the pendulum between grace and determination

A few days ago I posted about my thoughts about New Years resolutions.  I expressed how I was hesitant to make any resolutions because I didn't want to take my focus off of God, his strength + his plan and put it on myself and my own grand plan for my life.

A little back story -- If you've been reading my thoughts and notes here for a little while, you probably can gather that I struggle with being a Type-A planner and perfectionist.  2012 was a huge year for me.  A lot of amazingly, beautiful + God orchestrated things happened in my life that led me to a place where I was faced with the decision to either deal with my perspective on life or to be perpetually unhappy and exhausted with myself and my expectations.  Of course, this is something that I will always carry along with me because I'm human, but there was definitely a healing process and a perspective shift that I had to go through.  I realized I needed to actually accept God's grace instead of just understand it.  I also needed to offer myself grace.  {{side bar: Influence (the women I met, the speakers, the Word that was shared, the community, etc.) was a catalyst for all of my thoughts about this. I can't say enough about the community. Simply amazing.}}

Ok, back to the point.  I couldn't get the thoughts about 2013 that I wrote about out of my head after I hit publish.  I thought about them in bed at night, when I woke up in the morning, in the shower.  Finally, I realized I needed to really sit down and pray about it.  I put the babe to bed last night and sat cross legged on the floor with my journal and bible ready to just be.  I felt like I was in the tension of wanting to be gentle on myself, but also feeling inspired and wanting to move forward with life.

I realized by trying to protect myself from expectations and perfectionism, I essentially was paralyzing myself from committing to anything.  I was living in a state of not really owning anything.  I definitely think there are times in our lives where we need to turn our brains off and accept rest and space from God in order to heal and restore ourselves.  I think I needed that for a few months.  But, now I want to actively love and live my life fully and freely as God intends and moves through me.

I now realize that commitment is needed.  I can't live on the fence while trying to protect myself from failure, mistakes, hurt.  God intended me to accept rest for awhile, but now I'm just paralyzed by fear.  My fear of failure.  Fear of unknown.

I realized I was so paralyzed and protected that I wasn't allowing God in to show me his purpose for me.  I was seeing His beauty, but I wasn't experiencing it.  

This is such a sensitive tension in life... the pendulum between offering yourself grace, but also being determined and setting goals.  I know one thing for sure, I want to life, breathe, feel, + fully experience God's beauty and plan.  I want Him to move me with what ever he intends.  And, He can't do that if I'm  paralyzed.