Free Falling
The past few days have been a roller coaster of emotions.
Daniel and I have felt in full the rise of excitement that comes with newness starting in motion. The joy of free falling into lack of control, the terror of free falling into lack of control and the dizzying loops of all the could be's, to do’s and potential.
As we start this adventure, we hold a blank canvas of a time frame: four months. We leave in August and return right before Christmas.
This is our starting point. Other than this, we have no set plans.
Even as a free-spirited, "no plans are good plans" believing couple, this is a fairly daunting place to be.
No reservations. No commitments. No expectations.
Two words have surrounded our thoughts, securing us together as we get ready to jump.
Risk and peace.
Risk is worth it. If there is peace.
Peace is a gift that is sometimes hard to understand. As an avid over-analyzer, I dissect decisions to a pulp. Pros and cons, round and round. Do I have peace? Where is the peace? Is it in this or that decision?
We started this pursuit of Europe a few months ago looking for peace in avenues of certainties: set places to stay, guaranteed jobs, specific countries. We eventually came off of our decision making merry-go-round, discouraged and confused.
It wasn’t until we claimed peace where we were standing, in our everyday, that opportunity came. We finally came to a place of truly accepting staying in our life as we knew it. It’s a pretty great life, this life that we have been living. We were given peace to just be. We wrapped this gift around us and settled in.
After that came the call to jump.
What we have been learning: Chasing peace in the form of certainty does not grant peace. Peace is something to be carried, held from the first step. A covering that infuses confidence beyond understanding. It protects and guides and ties you to truth. It warrants and fuels risk.
We want to be people of peace. We want to move from a place of peace. Not because it guarantees that our plans will work out as we want, but because we carry a gift of peace from the One who is Peace.
We have the peace to go, to risk. So here we go, plans or no plans.