There are a couple of things that have been rolling around in my mind as I’ve been thinking about what I wanted to share this week. The first is the idea of true friendships and relationships, and the second being the solar eclipse that happened this morning. Two totally opposite things, I know, but I wanted to talk about them with you guys.
Lately, I’ve been listening to a new podcast that recently launched called “For The Love” by Jen Hatmaker. For those unfamiliar with Jen, she is a genuinely hilarious and witty writer, author, speaker and just all around great person who has a knack for saying the truth in a sweet, no-beating-around-the-bush type of way. She even had her own TV show on HGTV for a while, so of course I love her. I aspire to write like her someday and also be just as funny. I guess only time will tell. With all that said, she just started a podcast a little over a month ago and the first series that she focuses on is titled, “For The Love of Girlfriends”. During this series, she invited five different women to come on her show and talk about what the real, genuine and true girl-friendships look like in their own personal lives. As I began to listen to these women describe the different connections that they have pursued with each of their different close girlfriends, it made me think about the long-standing friendships I have in my own life and what I can do on my end to help improve them and make our relationship even deeper and more fruitful. One of the speakers on the podcast, Shasta Nelson, has created a website where you take a “Frientimacy” Quiz to see the areas where improvement may be needed. There are three areas that you are graded and assessed on, and there are tips on how to improve these areas. Lucky for me (sarcasm), two out of my three areas assessed tied for lowest, so I’ve been doing some thinking, praying, and working on these ever since I listened to the podcast a couple of weeks ago. If you have a few moments to spare today, I’d like to encourage you to take this quiz for yourself (and for those men who are reading this, you can take it, too!). Not only has it made me grow closer to my friends already, but it has changed my heart towards them and makes me love and appreciate them even more.
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The second thing that I wanted to chit-chat about is the Solar Eclipse that happened today! I honestly hadn’t really given it much thought until this morning when I kept on singing “It’s the Final Countdown! Dun dun dundun, dun dun dundundun!” to Seth as I danced around the kitchen. I had no clue I was so excited about this eclipse. I think I started becoming happy about it when I realized that this is literally a once-in-a-lifetime event and that lil ol’ me gets to see it! How insane. My family and I didn’t end up buying eclipse glasses, so we went out to the back deck and, with our backs to the sun, watched the shadows on the ground slowly become little crescent moons.
It. Was. SO. Cool.
(This was 3 minutes before the eclipse was at its peak)
In Washington State, we only had a 92-94% Totality (that word wasn’t even in my vocabulary until this morning) View, so it didn’t go completely dark here. It did, however, get kind of eerie looking outside, like someone threw a gray lens filter over everything; or, as my friend perfectly put it “it was very Alfred Hitchcock-esque” (Thanks Rachel :)). Very Hitchcock indeed. As the eclipse was happening above me, I looked around me and had this overwhelming, yet peaceful assurance of how HUGE and BIG and GRAND God truly is. I was thinking about how He’s holding the universe in His hands and directing everything exactly the way it needs to be. He even knows every single star and calls them by their name (Psalm 147:4). He really does have everything under control, and I am nothing but a small little speck on this planet called Earth that He created and loves with His whole heart. As tiny of a speck as I may seem compared to everything else in the Universe, the Bible says that God still thinks of me and loves me so much. It’s just truly incomprehensible. Even though I can’t even process how that is possible, I choose to believe it and chose to have faith in my Creator and His love.