I'm Ready to Dance!

I'm off to our women's retreat! Please pray for the women attending & the hubby's/babies at home. Especially my hubby - we have had a LONG week of sickness around here & he has some fear the babies are not totally over it yet?!
I am on the Women's Ministry team & we chose "When Wallflowers Dance - Becoming a Woman of Righteous Confidence" by Angela Thomas for our study this weekend.
Here is what it's all about...
Dancing is living in the fullness of your purpose for this life on earth. Dancing is loving every single person that God brings to you with the love He has so abundantly given. Dancing means that you have eyes that can see what matters for eternity. Dancing is a passionate life. Adventure. And living without fear.

Dancing is spiritual maturity. Thomas is calling women to this, away from being what she calls "un-women." Un-women are those who retreat from life by numbing themselves to its hardships. "I became the un-woman in my effort to avoid the relationship landmines all around me," Thomas writes. "Then there was some weird decision that I didn't deserve anything more than a numb, timid existence. And then sometimes it seemed like the more spiritual thing to do was to emotionally fade to gray. Be quiet. Remain unseen and unknown. Forget about becoming anything. Neutral. Unrecognizable. More and more it seems like so many women are surviving decades of their lives by turning their hearts inside out, trying not to feel. Becoming the un-woman." Chief among the problems of numbing yourself to life's pain is that you end up numbing yourself to life's joys as well --- and to God.
The antidote to un-womanliness is learning to dance --- essentially pursuing an "intentional" life. Thomas wants women to take time for their own needs --- body and soul. And her advice covers both; she counsels women to restore order to their physical environment even as they're working to restore spiritual order in their hearts and minds. Find a spiritual mentor and clean out your closets. Deal with deep-seated bitterness in your life and make time for exercise.

Thomas gives women permission to put aside most of their self-imposed expectations --- homemade meals and handwritten thank-you notes among them --- while learning to dance. "I love ironed clothes and beautiful dinners and having my hair styled. But I cannot do it all every day and care for my soul. I am deciding that my soul and the souls of my children matter more. My being peaceful when I'm with them matters more than anything else," she writes. "Sometimes it's more peaceful to drive through for chicken-Caesar wraps than to kill myself for homemade. I desire that part of my life, but I am also in a ridiculously busy season of mothering. Right now it just feels good to have my heart back, I don't want to run ahead of myself and sacrifice any of the growth I've fought so hard to get to."

Can I get an amen girls?! I wish that ya'll were going with me!! You will be there in spirit & there is always next year ; ) Much love & Many dances to YOU!!!