New weekly feature: Uncaged Roundup

Nov 4, 2012Archive

On Sundays, I’ll feature the best blog posts and Internetty things on this space, a roundup of words that best exemplify living an uncaged life. I’ll start with a link, then an excerpt from the post to taunt you (in a cool way).

Here are this week’s samplings:

A Letter to Hidden Survivors by Elora Nicole. (about being brave enough to tell)

According to recent statistics, there are 39 million of us walking around the US with wounded souls.

We look just like everyone else, minus the crippled heart. We mask ourselves in anger and perfection, and fear intimacy with a vengeance. And although we may talk a good game about trust, it’s really a four-letter word we avoid.

Most of us live in silence. Though we are large in number, few of us will ever say a word about the darkest secrets lurking around the corner of our memory.

For me, the telling proved more difficult than the remembering.

___________

“I made the Call” by Mike Paschall (about a call he made to a widower a year later, asking marriage advice.)

Then the intensity changed.  He said, “Touch her.  Pull her to you.  Grab her hand.  Touch her hair.  Rub her shoulders.  Don’t paw her because you want something from her.  Enjoy the fact that she is right there within your reach.  Smell her hair.  Notice her lines.  Touch her because you can.  That is what I miss.  That is the stuff that keeps me awake at night.  I miss touching and talking to my friend.”

__________

And So We Are Carried Along by Amanda (about the umpteen stresses of dealing with financial overstress, ill parents, and overwhelming circumstances)

The last year had been wrought with blessing and struggle. We’d lost two houses, gained two babies and quit one job in a few turns of the calendar, and we were fighting to make payments on this life we’d built together. This beautiful, chaotic, full life in this beautiful, creaky, old house – we loved it, every ounce. We trusted all would be well, and for now trusting meant taking what we wished we didn’t need.

The items were all scanned and Edward repeated the total, and I swiped the blue card through the machine. Swipe it again, he asked, and so I did. He looked up and gave an sympathetic half-smile and I knew the charge hadn’t gone through.

__________

When You Need a Steady Stream of Confidence Today by Kristen (about feeling small among other women)

So when on this occasion I find myself in a room full of women who aren’t just good but excellent at what they do, I am overwhelmed by my own smallness.

I slowly open the bathroom door and see kind faces wrapped in concern. I smile weakly and somehow the words just tumble out,

“I don’t belong here. I’m just not good enough.” 

Arms from Ann, Lisa-Jo, and Holley find themselves around me as well as kind words and prayers that give me fresh perspective of who I am in Christ. But I’m not gonna lie: It is a fight to keep my confidence.

 

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