Blogging from New Hampshire.

Currently, I am working as a mentor at a Christ-centered healing community. Initially I called it an "addict recovery program" but it is a little bit different than that. People come here as a "gap year" between high school and college to be discipled, some of them are addicted to a substance or unhealthy relationships or they might struggle with depression and anxiety. The women that sign up to do the program are called "residents" and the women that sign up to help are called "mentors" (that is what I am doing.)

As a way of allowing friends to be up to date about what is going on in my life, I want to practice the discipline of writing (a blog). I am going to shoot for once-every-other-week. Maybe I will post more or maybe I will post less.

Some structure to help when I am unsure of what to write (this is just for me to refer back to):
Recently...this past week...or today

• What are you learning?
• How is your relationship with God?
• Any new ideas/concepts?
• What really made you laugh?
• What made you cry?
• What did you regret?
• What did you enjoy?
• Who do you miss and why?
• What are some goals/hopes/dreams you have?
• What would I like others to pray for?

With that, I will start my first post.

What I learned

TODAY

September, 26 2014

First, you should know that the way my brain works is a little bit different and I constantly feel like I am having epiphanies about life, love, God, relationships, etc. When someone asks me "how are you?" or "what's up?" These are generally the things that I want to share. I am really bad at just telling people about my day, but I am getting better at that here.

Anyway, new residents came on Monday and they have been adjusting just like I was merely 3 weeks ago. Needless to say, it is hard. There was one woman in particular that did not want to be here and continually mentioned when I asked how she was that she would not last long here. She told me some reasons why and I took the liberty of taking all responsibility for those reasons. I was worrying myself sick about trying to please her and it was sucking all the energy out of me (and I was failing). At the end of the day, she would say again how she doesn't want to be here. Finally, when I had a moment to spare, I prayed to God and asked him to help me to surrender the burden I was feeling. I asked that if this woman was supposed to stay, that He would change her mind because I can't and I also couldn't handle the pressure that I was feeling. The next day, I still felt hopeless for this woman but my burden was some what lifted. It wasn't until later that evening, after she had gone to a group counseling session that she was smiling. I asked her how it went and she said "it's the reason I'm staying". I couldn't believe it. I got to tell her that I was praying that God would find a way to keep her here if it would be good for her to be. We celebrated together. The rest of the night she talked to me and was much more open than she was before.

When reflecting on this experience today, I realized that BOUNDARIES are so very important. Sometimes I take it upon myself to fix someone or to make them happy or to do whatever I can for them. These are not healthy ways of relating to people (even if I do love them!) If I maintain healthy boundaries, loving them when I can and leaving the rest to God by surrendering and praying for them, then that is truly loving them. Crossing boundaries is never okay, even if it feels like it is the loving thing to do. If you have any questions about what I mean by boundaries (or anything else that I wrote today), then feel free to ask.

Until then, I DID IT! Hopefully I write again soon and hopefully people who want to read this will and those who don't won't. It's not my burden to worry about that, though. ;)