Permission to Be Many Things at Once

Happy. ^^This is my happy face.^^

I can’t be the only one who struggles with this, so holla atcha guuuurl if you do too!

-*my thought*-

I try to define myself often… like literally every day. I try to assign labels to my personality and temperament so I can better understand who I am.

Am I a good person? I try to be thoughtful and treat each person with kindness, but I also yell at the person driving so close behind me because my 5mph over the speed limit just isn’t enough for them. I have ideas to help the less fortunate, but then I go home to the warmth of my couch, watch TV, and forget about the struggles of millions of other people around the world.

Am I a confident person? Well yes, I see my worth and don’t base my decisions or opinions of myself on what others think. But then there are those days where the phrase “I’m single” weighs heavy on my heart, and the names other kids used to call me in school swim in the forefront of my mind. I don’t feel so confident those days. So am I insecure then?

Am I hard-working and passionate? I feel inspired and literally on fire some days, and I always want to do my best. However, there are days (honestly, sometimes even weeks) where I have no energy and am the least productive person ever. Am I just average then?

Am I “fun?” Am I a “girly-girl?” Am I “a Christian?” I want yes or no answers, all-or-nothing explanations.

As much as I wish to create order in my life, to simplify things so they can be better understood, to break the world down into nice and neat categories, I cannot. I could never be defined by a simple word. The world is not black and white, nor is my personality. Life is too complex.

What am I? Who am I? I am many things. I’m a woman. I’m a momma. I’m the girl from high school who sometimes feels unattractive and left out. I’m a church-goer. I’m a woman who harbors the mouth of a sailor at times. I’m patient and kind, and other days I’m selfish and cold. I’m motivated and passionate, but lazy and bored too. I’m gentle but harsh, critical but understanding. I’m a good momma, other days a great one. Then some days I know I fall short completely.

I’m a human. I’m complex and ever-changing. I’m confident one day and insecure the next. I’m both happy and bummed out in the same moment. And that’s okay.

That’s. Okay.

My traits are not concrete, and just because I make a decision about who I am one day does not mean that’s who I will decide I am another day. It’s exhausting trying to fit into the neat, pretty boxes you’ve labeled, and discouraging when you’re bursting out of them into a mess on the floor.

I can be two opposing forces at once. That is not a weakness or a flaw, that is reality. I’m working so hard to embrace exactly who I am, each and every day. I want to break out of the thought patterns that limit who I am and what I can be. So cheers to being you – the sometimes happy/sometimes sad, crying-and-laughing-at-the-same-time, hopeful but fearful HUMAN! You are perfect and worthy.

Twisted Up and Tangled

I just wanted to feel God, close and personal – too real to deny or doubt.

I’d been battling my mind so much for weeks. I’d been anxious and far more negative than normal. I’d been believing the whispers Satan tells me: that I won’t be successful, that I’m not anything special, that I can’t be anything other than what I’ve already been. I’d been believing that I’m only what others think of me, good and bad, and it was awful.

It’s like the strongholds I worked so hard to break had slipped back into place, as strong and withstanding as a wall of concrete reinforced with steel. I was worried that I would never get back to where I was in my faith; I felt like a failure. Honestly, I felt crushed and started to feel hopeless.

Oh how I needed God! In my desperation for relief and His truth, I prayed and begged Him to reach His hand out to me and grace me with His peace. I needed the clarity and joy that only He gives.

I dropped down to my knees in the middle of my kitchen. I pleaded and asked for God to help me feel Him, to feel His hand in my life.

“God, please help me. I’m desperate for You. I am drowning in my mind, and I know this is not what You want for me, nor does any of it come from You. I worked so hard to break down my strongholds, and when I did, I felt Your precious peace. Please help me to discern Your voice and Satan’s. Please help me to hear Your voice louder than all of the rest, including my own. Please, Heavenly Father, please.”

My soul began to repair itself during that prayer. As I spoke, I focused on my relationship with God in a way I had failed to do for weeks. I felt every word, I let it flow naturally, and I allowed the world around me to fall away. I felt His hands reaching out to my heart! He spoke to me and reminded me of three critical things He taught me to fight Satan:

1) Negative thoughts about my life, myself, or others are from Satan. When I have a negative thought, I must choose to shift my thoughts away from that and ask God to take that thought and energy into captivity and destroy it. In this way, I will regain control of my mind.

2) I must not let my circumstances control my happiness. No matter how stressed I am, how much work I have to do, or how betrayed/disappointed/angry/anxious/whatever emotion I feel, I am bigger than this world. My life on Earth is a sliver of my existence; I am not defined by my life, my actions, my thoughts, my successes, or my failures on this Earth.

3) Whatever I put into my relationship with God, I will get back three-fold. However, if I put in nothing, I will still get nothing. I must prioritize my relationship with God, and be disciplined in my study of His Word and in prayer.

It took less than one week of repeating these points, meditating on them, and actually doing them, for my life to change. I was taking steps forward once again, and it felt SO WONDERFUL!

I’m still not where I want to be in my faith and relationship with God, but day by day, I’m feeling closer and closer to Him. I had to tear down the wall I inadvertently let Satan build to let God back in. Concrete and steel have nothin’ on my God!!!! ❤

Ignoring the Rules

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I’ve never considered myself a rule breaker, but when it comes to society’s rules for how to have a relationship with God and how to act in order to receive His love and blessings, I’m somewhat of a rebel!

I like challenging the “rules” for what a Christian is. I require myself to be transparent and authentic in my writing to show people that I am immensely unqualified, undeserving, and full of selfishness. I listen to online sermons through Elevation Church but I don’t attend a church in person. I had a child out of wedlock and am no longer in a relationship with her father. I’m very impatient and judgmental, and forgiveness is not a strong point of mine. In other words, I do not meet the “criteria” for what a Christian is. And yet, I’m still living with the peace of God.

I used to want to hide my pain. I used to shield myself to avoid judgment. When I had my daughter young, at 19, I hid the toxicity of the relationship I was in and the immense stress I was under. I didn’t want the statistics and stereotypes that society pinned to young mothers to be pinned on me. So, I struggled in private. I felt like a failure, and I didn’t need other people to help me; they didn’t need to see that in that season, I was living a life that young adults were warned about and protected from.

Times have changed, however. Thank God! I no longer feel bound by those preconceptions and judgments. I no longer fear what people think of me, because I know that has absolutely nothing to do with my worth, my ability, and God’s blessings for me! My writing has been a beautiful journey of putting my weaknesses and vulnerability on display, while subsequently showing the world that God has given me the confidence to own everything I’ve done, everything that has happened to me, and everything that I know I can be!

I so badly want people to see how broken I am as a human. The hurt of my past. The self-destructive thoughts I often have. How much I envy at times and how unforgiving I can be (that is one of my worst offenses). My mindset, at default, is one that tends to hoard what I have and not give to others. If I do give, I have to push myself to not give only what I have “left over” but give whatever the other person needs, regardless of what is left for me. It becomes easier to give without calculations and planning the more I do it, but I am still not where I want to be.

I want to share all of this so people that read this understand that I am NO different than them. I am no better. I am not a different kind of human, sprinkled with the “chosen dust” from God. And yet, despite everything I do that God tells me not to, despite me turning away from Him in times of chaos and stress, I am STILL living with a joy and fullness in my heart that is unmatched.

I am still loved so deeply by God that it moves me to tears.

I want you to see how much God restores. How much joy he creates. I want you to see that I have never in my life been as happy as I am, and that is because of God alone. My circumstances didn’t change – I’m not happily married, I don’t have more kids, I don’t own my own home – but He has touched my heart and mind and I will never be the same.

All of your judgmental thoughts, your ill wishes on others, your lying, stealing, and cheating over the years… God wants it all. He wants all of you. And as soon as you surrender to Him, and accept that He loves you precisely as you are NOW, with all of your baggage and “bad” behavior, you will be changed. You will no longer be defined by your failures or your wrongdoing. You will no longer be chained down by who you’ve been up to this point. You will no longer feel like you can’t be whatever you want to be.

You will be gifted clarity.

You will be gifted tranquility.

You will be gifted confidence.

And you will be gifted an ability to love others deeper than you’ve ever been able to before.

There is nothing you can do on this earth that disqualifies you from having God’s love and favor. Nothing. So pack your suitcases, folks, and start your journey to a whole new world!!

Pause and Pray

Lately I’ve been feeling off balance. I open my eyes to “snooze” my alarm, and a swirl of anxious and busy thoughts instantly bombard my consciousness. I feel a heavy burden and a worry at the start of my day, despite being well aware of how harmful that is to the joy I’ve fought hard to obtain.

I drop my daughter off at school and begin my morning commute to work. I listen to Life 102.5 out of Madison (seriously a HUGE shout-out – what an awesome, light-hearted station with endless encouragement and inspiration!) every morning. However, when I can feel a crippling weight of worry, I turn the radio off and pray to God.

>> “God, I know you don’t want me to feel like this. I know these feelings don’t belong to You. Help me to feel your presence. Help me to remember that regardless of my circumstances, I was created to feel Your love, Your joy, and spread it. Please Lord, help me recognize the difference between Your voice and Your thoughts, and those that come from a sinister and harmful place. I know I can enjoy this day and feel gratitude in my heart for everything I am in You. Amen.” >>

Do you know the amount of relief I almost always instantly experience? When I take the time to quiet the noise of the world around me – the buzzing of cars, radio advertisements between songs, celebrity gossip updates – and focus on Him, I feel Him right there. Right. There. As if He was never anywhere else.

My God, our God, is never not with us. In the busyness of life, we adopt the false thought that we are responsible for this world going ’round and ’round. We feel an immense responsibility to always be on time, never a minute late. We feel the responsibility to never make a mistake or forget to complete a task. We feel that if something doesn’t go according to plan – which is very often – we are to blame. And when we internalize everything and focus on how we impact the world, we lose sight of God. We were never meant to be the center of the world. We were never meant to carry that burden. We suffer when we take our eyes off of Him; We slowly suffocate. We wake up unable to breathe.

When we pause amidst the chaos of life and refocus on God, we allow ourselves the opportunity to feel Him next to us again. We can feel His strength. We can see that He is in control. No matter how messy our lives feel or how broken we feel, He is standing beside us. He is calm, He is collected, and He is sure.

When I feel overwhelmed, when I feel the weight of the world on my shoulders, I must remember to stop. I must take 5 minutes and pray.

Open your eyes to see that He is reaching His hand out to you with a gentle smile on his face.  He knows it all, has seen it all, has a plan for it all, and is surprised by absolutely nothing. Cast your cares on the One who has battled it all and has come out victorious. He has defeated the world for you. Rest, my friend, for the outcome has already by determined by Him.

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“He stilled the storm to a whisper; the waves of the sea were hushed.” 

Psalm 107:29 (NIV)

Death Comes Before Resurrection

Truth time!
I can feel that it’s time for change in my life, but all of my efforts are leading to dead ends. I feel like I’m flailing, and now I’m yearning for the comfort I had. Even though I want to move on, I’m clinging to what I’ve known. Why?

We are often afraid and anxious when something comes to an end. It could be a job we’ve chosen to leave for another. It could be ending a relationship, even when we know it’s not fulfilling us as it should. It could be moving to a new town or even just a new apartment. It could be losing a loved one. Death, or an “ending,” can be devastating and so scary. We resist it; we prolong it; we avoid it at all costs.
I don’t feel comfortable or confident changing my life unless I am guaranteed that it’ll be successful or positive. But nothing in life is guaranteed, and I can’t see the future… which means any sort of change leaves me with awful thoughts.
“What if I fail?”

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“What if I regret making this change and wish I could go back?”

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“Do I want change because I’m taking my current circumstances and blessings for granted?”
I often (more than I’d like to admit) have to remind myself that even though I don’t know how things will end up, God does. And He loves me too much to lead me down a road I am unsure of and abandon me. So, I turn to the ultimate truth: His Word. >>>
Jeremiah 29:11 says, “For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.”
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Proverbs 3:5-6 says, “(5) Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; (6) in all your ways submit to him, and he will make your paths straight.”
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Proverbs 19:31 says, “Many are the plans in a person’s heart, but it is the Lord’s purpose that prevails.”
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Romans 15:13 says, “May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.”

Change, sometimes painful, comes before growth. “Endings” must occur before something new can start. I pray that I remember this and trust in my guiding and faithful father!

Welcome!!!

Welcome to my blog! My diary, my safe space for my most vulnerable thoughts, my arm stretched out into the world.

My name is Katrina and I am a believer in Christ! I am a warrior, a beloved child of God, and a mess all at the same time!

While I am so many things, I am also NOT a lot of things.

I am not an expert, not an example of a perfect Christian, not what modern religion expects of a believer.

I am broken.

I am inadequate.

I am a sinner.

I am imperfect, angry at times, and a grudge-holder.

I doubt God, shy away from God’s direction, blame the world for my shortcomings and failures.

I, at times, pretend to be whole, happy, and Christ-like, even when I feel tiny, forgotten, and lost.

I am so flawed. 

For 24 years of my life, I didn’t have faith or a relationship with God. Everyday I was sinking, paddling my arms under water, gasping for a breath until I reached utter exhaustion.

That’s where God saved me. He called out my name, so gently but surely, in my darkest time. I had no love left for myself, and in the quiet of my isolation and darkness, I was able to hear Him. He cradled me in his arms and set me on a path that forever changed my life. I cried for days because I couldn’t believe that I could be so loved, so understood. It changed me forever, and I still cry when I talk about it out loud.

Over the past year and a half, I have become whole with His love. I am free from all of the labels the world assigns me, good and bad. I am no longer defined by my failures or my successes. My cracks, holes, and crevices are completely filled in with His love, grace, and mercy. Everything that I am, everything that I’m not, is celebrated by God. Oh, to feel such love!

So I feel I have something to offer – my truth. A realistic, bare, raw truth. And that’s what I’ll do here. I have so many reasons for creating this blog, which I hope to piece together for you with each post. My hope is that you’ll feel welcome here, and even if you don’ t have a relationship with God, that you’ll feel less alone in your struggles.

Le’s do this!!!