Cultivate

Let’s debunk some myths Too often, people think love and consequences cannot coexist. If you love someone and if you have forgiven them, then you will forego the consequences. Or put another way, if we allow someone to experience the consequences of their actions, if we hold them accountable, then we are not being loving. There is nothing further from the truth. ... You can love someone and there can still be consequences that must be faced. You can forgive someone and there can still be consequences that must be experienced. Love and forgiveness can absolutely exist alongside consequences. And reconciliation is impossible without the combination of acknowledgment, amends, consequences, and forgiveness. When we don’t allow someone to experience the consequences of their actions, we are enabling their behavior. Here's another way to think about this- , there are always consequences for actions. If you do not allow someone to experience consequences, do you know who ends living consequence? You! You bear the consequences when you rescue someone from their consequences. This is not the way you build healthy, safe, life giving relationships. Holding someone accountable and letting them experience the consequences of their actions is a critical step in repairing and rebuilding trust and safety in a relationship.

Today we honor Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.'s life and legacy. His words were spoken decades ago but are so incredibly relevant and needed today.

All are invited. All are welcome. Those who are easy to love. Those who are hard to love. Those who are patient beyond measure and those who are short tempered. ... Those who are givers and those who are takers. Those who are victims and those who are victimizers. This is the Truth of Grace. This is the mystery of Grace. This is the depth, width, and breadth of God's love. God is the father who has run out into the road to greet the prodigal son. The question is not does God love me or who is God's love for. The question is: Will I receive God's love and let that love penetrate and change my soul, my mind, and my actions?

Do you heal all at once or bit by bit? (To steal a line from The Velveteen Rabbit) Healing takes time because we heal in layers. We heal what is ready to be healed. There is no timeline for healing. There is no expiration date on hurt. No one can tell you how long. You heal when you heal. ... Which means that years later, you may have a resurgence of hurt around something. That doesn’t mean the hurt wasn’t healed. It means that your soul is READY FOR MORE healing. It means that your soul is ready to dig deeper and your soul is going to use the alarm system of pain to ask you to stop and heal some more. You cannot control how long it takes to heal, but you CAN control how intentionally you work at healing, but Healing means we don’t have to be who we were or what happened to us. We don’t have to be in the relationships we were in. We don’t have to act the way we did. We don’t have to feel the way we did. We don’t have to stay in the pit of loss. We don’t have to keep reacting the same way. We can be different. We can grow. We can be set free from that old hurt.

Two thoughts on this quote: In a season that continues to be wildly out of our control, it is normal to point to all the things and people that we think need to change and be different. But in this year where it feels impossible to make plans because you don't know what your external life is going to look like six weeks, six months from now, you can STILL GROW. Friends, dedicate this year to your internal growth. Dedicate this year to your emotional, mental, and spiritu...al health and grow. None of us know how what is going to happen with COVID or if/when our country will be able to heal from the trauma it has experienced, but we can work everyday to heal ourselves. We can invest everyday in our own growth so that when this season is over, we are wiser, bolder, and more firmly rooted and established in Truth and Love. That was the first thought. Here's the second... We want to be change agents in this world. We want to notice pain and go help those who are struggling. We want to notice injustice and suffering and shine light and awareness. We want to give more than we take. But we cannot effectively do this unless we clean up our side of the yard. Does that mean you need to be perfect and have it all figured out before you can serve others, help others, lead change in your community? No, absolutely not. But it does mean that we can only lead people as far as we have gone in our own personal work. We can only model for others what is our own heart. We can only use our voice for so long before we burn out if we are not self-aware and continuously working on our own struggles and healing. Personal growth and change can take place under any circumstances. Invest in yourself, friends. Give yourself the gift of more joy, more courage, more freedom. Give yourself the gift of healing.