There's Something About People Believing in You.

"What was your favorite thing about school this year?" My teachers, slash, pastors, slash, friends asked me this on Thursday as we completed our last day of second year.

For a second I was just lost for words. Normally I can pin point exactly what I want to say, or at least take a minute to figure it out.

I think this time my problem was that I couldn't pick just one thing.

One, I didn't really want to think of anything because I didn't want to admit that it was over. Two, I loved almost everything about school.

Sure, there were some hard times, and things happened that at the time felt like everything was falling apart. Looking back now I can see God's hand in every single thing that happened this year.

I am stronger. I am wiser. I am definitely more confident. I was challenged in so many ways, and God gave me the strength to power through.

I am more passionate. I am filled with hope for my future.

I am finally letting creativity have my time.

I am dreaming bigger. I am dreaming out of the box. And I am doing.

A couple of weeks ago, we had a Lighthouse core team meeting. There Jamie shared his heart about "The Living Room," a new feel for the ministry building. He mentioned wanting to make these big burlap canvasses with all the Lighthouse countries on them and the city that it's in.

Immediately I started dreaming. You see Jamie had shown our class how to make stencils for spray painting and from the very moment I pulled my first stencil off of my canvas and saw a beautiful picture, I wanted to keep doing it.

After the meeting ended I went straight up to him and asked if I could do it.

Weeks later, three hours of cutting stencils, stapling and removing staples from the stencils, inhaling spray paint fumes for a couple of hours and I was done.

Nine countries were laid out before me on beautiful burlap canvasses. Nine places that I know if I were to go there at some point I would be welcomed as family. Nine Lighthouses that are standing tall and strong, encouraging people and welcoming people into their homes just as they are. Amazing leaders who choose to believe in the people who enter their doors, just as Jamie and Natalie believed in me.

You see, I was actually astounded at the fact that Jamie immediately told me to go for it. Both him and Natalie encouraging along the way, telling me what looked amazing and how awesome it was. THAT was the reason in the end it felt like one of my biggest accomplishments. Not because I thought I couldn't do it, but because of them, I knew that I could do it the whole way through.

So my second year is over. Second year is over and I don't know what is next for me. But for the first time in forever, I'm not scared.

I'm not scared of the unknown, and I'm also not scared of what's going to happen to me.

I'm hopeful. I'm excited for new beginnings and new things brewing.

I'm excited to dream, and do, and be.

I'm excited to go out and fight for what I want because I am believed in.

My friends believe in me, my pastors believe in me, and most of all God believes in me.

Life Is More Than What I Have Accomplished

Today was rough. I'm not even gonna say that life is great. Life has been tough.

The past couple of days I have had a couple of realizations.

And the weight of those realizations was crushing.

In school today we had the chance to talk about said realizations. About the things that make us feel alive. About the things that I haven't necessarily been doing.

I have dreams. I have passions and desires to do things that I love doing.

But to be honest. I've just barely been surviving.

We went through a whole conversation about past events that could have led me here to this place. This place where I doubt everything I do. This place where I feel uncomfortable in my own skin. Where I can't remember the last time I wrote a song. To this place where I feel like all I'm doing is what is asked of me, instead of what I want.

Once we had finished this conversation, it was as if my chest was ripped open and my heart was exposed. And I laid on the sanctuary floor with my chest open crying out to my God. Crying out for help and crying out for some explanation as to why I was crying so uncontrollably.

I couldn't breathe. I was trying to worship but all I could do was curl up into a ball and lay there, right in front of where I stand on occasion and lead worship. I had tried to sing through the tears, but it made it worse and I began hyperventilating.

Completely alone on the floor, I reached out my hands for something. I reached out for hope maybe. Or maybe something that felt like more. Maybe something that was similar to joy. Something I have been lacking for a while.

Natalie told me to text if I wasn't okay. And I desperately wanted to. But I also desperately wanted to be okay. I desperately wanted to seem as though I was strong. Because I am, and I should always be, right?

Today was a relatively good day too. I got to see the dog I took back to the shelter with his new owner. I got to hangout with good friends and eat amazing Mexican food and watch trashy television.

Then I walked into class and it seemed like the flood gates were opened and I couldn't stop.

I feel okay now. I feel very drained, but overall okay.

I have carried around this expectation of myself. That I need to be exactly who I was. I need to have the same consistency with writing songs that I did in high school.

But a wonderful friend so graciously told me today that I don't need to. I can let my focus slip to other things that matter to me. I can paint and take pictures. I can draw and make bracelets. I can write on my blog and I can write in my journal. I can do whatever I want. Because whatever it is, I am creating.

I am a creative.

I love to write, and sing, and be.

I care about people and love crafting relationships out of thin air.

I love creating things that mean the world to me.

I love learning new things.

So as I sit here internally processing, and then externally processing to you all.

I have the realization that it honestly doesn't matter what I do. If I do it with love.

So music doesn't have to be the end all be all.

Creating does. Being in relationship does.

As long as I am doing what God created me to do, then I am doing what I want to do.

As I have this revelation, a quote from my favorite band comes to mind:

"I have come to the realization that life is more than what I have accomplished and life is more than the realization that we have accomplished nothing at all..."