Letting Go.

“Miss Timia, I have something to show you.” I hear the small voice before I can see her. I squint, the sun intense and much to warm for my liking. Her little hands reach up to clasp mine, in them is a wilted dandelion that has obviously seen better days. She looks up at me, her eyes full of wonder and hope, “ look, isn’t it pretty! I am going to give it sunshine and water and it is going to turn into a beautiful yellow flower. I can’t wait.” Before I can say a word, she grabs the flower and scampers off to play; the bright sun beating down doesn’t seem to damper her enthusiasm.

I am left standing there, hands empty and heart conflicted. How beautiful is her faith and anticipation that her small and lifeless flower will grow and bloom as it shows off its beauty to the world. Yet her sweet little heart is unaware of the reality to come and that her dandelion has already passed its peak and will never bloom again.

My heart begins to break, for I am just like her, so often the one who refuses to let go. Stubborn in my ability to hold onto past seasons or regrets, convinced that beauty will come from things that have clearly passed their prime time to thrive.

We so often grasp things tightly, unwilling to let go of the things we want, unable to fully surrender. Hearts slowly fading into darkness, broken pieces of a purpose that have been claimed by complacency and worldly desires. Forgotten, abandoned and used we find our hearts have stopped fighting. For what is the point in showing up to war when our hands can’t muster the strength to hold the weapons that will assure the victory. Sometimes I think the biggest battle is found in awakening ourselves from the haze of depression that has created scars across the very core of who we are.

For when did the battle become bigger then the very one that breathed our hearts into existence. It seems that our hearts have often become entangled in the routine hands of the clock as it slowly dictates our purpose and sets the tone for the song our hearts beat to.

Yet what if we began to learn to let go and to allow Gods freedom to truly invade every piece of our hearts. For beauty cannot thrive in soil that is rocky and stale. Our hearts crave freedom and we long for peace, yet we choose to hold on tightly to the very things that chain us to the ground. We dance cautiously, afraid to fully step into our purpose because we feel inadequate and insignificant.

The beautiful thing though about God is that he never asks us to let go if he doesn’t have something even better to give us in return. He so often sits there ready to give us a whole bouquet of beautiful wildflowers, but yet we sit there refusing to let go of our one wilting dandelion.

Letting go is scary; it is admitting that we can’t control the situation and it is choosing to trust that his love is always enough.

I’ll be honest; lately I have been feeling a little stuck. My heart longs to be free of this mundane day-to-day routine. I often find myself reminiscing; missing the days where boarding a plane was the consistency my heart had learned to love. I miss the freedom of no structure and these past six months I have so often struggled to find joy in having a Monday-Friday job that doesn’t always feel glamorous and fulfilling. Sometimes I find myself questioning my decision to stay because I feel that I can never quite silence the cries of the kids that know violence instead of love.

Yet that one small moment at work was Gods way of gently telling me to let go. To let go of my entitlement, my stubbornness and the thoughts of how I want my life to turn out. It is time to stop dwelling on the past adventures and seasons of life that so starkly contrast the one I am currently in.

For there is an invitation to growth that I think we so often overlook. The invitation to be disciplined and to walk in humility. The invitation to let go and to walk forward in love. Growth wont always be visible in big blooming flowers, sometimes it is the days spent watering a field of seeds even when you don’t see the victory. In the same way that freedom takes time to develop roots, letting go is a process that takes time.

We live in a world that is so often harsh and relentless in its pursuit of stealing our passions and dreams. The reality is that usually we don’t put up a fight; we let complacency and the clock ticking slowly cause our heartbeats to fade into darkness.

Yet it is time to let go, to awaken from the slumber that has been slowly suffocating us and causing us to live half-heartedly. For being half hearted is choosing to take small breaths of stale and purposeless air. To let go is to choose to grow and to seek love rather then settling for being comfortable.