BY: JORDYN FERRARO
We started this blog over a year ago now – over a year since we bought those first, one-way plane tickets – and nearing weeks since we boarded that flight that would forever change both of our lives.
This blog had been many things for us each – a place to process, to tell stories, to write of adventures and lessons learned, a place to connect with those at home, and most of all, a place that we have each discovered a love for writing.
But after the traveling ended, and we settled into life (as you know) we began to enter the mundane, enter into jobs neither of us loved, and learned what this “dream” meant in reality.
For me, blogging always was something I’d whisper when we’d tell people – because to me, I just wasn’t a blogger. The title didn’t seem to fit into my preconceived idea of “bloggers”. And so, as the stories of getting kicked off trains, lost in cities, and describing about the mass amounts of food consumed along the way ended, I also lost what this was all meant for in the first place.
This past weekend was spent with several good friends, reconnecting after time away in America as we enjoyed movie marathons, soaking in the time we had left before one of them departs for America, & pouring into new opportunities for church, but what made me start asking this question of why again was through the one friend leaving America as he shared with Megan and I his blog.
Tracing back over five years ago, he shared posts of stories & lessons, poems & moments that shaped his life into where he’s at now. And it was in that moment of looking back on what was to what has become now that I remembered the point of all this.
You see, I’m great at answering questions. Ask me a question and I promise I’ll answer open book. But without questions, I’m lousy to share. And the Lord is revealing to me how I do this in more facets than just this blog. I do it with family, I do it with friends, I do it with my home team who it seems would be the easiest to share with. But for me, openly talking without prompt to do so has never been my strong suit & I’m learning, it’s showing.
So I think that’s the struggle. That’s the stopping point of the why behind the what because I cannot seem to write without prompt, to share without being first questioned. And I realize this isn’t exactly the healthiest way to grow, to share, or to dig deeper into relationships or this life of writing. So, here’s my attempts for change. My asking for grace and forgiveness and stepping outside comfort zones into the realm of opening the door without someone doing it for me.
We started this blog as a place to share life – openly, honestly, and without edits of the good and the bad. And its become such a safe place to each of us, a place where a new dream has come forth and where we’ve each been able to connect with so many unexpected people along the way. And I don’t want to lose that. I want to embrace the ability to open up, to be able to look back on this site in 5 – 10 years time and see the work of the Lord in every word and see the path He created through it.
It excites me to know that this is a place of remembrance. A place of bursting through walls and writing through these revelations, these opportunities for growth, and allowing this to be the place to do so.
We make a lot of promises, have a lot of plans for what we hope this blog can be or become, but ultimately, the why behind the what is solely that it is all to glorify God. To share with you the fingerprints of Him moving in our lives – through every mundane moment and exciting adventure.
All too often I forget to ask why (anyone else do the same?). I’ve spent the last three weeks running through America, catching up with family and friends, attending weddings of some incredible people, and holding onto as many Starbucks cups as my hands would allow – but all the while, the what’s kept driving me crazy. The what’s next, what’s even the purpose for now, the what’s that filled the space and made me miss the why completely.
We get so busy running around chasing the what – what job, what guy, what place to live, what (fill in the blank) – but ultimately, figuring out the why is the heart of the matter. The heart I intend to search for through these last few months in Ireland and the heart I hope to embrace by learning to write without prompts and share without walls both in this blog and in the relationships happening all around. So I challenge you to ask yourself why? What is your why behind the what?
My prayer is that it open doors, it un-clouds the fog for you to see the Lord more clearly and how He made you so intricately you, & challenge you, as it has for me, to break down whatever walls may have grown in the process.
This blog had been many things for us each – a place to process, to tell stories, to write of adventures and lessons learned, a place to connect with those at home, and most of all, a place that we have each discovered a love for writing.
But after the traveling ended, and we settled into life (as you know) we began to enter the mundane, enter into jobs neither of us loved, and learned what this “dream” meant in reality.
For me, blogging always was something I’d whisper when we’d tell people – because to me, I just wasn’t a blogger. The title didn’t seem to fit into my preconceived idea of “bloggers”. And so, as the stories of getting kicked off trains, lost in cities, and describing about the mass amounts of food consumed along the way ended, I also lost what this was all meant for in the first place.
This past weekend was spent with several good friends, reconnecting after time away in America as we enjoyed movie marathons, soaking in the time we had left before one of them departs for America, & pouring into new opportunities for church, but what made me start asking this question of why again was through the one friend leaving America as he shared with Megan and I his blog.
Tracing back over five years ago, he shared posts of stories & lessons, poems & moments that shaped his life into where he’s at now. And it was in that moment of looking back on what was to what has become now that I remembered the point of all this.
You see, I’m great at answering questions. Ask me a question and I promise I’ll answer open book. But without questions, I’m lousy to share. And the Lord is revealing to me how I do this in more facets than just this blog. I do it with family, I do it with friends, I do it with my home team who it seems would be the easiest to share with. But for me, openly talking without prompt to do so has never been my strong suit & I’m learning, it’s showing.
So I think that’s the struggle. That’s the stopping point of the why behind the what because I cannot seem to write without prompt, to share without being first questioned. And I realize this isn’t exactly the healthiest way to grow, to share, or to dig deeper into relationships or this life of writing. So, here’s my attempts for change. My asking for grace and forgiveness and stepping outside comfort zones into the realm of opening the door without someone doing it for me.
We started this blog as a place to share life – openly, honestly, and without edits of the good and the bad. And its become such a safe place to each of us, a place where a new dream has come forth and where we’ve each been able to connect with so many unexpected people along the way. And I don’t want to lose that. I want to embrace the ability to open up, to be able to look back on this site in 5 – 10 years time and see the work of the Lord in every word and see the path He created through it.
It excites me to know that this is a place of remembrance. A place of bursting through walls and writing through these revelations, these opportunities for growth, and allowing this to be the place to do so.
We make a lot of promises, have a lot of plans for what we hope this blog can be or become, but ultimately, the why behind the what is solely that it is all to glorify God. To share with you the fingerprints of Him moving in our lives – through every mundane moment and exciting adventure.
All too often I forget to ask why (anyone else do the same?). I’ve spent the last three weeks running through America, catching up with family and friends, attending weddings of some incredible people, and holding onto as many Starbucks cups as my hands would allow – but all the while, the what’s kept driving me crazy. The what’s next, what’s even the purpose for now, the what’s that filled the space and made me miss the why completely.
We get so busy running around chasing the what – what job, what guy, what place to live, what (fill in the blank) – but ultimately, figuring out the why is the heart of the matter. The heart I intend to search for through these last few months in Ireland and the heart I hope to embrace by learning to write without prompts and share without walls both in this blog and in the relationships happening all around. So I challenge you to ask yourself why? What is your why behind the what?
My prayer is that it open doors, it un-clouds the fog for you to see the Lord more clearly and how He made you so intricately you, & challenge you, as it has for me, to break down whatever walls may have grown in the process.