Taming the Shrew (or something like that)

As I sit here watching the finches and cardinals turf rumble, over the last little bit of bird seed from the base of my bird feeder (which was destroyed by the wind last night), my heart has settled on the beauty of the wilderness.

I mentioned in a prevous blog, that I am unrecognizable to my former self, and I continue to evolve forward. Tammi 6.0 (short pause for laughter).

It’s hard to remember me from back then. I do remember, that ‘city girl’ would NOT have known how to survive in the country. But God knew me better and, perhaps, wanted me to see what I am fully capable of.

Psalm 18:19- “He brought me out into a spacious place. He rescued me because he delighted in me.” I have that verse displayed, in my bedroom, above my headboard. I didn’t know that I needed this place, but the One who created my heart, laid out every detail, before I was formed. He “prepared a place for me”.

If you have paid any attention to me, you know, I have come to love adventure. I know that’s not who I was. In fact, six years ago, I walked into the girl’s bathroom at school, filled with girls who were discussing the recent loss of one of their male classmates. They were devastated for his girlfriend, who was present, when he tragically died. I remember saying, verbatum, “If anything ever happened to my husband, you would never see me again. I would crawl in a hole and die.”

A few weeks later, without warning, he was gone, and I did. Obviously, not physically, but emotionally and mentally, I died. Those who were closest to me, in those days, could attest to this. It wasn’t long before I was so deep in that hole, they couldn’t even find me anymore, and I spiraled until I was completely unreachable.

I’m not going to sit here and say that the way I handled my grief was normal or appropriate or even close to healthy, but I do think it was a reasonable reaction. I mean, what place does normalcy have in grief? What’ the measuring stick?

I believe grief is the most awkward, uncomfortable, disgusting, unreasonable necessity we have, as humans. I also believe, that if we go through deep grief, unchanged, we are certainly missing an opportunity that can only come from a trudge through the wilderness. A chance to meet the Maker and live to tell the story. A chance to step outside the box you built in your own creation of ‘happily ever after’, and let Him rewrite the story. That “thing” that’s missing inside you, is a desire that you haven’t met yet. You don’t know it’s missing because you can’t quite put your finger on it. What is it? You will never know, until you open yourself up to it. Get uncomfortable. Isolate yourself. Spend time with your mind open, and let God show you, who YOU really are.

We dilute ourselves by attempting to avoid the wilderness. I spent a lot of time trying to busy myself so I wouldn’t have to face the brush and briars. But we are so worth the tedious effort.

A few years before becoming a widow, after a conversation on the topic, I was gifted, “Wild at Heart: Discovering the Secret of a Man’s Soul”, by John Eldredge. I never read it until around 2022. I was well into my adventureous stage, by then, so when I saw this quote, it hit my soul like sunrise, “There is something else I am after, out here in the wild. I am searching for an even more elusive prey…something that can only be found through the help of wilderness. I am looking for my heart.”

That was IT! My heart! I didn’t need the noises or the distractions. I needed to figure out where I buried my heart. I had left it in that hole. But He was ever-present with it. He never took His hand off of it. He kept it for me and He returned it to me, but it was a package deal.

It wasn’t immediate, it’s been a gradual process of waiting and learning to trust and listen and obey. I don’t know were He’s leading and honestly, that’s the terrifying beauty of the wilderness. The most freeing part of this journey is knowing that I only have to focus on Him. I don’t have to find my way out. He is the Way.

Believe me, you cannot go too far into the wilderness, where He is not a breath away. He delights in you!