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My current life catch phrase is “this is hard”. True story, it is. I had a killer migraine that kicked in late Monday night and lasted the majority of Tuesday. It sucked. And as I’ve said many a times, feeling not so hot almost three thousand miles away from where you originate and your people wait sucks. And sickness is just one part. It’s hard. All around. But there’s also stuff that relieves the hard. Get this, Medellin is gorgeous. It’s really a super rad place, there’s this adorable barrio [neighborhood, town-thingy] full of cute little restaurants, coffee shops, people with cool ink; essentially, some things I love. But, when you add missions to things I think it makes it a bit more complicated. There’s a bit of a spiritual element that is like highlighted, circled and very annotated. When I say “bit”, I mean like a huge chunk of a portion. So yeah, this is hard. It’s hard to know that the kid I’m trying so hard to console is going home to an abusive atmosphere. It’s so difficult to know that as I’m eating my dinner that one of the tinies I was holding is probably crying because her stomach is raging and begging for a morsel of food. And the spiritual stuff? Oh forget it. It sucks. Oh and I have [had] one of those cool little stuffed animals that you can heat up in the microwave and then it’s warm and snuggly [what a missionary I am, with my warm little elephant]. IT EXPLODED! Actually no, it burned through its own fuzzy, blue, lamasery scented flesh and bled it’s fiery hot beads all over my palm in a fit of rage. Big F-you to my evil snuggle pal. That type of stuff makes you feel like you’re being attacked: 7 day flu, migraines and exploding elephants. Grrr. 

But back to Tuesday. Bedridden, migraine Maggie laid in bed sobbing and restless. I called my mom like eight times and just cried to her more than I actually talked. Because let’s be real, mom’s are great and have this way of listening to tears that no one else really can. Read through Lamentations. Oh timing, you sweet, sweet pal. Also facetimed some good ol advice giving people. Tuesday was good in a really sucky sucky way. I had a good hashing things out with God. Which looks more like me being a fitful, confused, cranky and very tired and Jesus just constantly breathing breath into me and calming my soul. I ended Tuesday with these things: 

• if I’m doing all of this for God, I need to loose myself. I have nothing to prove. In the eyes of the world I could fail, but if my efforts are for the kingdom, the world’s view of me means nothing 

• it’s really easy to trust God’s plan when you think you know what’s going on, but it’s not my job to know the plan. That being said, I have to trust especially when I don’t know/see/understand the plan 

• embrace the suck, the hard, the difficult. Dive headfirst into the pain, that’s where we grow from 
I am so thankful to the amazing people who answer my FaceTime calls to counsel me when I’m lost or frustrated or need some help guiding what feels like a raging, pounding, threatening wave. Thankful for advice and understanding and the perspective checks. Thankful for a momma who sends me more coconut oil when my jar gets empty [shameless plug for Dignity Coconut Oil, check it out, it will bring you soft skin, healthy hair, joy and more] as well as fills my love jar when it gets empty. 
Why am I including this part? I don’t know- but my favoritest worship band [Rend Collective] used a photo that I took on their Instagram account. Yes yes yes! I shrieked with more joy then that of twelve year old me at a One Direction concert. Really. You don’t understand. I’m still on cloud nine. They’re such cool people. Also, totally go read their iBook, Campfire Stories. Here’s an excerpt that is beautifully phrased and my heart so much agrees with, “But I reluctantly have to admit that ghost stories are as much a part of our campfire experiences growing up as even our beloved s’mores.” So eat s’mores and tell your stories. 
Today is Sunday. And it was good. I went on a picnic I wasn’t expecting to enjoy; but I laughed hard and loved every second. One thing I’ve discovered over that last three years is that even though I’m extroverted, my quiet time is so important. So, even though there’s a dinner party of twelve commencing ten feet away from me, I’m hiding in my room to decompress for a second or twelve hundred. I also really enjoy writing this and putting my thoughts out there, so this helps in that. 
Here’s a little something for you: on our two in a half hour car ride home we played a made up version of 21 Questions, and this one struck me, “what are you doing now to change the world?” Ponder on that. 

So that’s all I have for you now, I hope that’s well worded and flows somewhat naturally. Growing is painful and hard. I am oh so tired, filled up by people, spoke a lot of Spanish and now I must rejoin the party, because it’s actually culturally inappropriate for me to be hibernating from humans. Plus, I like these humans. 

The end. 

Excerpt From: Collective, Rend. “Campfire Stories.” iBooks. 
This material may be protected by copyright. I claim no rights to their awesome book.