made new.

There was a soft light peaking through the curtains, the rest of the room was dark and still. A faint muffle of the radio and the sound of deep sleeping baby breaths filled the air. And there she was. The woman in the mirror. I couldn't see the details of her face, I couldn't tell the color of her hair, nor could I see the distinction of the clothes she was wearing.

But somewhere between the rocking, the shuffling back and forth, the patting of backs, rubbing of eyes, and the calming shh's, my eyes caught a glimpse of the woman in the mirror. I had seen her millions of times before but something about her was different. A part of her was undiscovered, a part of her was made new.

A new she had never seen before. A new that quietly snuck into her open heart and settled in while she wasn't looking, a new that made its presence known only when she was able to distinguish that the new belonged to her.

The last few months for me have been ones of discovery. As a mom of two young children, so close in age, there are times when I have been beyond tired, completely overwhelmed, and super stressed, so much so that I've wondered how I would make it through the day. I would read articles written by faith-filled women on the gentleness of their motherhood and the joy in their spirit and as much as I could relate to them through all my better moments, believing they maintained their 'life is beautiful' mantra through all the 'shit hit the fan' moments was hard to believe. Are they never exhausted? Do they ever get frustrated with their kids? Do they never cry after a long day? Maybe they do, maybe they don't. But that's not the point. I didn't believe that this tender gentleness could belong to me...I'm a little rough around the edges when I'm frustrated and that's how I'll always be, end of story.

But I wanted to be more gentle. I wanted to be more patient. I wanted to be more joyous. I wanted to be happy. Especially in the chaos, through the headaches, among the tedious chores and repetitive tasks. And I wondered what, if anything, could I do to make this happen, to birth this 'happy about peeling potatoes person' from deep within my soul.

If I get easily agitated with schedules and hiccups in the day and simultaneous messes, what am I really frustrated about? Baby work is messy work, maybe the messiest. So why not rock the mess? Yeah, you can bitch about how tired you are or you could rock your tired. You could cry when your kids don't sleep, or you could rock out that extra hour and do something interesting with them since they're up anyway. What some parents would do for an extra hour with their kids.

If you live parenthood with the mindset of 'what can my kid do for me,' I can assure you your stress levels will be high and your frustrations will be frequent, because more often than not, they will not fit in your parameters. But if you live parenthood with an open heart of meeting children right where they're at, realizing there is a time and place for a stern tone, but they want to be spoken softly to just as much as you enjoy a comforting voice, then your agitation will sink and your love will rise.

I realized the other day, people do this all the time with children, with family, with friends, but especially with God. We yell at God, we demand of God, "God, you need to fit in my life, fit in my plans, fit in my wants, fit in my dreams"...and when He doesn't, we bitch, we complain, we cry rivers, we stop praying.

But what if life is about more than people doing for us and being for us? 'Can you do this for me?' 'Can you be this for me?' Rather than be all about me, I want to be attentive to you. Instead of asking God to fit in our perfectly planned out schedules, we can center our schedules on God, on the people we love. But it comes at an expense...a big one, the expense of ourselves, the sacrifice of me for you. I know, I know, it doesn't always feel good, but I can assure you there's more joy in a life filled with concern for others than a life focused solely on yourself. So stop whining, there's a light at the end of this tunnel, with every loss comes a gain. And if you need a reference, the cross is a pretty damn good one.

We can trade 'what can they do for us,' with 'what can we do for them.' We can swap out our inward tendencies for outward concerns. We can be less, so that He can be more. We can let Him make us new.

And that's what He will do, if we let Him. He will make us new. 

Many say happiness is a choice to be made, a choice to be happy, to be joyous, even when it's challenging. As true as that is, it's a much easier choice when you have faith on your side, when you pray for strength in your weakness, when you ask for grace for your imperfections, when you ask for love for your selfishness, when you see good in the struggle, when you feel purpose in the grind.

As that soft light peaked through the curtains, I could only see the shadow of the woman in the mirror. One who held a baby boy in her arms, while standing feet away from a little girl sleeping soundly after water slides, ice cream, and the summer sun ran her wild. The woman had tired arms from lifting babies and over-sized bags all morning, still rocking, patting, singing her boy to sleep. Her legs were heavy, they had chased, and danced, and jumped. And as many times as she had done all these things before, her outlook was new, her spirit was new, her heart was new.

Life is not all about us, life is not self serving. And when we live life that way, a dark loneliness will slowly consume us, for our hearts were not made for solitary love. And I don't know about you, but I want more for my life than what I'm able to give, I want more for my heart than a one-way street of love. For deep within my spirit, there is peace where anxiety lived, hope instead of despair, happiness and less frustration with myself and with others. For by the grace of God, that woman in the mirror was the fruit of prayer, "less me, God, more you," for prayer through His grace, can make all things new.

♥ photo by one of my favorite photographers, Marianne Greig

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