Finding Balance through Resilience

One of the "fun" perks of pregnancy is that you are always growing in one direction: forward.  I keep running into things, because my stomach is growing more than I realize or because I’m a bit off balance. I’ve never had the best sense of balance…I’m not the best bike rider…but I am very good at resilience--falling down and getting back up again.  Ironically(divinely/thankfully), I returned to my yoga practice a few weeks before we got pregnant, and I have kept it up since then with a few necessary modifications. I do a lot more “table-tops” and “child’s pose” and I avoid “forward folds” and “downward dogs”.  At first I avoided the balance poses, because I was afraid I might fall.  Then one of my teachers said, “Those will be the most important for you now. Your weight is shifting every day, so the more balance poses you do, the more you can adjust to the changes happening in your body.” 

I had never thought of deep squats or “Sunflowers”(my yoga instructor really calls them that!) as balance exercises, but as I get bigger, it almost makes me giggle when I feel like falling forward.  Like the Sunflower balancing her head of seeds, my belly is growing with size and weight! Every time I show up for yoga, I get to rediscover what’s happening to my body, and it helps me find balance later in the day. Even simple arm and leg extensions, like “bird dogs”, seem confusing to my body some mornings. Once I wrap my brain around what my body can and can’t do, I am able to make safe choices and feel more agile throughout the day.

The balance exercises do more to strengthen my muscles than to secure me to the ground.  I find that it’s more about having the muscle tone for resilience than the “rock-solid” sense of balance. This has been a major turning point for me with yoga, but also when it comes to life. I had always thought that balance came from this unwavering sense of solidness, and yet, in reality, my balance comes from my strength and practice of resilience.

Last week I preached about Philippians 4, and I keep getting drawn back into these encouraging words from Paul.  “Rejoice in all things…I have discovered the secret to finding contentment in plenty and in want…I can do all things through Christ, the one who gives me strength.”  Growing up, I was always trying to reach this pinnacle of spirituality with unwavering faith.  I worked hard to lean on God and prayed fervently for this secret to finding a balance of the heart once I became “strong enough” through Christ.  The trouble was that every time I started to feel a bit stronger, life would rip the rug right out from underneath me again.  I refuse to see my hand injury or the loss of our first baby as “trails from God to make us stronger.”  The God I worship brings life out of death, not the other way around.  

Nevertheless, when I look back on these challenges, contentment didn’t rise out of a sense of unwavering faith. My faith wavered so much I felt more like one of those flailing air inflatables outside a car dealership. Like those people of fabric, I kept falling on my face, but the breath of God helped me find the strength to get back up again.  Little did I know that during these embarrassing moments when I lost my balance of faith, I was gaining the strength to believe again.  This strength of resilience pushes me to find beauty and hope through each circumstance. This is what I think Paul was getting at when he encouraged his friends to “rejoice in all things.”  When we show up to rejoice, to search for beauty, to commit to hope, to offer thanks, we build the muscles to keep returning to faith.  Even on the days when we can’t see the beauty or our voice is frozen and can’t rejoice, when we at least show up and give it a try, we can acknowledge the big things that are happening in our lives and making this search for balance so hard.  When we ignore these changes, we might find it easier to say, “Rejoice,” but we will fail at finding contentment and true joy.  Acknowledging these changes allows us to breathe deeper, bend further, and find a balance strengthened by the muscles we built by getting up after we fall.

May you also find the strength to continue on your journey of hope by exercising your muscles for resilience. And may the balance you find connect you with the peace of God which surpasses all understanding and guards our hearts and minds as we reach out for the next big thing!

Read more of Philippians 4 by clicking here.

PS. My favorite app for all kinds of yoga and especially prenatal yoga is Yoga Studio. Here's a link for GooglePlay and iPhone.  And honestly...you don't have to be pregnant to do prenatal yoga...anyone looking to "give birth" to a new season of their life will find that it can open up your hips and open up your heart;)

My Little Secret

I’ve been keeping a secret, holding it in my heart, waiting with excitement to tell everyone I see. Robbie and I are expecting a baby in January 2019! For those of you who have been following our story, you know this is a tender time, full of joy and fear and wonder and anxiety and ginger chews and ptsd flashbacks and brand new experiences. The longer version of this story started back in January when Robbie and I embarked on a cycle of In Vitro Fertilization.  I used that time to build

trust.  I spent many hours in meditation, learning to trust my body again. I spent many hours painting, reading, and walking in contemplative prayer, learning to trust God again.  I spent several hours on the road to Kansas City, in waiting rooms and taking shots, reminding myself that all of this human effort still left room for God’s activity, that IVF is an “art” form and relies on the magic of creation, which normally works one way, but if everything was working “normally” we wouldn’t be doing this. I ended the cycle with my body being in better shape and feel healthier than I have in years. 

Unfortunately, that space for God to move was proven in a painful way—an unsuccessful cycle. On Good Friday afternoonwe got the call which revealed I was not pregnant, and Robbie and I carried on with our worship commitments, singing songs and praying with the same fervor and feelings of denial and frustration and betrayal that drove Peter to abandon the Jesus who would give up and die on a cross. “Our lives were supposed to be different. We have been serving you with our whole hearts. What have we done wrong? What do we do now? Where do we go from here? Will we ever receive the promises of God?”

I call it the worst April Fool’s Joke Ever. I literally preached on Easter morning, which fell on April Fools Day, saying, “Are you ready to be surprised by God today? No one knew what would happen that First Easter morning.  Every follower of Jesus was dumbfounded and devastated. They thought they knew what Jesus was up to, and then all of a sudden, he was gone! They thought all was lost, and then Jesus rose from the grave.  The resurrection was a HUGE surprise! God wants to surprise you again this Easter! God wants to surprise you with Joy, Love and Hope. Are you ready?” Was I ready? I wanted to be with my whole heart. Surprise us God, I prayed.

We spent that week feeling pretty lost, but we decided we would try another cycle in May, which meant a whole month of sabbath rest for us. No shots, no driving, plenty of exercise, plenty of couple’s time together, and plenty of caffeine for Kati. We would love God and love the life we had together, whatever that looked like.

By the end of the month, I had a feeling. After several fool proof tests, it was undeniable. We were pregnant. Robbie and I were speechless.  I literally laughed loud. I felt a bit like Sarah listening to the angels tell Abraham that she would bear a child. I couldn’t stop laughing. Considering about a month before a doctor had suggested we use donor eggs if we wanted to insure a successful pregnancy, considering all the extra scientific effort which had stimulated my natural hormones, considering our determination to be open to whatever God had in store for us, and God gives us a spontaneous chance with what we really wanted most of all.

So, here we are, 12 weeks down and at least 25 weeks to go. We considered on waiting to announce until the kid was graduating from High School, because we know and understand the fragile nature of life, but we wanted to share this story of immense joy as soon as we could so that we can savor and enjoy every stinkin’ minute of it.  So rejoice with us, because today is the day that the Lord has made.

Alleluia, Amen.

New Beginnings

Ahh…2018, how we have longed to see you.  You are not offering us the welcome we wanted.  Bitter storms and mudslides instead of quiet winter days and solid ground to steady our feet.  The continued threat of war, the continued fear of those who are different from us, the continued bickering from the right and the left.  You may put on a show of gloom and doom, but we know the truth.  You are offering us a new beginning each day.  Every morning, every step, every breath is another chance to re-direct our perspective towards hope.  

We have come a long way from the day when Martin Luther King Jr. simply spoke the words of his dream for an America where "one day right there in Alabama little black boys and little black girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls as sisters and brothers.”  Some days the children seem to be kinder to one another than we are.  Other days, the children reveal the worst of our locker room conversations, degrading one another for things we didn’t know we taught them.  We still have a long way to go to reach the day when children "will not be judged by the colour of their skin but by the content of their character.”

Disruptive Nature, Divisive News, and Distracting Networking block us from taking a break, pausing for a new breath, or resetting our course for hope.  We have met the challenges of our times with genuine perseverance, and we will continue to meet whatever you bring to us in 2018 with determination and a good sense of humor.  May we do so with hearts as courageous as Maya Angelo, who said, “Have enough courage to trust love one more time and always one more time."  

One more time? I can do that.  I can trust and hope for another day, another new beginning, and from there, we’ll take a breath, reset, and trust again. 

My Ninja Story

I am a big Ninja fan. Whether it’s historic Ninja folklore, Dark Knight Ninjas, American Ninja Warrior or Lego Ninjago, I love Ninjas.  I love the depth of their skill which requires strength in a variety of areas.  I love their sleek stealthy ways, somehow humble and peaceful and strong and frightening they seem, all at the same time.  Most of all, I love their resilience, flexibility and persistence. 

Some of the kids in our church (and adults) watch American Ninja Warrior religiously.  One of the parents dropped the comment, “Maybe we should have a Presby Ninja Warrior competition,” and I said, “Hold on, why don’t we? We can do this. Are you joking, because I need to know, before I get too excited about this.”  They all felt like it was a great idea, and believe it or not, we came through.  Our maintenance director, who is an awesome carpenter, helped me make the floating steps with our nursery workers, and he made a warped wall ramp.  I soon discovered that part of the training is in the building of your practice course.  Wood pallets are heavy.  Tires are heavy.  And Wood pallets covered in 3/4” plywood, attached to a couple of 2X4’s are extremely heavy.  When I built the course, I didn’t imagine myself doing it.  I would make it challenging for the kids and adults, but I didn’t expect to touch the top of our ramp, and I really didn’t expect to master the floating steps.

If you’ve been following my blog, you know that we had a traumatic miscarriage, and I developed severe preeclampsia last January.  I expected to recover in a month or two, then I thought it would take me a few months, and then I gave myself till 6 months.  Now that it’s been seven months, I can tell you, some days have been good, some days bad, some days really bad, and still some days I don’t know what to do, and then I put one foot in front of the other and keep going.  I am learning to be kind to myself, and the waves of my grief are not quite as overwhelming as they once were.

When we finished constructing the Presby Ninja course, I asked one of my fit friends to try it.  She had never seen the show, so I had to show her how to do the floating steps…and I hopped from pallet to pallet…and I didn’t touch the floor.  I was shocked at my strength, and I felt incredibly empowered by the way my body was able to gracefully maneuver the obstacle.  After she ran the course, I had her video me doing the course. What a rush! I was able to do the obstacles with pride and confidence.  This little 5’1.5" Presby Ninja even reached to the top of our ramp at eight feet!

The next day our event was a huge success.  The kids were also empowered at their ability to handle this challenging course set before them.  Even the parents stepped up to the challenge. Two of them reached up to 12 feet on the ramp!

Over these last seven months, my healing has seemed to come along very slowly.  In fact, I feel like I’ve been struggling forever and sometimes I wonder if my full strength will ever return. 

From my ninja training, I am learning that each fall makes us stronger, not in the way that keeps us from falling. No, if you are living adventurously or, to use Theodore Roosevelt's phrase(renewed in popularity by Dr. Brené Brown), if you are “daring greatly”, falling, scraped knees, broken arms, concussions and loss will come.  Failure is inevitable at some point in experimentation. The strength we gain from these experiences is manifested in our ability to continue to put one foot in front of the other and “stay the course.” A friend recommended Dr. Brown’s book, Rising Strong, and while I’m reading it, I feel like underlining every word, because she is telling my story, and she is using the most amazing language and terms to make sense of it. Yesterday, I read this complete gem:  

Experience doesn’t create even a single spark of light in the darkness of the middle space.  It only instills in you a little bit of faith in your ability to navigate the dark. The middle is messy, but it’s also where the magic happens.  Brené Brown, Rising Strong

Like ninjas we are called to keep “daring greatly” and taking great leaps in the dark. We do not rely on our perfection or our impeccable invulnerability, we rely, instead, on our ability to bend, to take a deep breath, and to rise with the strength to walk towards the mountain in front of us.

Blessings to you, my fellow ninja, in your current struggle or obstacle course.  May you remember to breathe and keep walking as you seek to navigate the dark.  The light still exists and will shine with greater brilliance when you reach your goal.  The Holy Spirit which breathed life into your bones continues to blow over you, within you, behind you and before you, to guide you on your way home.