Lesson 187. I do not understand why some things happen, but I do understand that God is here.

As usual, I've been riding the waves of grief. I've been in and out of my head, and predominantly stuck in bed trying to figure out how to write you without breaking your heart but at the same time being honest.

The last few months have presented me with many truths. Some disheartening, some comforting, and some just simply as they are- blunt, confronting, raw. However, one that rings true everyday is one of a fathers love for his children. 

I understand that not everyone who reads my blog knows Jesus, and I acknowledge but make no apologies for the fact that this might cause you to raise your eyebrows. I accept that you and I can be different, but here's what I know:

Life will break your heart and make it in the same breath. You are going to get hurt and you're going to cry your heart out about it. At some points you're going to be mad and at others just desperately lonely. It is unbelievably beautiful and completely devastating at the same time. 

You might not understand where you are right now, I know I don't and I know I probably won't in my lifetime. Loss and grief are lifelong journeys and we can't question why they happen all the time; all it does is leave us drained and hopeless, with a bitter and bleak outlook. I've sat and stared at my white walls trying to work out why we lose people, or why things take the sudden turns that they do and I have no answers. 

However, I understand that regardless of why things happen, God is present within them. I do not know why we lose the ones we love, but I know that he holds us. I know that he gives me the grace to keep going when grief seems crippling. I know that he allows me moments of relief and happiness; a moment of laughter that echoes to my soul, a smile from a stranger on the street, or sometimes simply silence, stillness, a break from all the sadness.

I'm not asking you to believe in sunshine and lollipops when all you feel is heartache and anger. I'm asking you to believe in a steady hand in the storm, a heart that holds yours when all else falls. A God whose love does not depend on circumstance, he loves because he is.

Have hope in that. Maybe somebody left or you lost something or someone and you feel let down, you're confused and that's okay. But take heart in the fact that God is present in every situation, and we don't have to understand it to have hope that he always stronger and steadier than our hurts. 

I do not understand why some things happen, but I do understand that God is here. 

Lesson 186. Don't give up just yet.

Oh sweet thing, I write to you in a very sorry state.

I'm snuggled up on my floor in my sister's high-school musical blanket after having consumed too many cookies (sorry-not-sorry, they were worth every millimeter of bloated-beach-whale belly) and the ground is no longer visible due to a losing combination of sociology notes and discarded clothing from the yesterday's mid-morning can't decide what to wear tanty. Because I missed the first two weeks of Uni, I missed out on a sizable chunk of content to aid me in preparation for my sociology test tomorrow morning, and I'm struggling with it. I'm under prepared and over anxious, and at this point there isn't a lot I can do about it.

So, whilst sitting very much on Zac Efron and Vanessa Hudgens and their smug smiles (it didn't work out kids, not so smug now are we?) I've made a decision. Tomorrow morning, I go in with great gumption. I walk in with purpose, I take my seat and I write what I do know. Just as I always do with you.

Right now I know this much, I know that giving up is not an option until you've given all. I know that it's not enough to have a pity party and say I've done all I can tonight, I know that I have to read over my notes 'til my eyes are heavy and my head shuts up shop.

I know this much, I know that when life gives you lemons, you have to do more than make yourself a bowl of chocolate icing and sit on the floor in tears (I know this because I tried it earlier today and it didn't go so well.) When things get hard, and you don't know why they've played out the way they have, you have to stand up again. I'm all for taking time to process, I know this to be crucial, but I'm not for letting heartbreak paralyse you further. Winnie the Pooh once told me "You are braver than you believe, stronger than you seem, and smarter than you think" and I believe him to be quite right.

I don't know if I'll pass tomorrow morning. But I know that the odds go up the minute I walk through the doors and into the lecture theatre. I know that they get a little greater during every crazy conversation I have with myself about cultural studies in sociology.

Maybe you've got a test in the near future. Maybe each day is a test, maybe just getting through is your mountain, but please know that each morning when your feet hit the floor you're getting your head one step closer to sunshine.

Oh sweet thing, don't give up just yet.

Lesson 185. Just wait.

Welcome to the world in which we live,

We rush. We demand answers. We want our wants to be supplied at the same rate as our needs. Prayers are fired up as 'gimme's' as opposed to trusting in his ability to know when and what is right for us. We tell God that we'd like this job at this time, the storm to calm within the next 5 minutes, and everything we don't understand to be clarified by the click of our fingers.

Then when things don't go the way we'd like them to, we're quick to grow weary and disheartened. We become disillusioned about God and his whereabouts, confused about why he's not doing as we've told him to. I know this because I've done this, and I've battled with him many sleepless, tearful nights over why things are the way they are. I've screamed into pillows and stuttered through sobs "Why do we lose the ones we love?" "Why does it hurt like this?" and "Why won't you just make this go away?"

I don't have answers to those questions and I probably never will. I haven't gained an understanding of why, but I have come to realise that in waiting for the sun to rise, the darkness pulls us closer together. In the midst of the pillow-screams and stutter-sobs, I've drawn close to the ones I love. I've leant on God and God alone because there is nothing else to hold onto. I have found hope in hopeless situations because I have had to, I have seen the strength of my heavenly father in getting me out of bed each morning. I have felt his arms as I have been shaken by deep sadness, and I have found a real, raw sense of joy as I rest in the only one able to truly restore.

So maybe it's not about getting what we want exactly when we want it. Maybe it's about being here, right now, messy, impatient, tired, sad, frustrated. Maybe it's about being here right now, growing closer to the author of the universe, knowing and loving him more, falling deeper into his arms and hearing his steady heartbeat sing out his rhythms of grace. Maybe waiting is not a hindrance but an opportunity.

Just wait.

Lesson 184. Let them take your appendix.

Ready for some grotesque medical particulars? Bet you never thought you'd see that on my blog. Don't worry, I'll speak plain and simple because I don't know how to speak any other way when it comes to anything slightly scientific.

My mother is a nurse, so naturally when I had my appendix out, she pulled my file and got information about the state of it. She came home extremely excited to explain to me the condition of my seemingly useless organ, only to discover she'd forgotten the notes. However, this didn't stop her from doing her very best to put me off my dinner whilst describing what had happened. She told me that my appendix had already started to burst, one end was perforated, and had they waited even a few hours longer I would've been in serious trouble. Talk about timing. Had any of the events I'm about to tell you of occurred any later, things could've been a lot worse. There was someone looking out for me, that's for sure.

I got ill on the first day back at Uni and I thought it was just a 24 hour bug, so I went home and tried to sleep it off. I woke up the next day, still wasn't better so called Nurse Sheena. After a series of questions, she told me I needed to get to the hospital. So off I went with my fabulous flatmate to the emergency department. Several medical professionals prodded at my abdomen with great strength and disregard for my pain levels, and they all told me the same thing. In fact, one man even wanted to bring in a bunch of medical students because it was "such a classic case." Appendicitis, my friends, appendicitis.

No one told me why it happened, so I guess I can't tell you the answer to that. All I know is that my appendix wanted out, so it told the rest of my body in the most violent way it could. It gave me an ultimatum, it said"Let me out, or I explode. And then I riddle your body with potentially life threatening infection." I decided it was probably best to give in to it's demands.

So that night, they took me in and took it out. I spent four days in hospital, three of them in a shared room with an 80-something woman called Margret (Margret had three budgies called Twinkle, Little, and Star. Her favourite pastimes include: Sitting on my bed, waking me up when I'm sleeping, and telling me about her budgies) I had a few less than delightful post-op complications, I had strangers feeling my swollen belly on an hourly basis, and I had much time to think.

I pondered the metaphorical appendix. The things we keep inside that we need to let out before they explode and become seriously dangerous. The things that we need to entrust others to help us get out, that we don't want to face or talk about. The things that continue to make us ache and hurt for as long as we let them live inside of us.

We have to stop. We have to stop with this idea that suffering in silence is okay, because it's not. And the longer you keep it to yourself, the more troubling it becomes. Let someone who knows what they're doing help you get it out. Whether it's a trusted friend, or a professional, make sure you don't hold on too long. Make sure you don't make too many excuses about it being nothing, about you being fine, because it's something, and you're not. The best thing you can do, is take it to someone who knows what they're doing, explain your symptoms, trust their diagnosis, and trust the course of action they suggest.

It might set you back a little for a while, it might hurt, you might have scars, but you'll get there. Let them take your appendix.

Dear Friend, you are my silver lining.

Happy Monday,
I would offer you a cupcake to ease the pain of the afore mentioned turn of the week, but I've already made plans to eat the whole plate myself and I don't cope awfully well with a change in direction.

Speaking of which, everything about my life is different now. We should talk.

Surprise surprise, I've changed. I lost a part of my heart this summer, and the whole ordeal, the whole learning to breathe again thing has changed me. Now now dear- don't fret, I'm still charming, full of wit and perfectly capable of writing absolute codswallop for several sentences. But I've learnt and I've grown and I've experienced the most extreme emotions one can encounter. I have hit the lowest place and I have seen the greatest light. I have hurt more than I thought humanly possible, and I have hoped more than I ever imagined. I have realised that nothing is permanent. That I love you should always be said out loud, that arms and hands are for holding. I've realised that you shouldn't always do what you're told, that sitting in silence can sometimes be the sweetest shoulder anyone can give.

I have realised that now is the time. Now is the time to make a difference. Now is the time to feed the hungry and clothe the poor. Now is the time to make friends with the awkward-kind-of-quiet-slightly-creepy kid that you only talk to when you need to borrow stationery. Now is the time to shake off inhibitions and to simply love with reckless abandon. You don't get a guaranteed tomorrow, so quit holding back with what really matters.

I quit my music degree. I knew it wasn't where my heart really was, because my heart lies here, in writing about what means something to me. So I quit, and normal University is as challenging as it is lonely. But I'm back, and I'm brave. More importantly, I'm determined.

This is the beginning of a new season, for you and I. Fresh start, blank page, big scary challenges up ahead. I'm confident we'll face them with as much good grace as we can muster (You might have to muster up majority of it, I'm a little clumsy when it comes to physical grace) and I'm confident we'll get there.

So take my hand, and let's embark on this journey all over again.

Dear Friend, you are my silver lining.

Stop talking, start doing.

Over the last few weeks I’ve come to recognise a sense of desperation for justice within my community.  Even strangers, those far removed from an extremely complex situation, are demanding answers of us. Onlookers are stopped on streets and are asked for their opinions by provocative journalists, they are asked to serve the local paper by giving uninformed answers that are dripping with judgment. I am growing tired, as I’m sure many others are, of the accusations of hypocrisy and dishonesty.

I too long for truth and justice in a greater sense, don’t we all? Well if we’re a country so hungry for truth and justice, it’s time we faced the world’s greatest injustice and most swept under the rug truth, the one my friends died fighting against: poverty.

Take your eyes off controversy for a second, off your neediness and so-called right to know the details, and focus them here. The tragedy of this situation goes beyond the four lives lost, the tragedy of this is that the very cause the team were fighting for is being ignored- by you. Justice was and is at the very centre of this trip. Meet an incredible team of nineteen individuals determined to witness firsthand the truth of poverty, and then further serve in any and every way possible. Meet the kind of people who could change the world and deserve to be honoured.

You want truth? Here’s truth: People are dying and we are not doing enough. You are angry because you think you have right to information and you think you’re being denied this? Get angry because helpless children born into broken situations have the right to be healthy, to be educated, to survive, but are being denied it every single day. You want justice? Stop talking about who is right and who is wrong and start acting. Start acting on behalf of millions of helpless human beings and join the fight against poverty. Get your work boots on and go.

For the injured, for the hurting, for the families of the lives lost: do something. Before you point the finger, take a good look at yourself. Can you afford to impose such judgment upon people when the greatest injustice known to man is taking place everyday while you sit and do nothing?

Caitlin Dickson, Brian and Grace Johnston, and Christopher Mmata died fighting against poverty. The Kenya 2012/13 team were injured in the same battle. It isn't easy but it's more than worthy and it's your turn, your time. Grab hold of their torches and go forwards, honour their memory by carrying the crosses they so faithfully shouldered. Stop talking, start doing. 

Lesson 183. Life just keeps going.

Life just keeps going.

This is a concept that we accept with great ease when life smells of roses and throws sunshine on every path we tread. Or even when smiles don't ride ear to ear, even when we become complacent with our somewhat stereotypical lives, it's easy to simply nod when faced with the realisation that life just keeps going.

It's when grief strikes that the thought of life continuing to move at the same pace that we are faced with a mountain to climb. We often cling to pieces of tragedy left behind. We don't want to get out of bed in the morning, we don't want to see anyone living outside of our nightmare, we don't want to smile at the supermarket cashier and politely declining a flyer from an overly zealous stranger seems completely out of the question. But the truth is, it continues. We have to return to work, to study, to supermarket shopping, because life just keeps going. It does not stop and ponder, it does not eagerly await your return, it simply continues and expects that you do the same.

I'm living in limbo. To be perfectly honest with you, I'm absolutely terrified of the life that lies ahead of me. Moving forwards without someone who has always been beside you is scary, not impossible, but at the very least an extremely difficult concept to come to terms with. But I'm determined more than anything else to learn to love that life keeps going, not in an unhealthy shut-all-the-grief out kind of way, but simply in a way that honours the lives that I loved that were lost.

I'm determined to quit second guessing, to stop dreaming and start actively pursuing. I'm determined to stretch my arms further and to say I love you louder. Life just keeps going, so jump in and start doing it better. Let yourself feel, let yourself have bad days, recognise that it's okay to feel like this, but don't stop living because of it.

Life is going to break your heart and be breathtakingly beautiful at the same time every single step of the way, so here we go, headfirst, straight in. Fight with it, figure it out a fraction more and then celebrate the terrible wonderful truth that life just keeps going.