Expectant Not Expecting

In a mere 24 hours I will have landed in the great state of Colorado for a much needed vacation getaway. I'm saying goodbye to Ol' Virginia for 8 days and hello to those beautiful Rocky Mountains. My heart starts to race just thinking about the majesty that I will behold. I will be staying with a dear sister-friend who is originally from right here in Virginia Beach. Just so happens that the week I threw out to her in hopes of my visit, with less than a months notice, is the only week she doesn't have anything she is committed to with her job. Can you say perfection? So I booked my ticket on July 3rd and didn't look back. Uncertainty is a funny thing. Sometimes the planner in me just has to make the leap, take the step, or make the drive half way across the country to realize although I didn't have it planned out, the Lord certainly did.

Why Colorado you may ask? Well, it helps that I have 5 friends who live out there already. But, other than having connections I felt the pull. I've been to Colorado 6 times growing up. Ski trips with the youth group and a couple times with my family for vacation and my dad's job related travel. The last time I was in Colorado was 2 years ago. I spent Christmas in a cabin with my family. I've only been during winter and fall so being there in the summer is going to be a treat!

I want to find myself humbled. I want to be overwhelmed by experiencing creation in it's rawest and purest form. I'm going back to The Garden. This is a concept I have talked about here before and it's one that I think I will always hold on to. As an artist we can find ourselves overstimulated and overwhelmed with creating. Well, I have something to add to that. As an artist sometimes I can find myself uninspired and seeking purpose. Getting back to "The Garden" is in a sense saying that as an artist, especially as a Christian, I desire to be reminded of why I create in the first place. Getting outside and experiencing creation at it's foundation can be rejuvenating, encouraging, motivating, and affirming. I'm looking forward to, in a sense, a week sabbatical.

So now I get to the point in the blog where I explain why I chose to title this post "Expectant Not Expecting." I'm going into this trip with an open mind and heart. I want to be expectant of great things during my time in Colorado and expectant of great things to come. What I do not want is to go in expecting certain selfish desires. I don't want to find myself expecting because if I try to plan out what I want to happen and it doesn't happen that way then I stressed myself out and put my heart in a place to be let down. This goes for the plans that are made for things I may do while I'm there and it goes for the way that the Lord is going to work on me while I am there. The only things I am expecting while I am there is to experience the Lord and His creation alongside my beautiful friends, That's it. I'm keeping it simple. I want to leave as much room as possible for the Lord to take control.

I hope to be sharing some of my time with you all here. I'll also be posting photos on my instagram and snapping some of my trip. If not, then I will have plenty to share when I return.

Freely, Gabrielle

& with that I leave you with this picture from my last vacation in Iceland

Woah... That Anxiety Though...

I kinda chuckle reading the title I just wrote for this post. I can't take too long to write but I need an outlet for some encouraging quotes of the day.

"Be quiet dear heart, breathe deep and long, soul, and find comfort in your God, who has gone before you in all things..."

"Tranquil stillness is the space in which our minds and bodies can finally reconnect with our spirits and give living water to our withered dreams."
-Whole Magazine (written by Sarah Dannemiller)

I may have had an anxiety attack at church last night...and by may...I mean I did. I laugh at it now I guess because I'd rather laugh than be serious about such a matter. Perhaps its how I am dealing with my stresses and anxieties lately. So the short story is that I was sitting there listening to a teaching on anxiety and stress, of course processing through my current stressors but my stresses as of recently have not manifested themselves in my typical way of experiencing stress. Rather, I have been quite calm. I realized that before I left Texas the way that I manage my stress has changed, and not because I made the conscious decision to change it, it just sort of happened. I don't feel stressed in the sense of being overwhelmed because generally I am excited about where I am and what I'm doing and what's coming. But, that doesn't mean that there aren't things that are weighing on me. I'm having to dig a little deeper to discover these things so that I can properly process them. I got an image the other day while in worship at my discipleship group called "Love Feast." Funny to me because I don't often get images like this and didn't understand it until I started writing it down. I then shared it with our group and Sara (our discipleship leader) asked for me to pray into it for us...which I have never done before. Anyway, this image was of a heart in the cavity of a chest covered in cobwebs. I can see it clearly in my mind even now. So first I was like...huh...weiiiird. I then decided I should write about it so I jotted down what I saw and meaning was revealed as I wrote.

This is what I wrote:

Cobweb heart- cobwebs...they're uncomfortable, basically invisible, and hard to get rid of but the Lord wants to help me wipe away the cobwebs that I may not be able o see or know are there to gain deeper access to my heart. Lord may I be sensitive to your spirit calling out the cobwebs over my heart and anxieties and fears and hardships and lies.

So I shared this and prayed into this for our group. Honest Gabe time... haha thank you Dan Jeter. All this anxiety and fear and all the lies began to surface during my trip to Tennessee this summer. I had a moment where I shared with my very dearest sister Brit that I felt people saw me as "this way" or "that way" or whatever it may be. She said, "Hon I think you are the one thinking those things about yourself, I don't think anyone thinks those things about you," and my friend Alex confirmed. I spent a very long 13 hour drive processing a lot and when I got home had a conversation with my girl Caron from Florida who put it bluntly because she had been struggling with the same thing. "Gabe, you aren't concerned about what others are thinking about you, these are things you are thinking about yourself and you are projecting those thoughts on other people." I think I may have shared this in a previous post in recent months...but there I was in a puddle of my own tears in my car...because she was right. I had been at war with myself struggling through my own self-defeat. Knowing that then I did spend some time with the Lord about it but I also had a lot of other things taking my attention so it kinda took the back burner.

Here I am now a couple months later and all around me the lessons and words are about anxiety. Leila (my friend and coworker) actually named the fat man that sits on my chest Roberto haha comedic relief. But, honestly, it really feels like I have a very heavy barbell laying on my chest that I don't have the arm strength to lift. When I got to Virginia I jumped right in, sink or swim. I haven't taken as much me time as I need and I'm realizing that I really need to take time to process because I haven't. I still have moments of realizing I live here and I have a big girl job and other major changes. It was a quick decision and quick following action to make the move and start a job two days after I got the offer. I haven't spent quiet time with God to process through everything I just jumped right in. So the good thing in all of this is that through it all I am realizing some important things. Thank God for realizations!

I completely uprooted myself when I left VB back in August of 2013. This is an opportunity to set new roots and lay a new foundation for my time back here for however long it may be. I'm not planning on going anywhere so it's important for me to be putting my roots in healthy soil. I have the knowledge to do so, so, come on Gabe get with it! haha

I need to work on my self-perception cuz it's not good. I think some old stuff has resurfaced as of recently that I have been freed from for years but they are coming back to taunt me as lies and I have been believing them. So there's that. I actually had a really good convo with an elder mentor from my church sunday morning at breakfast and we talked a bit about that. I'm so thankful for her. This is an area I will need to spend some time meditating on and praying about.

These are two major areas I need to work on and then there are all those others but it'd be a lot to talk about here.

Just some thoughts on where I am in life right now. It feels good to write again & now that I've hit the end of my lunch break I'm gonna get back to work. I start traveling October 1st! Say a little prayer for me as I hit the road! I'm super stoked.


Just some real moments, learning and growing with Gabe. Till next time...

   

Beautiful Girl...Let The Sunrise Come Again

I know it's way too late/early in the morning but I couldn't help myself. I haven't blogged in over a month and I'm feeling the weight of thoughts overflowing my mind; and of course I would choose to write during the craziest part of this month. I honestly don't know where to start so I guess I will start with a summary of these past several months.

To sum things up:

Dearest May, 

you were pretty exciting. I wasn't sure what the later days would hold but Lord knows I was in for a life impacting experience. I spent a glorious week in a third world country loving on little ones and placing my craft before the Lord to use to help His people. I came back exhausted and sick but pushed through and pulled through to end up on the other side, a more driven and passionate form of myself. Then you were gone. Just like that.

My Sweet June, 

you held such gladness and sadness. I longed for the 18th day to arrive, a fresh start, a new year, a chance to greet life with new inspiration and goals. Twenty-three, what a funny, uncomfortable, interesting, hard, and lovely age to be. (so far that is)... Then you brought me sorrowful news that had my heart longing for Virginia and my family afar. I can't help but tear up thinking about that early morning phone call and how beautiful it was to see the Lord's hand at work in the midst of all our grief and mourning. Before I knew it...

Oh Hello July, 

we've been together for quite some time now thought I feel like it was yesterday that we began day 1. I don't remember leaving the earlier days behind us only because I was yearning for that 8th day to begin the most beautiful adventure of this 23rd year yet! Oh the forests that captivated my heart and the sounds of effervescent voices I knew so well. It has been in your days I have found a glimmer of hope for whats to come in the month to follow but it is also within your weeks that many of my covered weaknesses and inner struggles have surfaced. So here I am, in the midst of them, still processing, learning, healing, and growing...

So I've been a part of this really awesome bible study with some girls from my church. I didn't know what we were going to be studying when I joined in on the first day they met until I was sitting in the living room with a bunch of girls I didn't know so well and they brought up the study we would be doing was one on Gideon. Nooowww, I don't know about you... but I didn't remember much about Gideon........let's be real though... I didn't remember anything about Gideon, other than in my head I was like 'Hey! I know that name! It's in the bible somewheres...' yep. So I went out and bought the study book the next week to go along with the video we would be watching before discussing the message Priscilla Shirer brought. Now I do wanna make a comment about this lady cuz she's just awesome and reminded me of Pastor Tina from New Life Providence in Virginia Beach... for those of you who know who I am talking about you know that Pastor Tina is pretty awesome and so anyway, this Priscilla lady reminds me of her. ::Ok, end random tangent:: So the tagline or 'log line' of the book I guess you could say is "Your weaknesses. God's STRENGTH." I didn't go into this bible study really expecting to come away from it with anything specific. I had no goals for myself other than forming bonds and fellowship with the girls...but in reality what I have gotten from the study itself has been priceless. 

I'm gonna skip over talking about the first session even though it was like WOAH awesome! Only cuzzz I am going to write a lot anyway...which is one of the things I wanna talk about here... So the first session was super sweet and all but then later sessions began to stir something in me I wasn't expecting. 

I'm just gonna throw these words out there bluntly...

Inexperienced. Intimidated. Incompetent. Too Young. Rejected. Unwanted. 

It's really hard for me to write those words because of how I relate to them. Let me preface what I write by saying that I recognize now that I am in currently under attack and in a constant battle against an enemy that would have me destroy myself if he had his way. With that said I will explain my relationship with those six words above. It's probably a given to most that a person would struggle with a lot of those things when they are in the shoes I am in currently. That place in-between completing sixteen years of schooling to step out into the real world to get a job and be jobless for a time before stepping into the next season...it's pretty uncomfortable. I mean, let me be real, I haven't been stressing over the fact that this season has been uncomfortable... let me make a metaphor since I like using them and really only the ladies will understand... it's like the uncomfortability (that's not even a word but deal with it) of wearing a bra, it's not the most comfortable thing but the bra is a reality and there's just no way around it until that glorious moment when you get home and you can shout 'FREEEEEDOM' as you throw it across the room.... hahaha only me??? ....awkward. Well anyway, it's kinda like that...it's not something I can really get away from right now and I've learned to live with being uncomfortable but it sure would be nice to move on from this season sometime...soon...maybe? God? He's workin' on it, He'll get back to me. Anyway, now that I've embarrassed myself a little... we move on! 

"The enemy would have us look inward and be insecure about our strengths and weaknesses. We are to look outward and upward at the power of Christ and He in us!"      -Priscilla Shirer 

The funny thing is now that I am two weeks out from that second session and have taken a personal vacation to Tennessee and come back for that third session and had several conversations with valued friends I can honestly say that I see the pattern. I can see where the underlying internal struggles have surfaced I can see that there is residual hurt that I am needing to deal with before I move on from this season. When I say hurt I am not referencing hurt inflicted on me by another, I mean self inflicted hurt and no not physical hurts but psychological hurts. I know we all deal with those, we all have our own poisons these are just a few of my own, I am my own poison. I won't say I am my own worst enemy because that's just not true, but there is an enemy that's mixing the poison and I'm full and well taking it, or have been, or did. Like I said, I'm working on it. The best way to combat struggles and lies is to call them out right? Well, I'm calling them out. Right here and right now. Not only am I calling them out here but I have also called them out within the company of a few friends who were to kind to listen to my heart break over my own self defeat. 

"When life's shadows distort our reality, those distortions can easily become our truth, ripping us away from God's truth and thwarting our purpose." -Priscilla Shirer

I have this feeling... this feeling that this season is coming to it's close and another one is about to begin, whatever that may mean. So with that I am reflecting on the struggles of this past year and some of the battles I have had to fight were battles against these lies: Inexperienced. Intimidated. Incompetent. Too Young. Rejected. Unwanted. Thank God for saving me from myself and revealing his truths to me because the past couple weeks I have been overcome by all of these lies and I was drowning in them. I had began to believe them about myself and started to throw them around my neck and shoulders like a new accessory. I took my former parts of me I didn't like and began to believe that those past hurts were still a part of me. I think it's because I am dead-set on not ending up back there. I didn't like me then, but I am not the same person I used to be. I'm going to continue to battle it, I will have an enemy constantly trying to convince me that I am that person when I start to loose sight of who I am in Christ. The good thing is that I'm learning how to fight that battle and I don't have to do that alone. 

I had a friend put it bluntly to me the other day as I sat in my car in my driveway after an exhausting work out: "I don't think that it's that you are concerned with what other's think about you Gabrielle, but more so that you are hung up on what you think about yourself." &&&&& with that I was done. She kept talking and speaking over and into my life and I was just wrecked, sitting in my car and realizing that God was calling me out on my self destruction. I had had a friend earlier that week tell me when I told her that I am striving so hard to be a lady, that I long to be a woman and just don't feel that way, that I am the only one that thinks that I'm not that and another friend agreed saying that no one saw me as a child. I've had a best friend tell me that I am too hard on myself, that I beat myself up over things that I should give myself more grace for. All of these lovely ladies are completely right and I am so thankful for their words for helping me face this battle head on. 

This post is oooooberly long but I've decided I am not going to apologize for it. I am learning to accept that I am a verbal processor. Both of my parents are and neither of my sisters are so here I am the one in the middle with all the words. I will say more than I need to say. I will overwhelm myself with how much I talk. I will spend way to much time exhausting the same subject till I'm blue in the face. Recently I have hated this aspect of myself, it's so hard not to exhaust everything I have to say when I talk with friends when I'm over here in Texas and I don't really have any of my east coast friends to process through life with face to face or a significant other to walk through life with. (& oh my dear ashley I fear to have overwhelmed you too much although you have repeatedly said you love my 'word vom'.) So this is me. Processing. I am going to work on my verbal processing rather than hate myself for it. It's funny because I have projected my own overwhelmed state on others... meaning when I have said in the past 'I'm sorry for overwhelming you with all of this' they usually say that they aren't overwhelmed in the least but what I'm realizing is that it's really me who is overwhelmed by it, maybe not necessarily because of talking about it out loud but also because it's all been internally running through my mind and my heart that when it finally comes about in word form I've already spent hours, days, weeks or months mulling it over inside. So to all my dear friends who have experienced my so called "word vomit" over this past year I want you to know how appreciated and loved you are. Thank you for listening. Thank you for helping me process this season of life. Thank you for your encouragement. Thank you for your wisdom and shared advice. Thank you for letting me be me and as messy as I may think I am thank you for loving me in the midst of it. 

I think that's all I have... It's 3:30 in the morning and I really should turn in for the eve. If you care to, leave me a comment, I'd love to hear from y'all. I'm not even really sure any of the above even makes sense since I'm basically sleep typing... Goodnight Moon!

With Love,

With A Heavy Heart

It is with a heavy heart and a lump in my throat this morning that I write this post. For those of you who don't know a friend of mine from school from the theatre department, from my theatre family was killed in a head on car collision Saturday. He and the other driver in the accident were driving down a two lane highway in indiana (he on his way to a family reunion) when my friend Adam went to pass a Semi and didn't see the car in the other lane they both attempted to avoid each other pulling out and colliding head on in the ditch. Please be in prayer for the family of 5 that was in the other vehicle. The mother and father of the three children in the back seat were last in critical condition and the children's status was never released.

Adam was flown Careflight to a hospital and a few hours after the accident he passed away from his injuries. So one of my best friends texted me yesterday at 730am which would have been 630am her time to see if I had heard the news... one of the most sobering texts I have received in a long time. "B...did you hear about Adam?" (B is Julie's nickname for me) To which I responded no and she immediately called me. Our theatre department is a family, mess with one of us you better be careful because we have each others backs. I don't mean that to sound threatening it's just to represent how we look after each other. I don't know ho I could have survived college without my theatre family students and professors alike. So with this news we are all breaking and the Crowhort is probably taking it the hardest because they spent the last three years studying, learning and growing together to finish up with their MFAs back last month. My heart breaks for my friend's loss and breaks for the hurt that so many of my wonderful and dear MFA friends are experiencing.

A little over a year ago Adam's father was killed in a car accident as well. He was devastated and we all hurt for him. We even set up a giving account where people could contribute to helping to bury his father and send him home for the funeral...here we are a little more than a year later with a giving account set up once more for our friend, our own brother's funeral. I want to say a few things about the character of my friend Adam before I go on in this post to reference some things I am learning this morning about death.

A Character of Life

I met Adam when he was a first year MFA student and I was a Junior in College. The first show we worked on together was Three Musketeers. I was the Assistant Stage Manager and he was one of the main supporting roles. Adam was a humorous guy. He liked to tease the BA's especially the girls because he found them to be more gullible, knowing we would fall for his dry sarcasm and humor or just for the tap on the shoulder-walk away-pretend it wasn't you joke. Adam would tease me about taking me out on the date that he had never asked me out on. He also joked about how he felt we were growing distant after we had just finished an entire show we worked together on for several months. "Adam...we just spent the past several months working on a show together!" hahaha. He joked about me leaving him alone with the kids...that we didn't have. He was always one to walk up to a group of us talking and put his arm around one or two or three people and stick his head into the conversation. He and some of the other guys had a game where they called dibs on everyone and everything so yes even myself along with so many other girls of the department got called "dibs" on. "Dibs on Gabe!!!!" - Adam "What does that even meeeeean?! Hahaha" -Me ::Adam Shrugs Shoulders::

Adam was a giving person, a true 21st century good samaritan. A friend of mine had mentioned to someone within ear shot of him that she was frustrated that she didn't even have money to buy lunch and he whipped out a $10 and handed it to her not even knowing who she was. Adam had the biggest arms and the biggest hugs coming from a big guy with an even bigger heart. Adam made sure that no one person went unnoticed or unrecognized. I can remember on several occasions where he praised me for doing a good job even clapping for me as he walked by. "Keep up the good work Gabe." -Adam. I don't think I appreciated that as much as I should have. Adam saw when people were having a rough day, he knew just by looking at them. He was quick to listen and be there for the people he cared about. Although he was scared of leaving school and heading out to LA he was determined to make the leap of faith with his fathers encouraging words "I'm betting on you even if no one else is" and knowing God had his back. My friend Tim put it this way: "If you haven't made the world a better place, then what difference does it make. Thank you Adam for inspiring us to live fully, love passionately, and laugh without hesitation." If I could say anything that would encompass him, that right there would ice the cake.

So...death. A bittersweet taste on my tongue with that one word. & can I just take a moment to mention that it is magnificently stormy outside. The storm is a reflection of my heart, moments of eruptive thunder and pouring rain and then stillness for a moment. I am still between disbelief and realization. Yesterday was long. I went to church because I knew that Adam would have encouraged me to, he was also an ordained minister. I came home after lunch and fell asleep waking up still exhausted and eyes still tired and worn out. Tears come and go as they please.

Our Loss, Adam's Gain

I'm sure you have heard people say in the past "God's got another angel up there" or "It's our loss but Christ's gain" both are things I have heard in the past when going through bereavement. But, this time I am choosing to see it as Adam's gain. Yes, I still believe that it is Christ's gain but I also want to take the time to recognize that Adam gained a whole heck of a lot when we left this earth. I am in no way belittling the gain of Christ I just also want to recognize the significance of what Adam himself has gained. It's easy to say they are in a better place and not think in depth about what that means. It needs to be talked about, we should be discussing it, especially when it hurts. So I did some research on death this morning and came across this relevant magazine article from 2008 that talks about death being the servant of God. I was like, huh, interesting perspective and you know what...I agree. God sent Christ to this world to conquer death and by conquering death as He did, death became a servant.

It's a bit of a read but honestly I don't think I could cut anything out so stick with me for a moment and read the below quoted pieces from Relevant Magazine, see if it doesn't strike a heartstring with you as it did with me:

"Death divorced from God becomes a power unto itself and becomes master of humanity rather than servant. Only through the re-mastery of death can death cease to be an enemy and return to its place as servant of God and humanity. Death is what Christ came to reconquer and is the means by which He conquered. Death became servant to Christ so that it might once again become servant to humanity. It served the true human so that it might serve all humans."

"Death is the gateway to life. Death is the boatman who ferries us from this life to more life. Death is the servant now. For one must lose his life to save it. We are baptized into death so that we might rise with Christ. We are joined to Christ’s death so that through death we might be joined to Christ’s resurrection and new life (Romans 6:4-5)."

"New life is not found through any other means than death. Resurrection implies death and it is resurrection that we seek. New life in Christ is not merely the prolonging of this life but it is a completely new life unlike this one. New life requires death. Death is the gift, the means, through which we are granted new, resurrected life with Christ."

"Lordless death is the great enemy, not death itself. Christ, who submitted to God, submitted to death and in doing so received life and death’s allegiance. Christ cannot die again because death has no mastery over him (Romans 6:9). Death returns to its proper function as servant of God and is rightly ordered humanity’s servant as well. Natural immortality is horrendous and hopeless. Death gives us hope for new life. Death, when with God, is hope. It is hope of resurrected life. It is the gift of God to humanity, abused by humanity during the Fall, then given back at the Cross. Paul continues to warn that sin and corruption lead to death (Romans 6:23;8:6) but to lordless death, not Christ’s death, which brings eternal life in Christ."

"J.R.R. Tolkien illustrates death as gift and the corruption it underwent better than I ever could in his epic The Silmarillion:

The sons of Men die indeed, and leave the world; wherefore they are called the Guests, or the Strangers. Death is their fate, the gift of Iluvatar, which as Time wears even the Powers shall envy. But Melkor has cast his shadow upon it, and confounded it with darkness, and brought forth evil out of good, and fear out of hope." 

"Charles Williams, a personal friend of Tolkien, once wrote “The definition of the Fall is that man determined to know good as evil.” One example of this is to be seen in humanity’s view of death. A good was seen as an evil. A gift was seen as a curse. A servant was seen as an enemy and became just that. Christ laid down his own life freely to death and in doing so mastered death. In his mastering of death he gave death to us once again to be our servant. Christ says, “He who believes in me will live even though he dies,” (John 11:25). Christ goes onto say “whoever lives and believes in me will never die,” (John 11:26). I believe Christ speaks of the life that only comes from death. As Christ cannot die again, neither can those who are united with Christ’s death. Death is not the end of life but the means to it, for Christ says, “Whoever tries to keep his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life will preserve it,” (Luke 17:33). To defeat death one must die. To be born again one must die. To live one must die. Therefore, die before you die. There is no chance after."

So there you have it my friends. I myself want to remember to see death as a servant of Christ. I made the choice to die to myself a long time ago but it's not just a one time decision that I can make and not continually work on. Dying to oneself is a lifelong commitment and it's hard! I believe that is what Adam did in his time here on earth. He died to himself and accepted Christ's defeat of death so that when death came to him he would gain life. Death is a daily walk, not just a one time occurrence. Death is servitude. Death is choosing life. Death is not the enemy. 

On a lighter note: The 5 Stages of Grief as told by Giraffe from Robot Chicken:
WARNING: Bleeped Out Offensive Language Content Viewer Discretion is Advised Not Suitable for Children