Because I have been so busy getting the new line out I have not had a chance to share with you about Brave Girl Camp.
If you have been following my blog for awhile you know that I went to BGC a year ago and what an amazing impact it had on me.
You can read about last year here, here and here.
About six months ago two of my friends asked me if I would join them at BGC. I agreed. As the time was coming closer one of them had to back out. When it was about a month away I was regretting signing up again. I have had many trips this year and just didn't want to leave my family again...and the biggest reason was because I HAD DONE THIS ALREADY. I was worried that an experience that had been so amazing could be tainted by doing it again.
When I finally bought my plane ticket and I received the email full of all the other girls coming.....I cried.
I cried looking at their photos and hearing their stories.
I cried because many of the staff are people I love DEARLY and I couldn't wait to see.
I cried because I was so excited and happy for these new girls because of what they were about to experience.
When I came home after the first camp I was so full of ideas, dreams, resolutions that my sweet husband couldn't get a word in.
Camp for me last year was a time of quiet for me that I desperately needed to truly find my focus.
When I was quiet long enough my head and heart were able to hear and respect each other and I saw clearer than I had in a long time.
I believe you can only be brave when you know some kind of direction.
If you have a focus/direction you can be scared and uncertain but at least you can take that FIRST step into that new world.
For so many of us we can flounder for so long because we don't know our focus.
We can even allow so many others to steal our focus and we allow them/situations/commitments to distract us.
Sometimes we can stay so busy with things that don't matter that we have no energy left for the things we were meant for!
When I came home this time I didn't need to talk and talk.
This camp has been just as powerful and heart changing...but in a completely different way.
I had such a deep quiet peace as I had watched miracles.
I watched women change before my eyes.
How last time I had found focus ...this time I heard so clearly to open my eyes.
Open my eyes because there is hurt everywhere.
EVERYWHERE.
On my street...in my town..in my little world..because we are all broken a little aren't we?
When I relived Melody's journey I was so aware of how much pain people can carry.
Melody has such a unique way of sharing her story that I will carry some of her experiences with me for the rest of my life.
I don't want to look at those around me the same way.
The Lord calls us to be his hands and feet and that is EXACTLY what I want to be.
What I have seen with my realtionships throughout my life is that the heaviest burden, the most painful shame, the ugliest secrets, the most devastating acts can be lightened by another.
When women come together to support, uplift, encourage, love, listen, cry, laugh.....there is healing.
HUGE...undeniable....HEALING!
I am not saying that all their problems go away.
What I am saying is that you give another person HOPE!!
Hope that life doesn't have to be what it has been.
Hope that what is in the past doesn't define you.
Hope that there are people in this world that love them and will stand by them.
That is the kind of women I want to be.
Women at their worst can be so destructive...but women at their best can be the most powerful force on earth.
Don't you want to use THAT power?
I want to live with my eyes WIDE OPEN!
I can't tell you what you will come away with if you go to BGC or how that experience will change your heart.
I can only promise you that it will be GOOD...so good!
{to all you brave girls that I met this time..you are precious, beautiful and brave...so, so brave}
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Don't forget that there is still time to enter my $200 shop giveaway.
Thank you, thank you, thank you for your huge and beautiful response to my new line!
