thankful for the motivation to start blogging.

I am not sure why it has taken me so long to start blogging. could be not wanting to go with the new and trendy thing. could be a fear of being known. could be sheer lack of time and energy. whatever it was, I broke through it today.  I realized how sweet and special and wonderful life is and how much I want to remember these things.  I want to be reminded of the blessings God has poured out on my life, and be able to look back and reminisce.

I have been pushed this week and really since I have been married.  I thought after wedding planning was over, life would slow down but I was wrong.  Life finds new ways of snatching up my time with other things, I feel like it has been weeks since I was able to sit and have silence and breathe. I am hoping blogging provides this relief for me and pray it does not become another notch on my to do list or  something that weighs on me.  I wrote a blog when I was in Seattle for the summer visiting my brother and his new family, but since then I have resisted the blog movement.  I envied girls who kept up blogs in one aspect- as a way of memorializing life and its precious moments, but I also know my personality.  I was scared of my perfectionism and my wanting everything the Shannon way and I didn't want blogging to be taking up more of my hard to find free time.  I want blogging to be an outlet. A way to journal online, an organized account of things I feel, see, do, touch, and learn.  A way to have another outlet for feelings of both joy and sorrow besides dancing, running, and reading.

The meaning behind the blog comes from a book I recently began called one thousand gifts.  The writer, Ann Voskamp, begins explaining how she came to embrace a lifestyle of radical gratitude, in the light of knowing Jesus more deeply.  Luke 22:19 says Jesus "took bread, gave thanks and broke it, and gave it to them..."In the original language in Greek, it translates, Eucharisteo.  The root word charis means grace and chara means "joy"  Each morning I strive for a fulfilled and joyous life, and the following quote floored me and something clicked inside of me.  

Deep chara joy is found only at the table of the euCHARisteo--- the table of thanksgiving.  I sit there long... wondering... is it that simple? Is the height of my chara joy dependent on the depths of my eucharisteo thanks? 

 I realize that in order to have that deep joy that outstands all sorrow, hardship, and failure, I must have a thankful heartitude (yes, an attitude of the heart is a heartitude).  Therefore, we come to why I am blogging and what this blog is about.  A chance for me to commemorate those moments, both small and large that I am thankful for, in hopes that my vision will coincide with how the Lord sees me and sees this life I am living.  I want to be thankful. I want to blog. I want to have deep chara joy.