As I sit here writing this blog, it’s been 6 weeks since MY plans of going on The World Race this August were changed and I was sent home from Training Camp… notice how I said MY plans and not The Father’s plans, he knew all along that I was only going to be at Training Camp for 4 days and be sent home the morning of the 5th day.
6 weeks ago began what I saw as the biggest heartbreak in the World. I had been accepted to The World Race almost 1 year ago and had been thinking/praying about it for about 1 year before that, so The World Race wasn’t just something I had been looking forward to for a few months it had been on my mind/heart for almost two years, and suddenly having it be taken away was so incredibly hard to deal with and process.
I’m not going to lie here, when I was told that it had been decided that I wasn’t ready to leave on The World Race and was being sent home (in just a few hours) I immediately shut down and didn’t really pay attention to what was said after that… because what else was there to do when the one thing that you were looking forward to, and was probably the one thing keeping you together after another heartbreak just a month and a half before (read about that here), is “gone” in the blink of an eye? And yes I know I could’ve chosen to stay present and remain where I was, but I honestly felt like I had just been hit by a really big train and couldn’t focus on anything that was being said to me in that moment. I will be forever grateful for the time I spent at Training Camp, because without that time, I wouldn’t have learned what I did or grew as much as I did.
The past 6 weeks have been filled with LOTS and LOTS of tears, and if I’m being honest about the past 6 weeks I probably didn’t really begin to process all of what happened to me at Camp until the past week or so (who really wants to go back to the thing that hurt them the most????) but I feel like I am now truly beginning to process and work through what was revealed to me at Camp.
I was looking back through my journal on what each session was about at Camp, and I came across one that inspired the name of this blog. In that session we talked about Pain (I was going to originally title this blog Hope in the Pain)…. Here are just a few of the notes I jotted down during that session and my thoughts on how they either relate to my time at Camp or now
- I can’t control what happens to me, but I can control how I respond – this stood out to me, because the day before after out fitness hike I was talking to Stacy (one of my trainers) and she said that I should spend some time with The Father asking him how I could RESPOND instead of reacting to situations.
- If I want to set people free, I need to be free myself… I can’t give what I don’t have/understand – during Camp I realized that I wasn’t free from some things in my past and before I can go on The Race to set others free and help them realize the Father’s love for them, I first need to realize his love for me and allow him come into the deepest parts of my heart and heal them.
- Pain can connect me to God in a way that nothing else can – these past 6 weeks have been filled with a lot of pain and I can honestly say that I am truly beginning to feel connected to The Father in way that I haven’t felt before.
- When I run away from pain, it doesn’t go away it just gets pushed deeper down and I don’t actually deal with it – I have spent so many years doing this and when has it ever done any good you may ask… my answer would be NEVER!! So in this new season I am choosing to press in The Father and what he has for me.
- Pain and emotions are part of my story – #truth without the pain I have been through in the past 3 months, I wouldn’t be where I am and growing in my faith and relationship with The Father like I am.
It was about a week and half after being sent home from Camp that I messaged Courtney (one of my trainers) about how my emotions were still all over the place and I never knew when the tears were going to come, and what she said reminded me of the session on Pain at Camp… she said “Yeah girl … It’s okay to cry, it’s okay to sit in the tears and invite Jesus there too– keep sitting with him and you’ll know what you should do!” that afternoon I was on Pinterest and found this
… talk about God speaking to me.
Each week I talk with my Squad Coach Ruanne and last week she asked me if there were any areas that I needed to forgive her/The World Race/God for not being able to launch in August… and yes there are areas where I need to forgive one or more of these people (I’m not going to go into the details of what I need to forgive, because this is not the place) and it’s hard to forgive when you feel like this is where you were supposed to be, but I know that if I don’t forgive for what happened, I wont be able to grow his Kingdom and growing his kingdom is so important to me.
Here are 3 steps to something (haha I didn’t write down what these steps were for, but they were talked about in the session on Pain)
- Acknowledge my emotions
– Give myself the space to process
– Don’t run to quick fixes
- Bring it to God with full disclosure
– Don’t hold back
– Let it be a dialogue NOT a monologue
– Go to the root of my emotions (something that was talked about A LOT at Camp)
– I cant fix it myself (believe me when I say I have tried this so many times and it NEVER works)
- Open up to community
– Let others into my journey
About a month ago I talked with the Interview Manager for Adventures and she was able to answer the questions that I needed/wanted answered so I could begin to process and move forward in this new season of healing and preparing for my new World Race route. It was during this conversation that I found out when I will be able to launch, what happens to the money I already raised (read about those answers here), and a few others. It was after this conversation that I truly began to feel some hope in this situation (hence the title of this blog) and things began to truly look up for me, because I was now able to have concrete answers when people asked me those questions, because up until that conversation all I was able to tell people was that I wasn’t launching in August and I didn’t know anything about when I could launch… and if you know me, you know that I HATE not having the answers!!
Another way I know that I am growing and healing, is because after I had been home for a couple weeks I was looking on the Adventures website at some of their short term mission trips and came across one in Gainesville with Beauty For Ashes (the women’s ministry at Adventures) and I thought to myself “this could be the trip that I need to go on to help me heal and process more of what happened at Camp” so I clicked on the link to apply and started the application, but didn’t finish it. About a week or so after that I got an e-mail from someone associated with the trip that contained details about what we would be doing and if we wanted to go we needed to let her know soon, because there is a maximum of 12 people allowed. So I e-mailed her back and said I was definitely interested and really wanted to go, but that I was just trying to figure out how to pay the application fee… then about 6 hours later I e-mailed her back saying that I had spent some more time in prayer and with The Father, and had come to the conclusion that I just wasn’t ready (I’m only 1 month post being sent home from Camp and 4 months post by the time of the trip) because I hadn’t truly had the chance to walk through and get the necessary healing from the things that were revealed to me at Camp, but I was hoping there would be another trip before my new Race, because I did feel like this would be a great trip for me it was just not the right timing… and this was her response
I am looking forward and nervous at the same time to see what the next 18 months hold for me as I prepare for World Race launch in January 2018!! Side note here… I will be able to apply for a January 2018 route once January 2017 routes launch and they release January 2018 routes, so just 6 months until I can let everyone know the countries I will be traveling to and serving in while on The World Race!!!!!!
#WorldRace #11n11 #January2018
