Tender & Truthful.

Sad. Fruitful. Broken. True. 


I love words. They can be so powerful, so beautiful. There is so much potential in words. I get the same feeling from reading a beautifully written paragraph that I get when I listen to a good song. It can fill me up, give me hope; words have the ability to stir things, to enhance already existing feelings, even if I don't really want them too. 


2011 ends today. EEEEEEEE Ashley is getting married! One of my best friends got engaged yesterday or the day before. I don't know one of those days. They are all running together. This life is moving more and more quickly, it seems. I'm not always sure how to keep up with it. It's speeding. I want to soak it up. I want to be brave in the time I am given. I want to remember the things that matter; I want to dwell on those things. I want to love better. I want to be more kind. I want to be wise in the choices I make. 


I've never really done new years resolutions. Mainly because I've never really understood why there is this huge hype around January 1st. January 1st doesn't change things. I like to think that we can change things any day. There is nothing wrong with striving to be something better, to change, but there is also nothing magical about starting a new year. If I believe what I say I do, then I have to believe that people can change. I do believe that people can change. I guess I've always just been uncomfortable with new years resolutions, because I get this feeling that people think they can only start over when the calendar does. 


Well, I was thinking about all of this yesterday, and so in an attempt to maintain my anti-new-year-resolution-persona, I made some December 30th resolutions. Just kidding. I think resolutions are great. I think goals are good. Things to reach for are a good thing. 


I want to be softer, more tender, more kind. I want to smile more. I want to love better. I want to feel things more deeply. I guess I'll sum it up with tenderness. I like that word. I think it includes a lot of things that wouldn't really describe who I am today. I want to feel warm to people. So there it is. Tenderness. 


Honesty. One of my other, non engaged friends and I were talking the other day about relationships. All kinds of relationships. We talked about honesty and how it can be hard sometimes. I don't tend to flat out lie to people a lot. That's not really a struggle of mine (although I have done it), but I do have a hard time being honest with myself sometimes and with God. 


It's important that I take time to process, reflect, talk, dig. It's important that I do that on my own, and it's important that I have people who will help me do that. It's important that I have people who won't take ____ from me. I don't tend to straight out lie to people, but I will gloss over things, I will beat around the bush, I will make things look just a little bit more pretty than they actually are. I want to be honest. I want to be truthful. We half-jokingly, half-not made comments like, "2012 is going to be all about honesty." I like that idea of that. 


Tenderness and truthfulness. 
Truthfulness and tenderness. 


I have a long, long list of things I'd like to change someday. Right now I'm thinking about tenderness and truthfulness. Who would have thought I'd ever go for the two word exercise on my own. Looks like people really can change.