writer, I am not special enough, I don’t cook enough, I am too hard on my husband, My grades aren’t good enough, I don’t take the kids on enough playdates, I don’t do enough at church, I am not as smart as all those other moms, My house isn’t clean enough or big enough… enough … enough..Enough!!!!!!!!

But then…I heard a message at church!

I don’t think I have mentioned how much I love my church. I literally get super excited waking up on a Sunday morning bright and early to get ready and go serve. I am super eager to welcome new faces and I am constantly praying that strangers will walk in those doors so we can make them feel welcomed and I can be apart of making them feel the same kind of love for God and His grace that I feel. (I don’t want to be That cheesy Christian but that is really the best description I have about what Sundays mean to me.)

Any ways, back to my point… the message I heard was from a month or so ago and I’ve been carrying that message around with me because it was so good, but for some reason, I have only recently been able to make a solid connection and use it to help me with the things I’ve been struggling with. One of our good friends preached about how God lays it out for us, but it is up to us to trust Him and take what He is giving us and Just Do It! (that was the title of the message).  In that message, he spoke about how we tend to get down on ourselves and we start to think that we are not capable and start speaking words of death into our own lives, and the question he asked was,  “Who told you?”

Boom…

After weeks of carrying that message, it hit me. WHO TOLD YOU?

Part of my walking in faith now means that I Trust in Him and believe that He loves me regardless, so why have I been walking around believing and living out these lies that He would never tell me. I realized that if I consciously think about God’s grace and love for me that I don’t have to worry about not being good enough and not being a good mom and not making enough money and not doing enough crafts and not doing all the things that other moms appear to be doing. And when I sit down and think about it, why in the world do I discredit being a mom and wife anyway as if that isn’t enough. Instead of using all this energy trying to keep up with everyone else, I realized I should focus that energy on being the absolute best mom and wife I can be. Besides, I am all my little ones have right now and I am my husbands right hand… and that’s pretty damn important.

One thing I realized, was that just because that’s my main focus now, doesn’t meant that that is all that I am. I was feeling lost because I don’t take the necessary time I should to take care of myself. I was burning out and instead of recognizing that I just got really down on myself.  As mom’s we tend to forget about ourselves often and its super important that we find a little something that is just for us. For me, its this! Writing makes me feel good. I may not be crafty or stylish but I have this. I know that taking care of ourselves means more then just that, but this is a start. Regardless, it took a lot a reading my bible plans and talking to other moms for me to realize that this is just a season. This just happens to be the season I am in now and instead of being miserable through it I need to remind myself of how lucky and blessed I am to get to be in it! I need to Trust Him and know that He has made me the best me I can be even if right now that means I am not Just someone’s mom and wife… but that I get to be  Mason and Avery’s mom and Luke’s Wife.

Moving to a new city where you know no one and have no connections, can be extremely daunting for most people. There are those rare breeds who actually fall in love with the idea of starting over in a new place, and I happen to be one of them. I have lived in many different cities, but my latest move from Las Vegas to Nashville, has by far been the hardest. It has been almost 3 years since we made the move and I still haven’t connected here like I had hoped.

Let me preface this by saying that I was so excited about this move. Las Vegas was getting old and boring to me and I was ready for a new adventure. I did all the research and joined a ton of Nashville based groups online and started packing. The hardest part about leaving for both my husband and I, were the friendships and relationships that we had built over the years. We had surrounded ourselves with a good supportive community and although we knew we would miss them, we decided together that it was time to go. We chose Nashville because it was close (not too close) to where my husband’s family lived and we figured that if we were going to be leaving the military life, we needed to be somewhere that would provide support. Actually, it’s kind of silly now that I think about it, because we really did have support there all along.

As soon as we got to Nashville, I immediately dove right in. I may be a stay at home mom, but rarely do we stay home. I knew that if I was going to love it here, we had to get out and explore. So, I started networking. If I was going to be happy here, we needed to find a new community of friends. I went to parks and museums and the zoo and the science center. Basically, to any and all places that I knew I would find other moms.

After only 6 months of living here, we hated it. I felt like I had tried so hard to love it but for some reason I couldn’t. I was miserable and so was my husband. Our frustration and unhappiness started to affect our marriage. I’ll be honest, it was not a good time for us and the only thing we could agree on, was how much we hated this place. We were hypercritical of everything. The weather, the people, the bugs… oh the bugs, the food (or lack thereof), the southern mentality… just all of it. We started putting our energy on figuring out how to make the move back. After a 6 months of trying to move back we came to the conclusion that it just wasn’t time for us to leave yet.

I realized much later that I had not fully bought my heart with us on this move. I was missing the life that we left in Vegas so much that I couldn’t see that it wasn’t as bad as we thought it was. Don’t get me wrong, Nashville is still not our ideal place, but we never truly gave it a chance and frankly we never cared to. It took a lot of frustration and disappointment from our attempts to leave before we gave in and gave it a chance. I began to really put more energy into making this place our home even if it was temporary. My hubby found a better place to work that enabled him to have more family time. We made a conscious choice to love where we are and what we are doing even if its not everything we thought it would be.

Now after giving it a real chance, we can confidently say that Nashville will not be our home for much longer. Will we go back to Las Vegas? Maybe not, but we are ready to take on a new place…only this time we will be making sure our hearts are there right along with us!

Thanks for joining me!

Good company in a journey makes the way seem shorter. — Izaak Walton