Written by Valynne Underwood

Let me preface the first part of this blog with some background information.  I am a mom of one child.  A daughter.  I am very obsessed with her, proud of her, love being with her, and love her dearly.  She is everything to me.  One day, while in college, she declared she was going to get a tattoo.  Yes, I was that mom.  I didn’t want her to get one.  I said things to her like, “Why?”, “No!”, “Oh hell no!”, “Grandma and Grandpa will not like that!”, and the ultimate mother phrase, “Why would you do that to your beautiful, perfect skin that I created!”  I’ve always tried to be the kind of mom that always accepted her and not try to change her.  I tried to always remember to “act with love” when it came to her.  Well, when I realized what I was doing, I quickly shut my mouth and attempted to internally begin coming to...

Photo by Giulia Bertelli on Unsplash 

Your happiness is on YOU.

Part of growing into maturity is learning how to meet our own needs. As a child we were dependent upon others to fill our cup. If we wanted fed, we asked and waited for someone else to feed us. If we wanted comforted after we fell down, we cried to our moms. If we wanted to play we had to wait for the next activity or we had to get permission. We learned as a child that something outside of us was going to take care of us and fulfill us. Some people never grow out of that…

Emotional maturity is learning how to meet your OWN needs and it is a learned behavior. Most of us learn it the hard way, by expecting someone else to show up for us, stand up for us, be there to comfort us, listen to our every desire and come running (because that’s what “love” is). We wait and wait (some learn to manipulate, whine or punish other people into meeting their needs) until one day we FINALLY figure out that we are a grown up now and we are the very...

“Sometimes people think that calling on God means inviting a force into our lives that will make everything rosy. The truth is, it means inviting everything into our lives that will force us to grow—and growth can be messy."

We've done a lot of messy growing lately haven't we babe? We've done a lot of building, tearing down and re-building.  We've looked at our lives with incredibly raw honesty. We've joined hands with the God of love, stood over the rubble and decided what of it we actually want back...

We have started over with a new home, an evolving faith, and a commitment to each other that is deeper than I've ever felt. Life with you keeps getting better Trav. You're my best friend.

Also, messy growth with you is exactly the kind of growth I want to do.

--

If any of you are standing above the rubble that was once your life, I want you to know that whatever you are going through is not the end.

Your world might feel like it is falling apart. If it is, let...

I was at the doctors office the other day and there was a little screen that kept popping up quotes on depression statistics. I thought of you. Any of you who might be struggling with the weight of the world right now. Then this little bit of advice popped up on the screen. It read,

Rules for happiness:
- Something to do.
- Someone to love.
- Something to hope for.

I instantly started smiling at the simplicity, wrote it down and keep looking at it deciding what my three things are.

Here is what I have so far:
Something to do: Come online and spread a little bit of healing in these squares.
Someone to love: The girl living inside of my skin. My husband. My kiddos. Whoever it is that stands before me.
Something to hope for: Our little business adventure down in Blackfoot.

So I’m curious to know, what are your three things? ‍ Comment below