(By Ryan)
If you have been following our blog, you will know that we have been on a journey of discovery. While the journey can sometimes feel tidy and relatively short when you view it through the lens of blog posts, the reality is that at times it has felt LONG! The desire and openness to live life a little differently and be more intentional in our decisions but not knowing in practical terms what that looks like has been frustrating and infuriating at times.
As people of faith, Laura and I have had many conversations expressing our pure desire to be used by God how He wants to use us but then feeling like our openness and seeking was being met with silence.
In moments of greater clarity, I know logically that the journey is just as important as the destination. But if I am honest, I enjoy a journey the most after I have arrived at my destination. As a funny side-note, I was on a road trip once with a girlfriend driving her back to California after our University year was done. A pivotal moment in our discussions on that road-trip was her shock that I didn’t particularly like road-trips. After driving for many, many hours, we arrived in California and the next day we toured through San Francisco with a bunch of her friends. She decided that sight-seeing with a group of people I didn’t really know would make for a good time to dump me. Nice! So that cut my time in California short and I drove all the way back to B.C. I definitely did not like road-trips after that!!
Back to my point…the idea of embracing the journey does not necessarily come naturally to me.
In many ways, as a “highly sensitive”* person I like to feel in control of my surroundings. I can easily get overwhelmed with unknowns, surprises, and the emotions of others. Yet if I am truly open to God leading us in a direction that He wants, I need to become more comfortable with giving up control.
*From the book “The Highly Sensitive Person” by Dr. Elaine Aron – “a Highly Sensitive Person has a sensitive nervous system, is aware of subtleties in his/her surroundings, and is more easily overwhelmed when in a highly stimulating environment.”
The theme of simplifying our life to be more in line with the values that we have set-out as a family has been one of the driving forces of all the decisions we have been making. Decisions to purge and physically simplify possessions, sell our house and downsize, do Christmas differently and move away from the gift giving and all of the stresses that brings.
We want to embrace the fact that life is not just happening TO us but that we have decisions that we make every day that can move us closer to living a life that outwardly demonstrates the inner values we hold.
As Laura wrote about, selling our house was one of the biggest decisions we have made to date and it took us a long time to come to that decision. But after we made the decision, I wanted things to happen fast.
4 months, 25+ showings of our house, 25+ times of cleaning the house to perfection, and countless times of getting the kids out of the house and finding something to do during the showing, and our house is STILL FOR SALE! The concept of “the journey being as important as the destination” is something that I need to embrace more than ever because this dang journey is proving to be a cross-Canada trip!
One evening a few weeks back Laura and I were talking about things with the house and the frustration level was particularly high. We talked about trying to not focus too far down the line but taking things one step at a time, trusting that just like we have been slowly lead to where we are at now, selling of our house is the next step in a journey of many. Laura in particular was really frustrated, feeling like we weren’t doing anything, and talked about feeling an itch to do something meaningful, travelling and helping people, doing something more tangible. There was a feeling of agitation and unease in the room so thick you could taste it. We spent some time talking and praying and left it at that.
The next day, in a Facebook conversation with people that we had just been introduced to on Vine (the app where we create the crazy 6 second videos), we heard a little snippet of their life story which included time in Thailand/Burma working with YWAM. We shared with them a bit about our story and what we do in real life (vs Vine life). They said that we should all go to Thailand together next Fall. I said pardon? (at least I did in my mind) They said that there is a ton of work to be done there – working with families and children who are extremely vulnerable to human trafficking because of no documentation, a medical clinic that helps a variety of people including women in childbirth.
It was all seeming pretty crazy. Just the night before we had been talking and praying about having the confidence to take things one step at a time and trust that the journey will continue after our move and that the next steps will surface when the timing is right. While time will only tell whether this particular possibility materializes, it was an amazing sign of encouragement that there are surprises and possibilities in our future that we can’t imagine right now. It was validation that we don’t need to know the full story.
One of the books that has influenced us this past year has been “Love Does” by Bob Goff. He is someone who embraces each opportunity that comes his way, and by saying “yes”, he makes amazing connections with the people around him. By simplifying our life, we are starting to create more space to say “yes” to the things that come our way and it feels great!
Life IS about the journey and I am slowly learning to embrace it!
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