a view from the ground...

on wednesday, i woke up a little excited as gma week was wrapping up and there was hope soon for some rest. though exhausted i left the apartment at about 6:30am to do some quick things in the office and then head out to downtown nashville for many meetings.

i make to nashville at about 7:45ish, enough time to find parking and make it into the hotel for meetings. i walk up to the machine, pay my money and head back towards the car to put the slip on my dashboard when all of a sudden, PAIN and then i hit the ground. my right foot went inward on the uneven gravel and i collapsed.
kneeling on the ground and frustrated i had almost no will to get up...

there was NOTHING inside me that wanted to give enough energy to pull myself back up and limp towards my car, nothing. i had hit the bottom (more than literally), the build up of frustration, sadness and anger in my life culminated in that parking lot in downtown nashville. i was so angry with God, why would this happen when i have 48,326,294,534 things going on and don't have time to deal with a hurt ankle?

in the end, i do believe that everything happens according to God's plan and well, my hurt ankle was necessary in a way. it taught me that i need to learn how to get back up, how to recover, cope and move on. i have fallen and hurt my ankles SEVERAL times, ask anyone, but never have i had this hard of a time getting up. this may make no sense, but i think back to that moment right now and think about getting up from that fall and i tear up.

currently in the series we are going through at church, it's about what to do when our dreams are shattered, how to deal with the plan b... the woman in the video we watched today said, there is no plan b, everything that happens was supposed to happen, nothing is a surprise to God... and though that is hard to deal with at times, i have to hope that there is something bigger than me right now that is guiding me in life.

somehow, that day, i got up. it could have been an extra bolt of energy, maybe i got some help; but i did get up, i hobbled to my car and sat and cried. i drank some water, regained composure and hobbled into my meeting a few minutes late. i went to the doctor later that afternoon and had some x-rays done to make sure there wasn't any crazy damage, and it was just a sprain. i have a brace and am still not sprinting :) i do believe that its moments like that (physically and emotionally) where getting up is the last thing you want to do after falling, but its necessary, no one wants to remain stagnant, right?

at the end of church today, one of our pastors was talking about a gps system and how when he missed a turn, the system would say recalibrating and then recover; he said wouldn't it be great if our hearts and minds could take something like a missed turn in life and recalibrate so quickly? it would be awesome, but then again, missing a turn (though no on our path to wherever we were intending) could lead us down a prettier path...

give everything

"Jesus sat near the temple money box and watched the people put in their money. many rich people gave large sums of money. then a poor widow came and put in two small copper coins, which were only worth a few cents.

calling his followers to him, Jesus said, "i tell you the truth, this poor widow gave more than all those rick people. they gave only what they did not need. this woman is very poor, but she gave all she had; she gave all she had to live on."

mark 12:41-44 (ncv)

i swear God has sent this message into my life a million times this past week, so i guess it's time that i actually reflect on it.

a lot has happened in the last couple weeks that i think have turned me from being unhappy to just being completely bitter. for a while it felt like God had forgotten about me, that my prayers were being sent into some black hole and never to be heard and i was upset. funny thing is, i did pray for his will to be done but i think deep down i prayed for his will to be done as long as i was ok with it :) so like any mature parent to a child who has a lot to learn, God let me cry and scream on the floor while going through my anger and then i stopped, came up for some air and began to reevaluate.

while i am still not in a place where i completely understand why things are happening the way they do and i am still going to be mad and unhappy at times i feel like i am coming out of this a little wiser.

on friday night i went to go see donald miller (author of blue like jazz) speak and what he said had me in tears because it's like he put a flashlight on all those dark corners of my heart that i wanted to not think about. but one of the things that resonated with me since then was that he said we need to 'give everything' and not financially but our hearts, whatever we are doing we need to do it with all of us. he also gave the example of when they went to machu pucchu in peru that they came to a point where if they went one way they would make it to machu picchu in 6 hours but the other way would take about 4 days and they would have to climb up a large mountain. the 6 hour route really was only for cargo, the villagers wanted visitors to go the 4 day route so when they did arrive at their destination they would be tired but also grateful and more appreciative of it. i think we are sent on the 4 day hikes sometimes so that when we make it to the end we can be that much more grateful.

but it doesn't end there :) there are times where i volunteer at kidstuff at church. i run the sound effects and music and its always a fun time. it's amazing though, because i am always surprised at how much i learn from the message geared towards kids. this month's theme is joy and being joyful even when you don't feel like being joyful. today one of the characters felt like God didn't like him because things weren't going his way but his friends reminded me of times where he went through trials but if they hadn't happened then their lives would be considerably different.

at church we've been in a series called plan b: what to do when your dreams are shattered and we've gone through great examples in the bible where things do not make sense while they are happening but at the end of the story that crazy puzzle piece was needed for the big picture. today we learned about joseph and how he was faithful though he was sold into slavery by his brothers and jailed for doing the right thing, etc. we were challenged today with the following question:

what would you do if you were completely confident that God was with you?

joseph was completely confident even in times where he did everything right but ended up in some sort of dilemma.

not sure if those all tie in together for you, but they go hand in hand in my head :) lots of writing and lots for me to digest, so i will leave you with that. good night.

replace your tired heart with mine

today i am sad.

i am sure it will get better as time progresses and healing begins, but today i am sad and i am ok with that. yesterday some amazing people lost their jobs where i work and there has been and will be a lot of change. and to be quite honest, the change has happened too fast for me to digest. i know what some of you are thinking, nicole, it's just a place of work... but seriously, it is more than that, i spend 40+ hours with these people every week and many of them were my first friends after moving to nashville and have now become my good friends.

the music industry is a horrible one right now for profits, etc. and i understand that it needs to happen and it is expected but for right now i am going to send my my heart out to my friends and just be sad.

the past several weeks, or probably more like several months have eroded at my spirit (for more reasons than just at work) and i have sadly let that happen.

but the great thing about being sad is that i can take comfort in things. my teddy bear, pictures of good times, great conversations with friends and family and of course, music. i know i work in the music industry and its easy to forget what its like to be a fan of music rather than just work in it. i came home today, laid in my bed, stared at the ceiling and listened to 'astronomy' by bleach. i haven't listened to the album in a long time, but i was just going through my stack of cds and saw it and thought PERFECT... then i continued the evening with no television, a little internet (to chat with friends and blog, of course) but with just a ton of music. some stuff i haven't had a chance to hear yet and some old favorites (i.e. astronomy). and now i am closing out the evening with some by sea.

all in all, music isn't a person or anything that can physically give me anything but it is comforting. it's like getting a hug and being assured that everything will be ok. so i leave with you tonight the lyrics to a song that really spoke to me tonight..

i haven't felt good in months

the well has run dry, all at once

the habits come easy, but they're so hard to break

i really need to hear, to hear you say

peace be still

i am with you

rest in me for one more night

peace be still

i am with you

replace your tired heart with mine

so i'll sing songs of life

for all these broken hearts

just like mine

and i'll lay down all this pride

so i can hear you whisper

that it's all right

peace be still

i am with you

rest in me for one more night

peace be still

i am with you

replace your tired heart with mine

and i'm so sorry

i haven't come home

but i'm coming home soon

"tired heart" by bleach