A Story of Rediscovery
[Guest post by Erin Marie Shell: This is a story of God’s love, a story of heartbreak and a story of rediscovery. Thanks for sharing, Erin!]
Exhausted after a full day of work, I arrived home late one night, opened the front door, and entered the darkness. As I walked into the house, my heels clicked on the floor, greeting me with a very loud, unfamiliar echo. Without turning on the lights, I began to realize what had happened.
After 11 years of marriage, he had moved out. The shock of an empty house left me reeling in confusion. I was exhausted with life, exhausted with familiar feeling of not being good enough, exhausted with begging him to see me…really see me.
As though life itself was being drained from my body, I sunk to the floor with my sleeping baby girl in my arms.
Physically, emotionally, mentally, with certainty, I knew that this would be the one that I could never overcome. Surely, this was the blow that would take me completely out. I cried for hours, and I lost track of time. There was no one I could call, there was no one who could understand.
The journey to this point had been traveled imperfectly by him and me alone. We were both responsible for what appeared to be a tragic failure. I had given more than I had to give to a marriage that was never satisfied, a marriage that didn’t care if I suffered, a marriage that refused to justify our existence in it.
I felt dejected, fooled, and crushed with disappointment as I lay on the floor, my body heaving with every cry and breath.
But it was on that floor, in a single defining moment, that God met me, and gently picked up the shattered pieces of my spirit, shattered beyond my recognition.
He met me there, right where I was, and flooded my heart with His love. Suddenly, I didn’t feel like I was alone – I was accompanied by a great, warm Presence.
God reminded me that in my weakness, He was strong. This was not an opportunity to give up on His abilities, instead, this was an opportunity to give up on my abilities. I had to give up on the belief that I had to do it all by myself, that I was alone, and that I would fail.
This was my opportunity to let go, and allow Him to be God. This was the beginning of my ultimate love-encounter with God.
I began to experience my love-encounter with God, beginning with my own personal meditation practice. This was a time that I dedicated to listening, feeling and recording the knowledge and wisdom that God impressed upon my spirit in a delightful, soothing way.
Just as with anything you devote time and energy to, over time, I came into a deep knowledge of what I was studying – God and my Self. As a result, I was restored, stronger, more radiantly than I can recall with any previous awareness. This delivery of restoration reverberated throughout every aspect of my life, from my spirit and relationships, to my career, business, family, and ministry.
During this period of time, Beautiful Wild Free – Spiritual Healing for Women Rediscovering Themselves, was birthed. Women began contacting me as they experienced the inevitable challenges of life, looking for answers.
“Why?” they asked, and as we engaged in conversation, I discovered that a process of rediscovery was a natural result of having been spiritually broken. It doesn’t really matter what did the breaking – the loss of a child, a marriage, a relationship, health – it was simply the fact that there was a breaking that positioned them perfectly to embark upon a journey of restoration that would exceed any understanding of possibility or expectation.
What would you do to discover peace, to wake up vibrant, to embody radiance that illuminates that life path that you’re walking? At the base of all created things is an energy of love.
Love has the power to restore, create and enliven.
It takes more than just a knowledge of love to accomplish this, it actually takes a love-encounter. An encounter with love brings you to your most authentic self, which is a gateway to true personal freedom. As you learn to love God, then to truly love yourself, you can then love others – even those who have purposefully committed severe acts of hurt and hate against your spirit.
This is where you find true peace and love, and where you learn to position yourself to receive what it is your spirit truly desires…to rejoice in the beauty of love, wildly, freely and with abandon. Beautiful. Wild. Free.
Erin Marie Shell, MBA is a passionate lover of Jesus Christ, bestselling author, compelling speaker and successful businesswoman whose life purpose is to help women achieve spiritual healing by coming into an intimate encounter with God’s love. She is the creator and spiritual catalyst of her women’s ministry Beautiful, Wild, Free: Spiritual Healing for Women Rediscovering Themselves.
photo credit: Petite Blonde via photopin (license)