HOW FAR AWAY?
At midnight I awake to a scuffle in my makeup drawer and discover I’ve captured another little mouse.
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It’s one o’clock in the morning and I’m driving a little plastic trap containing a fury creature to the open field where the moon shines bright. This is the part when you begin to think I’m crazy. But if I am to speak life into every situation, it must include the little Fievel’s that find their refuge from the freezing cold nestled in my Q-tips and cotton balls.
The directions on the box instruct, “Place bait inside trap and when creature is caught drive it two miles away. “
Sometimes the miles required are much more than we imagined, to get to where we need to be, from where we are.
On this day last year I was 3,626 miles from the comfort of my own nest. The distance was necessary to not only change my thinking but to open the possibility to just a little more life.
It’s something of a phenomenon that a tiny mouse can smell his nest from nearly two miles away. And he fights with all his tiny strength to make it back there instead of making a home in the new place where he is.
We make up our minds that we will leave behind the things that trip us up and bind us. But how far forward must we travel to ensure we never go back?
What is the distance between your heart’s desire and the life you’ve made for yourself?
Beside me in this image is my spectacular friend, Summer, who reminds me of happy things like coppertone and lemonaide. We met in the most vulnerable season of our mutual lives, this same week last year.
Here we are in our fancy robes.
Makeup and vanity stripped bare.
Bodies exhausted from 16 therapies every day.
Apprehensive but unwilling to admit it.
Guarded yet utterly defenseless all the same.
If you ask me, I would tell you I think we look vulnerable…and powerful.
Summer grows more beautiful with every month we share on this journey of how far away—
Far away from the women we were once,
Far away from security and relief,
Far away from the confidence of being certain,
Far away from surprise and disbelief.
When is the last time you removed yourself from everything familiar to uncover how you really want to live?
The change we crave is rarely just around the corner or waiting along some ordinary route.
And still it seems, no matter how often we attempt our escape from the unwanted, we nearly always go back.
How far must you take yourself out of your comfortable reality to discover a new path?
Last year, standing on a beach [at Hope4Cancer] in Cancun I wrote,
Breathing. Right this instant. It may sound silly. Maybe even a little trite.
But in this very minute I’m filled with this overwhelming joy and peace.
For a woman who has planned, anticipated, and strategized her entire life, this is a big deal.
As big as the sea.
I scribbled this on a napkin in the midst of an intensely exhausting three weeks. Far away from home. Far away from the ones I love.
I can’t tell you how far you must be taken to ensure you never go back—
To the lies that haunt you,
To the mistakes you perpetually make,
To the habits that own you,
To the negative thinking you wan’t so badly to break.
What I can say with confidence is that the life you long for will require a more expansive journey than you ever presumed or believed.
Who we want to become is rarely a step or two away. Our instinct will do it’s best to pull us back to things we knew, even if they’re rotting from decay.
At 4am I load the trap into the jeep and drive to the open meadow where I have dropped off members of his tiny family so many times before. Opening the lid he leaps to his freedom and scampers off to take new territory on this frosty November morn.
The exaggerated nature of my response is curious,
but the same hope I feel in this moment, is reflected in that picture, in our smiles.
We have been released from the thinking that held us back, allowed a fresh perspective to permeate our cells.
It took the willingness to embrace the truth that change brings freedom,
It required a journey of 3,626 miles.
NOTES:
First, a disclaimer: We live right next to a forest and during our three year construction, mice found their way in. Despite our most valiant efforts, recently they've found little entry crevices to shield themselves from the Winter cold. And perhaps, the word has gotten out that I don’t trap to kill :).My life is filled with new relationships and intimate conversations with those, like me, who are in one way or another fighting for the lives they crave. My cancer has expanded my ministry. How so like our Creator to arrange it exactly this way.
I have never seen anyone pray quite like Summer. In fact, when I first met her, the intensity with which she approaches her Savoir set me back. I was weary of it, questioning what was anything but an ordinary faith.
After watching Summer these past three-hundred-and-sixty-five days, I have learned that there is this breathtaking constancy embodied in her grace.
Summer is one of the rare ones that prays on her knees. To say she is passionate when she speaks to the Father would diminish the supernatural relationship she has cultivated with the Creator of all things.
Recently, she underwent a necessary surgery and has started multiple rounds of radiation…all of this paired with integrative therapies that not only make the side effects of these more bearable but accelerate her healing and extend her life to years instead of months.
Our mutual journeys have proven that even when we think we’ve arrived, there is still so much further we can go.
To bless you just a little more, I leave you with Summer’s life verse—
Isaiah 26:3
You will keep in perfect peace those whose minds are steadfast, because they trust in you.
MORE READING ON MY STAY AT HOPE4CANCER, THIS TIME LAST YEAR
https://www.sanctuaryliving.life/thejournal/is-it-obvious
https://www.sanctuaryliving.life/thejournal/the-art-of-the-free-fall
https://www.sanctuaryliving.life/thejournal/all-of-everything
https://www.sanctuaryliving.life/thejournal/twenty-one-days