What are You Noticing?

If you took a few seconds to write down the words and phrases that have been most on your mind this past week, what would you write? As the New Year continues to get underway, what are you noticing about yourself and your life right now? Here’s the short list of what’s on my mind: mercy, beginner, rest, champion, delight, stay the course, and roots.

Sunday, I took a drive to a place I haven’t been in years and years. If you read my Instagram post, you might be familiar with part of this story. I’d been talking with my cousin about cultivating delight over coffee last Friday, and sometime on Saturday, I realized I needed to get back into delight. So I stayed up much later than I’d planned and woke up earlier than I wanted, and hit the road. I’d found a little French bakery online that sounded lovely, so I made my way there. I sat reading for a while, reflecting again on who I’m becoming right now and where that’s leading me this year. I drank dark roast coffee and ate the amazing croissant with eggs and gouda, and didn’t finish it on the spot on account of really wanting to eat the small-ish eclair I’d ordered. Ha. I really went for it. And it was the best.

I considered areas of my life where I’m still experiencing growing pains and have an awareness of my need for transformation. I wondered about experiencing mercy in my own life in order that I might better offer much-needed mercy out here in the real world (something I talked about in this Forward Friday segment). I considered what it means that I’m a beginner right now and how I’ll always be a beginner—someone willing to grow and transform into better consistently, no matter what I think I know already. I wondered what it looks like to rest in the midst of all that life is right now—in the good and the challenges, and the realities that desperately need to change in the world. I wondered what it means that in this place of being, that I’m already succeeding somehow (like a champion—winning and doing it well), even when I feel like I’m not. If you’re hard on yourself, as I tend to be on myself, you might understand that in your own way.

Then I ended up in the actual spot I haven’t visited in maybe 17 years now. I didn’t plan on going there, honestly. It wasn’t on my radar for the day. But, I was so close in proximity and thought it could be really nice to see it again. It’s a place that held sweet memories way back then, but for me now, it also holds the memories of what happened in the months that followed the sweet. Have you recently gone back to revisit a part of your story that you didn’t know you needed to look at? Well, that became the rest of my morning into the early part of the afternoon and it was so, so good for me.

On the drive back, my thoughts shifted. I started to think about my grandparents and my roots. I thought about the way they set a precedent for our family in the way of being pioneers—really on both sides, paternal and maternal. They were those who willingly set out into the unknown because there was a call into more life and freedom ahead of them in a direction they’d not yet been. I felt deeply grateful for all they endured, all they risked, and the faith they mustered to explore, discover, settle, and establish from there. What a treasure. What a launching point. What incredible stock I’ve come from. It reminded me that I, too, can stay the course in my life right now. Between that coffee date Friday, a phone call from a friend checking in on me Saturday, and all of these considerations on my day-trip Sunday, I discovered how I needed that reminder this weekend. No matter what has been, the good and the challenging, there is more of both ahead. That’s life. It’s found in the moments, in the noticing, and in the decision to carry on to grow and transform in the process.

So I’ll ask again: what are you noticing right now? Where is that leading you as you continue to move through the moments and experiences of this New Year? What connecting points are you finding that might help you gain perspective on what’s valuable, what’s needed, and who you’re becoming in the process? And, how might engaging delight in your life usher you into deeper places of noticing in the days ahead?