You know how you pray to God and all and get all twisted out of joint when things don’t go your way….and then there’s Judy!

Well….I envision myself as being “enlightened” a loving soul, a transcendant spirit, a real hero in the spiritual world….well it’s all pucky!

Seriously…..it’s a load of phooey….I am super “enlightened” (um not!), super spiritual and over all relatively cool on the coolness meter at least as cool as all my “friends” friends and family and stuff….but I am not as at all as cool as Judy!

She’s a fellow adoptive mom and some of you may know her already, she writes a blog: Justenjoyhim about her son who was adopted from Vietnam. Some of my dearest friends, Randy and Elliot adopted their youngest son from Vietnam. Anyway, what makes her cooler than a lot of the coolest people I know (other than my cousin Kris who also battled a big time, big yucky breast cancer…holla Kris is this…. She was diagnosed with breast cancer and is fighting it!!!! And then writes a post like this….

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just this

20 01 2008 I’m happy today. Content.

Nate and I went to church. I told my Sunday School class where I am, that the cancer has metastasized to the liver, but that I’ll be doing chemotherapy once/week, that between medicine and prayers I am very hopeful. That people do beat this.

And I told them a story about an amazing woman I met at the Atlanta airport, someone who I believe God put there at the exact moment that I needed to meet her. I need to be able to put this story in words and I’ll write a post about it. It’s very profound, it touched me deeply, and it changed my prayers from ones where I was trying to control the outcome of what would happen with the liver biopsy to prayers of two words — Thy will — said over and over and over again, mostly because I couldn’t think of what other words of prayer to say. The words gave me such a sense of peace that I really didn’t fall apart when I got the news that the biopsy was positive. Of course, I wasn’t happy about it. But as I said to Frank, “I’m not on the floor, I’m not crying, falling apart. I don’t quite get it.” As one of my fellow Sunday school friends said:

That’s because God was holding you up.

I have to find the words to explain this story — this woman, her words, the impact she’s made on my life. It’s beyond amazing. A few woman in the class were in tears at the end of my story. I’ll get it down, I will, but it’s important that I get it right.

Just know that since I met her and her words reached my heart, I’ve let go of holding on so tightly to the outcome of everything and have just given over to God. I’m letting him hold me up. I’m letting him carry me. I’m letting him give me the peace that I had been so desperately seeking and the irony of peace is that you can’t chase it; it’s when you stop chasing it and sit still and give your life over to God that you get it.

So in spite of everything, in spite of how dark things may seem, I’m fine. Don’t get me wrong, I do have my moments, but overall I’m OK. And a lot of the time, I’m more than OK.

I’m still feeling loved. Incredibly, deeply loved. I’m strengthened by that love, by the prayers and good thoughts of everyone.

So keep them coming.

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You all know that I stress over money and career and have vowed that this year I am employing the “let go and let God” philosophy as I spent most of last year being a Ninja B!tch Warior from Hell….figured hey that got me….um…not so far….let’s try the Gandhi approach instead.

But seriously…..Judy has it covered….she’s doin’ Gandhi and better….she teaching about love and living in joy even in the face of some really scary stuff…she’s good…she’s a teacher and a guide and I am….well…I’m all ears Judy

God has raised you up How’s the view…..

Take a moment to send her love today….give her a shout We all could use as much love as we can get

And just to add a little puntuation mark to this post about one of the coolest people I don’t know This was Aria and My fortune today from the fortune cookie we split.

“Approach all areas of your life with bold enthusiam”…..thanks God, Aria’s got that down pat, but I’ll give it a shot….thanks for the heads up God!

Oh and PS….this is my favorite line of Judy’s post!

“I’m letting him give me the peace that I had been so desperately seeking and the irony of peace is that you can’t chase it; it’s when you stop chasing it and sit still and give your life over to God that you get it.”

Did I mention that Judy ROCKS!!!!