I surrender.

Hello friends!

It's been a minute since I've written on here, but man the Holy Spirit has been flowing in my life pretty strongly recently. There's a few things that's happened lately that I just feel the need to share. But first, let me start off with what I really think opened the gates for God to make some new breakthroughs in my life.

I recently went on a women's leadership retreat through the encouragement of my girl, DelaineJudith towards the end of December. I encountered so many wonderful women and witnessed them living out their "yes" to our Father. The sisters graciously shared such beautiful stories of their calling to their vocation. Interestingly, the big council I was looking for (the big yes or no from God about what path to take) didn't come. Instead, I was advised and reminded of the simplicity of stillness (Psalm 46:10). I've been brought so much peace just from their council and prayers. Sister Mikaela, in particular, on the first day I met her, beautifully affirmed me in saying that I have a "joyful spirit."

That really spoke to me, because ever since then, I've felt such immense joy rule over every other emotion I've experienced. Someone I newly met reminded me that joy is one of the beautiful fruits of the Holy Spirit, and I truly believe the Holy Spirit has definitely been working for me in this confusing season.

It's a confusing season for me because within just this past month and a half, I've been juggling a lot: a very brief, yet daunting period of drama with a guy, graduate school applications, deciding between staying home and moving to Seattle, getting an internship offer, leaving my retail job (that I had for 1 year & 1 mo.), family life, applying to be a girls' camp counselor, and discerning over starting this Nineveh 90. So yeah. It's a lot.

Allow me to elaborate on a few of those things I mentioned.

• Graduate school is something that's been on my mind a lot, and I'm finally starting applications (although I'm having a really hard time avoiding procrastination). I am leaning towards the option of staying home because I think my family--specifically, my parents--need me here.

• Last month I was undergoing an interview process for a job at a wonderful nonprofit called Rebirth Homes. I did not get the position, but through God's grace, they still admired me and offered me an internship. I then had to make a decision of how I was going to balance an internship, work, and school, and brought it to prayer. Which brings me to my next point...

• I left my retail job at Starbucks. I should first say, though, I did enjoy working here. I found myself embedded into a great community with co-workers I really enjoyed working with. I gained experience that this job only could've taught me. I was really close to working my way up into corporate, as well. However, juggling work and school became really difficult on my mental health. I felt myself physically grow in exhaustion, and my work ethic at school depleted. I kept up with it all because I wanted to continue working and keep that experience up. It wasn't until the Holiday season this year came closer, and new policies were enforced that I felt a big tug on my heart to really consider leaving. I felt that my job was getting in the way of my spiritual life, and I then began looking for a job that could help me foster that thirst for Christ. The internship offer came in pretty quickly, and I made that decision (also through guidance of others' advice), to leave Starbucks and just focus on my internship, spirituality, and school. Interestingly, the internship felt like it was on pause for a while, but I'm going to be starting on Monday, which is the same day I start...

• Nineveh 90 (click here for a brief summary of what this is): This is something very new to me that my friend Chelsea introduced to me. When I finally found time on Tuesday to look into it, I sat down with the "elements" of it written down & my planner, and soon felt really overwhelmed trying to schedule in my prayer times. Thus, that Tuesday night I brought it to prayer, and simply asked for an obvious sign to let me know if this is something I should do, even though I'm hesitant about how to commit to it. The next morning (Wednesday), I woke up to a follow-up email about finally starting the internship this upcoming Monday. Which is the same day I start Nineveh 90. I went to bed last night with that realization and I just chuckled during my conversation with God about how good He is. He answered my prayer so quickly and so strongly.

• The last thing I'm currently working on is applying to be a counselor at girls' camp. I haven't shared this with a lot of people, but I for a long time have been yearning to serve youth in ways outside of music. Whether that meant to pray for them, to offer my advice from experience, to offer my testimony, etc. The Sisters at the retreat encouraged me to apply and I randomly thought about it yesterday and found that applications are open. I'm definitely not qualified enough (at least I don't think so) but I do plan on submitting my application on Sunday, which to me, is a physical gesture of full-on placing my trust in God. Which is exactly what I told myself 2019 needs to be about.

I'm surrendering to what He has for me this year, because I already know, and you can tell as well, that this year is going to be full of surprises and changes; and, I think that also means it's going to be a year God can really break through and speak to me. I just feel and know in my gut that this is going to be a transformative year for me. So rather than spending time being stressed out this year, I'm learning to find joy and peace amongst the chaos of it all.

Please please pray for me, friends! I'll try to be better at updating you all so that I don't have to write such huge texts like this again haha.

With Love,

Shae