Looking in the mirror this morning… I was angry.

I heard a voice ask me, “what are you so angry about?”

I’m not sure. I just hate it all.

“Why? What do you see?”

I really hate my stomach. I don’t really know why. I’m 36 and still in a size 5. The same size I was in at 20. Just a little squishier. But it’s not flat and perfect. It never has been, but I hate it today. Now. For a long time really.

“I made you perfect.”

I really hate my skin and hair. My hair isn’t naturally blond anymore. It’s darker. More brown. My skin is still struggling with breakouts, dryness, and scars. And now I have dark circles and crow’s feet beginning. It’s just ugly.

“Says who?”

I hate that even though I feel strong you can’t see definition in my muscles. I really hate that I don’t look strong. I’m not lean enough. Maybe if I was leaner I’d look stronger than I feel. Maybe I should cut more calories. I hate what I look like when I eat anyway. It’s gross.

“I made you healthy.”

Maybe if I looked different… better… prettier… maybe I wouldn’t be so lonely.

“You belong to me.”

Sigh. It’s hard to give myself any grace. I’m my own worst critic, ya know?

“My grace is enough.”

Alright. I guess I should get back to work. Step out from in front of this mirror. Get out of my head. Get out of my own way. This is silly really. I am strong. I am healthy. My fluff, scars, crow’s feet…is evidence of a life of fun and adventure. And even though I’m struggling with 36, there’s nothing I want to do my body is not capable of. I suppose it’s not that bad.

*walks away from the mirror*

“You are my beloved.”

I had a dream last night. I haven’t dreamt like that in a long time.

I was walking on ice in what could only be described as this amazing landscape of ice and snow, brilliant colors of light cascading everywhere like through painted glass, with pools of water that were warm and steaming, but not hot and so clear you could see all the way to the bottom of the pools as if there wasn’t any water at all. The landscape was covered in ice and snow, and yet I was not uncomfortably cold. In fact I didn’t feel cold or hot, just clean and refreshed, unhindered and without pain.

The beauty of this place was indescribable. The colors were colors I have never seen before. Colors my subconscious could not have made up. They were… heavenly.

My dogs were there and walking with me. Shorty was going from playing in the water to bouncing at my heels and biting my feet. It puts an ache in me just writing it because in the dream there was no sense of her loss. No mourning of her death. It was not as if there’d been a happy reunion. It was as if that pain never existed. Perhaps… as if death had been wiped clean.

Nip was “supermanning” into the waters after nothing else but a tennis ball and being utterly ridiculous as usual. And I remember laughing. Laughing at the joy my children bring with every silly thing they do. I also remember I was not laughing alone. I was walking with someone. I never saw a figure, or a face. But I was absolutely not alone.

As we walked and my dogs played, we were laughing at their antics together. And I was babbling on with stories of things they’d done. Showing off their tricks. Going on and on about all sorts of things. My horses, adventures, ideas I have, my heart. Exactly like a little girl would when showing off to her dad, twirling in her finest princess dress saying ‘look at me’. And I remember feeling seen and adored. He never felt bored with me, never let on that He already knew all the things. And His laugh was the most amazing sound I have ever heard.

Why I have dreams like these I don’t know. Often waking up from them is painful. But I also know they are on purpose. I believe I was walking in Heaven last night, and laughing with the Lord.

• 

I had a really good conversation with a friend of mine recently.  We were discussing certain lifestyle choices and things.  And he pointed a very good question to me.  He said, “how do you justify (insert any number of bad habits I have) as a religious or Christian person?”  It was a very good question, and I had a simple answer.

“I don’t.” First, let me make it very clear I am not religious.  I despise religion.  It is nothing but a long list of behavior modification to do nothing but control a populous.    I do not buy into that.  And neither did Jesus, in case you were wondering.  However, I am, make no mistake a believer.  I am saved by His grace alone and I do not deny Him for one second.  With that also being said, you can be a believer and be angry with God.  You can be angry, kick and scream, flat out ignore or rebel and still believe in Him and know how real He is.  For anyone struggling I want to say to you, it’s ok.  It doesn’t make you a “bad” Christian.  On the contrary I think in the long run it will make many even stronger in their faith.

Let me let you in on a little secret.  He can take it.  He can take you being mad and angry.  He will not turn away, He will not retaliate, He will not hold a grudge.  He will never see you as anything other than precious and beloved.  I’ve held a lot of hurt and anger and fear in my heart this last year.  A lot.  I have fought with God and I have flat ignored Him for most of the year.  But in another debate, on an entirely different subject, I was quick to counter and sing His praises as TRUTH because even though I wanted nothing to do with Him, and was hanging onto my own hurt, I know better.  I know Him better and I was not about to allow Him to be misrepresented.  Not that He needs my defense.  But you can see the point I’m trying to make.  I cringe when I hear false theology being preached because when you know… you just know. 

When you are saved, life doesn’t just become wonderful and full of sunshine and roses.  It’s still life.  You still struggle, you still hurt, bull shit happens to you.  Jesus never said life would be easy.  But he did promise Grace.  Grace for when life sucks and you might not handle it as well as perhaps a daughter of a King should.  Grace for old habits and sins that are always there to swoop in at weak moments.  Cling to Him yes, but don’t kill yourself over your mistakes.  You are human, and that is the exact point of Grace. You cannot win against sin alone.  You just can’t.

I don’t speak of my faith too much because I do abhor hypocrites and I do not want to be viewed as such by so many of my friends and family.  But there is a huge difference between struggling with heartbreak, loss, sin and failure and knowing when you’re in the wrong, and being angry with God while you work things out, rather than saying yes… that is wrong, but it does not apply to me.  I truly feel there is a big difference.   But if you don’t know Jesus, and you don’t understand Grace, it is very hard to distinguish the difference.  I understand that.  So I just keep my mouth shut a lot.

I still find myself throwing my inward spiritual tantrum.  Screaming and sobbing, throwing punches at Jesus’ chest, shouting between sobs “how dare you!”.  Knowing full well this all will be for the greater good of me, and His plan will no doubt show love and grace in the end but needing to be mad at someone anyhow.  Blame someone.  And He will stand there and take it, waiting for me to exhaust myself, and then He will wrap His arms around me and still call me His.  His beloved.  A daughter of a King.   Because if He can calm a storm on the sea, surely when the time is right, He will calm the storm in my heart. 

“What kind of man is this?  Even the winds and waves obey him.” -Matthew 8:27

“What is something you are afraid of?”  I ask.

“Death.” He says.  No further explanation.  Very matter of fact.  And very final, and not dramatic at all.  I leave it alone, but it starts a chain reaction in my brain that I cannot help.  Truly, what is it we are most afraid of?  If we are honest with ourselves?  As I’ve said before, what drives people to do the things they do, live the way they do, act the way they do, is what they fear.  In some form or another I truly believe every action, if traced back to its true root, is fear based.  We are fearful, fight or flight animals after all. 

But I don’t think death is really the fear.  The act of dying?  No, I don’t think that is the fear.  We know pain, if there is any, will be short lived for the most part and there are chemical releases at the time of death that soothe the conscious brain into not existing.  That is fact.  So, the actual act of dying I don’t think many people are afraid of that.  I also believe it goes a little deeper than just the “is there life after death” question.  I think for the most part, the large majority of humanity believes very strongly in some sort of life after death.  So, if we believe, as we say we do, then there is nothing to fear.  So then why, is death the number one thing people say they are afraid of when I ask the simple question, “what is one fear you have?”.    

I don’t think we fear death.  I think we fear being forgotten. 

From the first hand print on a cave wall, we as human beings want someone to know we were here, and that some how that mattered.  We are “pack” animals, and to be alone was, from a survival standpoint, very deadly.  Our need for other people is based in survival, not love.  And we seek a partner, not for love, but security and someone to know our story.  It’s why we write, create art…. We want our story to matter.  We want someone, somewhere to remember us.  So that our time here was not in vain.  It’s almost a desperate need to have a witness to our life. 

So much so, that we will stay in bad relationships for far too long, sometimes forever… to still fill that need of someone in our life.  Someone to know, every day, our stories.  So that we don’t feel like a ghost walking the earth.  If a tree falls and no one can hear it, did it make a sound?  If I cried today, and no one knew, did my pain matter?… 

The idea that ghosts haunt the living because they have something left undone is intriguing to me.  How do you save a soul, trapped between worlds?  In short… someone, a medium… conveys their message.  They need to know they are forgiven, or they need to tell someone they loved them, or they need someone to know what really happened to them.  They need to be seen.  Remembered.  Everything we crave here.  A ghost can be trapped for eternity between worlds if no one hears them.  Lost souls… forgotten.  Even in the after life it is not death we can’t get past, it is being forgotten. 

“We need a witness to our lives.  There’s a billion people on the planet… I mean, what does any one life really mean?…You’re saying ‘Your life will not go unnoticed because I will notice it.  Your life will not go un-witnessed because I will be your witness’.” -Beverly Clark, Shall We Dance

That is what we crave.  That is what we need.  Love is secondary in this human condition.  What we fear is not death.  We fear crossing over… with a million things left to say, to explain and to share, for our true selves and what we went through to be seen.  Our greatest fear as humans, is being forgotten.  And through being forgotten, we will eventually cease to have existed at all.  I know that to me, that is a far greater fear than simply dying.

Stay Wild

-Jana Leniger

Jana Out West

10/18/2019

As I continue on this journey of my first blog series I’m finding it interesting the things that pop into my head and the abundance of topics within this single “wounds” topic that can be spoken to.  This morning, I want to talk about the importance of understanding wounds and why it is so crucial to your heart and everyone else around you to understand.  But also how to cope when the people who are closets to you, just don’t get it.

Each person has different wounds that can be caused by any number of things.  For example the would could be abandonment, caused by a father leaving as a child, a lover sneaking away in the night, an absent minded mother… the list could go on and the abandonment doesn’t need to be physical.  Abandonment has many forms and can be physical or emotional all leaving a gaping wound in our hearts.  Then the wound manifest in our day to day and all future relationships in any number of ways.  I would say the most common being anger and distance.  Key ways a person can build walls to protect her heart.  Hiding it in the tall grass.

Every single person on earth has deep rooted emotional wounds that they drag around every day.  Every single person.  Male or female, adult or child.  Because sin runs rampant in this world and none of us will get out of this place without major battle scars.  It’s completely impossible.  And no wound is less important than the other.  A woman who was physically beaten and gone through intense trauma has some pretty intense wounds.  But so does the woman who was dumped by her one true love when she was 13 because braces weren’t cool.  One woman clearly went through much more physically.  But the fact of the matter is both women will have emotional wounds they carry to the day they die and both are 100% completely VALID.  That is what you must understand about wounds.  They are all valid regardless of the circumstances.  They all leave scars on our hearts and they all effect and shape who we eventually become, thus they are all valid pains that must be acknowledged, and ultimately dealt with.

But dealing with wounds take time, patience and a deep and loving relationship with the only one that can heal those wounds.  I believe sometimes wounds can be so deep there isn’t time to heal them all before we go to heaven.  Our lives as a whole here are a work in progress and sometimes that work is finished in Heaven.  So do not be dismayed.  If you have a deep rooted wound and you and Jesus are working on it, but it doesn’t get fixed over night just because you asked Him to come into that place and begin to heal, be patient.  His timing is perfect and he WILL heal you.  But it will be a roller coaster because we are human, and we have an enemy that will derail us.  But Jesus is faithful to put us back on track, time and time again.

Living your life understanding that each and every person has these wounds allows you to see people differently.  You begin to have more grace toward them, their attitudes, their anger.  You begin to see that sometimes it’s not them spewing venom but their wounds hemorrhaging.  And if you understand this you can offer them grace and forgiveness a lot easier than before.  The horrible catch twenty two is when their wounds speak directly to tear at yours.  If you have two people who have deep abandonment issues it is hard for one to give the other grace.  Because the walls they build are identical.  Their defenses the same.  And ultimately, by nature, those defenses are the exact Achilles heel to the other persons heart.  Let me explain better.  A person who has abandonment issues will likely use anger and distance when their heart is being attacked.  They will become angry and have an inner dialogue telling them to push that other person away.  After all it’s the only way to protect their heart.  Then the person on the receiving end has the same wound…  Sees the other person pushing them away, confirming their hearts fear of being left, so they become angry and push away before the other has a chance to leave.  So you can see how this can become a deadly trap if you cannot step back and see… this is not them, this is the wound speaking.

To offer than kind of grace is hard, often painful and extraordinarily difficult.  We become so wrapped up in our own wounds we sometimes fail to see others.  Jesus has grace enough for everyone.  If you can put Him in the middle of everything His grace will cover everything.  But it is hard.  And sometimes feels impossible.  But if you open your heart to Him, he will not break it.  He will not wound you but heal you.  And in the process you will begin to see and be able to had out grace wherever you go because His grace overflows through you.

One of the deepest longings a woman has is to be heard.  I hear it over and over again from friends and feel it in my own heart so deeply I sometimes think I will break in two.  You hear people say the best relationships are friendships first and I believe it’s because if you can be friends it’s because that person hears you.  Not just the words coming out of your mouth.  You hear the morning news like that.  But hear beyond the words to the heart and what is actually being said.

We all have wounds that go deep, and trace back as far as Adam and Eve.  Men’s wounds are different than women’s’ and I cannot speak for them.  But I do know about a woman’s heart.  And although a woman is not fragile in any way, in fact she is strong in so many ways, her heart is very wounded.  That is why she protects it, hides it.  Like a deer hides her fawn who is so defenseless from the world.  She will hide her in the tall grasses and go sometimes miles away from her, knowing it is safe where she hid it from the world.  Just as a woman hides her heart and is often so far removed from it, as to keep it safe from this treacherous world.

The problem arises when a woman’s desire for relationship demands she bring her heart to the table.  She is basically a deer brining her fawn to the wolves and offering it to them, hoping they will not devour her precious thing.  Because again, a woman’s deepest desire is to be heard, seen.  The world does a really good job of telling her that she is not enough day in and day out.  She’s not pretty enough.  She’s not skinny enough.  She’s not on time, busy enough, working hard enough.  She’s not a perfect wife, mother, sister, teacher, student, athlete… you get my point.  And old wounds will continue to be brought to the table until she feels heard, because it cannot heal until it has life spoken into it.  It’s how wounds work.  It’s how insecurities work.  The world does a really good job telling her that her heart is unimportant.  And each woman feels these things in different ways due to their own personal wounds, but none of them are any less valid.  Is it any wonder she keeps her heart hidden in the tall grass?

If she brings you her heart on a platter it has taken all the courage she can summon.  She is counting on you not devouring it.  But so many times a woman can summon the courage to bring her heart to someone and they tear the wounds deeper and send her running for cover to hid her precious heart.  And it validates her reasoning to keep her heart hidden.  It solidifies her belief that it is not safe to let it be seen.  No one understands it anyway.

But a woman can never be happy living her life without her heart.  Just like the deer she always comes back to the fawn, no matter how far she has foraged that day.  It manifests in many ways depending on the wound.  Some are shut down to the world, some are angry, some are man haters, some addicts, and some put on a brave face and pretend there is nothing wrong and cry themselves to sleep.  But the world has taught her, and people reinforce to her, that the world is no place for her heart.  Eventually the world can kill the fawn if it cannot remain hidden well enough.  The doe will come back and with confusion and try and rouse her heart.  But eventually she will walk away, never to return.

There is only one truly safe place for her to bring her heart.  Only one man who will hear her, see her, cherish her heart.  Only one man who, time after time, will fight for and protect her wounded precious heart and even begin to heal it.  He has already proven his valor and love.  He has already died on a cross fighting for you.  And still, he has come back to save you.  He calls you beloved.  And he wants to hear you, he wants to see you.  And he will never devour your heart.  He will only cherish it.  He is the only safe place in this world.

 

I have come to a strong conclusion about death, dying and how it effects the human heart. And I hope this speaks to you if you are struggling right now.  Some people “handle” the aspects of death better than others.  People who are around it often.  Pastors, doctors, nurses, first responders, service members, veterinarians, shelter staff and so many more are in line to look at the complexities of death every day.  They “handle” it for the most part with logic.  Our brains can explain away a lot of emotion, through science and welfare.  Therapy helps.  Classes on how to handle compassion fatigue.  War can certainly give its own perspective on death.  But to say that these people that “handle” death so well, are not effected by it is ignorant.  Every human soul is effected by death.

Since the dawn of modern man the one thing every human on earth has tried to make sense of was death.  The very first man made alters, and looked to the sky for an explanation.  We ceremoniously bury our dead, as hunter/gatherers we gave thanks and prayed over the lives that sustained our own.  And we are not the only species that have been documented honoring our dead, grieving and mourning.  Far from it.  Death effects the heart and soul of every living thing on this planet.  But, why?  Death is a perfectly normal part of life.  Or is it?

My conclusion about death and why it is so devastating to the human heart and so many of our animal brethren is rooted in the core of my faith in Jesus Christ.  Plain and simple, we cannot come to truly understand death because point blank, our souls were never designed for it.  We were never meant to be mortal.  We were never created to experience death.  God did not create man or beast to ever die.  And because we were not created for it, there is no way we can possibly understand it.  No more than we can fathom breathing under water like a fish, can we fathom what, and why is death.  We simply were not created for it.

When God created all living things, He created them to live forever, in the garden.  It was not until that literally fatal moment of sin, did we fall to death.  So now, we are living and experiencing a thing that we will never understand.  There is tremendous hope through Jesus, that we will live again, and that our souls surely will not die.  And our sinless animal friends are more than included in His eternal kingdom.  This gives me great hope.  And the knowledge that this struggle of mourning and loss is explained through our lack of being created to handle such events does not make the loss of a loved one any easier, but at least gives us heart to overcome the day.   And knowing that the one who did create you, knows you are not equipped to handle this alone, and is always with you.  Never forsaking you, always pursuing you, feeling every pain and sadness and counting every tear.

Of course your heart will break.  Of course you cannot make sense of it.  Of course you are struggling to cope.  Of course it effected you.  Of course you are sad, lonely, confused, lost, searching, hoping, wishing, praying, begging.  It’s your soul reaching for something it cannot grasp.  We have to lean on God for this one.  Because of course we cannot understand, what we were never meant for.  If you are struggling with loss right now, I hope this speaks to your heart and perhaps gives you some peace in just knowing we aren’t supposed to be able to make sense of it.  Our minds can logic away a lot of things, but it cannot logic away our soul.  And when your soul is crying for an explanation, we have to lean on the only one who can give it when it is beyond our capabilities and understanding.  I pray you find peace and comfort in Him.  Have courage dear friends, have courage.

 

There’s a term we use a lot in the horse world to describe hobby horseman.  Weekend warriors.  They are the ones who are very seasonal, fair weathered riders who have no desire to get better or learn much.  They just want to play cowboy on the weekend.  Most are trail rider types, some team penners, gymkhana enthusiasts.  Most are middle age to retirement age.  They usually have inappropriate tack, awful boots and don’t get me started on hats.  They usually have run down old nags with spectacular names like “Trigger”, “Comanche”, “Spirit”.  Or the other extreme with horses that are green beyond imagination that have no business being paired with an inexperienced rider and usually have super tame names like, “Copper” and “Fred”.  If you’ve been around horses at all, you know exactly who I’m talking about.

Now if you are a weekend warrior, do it up.  Enjoy your life and enjoy your horse.  But those of us who consider ourselves serious equestrians will always shake our heads when we see you ride by.  Mainly because what you are doing is exactly what a hobby is and what 99% of riders get lumped into.  The majority of the population see riding as a hobby.  But for serious equestrians it is anything but.    The time, training, blood, sweat, tears, pride, devotion, falls, injuries all add up to a complete addiction to the sport.  Is it fun? Oh yes.  Is it a hobby?  No.  So we look at weekend warriors with a sense of disdain because they give us a “bad name” by lumping all riders into a hobby, instead of a sport.

Even when a rider is not competing, if it is a rider that is here for sport, the heart of why they are riding is far from a simple hobby.  You see that by the way the bridles are hung.  The way the barn is swept, the stalls clean, horses groomed.  A rider may not be in a place in their life where competing is an option, but there will always be a distinct difference between a weekend warrior and an equestrian.  And in their heart they know it’s not a hobby.  It goes far deeper than that and always will.

I’ve been thinking a lot about God lately.  I feel Him pressing me, that now is the time to pursue our relationship further.  And it dawned on me that there are weekend God warriors.  And the more I thought about it the more the parallel rang true.  We all know them, as well.  They say they believe in God, but they never talk about Him.  They say they’re Christians but they never go to church, or even try (I know a lot of people are forced to work on Sundays, this is not directed at you).  But they seem to make it to a Christmas or Easter service once in a while, will graciously bow their head at sporting events when a prayer is said.  And yet they still use His name in vain, watch porn, get belligerent drunk, spew hate to their loved ones.  But as much as that breaks God’s heart what they don’t do that hurts him the worst… not trying.  Not trying to get better, not trying to build the relationship.

These Christians are just like the weekend warrior cowboys.  They are totally happy doing what they are doing, seeing nothing wrong with how they go about things and have no desire to learn or get better, much less put in any extra work it may take.  After all, they know enough to get on the horse and go down the trail, what else could possibly be worth learning?  We all know someone like this.  I’ve been this person most of my Christian walk.  Although I feel like I have a better relationship with God than most, I still would consider myself a weekend warrior Christian.  There are things in my life, questions really, I’ve been too scared to ask, so instead of continuing to pursue God for answers, I stay here, where I know some answers.  Enough answers.  Enough to get me by, help me through tough things, but not enough to ever be fully at peace.

But here is what is so awesome about God.  Even when you don’t pursue Him, he will still pursue you.  Weather you want the relationship or not, you’re still never alone.  Because He really does have a genuine love and interest in you.  And when you open your heart the tiniest bit, He will flood you with His love.  And you become intrigued.  Kind of like when a weekend warrior picks up on something a fellow rider says and sees it works.  He becomes ever so slightly  interested.  If he stays open to it, the next thing you know, he’s going to clinics, buying new tack, taking lessons, throwing out the tomb thumb for an o-ring.  He’s learning now.  And as he learns his passion for it grows.  He may never become a horseman.  But after he puts in the time he certainly graduates to equestrian.  He gets it now.

I watched a sermon the other day online and for the first time I was actually able to decipher that, no, what this man was preaching was not of God.  And it was subtle, nothing obvious that anyone with basic knowledge would have picked up on.  You would have had to have read pieces of the bible yourself, been mentored to an extent by other Christians, gone to more than Christmas and Easter services.  And I noticed.  This was a huge eye opener for me that contrary to what I have felt, the last several years I have been learning, my interest has been peaked and although life, bad pastors and experiences and work have kept me on a short spiritual leash I have been learning, regardless.  I don’t want to be a weekend warrior Christian.  I know enough about God, to know that it gets so much cooler the more you know.  Just like horses.  I never wanted to just go down the trail.  I wanted to train, compete, teach, be the athlete.  No, a weekend warrior is not enough anymore.  Christmas and Easter are not enough.  I need to show up, put in the work, become hopelessly addicted.  I want to be the athlete for God.  And the more I pursue Him the more He will pursue me.  To become an equestrian it starts with the basics.  Take lessons, read, watch, ride as much as you can.  To truly become a Christian also starts with the basics.  Say yes to Jesus, go to church, read your bible, pray as much as you can.