CHOOSE Joy in Maturation

Hello World and Happy July! It is my birthday month and it has been an amazing one. I returned from Uganda last month and it took a full three weeks before I felt like myself again … back to my routines and relaxed into summer. What I didn’t anticipate was that simultaneously I’d be making the second largest investment of my life (my education is the first) – for the second time around – by purchasing a new home! For the last few weeks I’ve been resting, relaxing, rejuvenating and spending quality time with people I love. I’ve been packing and purging. And I have been thinking about aging …

My body feels different. My routines are different. I take delight in environments I once found boring and uneventful. My pace is slower. My relationships are deeper. My confidence – louder. With each year I feel closer to ME, to the me I believe I was created to be but silenced through the years.

I feel closer to the me who loves genuinely and chooses carefully. I feel closer to the me who relaxes with ease, knowing infinite striving is never a sustainable life pace. I feel closer to the me who cherishes people over places and prioritizes healthy relationships … the me who forgives AND pivots … the me who embraces and honors boundaries … the me who is complex, and wild, and reserved, and curious, and thoughtful, and loving, and sensitive, and forgetful, and hardworking, and present.

It is both amazing and awe-inspiring how we can travel the whole world to realize how much we love home, how close we’ve always been, and just how sacred these spaces are. My time in Uganda awakened a lot in me. But perhaps more than anything it helped me appreciate home – even the new home I am creating – and it showed me just how much I have evolved and returned … back to me. Back home. Back to the place where I belong.

In a world of anti-aging products and what seems like an ever-evolving quest to make all things tighter, smaller, bigger and more youthful, I find great joy in both my aging and maturation. It is BEAUTIFUL to reminisce on my teen and young adult years. I have undergraduate college memories for days. I explored the world with courage and fierceness throughout my 20s and 30s. I loved hard and fell fast. I pursued my goals and kept seeking. AND even as I know there is MORE, I love the confidence and assurance I now have in this season of life.

We all get to grow and expand and release. We get to recreate our new lives each day. We get to honor our journeys. And I hope that you join me in accepting that we also get to rest in this beautiful process of aging and maturing and becoming. This, too, is JOY!