life purpose

Image of Emily & David's Wedding by Katelyn James

A personal post today :-)

This week I’ve spent quite a bit of time praying for guidance.

For the past few months I have been so busy with concentrating on the basics of running my wedding business, that I was caught up in the everyday go-go-go. Because I was so focused on doing everyday tasks (wake up, work/design/do beautiful things, come home, make dinner, go to bed) I was forgetting to focus on the future, and where I want to eventually end up. I’m sure we can all agree, unless you like things to always be the same for comfort, that we don’t want to do the same thing day in and day out. That next year, we’ll take over the world. I have huge dreams of one day being an inspiration to the underdog, helping the hungry and the poor (yes, this is my Miss America speech). I just have a burning desire to do great work for God and to be his worker here on earth. I know many can sympathize in my dream to be able to pay my bills, have just enough clean clothes on my back to be able to go out in the world and HELP other people. Help ANYONE. Do you feel you have some sort of purpose that you aren’t fulfilling?  Doesn’t it drive you nuts?! I feel that God has given me the gift of business savvy, and the gift of great empathy – am I not yet realizing the potential of what He gave me those gifts for?

I saw a post that David Tutera made today about providing a dream wedding to a young lady with leukemia. I feel that one day, I’ll be doing things like that. But how do we get there? The bummer is that there’s no book on how to be great. Or is there? For Christian, all answers are in the Bible. I feel anytime I find myself hit my knees after a long absence of doing so, I find soon after the most amazing answers or inspirations. I feel that when I go days, weeks without prayer, I start to FEEL it. The fire goes away, and frustration settles in. Because of many many many past experiences, I am a very firm believer that if you don’t ask for God’s help, he’ll put you on your knees and make you BEG for it. At these moments, and very soon after, something magical happens that lifts me up – whether it’s a conversation with someone that I need to hear and they say all the right words that God knows I need. Or, that I read an article that is so random but so perfectly timed for me to read. Or, that thing I’d been cursing over just appears to work itself out in such a beautiful way that it MUST have been an answer. It might not always be the answer I want, but it’s always right on time. Isn’t God so good??

This week I’ve been praying for guidance, to be pointed in the right direction, SOMETHING. My begging is something like this: “I want to travel the world and do great work for you, show me how to get there!” HAHA! I often find that the answer is that it would take money to put my plans into action. But, God doesn’t like it when I pray for money or earthly possesions, or pray for exactly what ‘I’ think ‘I’ need. He knows my heart, ‘He’ knows what ‘He’ needs of me. So, I just have to have faith that the path will reveal itself to me and I’ll figure it out. Can I get an Amen?? :-)

Yesterday I got an email from a lady name Cathy Dyson, of the Free Lance Star. She wrote an article about me almost three years ago (found here) about my struggles as an athiest, suicidal teen. She wants to write another piece, sort of a ‘where are they know’ follow up article. The interesting thing about this situation is that as soon as my article was printed on the front page of the newspaper, I had quite a few local schools contact me and ask if I could come chat with their troubled teens. I did one speaking engagement, but I don’t think I was mature enough to handle the task, honestly. I never followed up with the other contacts. Is this new article going to be a way to maybe try to reach out again? I really hope so. I have such a passion for teens that have trouble finding their way, especially ones that feel so hopeless that they flirt with suicide. Is this God trying to push me to something that I missed on the first time around? I have faith that it was an answer, it’s guidance. No, I don’t think it means I should quit my job, don’t get that confused! But, I do think it’s something I need to pursue as that something that I can do to give back. Even if it’s not giving food or money, it is giving hope. So, I guess regardless of the platform or medium of helping others, it’s still achieving the goal of helping others. I have always dreamed of literally ‘giving’ food/water…. I’m hoping one day I get to that place of being able to, but for now I’m searching for whatever I can  get my hands on.

I know this article may be a little bit of a rambling piece, but, please share your thoughts about anything you can relate to here!