Like putty in your hands...

I guess it's no surprise that I've been going through some stuff. Like, pretty legit stuff.

But I am blessed enough to have family and friends who insist upon being there for me. I say "insist" because I am one of those idiots who has to be coerced to love on. I used to just curl up in a ball, take a day or two to be an utter disaster, then pull up the ol' big girl panties and move on. But I don't really think that will work in this scenario. Trust me: I've tried.

I am an absolutely believer in people and experiences shaping who we are. And yes, it tends to be true that the really awful, garbage situations are the ones that end up having the most impact. So boo on that. And yet, I've kind of surrendered to the shaping that is taking place for me as of late.

For starters, I find that I am completely wrapped up in my own little life. I hate that. I'm usually mildly thoughtful and try to remember all the (big and/or little) things going on in friends lives. (Side note: I worked with this psychologist while I was a health educator at the teen sex clinic--which isn't actually as sketchy as it sounds--and she used to make notes in her date book about goings-ons in each of the staff's lives so that she could remember to ask about it. "Hey, Natalie, how did the AP Bio test go? Did that guy ever ask you out?" The answers: aced it, and no. Per usual. Even if I felt slightly duped when I found out that she was "cheating" by writing down notes to facilitate her thoughtfulness, it was still such an awesome little picker-upper to know that someone cared enough about my mundane crap to follow up. And so I attempted to pay it forward by implementing such thoughtfulness into my own life. If I could find a pen.) But are my friends/family members complaining about my egocentrism? Nope. They just smile, catch me up, and feed me treats. For what more could I ask?

There is also a lot going on in terms of sculpting my heart. Not like I've been doing cardiac crunches or anything. That'd be weird. But I'm finally learning how to share my life with people, truly. As I mentioned before, I'm an idiot and don't find this comes naturally. I've been criticized by past loves (read: disasters) for not allowing my walls to come down fully. (To which I could have fairly replied that I would be much obliged to pull a few bricks out of said wall and chuck them with great force at him. But I've got a sneaking suspicion that is not what dude had in mind.) Despite the heartache and frustration at still being single with nary a flicker on the horizon, I know that I will not be the kind of wife and partner I want to be without having reached the stage I'm at (and will continue to progress through).

I've been keeping "Your Love is a Song" on steady rotation as of late. Partially because of my fairly recent obsession with Jon Foreman. Partially because it speaks to how I view my relationship with God: He knows I'm a "show me" kind of person, and He responds in kind. Always. Given the way things have played out as of late, I feel now, more than ever, that life is an intricate, gorgeously orchestrated symphony of sorts. Thing just work out too poetically for them to be anything but remarkably planned and intentional.

Maybe it's just me. But I'll take it.