Don't hold back

Life is short. Life has no guarentees. Live it up. Love unconditionally and without holding back today. Tomorrow is not for sure.


I have really been reflecting on how I live day to day. I get up, go to the barn, play with and ride Zi, hang out with my family, hang out with my friends, go to caribou, drink coffee, read, journal, go back to the barn and then I sleep. The same routine repeats. I don't want to get stuck in that routine. I want to not hold back, I feel like it is so easy to get caught up in day to day living and waste time. I want to invest in relationships and pour myself into those and love without holding anything back and stop worrying about tomorrow. Leave no words unsaid and open my heart and live every day as though it is my last.

Song of Songs 8:6-7 For love is as strong as death, its jealousy unyielding as the grave. It burns like blazing fire, like a mighty flame. Many waters cannot quench love; rivers cannot wash it away.

Love is powerful. Don't hold it back. Love today. It has been close to my heart to not worry about tomorrow and love unconditionally and live it up fearlessly for Christ right now with the time I have and keep an eternal perspective.

2 Corinthians 4:18 So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.

Becoming Uncomfortable

God does not call us to be comfortable.

He calls us to be uncomfortable because it is then that He grows us the most. It is a state of fearlessness.

I have come to realize in the past weeks that God is calling me in every part of my life to be uncomfortable and to step outside my comfort zone. It is uncertain. It is scary. In fact it is terrifying. Yet it is also full of joy, and peace because God is the center of it. I do not know what will happen tomorrow or a week from now or where I will be a year from now. What I do know is that today I am in God's hands and He is cradling my life. My heart is His and I want to live everyday as though it is my last knowing that for me to live is Christ and to die is gain.

What kind of perspective is that!? I love how Paul has that eternal perspective and I want to cling to that. I want to embrace it. I want to own it. What would it look like if every christian embraced that eternal perspective and spent their days living it up in a state of fearlessness for Christ?

-Kayla

The Choice

Life is a journey that constantly has so many twists and turns that can hurt yet be so joyful. I love that in the midst of them God is always there. I've come to discover in the last five months that God is truly my only constant. I can't rely on anything in this world because it will fail me. Friends will fail me. Regardless of how much I love them or how much they love me (or say they do) they will fail me because of human nature but God is so much bigger and He never fails. Being able to rest in that is such a comfort.

I had a in depth conversation with Courtney and Elizabeth about friendships the other day and just to see how God is working in them both is beyond inspiring to me, I love how they are so transparent with what God is teaching them. It made me realize though how true it is that God is really our only constant and as women of Christ we need to seek after what He has and live that out. We need to own it. I love that.

I took Zi to the 4H overnight last weekend and it was amazing. He did so much better than I had anticipated and maybe it was because of my growth as a horseman and rider. I went without feeling like I had to prove myself to anyone and I just focused on my horse and what he needed. He never even blinked at the train and I was able to play with and ride him in the arena. Katie was there with Ari and having her there was a blessing and seeing how she worked with Ari was a true testament to horsemanship. I don't think I've ever been more proud of her :)

In the last week I've had to face something that I haven't wanted to admit. I lost some confidence with Zi because of Magi leaving and just doubting myself because of health and situations. One thing with Zi that is so evident is he is so in tune to me as a leader and if I am not mentally "fit" enough he loses confidence. It's been a threshold for me to work through as a horseman and rider because I feel ashamed admitting I have allowed confidence to escape me in the last week.

The bottom line is I miss Magi. I miss childhood and I am afraid. I feel like there is this choice looming in front of me. I can choose to allow God to work through this and be fearless for Him and pursue my future with Him by my side and Zi or I can choose to constantly be looking back to Magi and my past. I have struggled with grief, anger and bitterness because of saying goodbye to Magi. I hate being that transparent but it's the truth. I keep running into God's arms and just pouring out my hurting heart and offering it up and I now have a choice. God is not calling me to be comfortable. He is calling me to live outside my comfort zone and be better utilized for Him. Yes I am hurting and I miss Magi but I am outside my comfort zone and God has blessed me with Zi and an opportunity to utilize my talents and give my best. I need to take it. Fearlessly.

Letting Love Live On

I miss Magi.

The pain of letting go has nearly torn me apart.

God is so in the midst of this though, his peace and comfort transcend all understanding and have carried me through a week that I did not humanly have the strength for.

I had a realization this weekend. Yesterday I had a not so great session with Zi... it wasn't anything that he did it was just that mentally I could not get myself together. I wasn't enough of a leader for him. Today, I went out to the barn and spent 20 minutes playing at liberty in the pasture. At the end of it he cantered over to me and stopped in front of me and I slowly sank down to my knees in the grass. I sensed that he was unconfident and by lowering my center of gravity I was less threatening. He nuzzled my head and then stepped closer and lowered his head into my lap. I rubbed him and we sat like that for what seemed like hours. It was then that I realized in the week since Magi has left I have closed my heart up.

I've been too afraid to let go and let myself love Zi the way he deserves because I'm afraid of being hurt again. In doing that I've not allowed God to have the victory He wants to have in my life. I have been issued a challenge. A challenge to let love live on and open up my heart and love unconditionally and unceasingly no matter how the relationship or friendship ends. I choose to let love live on. Yes I still hurt, I still cry and I still miss Magi but God is growing me and right now He is stretching me and helping me to see that I need to choose to let love back into my heart and to embrace it with every fiber of my being.

God is love.

Strength in Weakness

I don't think goodbye has ever been as hard at it was yesterday morning. It felt surreal.
I put Magi in the stall he was to stay in until his trip to Florida and with tears streaming down my face I buried my head into his mane and sobbed. He stood there and nuzzled my shoulder and it felt like we stayed like that for hours. Then I had to walk away.

I walked down the barn aisle and he whinnied after me and it took every ounce of will power to not turn around and run back to him. God held my heart though. I felt God's peace and comfort from the beginning and I rested in it. Magi is now on his way to Sarasota, Florida where he will have an exceptional home with someone who can give him what I can't.

What does moving on look like? How am I supposed to go on from here? I believe that God has done such a work in my life in the past few months. He has blessed me with friendships I will treasure for the rest of my life and He's given me the courage to surrender my heart entirely over to Him and He's given me the strength to stay living in a state of surrendrance. My heart broke in two yesterday and today I miss Magi so much it hurts.

It was not just a horse that I have loved for the past five and a half years that I said goodbye to. I said goodbye to my childhood, and to a part of my life that I will never get back. I said goodbye to a horse who represented the darkest time in my life and the victory that the Lord granted me in that time. I said goodbye to part of myself. My prayer is that Magi can go and be successful with his new owner and I trust that He will. He was never mine but instead a borrowed gift from my heavenly Father at a time when I needed it. Now, I have Zi and a bright career and future to look ahead to.

Right now though my heart is still broken and I still just want to cry. I feel like I'm living in a fog. I miss my first love. God is in this though. I hear His voice and I am trusting that He will bring me through this because He is faithful and He is good. He does not forsake nor forget. May His name be praised forever. I love the way that God grows us because He has stretched me so far outside my comfort zone in saying goodbye to Magi yet He is using it to grow me. New challenges as far as health and life itself have come up yet God is still God. He is my everything and I now have the opportunity to live that out.

A part of me will always miss Magi. Right now the pain is still raw but I am allowing God to heal. Courtney, Zack, Lizzy and Katie were all there for me yesterday and God used their support to help me through the hardest day of my life. God continues to shower down blessing in a time that is so devestatingly hard and uncertain.
For that I am thankful.

2 Corinthians 12:10
For when I am weak, then I am strong.

Saying Goodbye

I hate goodbyes. They suck. I dread them.

This week I have to say goodbye to someone who has been a major part of my life the last five years. He was there when my world fell apart freshman year, he was the shoulder I would cry on, he would listen when I had no one else to talk to, he stole my heart. My horse, Magi has been my gift from the Lord. God gave him to me at a time when I needed him. God used him to teach me and to mold me into who I am today. I remember being a 13 year old who stared into the eyes of a four year old Arabian horse and saw part of myself. Magi knew me, he was used by God to teach me and to help me through the darkest time in my life.

Now, five and a half years later I have to say goodbye to the one who has taught me so much. I say goodbye to my best friend, my greatest teacher and to the one who has held my heart and helped to ignite my passion for horses. I know that this is what is best and that this is what God wants. Above everything, I see that God gave me Magi for a season when I needed him and now God is taking him away and giving him a chance to be there for someone else who needs him more than I do. My heart is breaking and I hurt and I cry but God holds my tears and God is the one who is my passion and my everything. He is with me in this. I am not alone.

Magi,

I love you. Those three words don't hold enough meaning to express how I feel about you and how much I care and how much you have meant to me in the last five and a half years. You taught me so much and I know that I've not always given you my best but you always forgive. I look in your eyes and I see acceptance, I see hope, love, beauty, confidence, trust and I see a reflection of my heart. God has blessed me with you and He has used you to grow me, to stretch me and to mold me. Thank you for being there when I needed you, thank you for letting me sob into your shoulder and for letting me soak your mane with my tears. Thank you for making me laugh, and for giving me joy and for blessing me with rides that I will never forget. I am sorry that I have to leave you. This is what is best even though neither of us can see it right now. I'm sorry I can't be enough for you and I'm sorry that we couldn't make this last but God has victory in this. I love you. I will always love you. When you leave in that trailer on monday, part of my heart will leave with you.

Some may think it's insane that a horse means this much to me and has taught me this much. But God works in mysterious ways and God has used Magi to grow me. He brought Magi into my life when I needed him and is now taking him away. I will surrender to His throne and my heart will be filled with my passion for Christ and for who He is because He is enough even in the midst of this pain.

Goodbyes suck. Yet God is in the midst of them and eases the pain.

Goodbye Magi. I will always love you.

You will always be in my heart.

Job 1:21-22 The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away; May the name of the Lord be praised

Jeremiah 29:11 For I know the plans I have for you declares the LORD, "plans to proser you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future."

James 1:17 Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows.

Goodbyes

Zi has been doing amazing. I really have loved being able to work with a young horse again and watch him figure things out. He really has a great mind and an inate desire to please however he is so sensitive and requires such a level of softness that if fun for me to play with and experiment with. Magi and Zi are definitely complete opposites of each other but that's what keeps it fun for me as a trainer! I've been riding Zi a lot and he has improved so much every ride, he can now walk and trot consistent circles and figure eights and maintain a steady tempo. I have cantered him (his canter is HUGE!) however there is still a lot of work to be done to achieve circles at the canter. I've already started to ask for a little collection from him, more mental collection and he has been giving it to me. I am so excited for his progress and for what lays ahead for both of us together!

Magi is leaving soon. It hurts to even type that. It's good yet it's also hard for me, I have found a lady in Florida that will give him the best possible home and I know he'll love it but I hate goodbyes. I'm not good at them. I already have to say goodbye to friends this fall so saying goodbye to Magi in the next week will be hard. Yet, I see God's hand. I feel his prescence. I know that He is in this and I am clinging to that. God has been teaching me and growing me in ways that I didn't even imagine were possible. I am in a state of surrendrance that is beautiful and is opening my eyes to others around me and to how I can be used even more by Christ. I love that. I've been reading through Job and one verse that has stuck out to me like no other is from Job 1: 21-22 The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away; may the name of the Lord be praised.

That is my heart.