and I believe him

Turns out, I’m not very good at this blog thing. I kind of even forgot I had a blog for like, two months. The good news is, I remembered, and I’m here, and I have a lot to say.

Sooo…. I’m moving to Australia! 

The scoop: In a short 54 days, I will hop on a plane at LAX with a dream and a cardigan. {I couldn’t resist}. I will embark on an adventure that I can’t, and won’t even try to predict. I will be working with an organization called YWAM (youth with a mission) in Perth. It is a group of people scattered around the world whose purpose is to know God and make Him known. I will be there for six months for certain, during which I will also travel to Europe and Asia (Gah!!) and will get love on people in three continents! After six months, a few things can happen: I can come back to America, changed and charged to live whatever exciting next step waits for me here, I can join the YWAM staff, or I could start training in their midwifery/birth attendant program. The idea of using my medical skills and my passion for childbirth and obstetrics in places those things don’t exist just makes me want to cry! To have the chance to love people in that way…just, wow. But I’m getting ahead of myself here.

This is big, right? Huge. When I tell people, after the initial, “You are freaking crazy!” response that I’ve grown accustomed to, they usually joke around about how hot Australian men are (and I ain’t one to argue), or they suggest I “put another shrimp on the barbie!” But when the jokes have passed, the question I get asked the most is “Aren’t you scared?”

I can honestly say that I am not afraid. I suppose I should be, but in my soul is a crazy peace that prompts me forward, almost without trying. I am not afraid because, for the first time in years, I have made a decision that is not based solely on what I want, but what I feel I am called to. I am not afraid because I serve a big God who tells me not to be. He tells me he will never leave me, and I believe him. So, I’m leaving my fears behind me. They aren’t invited on this journey (and let’s be honest, there’s no place for them in my luggage). So that’s that.

I will leave it at this today. Short and simple. Both characteristics of this beautiful life. I want my short time on this planet to be spent living. Truly living. I want to be alive, and not just the heart pumping, oxygen exchanging kind of alive. e. e. cummings said “unbeing dead isn’t being alive.” I want to stop fighting my heart, I want to love people with everything I have, I want to eat weird foods, I want to climb mountains, I want everything I do in this life to honor a God that loved me first. When life asks me to dance, I want to always say yes. And when I die, I want to be remembered as someone who lived a wide open and fearless life.

If life is asking you to dance, say yes! Start living right now; it doesn’t have to be grand. Move to Italy, love your babies bigger, or try a new recipe tonight. Wear your hair in pigtails, because you like pigtails, go back to school, jump out of a plane, my goodness, take a bubble bath! Be brave and live with conviction. If you are afraid, leave it behind. Fear is a lie, friends. Fear holds us back, and life is just way to beautiful for that.