Have you ever jumped wholeheartedly into a project only to have it disintegrate before you landed???

A few weeks ago I jumped – excited about taking you on a life-changing journey that I envisioned deep within my soul.

Unfortunately, everything collapsed making me want to do the same thing.

It all started with my vehicle being in the shop for repairs and taking weeks instead of days to get the repairs finished. (I tried to stay optimistic as I relied on my husband for rides to work and packed my lunch every day.)

I sent out an invitation via e-mail to my entire subscriber list. And then I embarked on a search for the perfect graphic of being “poured out”. You know, ’cause that’s what we do, we place more emphasis on the appearance of things on Social Media (or maybe that’s just the people around here).

Before I could complete my plan to roll out this new challenge, a creator’s worst nightmare happened –

I fried my laptop! (with a little help from a spilled protein shake in an emergency Uber ride).

It was as if time stood still. The pouring out that I was hoping to write about was now happening in real life.

If you could imagine a virtual housefire, this was it. The next few weeks were spent combing through the wreckage to see what I could salvage. It wasn’t a lot.

You know how you have those memories that seem like it was only yesterday? Well, that is how I felt about the last time I backed up my laptop, except it was more like a year ago. And just like that a year’s worth of work, writing and curriculum were gone. Empty.

That was my prayer; empty me of me.

I wanted all the ‘yucky’ stuff to be dealt with. Pride, envy, bad hormonal attitudes.

It was actually surprising that this (& so many other things) revealed a new, stable version of me. (Maybe the woman I had always hoped I was becoming?)

When the emptying happens, then what? Like boundaries and margin, the new space creates opportunities to add something that there was never room for before. Maybe love, joy peace?

This is the key. When we are emptied the void should be filled with better. Going through trials, being poured out is hard.

But unless you are poured out you can never be refilled.

So many of us live life like those fountains that just recycle the same water over and over. It looks really nice, but there is no purpose.

During the next couple of weeks let’s focus on what we need to “pour out”.

May our prayer be, “Father God, empty me of me and replace it with a refreshing that will impact the lives of others for your glory!

May we be poured out and filled up!”