Guest Author 6 Minute Read I was eleven when my body first betrayed me, with a limp and sore legs. Doctors said I was overweight—another mark against my body—until one doctor finally x-rayed my legs and found that my hips were severely displaced, and one had a malformed socket. What words for a tender preteen to hear: malformed, displaced, disabled. “Use a cane if needed,” I was told. “Try and lose weight—you’ll be in less pain.”
Rachelle Rea Cobb 4 Minute Read When my professor told me I wasn’t participating in discussions enough to earn an A in his literature course that semester, I had an idea. Confessing that my heart stopped beating if I so much as thought about speaking up in class, I told him that if he would just call on me and save me…
Elisabeth 6 Minute Read Your vocation: what is it? It isn’t exactly the same as your career or job, says Jeff Goins, though it may include them. Its scope is life-long: it is the theme you will return to again and again, however many times your specific job description might change. The fact that I’ve gone from teaching English abroad…
Elisabeth 4 Minute Read When I was an awkward, anxious twenty-something who felt hopelessly crippled by shyness, it dawned on me one day that even a stick-in-the-mud might actually be transformed into the kind of person who joyfully welcomes new people, new adventures, and new growth in my heart. It might be possible to be born “old” and steadily…
Katie 3 Minute Read All I wanted was a Keurig in my early twenties with my coffee in a to-go mug. Travel mugs symbolized I was grown up, a professional, with important things to do and places to be. Time to brew a regular cup of coffee? Maybe someday when I was a grandparent. Over the years the Keurig…
Gretchen Louise 3 Minute Read I started growing my hair out when my son was born three years ago. It had hardly been much past my shoulders since I’d chopped it off around age 13. I was ready to see what long hair felt like. I wanted to know if I would be as beautiful as those women whose long hair…
Jenni Marie 3 Minute Read I eat food. I make food. I obsess over food. I workout so I can have more food. I eat food so I can live. I live so I can eat food. Food is divisive (carbs or low-carb? fats or fat-free? organic or not? gluten or none?). Food is unifying (have you ever attended a foodless party?)….
Jeannie Pederson 4 Minute Read Body image. It’s something that nearly all women struggle with: globally, only four percent of women consider themselves beautiful. Why is this such a widespread issue? God declared all of his creation good in the beginning. Adam and Eve certainly didn’t have body image issues. Oh, wait. As soon as sin entered the world, so…
Shannon Coe 6 Minute Read It wasn’t a mirror that “done me in” or made me feel old. And that surprised me. I always perceive the mirror or the scales to be my adversaries to a healthy body or age image. At the first signs that the mirror or scale will be speaking lies or distorting truths to me, I…
Callie Mitchell 6 Minute Read The Lord blessed me with a golden mane. Thick and wavy, though a little wild at times, it has been my glory for as long as I can remember. With my Princess Buttercup locks, however, came a peach fuzz in places a woman does not really want fuzz. Of course, I was unaware until someone…
Rachelle Rea Cobb 3 Minute Read I am terrible at parking. Ask my parents. They’re regularly regaled at the dinner table with tales of how I parked a mile away from the entrance of bookstores and class buildings because I was terrified of parking between two other cars. When I’m daring enough to try, I swing wide. Or I go narrow….
Natasha Metzler 3 Minute Read Isn’t it funny how we often think the most beautiful things are those we have not? As a young girl I read a book about a woman with chocolate-colored eyes and blond hair. In the story, she was exceptionally beautiful because her coloring wasn’t the normal “blond hair, blue eyes”, but different and unique. And my immediate…
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