February 14.

I am resting so sweetly in my current season of life. 

My heart is (after a lot of insecurity and work) at last a home of strength + independence, safely nurtured and radically changing in the best way. With every beat, I feel my heart being moved and shaken by the most precious, uncomplicated form of love. 

For as long as I can remember, I've heard a quiet whisper that God has been pursuing my heart since before I was born, that I am a Daughter of the King. That even though I am just one small, quiet human who makes art and gets emotional at the sight of basset hounds, God knows exactly how many strands of hair are on my head.

I cannot even begin to wrap my mind around that.

But I'm beginning to truly understand that even though God's love is unconditionally given + grace-filled, I have to be willing to reciprocate His beautiful pursuit + actually show up. To desire that relationship with God before one with anybody else. So that's what I'm trying to do.

The process is making me evaluate what I need to dig out from my soul and it is far from clean and shiny. In fact, it's messy and grimy, and some steps seem to harden my heart rather than soften it. But I think that's supposed to happen.  

This season of my life, this season of pursuing and showing up, is allowing me to be a doer, a dreamer + a maker, and the singleness that God has so intentionally gifted me with is allowing me to refine...

Do things that matter to me. 

Rely on myself to make things happen.

Finding my worth in God rather than seeking negativity + bitterness in being single. 

I'm confident that this is the season I'm supposed to be in right now. But that's not to say that I've ceased the process of waiting + hoping. Far from it, actually.

Yesterday I painted faces at a six year old's birthday party. Little things like seeing such happiness in a young family shakes my confidence a tad, causing a slight ache of desire and anxiety that I'm nearly 23 and quite laughably far from getting married. 

Because I'm not sure if I've even met him yet. I don't know his name or how he likes his coffee in the mornings. But I do know that God is teaching me to love him right now, teaching me to be patient (though sometimes with sadness or anxiety). Showing me how to already love him so deeply in this season of my life, even though I don't even know his name yet. 

The coming days, months, maybe even years will allow me to continue praying for him so abundantly, hoping that I'm using this period of waiting as a time to understand that his heart is being prepared and that mine is slowly being taught to not be anxious or hard or afraid. 

It's kind of hard to picture it now but someday I'd like to think I'll reside in a sweet little home, with fresh blooms always installed in every corner, the air saturated with scents of freshly baked bread — though I'll first have to learn to do that... — with forest green + cream colored walls, oversized windows for natural lighting and the most warm, cozy + welcoming family. 

All that sounds wonderful in its right circumstance.

And so this process of waiting will not freeze my heart or make me doubt there aren't "good ones" still out there. I'll continue being a doer, a dreamer, a maker, a Daughter of the King as I pursue Him first before anyone else — so that my heart is full of God's precious unconditional love when it's finally time for my own sweet story. 

Love,

Kate