Showing posts with label purpose. Show all posts
Showing posts with label purpose. Show all posts
Tre's Bookshelf: Reading with a Toddler
The first Saturday in June the kid participated in a race with the local library to kick off their summer reading program.
He has been such an avid reader for so long that I knew that we needed to get a library card and get more books in rotation than the ones in his room. So we began our summer reading journey! However, with our travels in July we did not get any library time in like I would have preferred. But now we are back in the groove and what perfect timing as most children have already returned to school or will be shortly.
Miscarried Emotions...
The Author: On The Heels... of an amazing encounter! (Book Release)
I’m back!!
You know when it rains it pours and after my son’s birthday our summer travels were non-stop!
The bachelorette party for one of my best friends
road trip to Cleveland
DST Centennial Celebration
Family Reunion
and finally the wedding
Autographed copies: On the Heels-Autographed
Direct link: On the Heels of My Father direct
The Mother: 2nd Letter to my Son! Happy Birthday!
To my sun, my baby bear, my smallest friend, my heartbeat:
I can't believe that two years ago I was somewhere thinking my life would only minimally change by your presence. There are moments now when I try to figure out what my life was about before you. There's a change in perspective about yourself and your life when you have kids and you changed mine in a major way. Here's what you've accomplished this past year:
Fulfill the God said... Happy Father's Day
2 years ago we took a LEEEEEAP! I'm talking about baby hold on, I'm praying for a ram in the bush type of leap. House payment, car notes, sallie Mae, baby on the way; you have to know in the depth of your heart that you are married to a man of God to make such a jump.
Pressing On: Change of Plans
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| Jeremiah 29:11 |
Share a time when you felt spiritually abandoned
My first year as an educator...YIKES! I absolutely LOVE to help kids shine, but I didn't major in education...on PURPOSE, and there I was being called onto the battlefield to fight a war for which I had not been prepared. Say what, Lord? Teach? Coach cheer-leading? Get them to college? Do it all with a smile? And no prayer in school? I fussed at God and cried myself to sleep as a daily regimen. How could He do this to me? My goals included becoming a business woman, CEO of a major corporation, dollar signs- you get my drift! Not teaching children with children, my hair being pulled, board meetings because my expectations were too high, my vehicle used as the neighborhood bus, pennies and nickels for pay, and paperwork up to my ears....this was the ultimate punishment!
Pressing On: Overcoming Spiritual Warfare
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| Spiritual Warfare |
Share a time when you felt spiritually abandoned
This past year I felt spiritually abandoned. It was January 2013, I was at my house and all of sudden I felt alone. I felt as though GOD didn't hear any of my prayers. I would come home scared. On top of that, I worked swing shift (3:30pm-11:30pm) and my husband was deployed; my house was empty when I came home at night. You would think getting off from work would be the best part of my day. You know, looking forward to coming home and relaxing, but it was the worst. At that moment I realized I was empty. I had been encouraging people SO much that I forgot how to encourage myself. I knew scriptures and I could tell anyone where to find anything if they were going through something. But when I would read those same scriptures, I felt nothing. I would literally run to my room, take a shower, and get in bed. I was scared. I was at home crying because I felt like something else (evil) was there with me. I know it may sound crazy and I wish I was lying about that, but I'm not. I began to call people who I thought were "spiritually sound". I called people who "I thought" knew the Word. So in February, I called a minister and a family member. The family member told me I was getting spiritually attacked because I didn't have the holy ghost/holy spirit. I was furious, I didn't say anything I just listened because I know the Word and I know I have the holy ghost, but I was so tired of fighting spiritual warfare with myself, I had NO room to fight with anyone else. The minister told me to pray and she prayed with me. But when I got off the phone, I was still scared. I literally thought I was losing my mind. I have never in my 28 years felt fear like that. I just knew GOD had thrown in the towel on me.
Pressing On: Darkest before Dawn
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| During tough times |
Share a time when you felt spiritually abandoned
Right after I finished college was a very tough time for me. I had gotten a job as a reporter in a small town, but I needed a car, and mine had died. My mother was having health problems, and my brothers and I didn't know how we could help her. My father is not in our life, and people that I thought were my friends were saying really ugly things about me. I felt like everything was unfair--I worked so hard! My mom didn't deserve this! I treat people decently! I remember sitting on the curb next to my broken car, crying my eyes out (and I'm generally not a person who cries!). Luckily, this was also the time when I really began to bond with my friend Erica, whose spirit and general sense of confidence in God helped pull me out of a very dark hole that I had fallen into.
Pressing On: Overcoming Divorce
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| Freedom |
Share a time when you felt spiritually abandoned
The only time I remember feeling spiritually abandoned was after my divorce. I remember feeling empty and alone. Like life as I knew it was over. I wondered everyday why this would be my story. I had an incredible sense of failure and guilt. Like no one understood or could help me.
Pressing On: Filling the Void
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| love in the wrong places |
Share a time when you felt spiritually abandoned
Losing one of my closest friends ‘Punkin’’ my senior year of college was really hard. He was my Clyde! I knew he’d always have my back and when he was killed I literally shut down. I stayed in my room and grieved for days at a time. This is was a process that would last for many, many years after his death. At that time I felt like a walking ghost. I remember people reaching out to share words of condolences and bible scriptures but I was so outraged with God for ‘taking Tre’ that I couldn’t bear to listen. Around this time my step father was publically preparing to serve prison time and my biological father was majorly failing to fill his shoes on all levels. Here I was heartbroken, searching for jobs so I wouldn’t have to drop out of school and using temporary physical affection to Band-Aid my hurt. My graduation from college should have felt ‘victorious’, but instead it was an extremely lonely time for me. I went into alumni hood not really feeling like God had a special place in my life.
Pressing On: Job Market Woes
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| Poor Job Market |
Share a time when you felt spiritually abandoned
I graduated from the University of Alabama in 2007 and in that same month began a Master’s program to gain certification to teach public school. I had been actively running away from the field of teaching but in my junior year of undergrad, had accepted the calling and I just KNEW I would be blessed in pursuing this degree. (Ever wonder about how much we THINK we KNOW?) However, after graduating with a Master’s in Education, while also working for a year in the local school system, I ended the year without a job or any such prospects. I had just begun a fast and was intensely seeking the Father for guidance, to simply hear a word of direction or encouragement. I was working part time in a retail position that constantly cancelled shifts and took up another position substituting at a former teaching center a few days a week to supplement; still, no word, no job. I took out cash advances on credit cards that had been paid in full just to make rent and my car payment. I even had a position come through in an elementary school as a long term sub that eventually ended up bottoming out before I could even start. I was at a loss as to what my next move should be and I had yet to hear from the Father, my Father, even after seeking his face and being in the midst of a fast. I was losing patience and my resolve was weakening. All I could think is "Why doesn't he answer?" Eventually, I decided I needed a change of pace and shared with God my desire to move and I was given a permissive 'yes'. I immediately found a job with the early childhood company I had been with for a few years in Atlanta but not even close to the pay or type of position I desired. I cried in frustration many times because I didn't understand what God was doing. Why would he allow me to move and find a job only to be in what I considered a position of failure? However, in that position I had more opportunities for growth and development as an educator and made more connections than I ever would have made had I stayed where I was. And though it has truly been a journey of trust and faith, my belief in my God has again been reinforced and uplifted. I learned to trust him again and to know that being faithful in a few things leads to him trusting me with so much more!
Pressing On: Losing a Parent
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| Losing a parent |
Share a time when you felt spiritually abandoned.
It was August 2002…I was preparing to start 7th grade and I couldn’t have been more excited. Little did I know, I would soon receive some news that would change the entire trajectory of my life. My grandmother, the only woman that I had ever called “Momma” and the only woman that I had ever acknowledged as my mom, was diagnosed with Pancreatic Cancer and given only 6 months to live. As a 12 year old, this was a HUGE pill to swallow. MY momma? Dying? No. Things like that didn’t happen in my family. Months passed and I watched her slowly, but surely, fade away. She passed away in February 2003, exactly 6 months after her diagnosis. After her death, I had to grow up quickly and assume the responsibilities as the “woman” of the household…at 12. I felt alone, neglected by God, and just…lost.
Pressing On: Taking Care of a Parent
Share a time when you felt spiritually abandoned
I can’t say I’ve felt this way. I have felt like the promises of God were not intended for me and to some degree I still struggle to believe that the promises God made to his children are for me as well. That doesn’t make me feel abandoned but it does make me feel like I’m not good enough.
Pressing On: Unashamedly Embracing Me
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| source |
Share a time when you felt spiritually abandoned
3 days after Christmas 2011, my husband was arrested for a DUI while pulled over on the wrong side of a curvy, highway on-ramp with heavy semi-truck traffic…wait for it…with 2 of our beautiful, priceless, IRREPLACEABLE babies in the car. This wasn’t his first incident with alcohol, BUT this was the first time the lives of my kids were about 2 feet and a TDOT worker from being taken from this earth. Forced by an ultimatum, he enrolled in a year-long, Christian-based rehab facility. I saw his life changing, I saw him seeking God, I saw him helping others; I saw him lift his hands in worship! This was a huge deal. At that moment, I KNEW God had heard all my prayers, seen all my tears, and was going to work it out. He wanted to enroll in seminary school and become an evangelist! In my mind, I had already written the testimony to come… “Marriage on the rocks, plagued by infidelity, physical abuse, and alcoholism miraculously restored. Family finds peace and hope in Jesus using their testimony to lift others.” I began to open up about the struggles, I started my blog, made moves toward the bigger purpose I knew God had been calling me to and really got plugged in at church. But like being blind-sided by a Mack Truck running a red light, the breath of life was knocked out of me and I found myself lying completely on my back. It wasn’t sincere…not one bit of it. He was still drinking, still angry enough to hit me, still having affairs, and this time she was in our home…my home. How could God do that to me? How could he show me the marriage I always dreamed of, the family I longed for, the husband I desired, just to snatch it right out of my hands? Why would he make me endure the misery and then get my hopes up that things were changing for nothing? Maybe he didn’t hear my prayers; perhaps all the tears were in vain. The last day I saw my husband was June 5, 2012. I filed for divorce on our anniversary in July and settled into a life of being a 26-year-old divorcee with 3 kids just trying to make it through each day sanely. Little did I know, everything that I thought I was losing was the very beginning of Him giving me everything I ever needed, the very best of what He desired for me…His daughter
Pressing On: Overcoming Adultery
Share a time when you felt spiritually abandoned
When my marriage was falling apart I thought - "God, what have I done to deserve this"? I would pray and pray, fast, and pray some more. I did not understand how someone I loved would treat me the way that my (then) husband was treating me. I felt that God had forgotten about me; that He had, for some reason, left me to figure it out all on my own.
Pressing On: Premature Birth
Share a time when you felt spiritually abandoned.
There have been many times where I FELT like God had abandoned me. However, the time I will focus on will be the way my son was brought into the world. I felt like I was half a woman, one who couldn't even carry her child to term. I blamed God so much for letting me have him at 29 weeks instead of full term one that i prayed for. I honestly felt like all my prayers for a healthy pregnancy went unheard because I got diagnosed with hypertension and diabetes all within the first month of me being pregnant.
Pressing On: Ending a Marriage
Share a time when you felt spiritually abandoned
I felt spiritually abandoned when I decided to end my marriage on our second anniversary. I had fasted, prayed, and yielded to the Spirit during the most difficult season of my life and, in my mind, had received nothing in return. I honestly thought that God was mad at me. Here I was 28, on my second marriage, and I felt like I had gotten "Punked" on what was supposed to be a day of celebration. I felt like God had turned His back on me. Pressing On: Losing a Significant Other
Share a time when you felt spiritually abandoned?
The moment I found out that my fiancé passed away was the first time I felt COMPLETELY abandoned. My body was there, but my spirit was someplace else. When I got out of bed, I went through the motions of life. I was just waking up to get through the next moment.
Pressing On: Women Chronicles
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| Empower other women |
God has connected me to some ah-may-zing women!
Their stories, their ability to overcome, their beauty, their intelligence, their strength, their grace; I am moved by their essence. This thing, this life, is so much bigger than us. We are all connected through our womanhood, our experiences, and our message.
I am a firm believer in spending more time collaborating than causing dissension and drama. With every inch of my being I really dislike drama and the inability we can possess to work together for a greater good. I am a constant learner and I am energized by women who are on a mission to leave their footprints on the world.
In the process of sharing my story and empowering you through On the Heels of My Father I wanted to celebrate some of the women I admire and share their stories with you these last few weeks of May.
I want women, who feel defeated by the chapter they are living in their story, to know that God has the power to shift atmospheres. He can change your playgrounds and playmates but you have to be willing to yield, be honest about where you are, and remain faithful about the season changing.
Empower, Uplift, Purpose:
This too shall pass.
This too shall pass.
Heads up, #nomakeup, #noweight, Press On!
Share a time when you felt spiritually abandoned
Last year the saying, “if it ain’t one thing it’s another” was the theme and I kept wondering where God was in the midst of this chaos. Giving up our house, losing a car, behind on bills; I felt like my prayers were stopping at the top of my voice and never penetrating the atmosphere. It’s difficult to see your way out of a situation you are walking through and I honestly couldn’t see beyond that place.
On the Heels of My Father: Removing the Weight While Walking into your Purpose (Pre-Order)
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| The movement starts within |
God takes my breath away; I am speechless.
How God will sit you down, teach you a lesson, and then shift you into the very place you thought you missed.
Have you ever had a bad day? A bad month? What about a bad year? A year where you wondered if God noticed your situation. Money was kinda funny, more bills than bucks, repossession, foreclosure, solitude; Moments when you felt so disconnected from your purpose that you felt like everyday was a walk in the season of winter: Lost, frigid, lonely.
I spent the past year just trying to keep trying. I wouldn't have imagined that God would call me to SHARE this experience. Because it wasn't your usual down on my luck type of situation. I watched God take my broken places, my foul attitude, my JUNK and turn it into a message that makes ME cry every time I read it. He showed me that there are so many people in this same situation but they lack the strength to press on. I wanted to give up and when He told me I would be the messenger I wanted to RUN. Just hide in the very place I had been hiding while being angry with where I felt He was holding me hostage.
