It Is Well With My Soul

Okay, peeps.

It’s been a week since my last post because life has been abundant—in both positive and negative ways—but I’m finally able to take a moment to wrap my head around it all and share.

I suppose the framework for so much of our recent vibe is the hubby’s work, so that’s where I’ll start.

This past week marked the culmination of, in many ways, the purpose behind our move to San Antonio. 

While there were several factors that dragged us down here from Dallas, the driving force was a loose, three-to-five year business development plan that is coming to fruition, now, four-ish years after our relocation.

As with any major life event, this brings with it quite a bit of introspection. It’s natural to approach the closing of a loop and find yourself a bit nostalgic or sentimental.

For so long, after our move (years, in fact) I struggled with the Big Questions:

Why are we here??

Why did we need to move??

What’s the purpose??

Will it be worth it??

Why did we have to go through so much heartache?

I attribute many of these questions to the pretty traumatic process of leaving Dallas.

Not only were we completely settled after 15 years there, but we’d never seen ourselves moving. We had a home we loved, a happy life with friends and some family in town, and we just never saw a scenario that would lure us away.

Add to that the fact that our move here was just awful any which way you look at it, followed by a pandemic less than a year later, a massive home disaster less than a year after that, and…welp. These past four-ish years have been wild and unimaginable, in so many ways. SO many things we never ever could have anticipated or planned for.

But what’s that saying? Make plans and God laughs, right?

Around our three year anniversary down here, I finally stopped asked all those why questions. After a trip through Dallas, I was finally to a point that DFW didn’t feel like home anymore, which felt like a major step for me, personally.

Then fast forward to our four year relocation anniversary, and I (somewhat comically, begrudgingly) admitted that San Antonio does feel like home.

Don’t get me wrong: there are so many things I wish were a bit different—namely, how far away we are from most of our family, and how far South we are (hence, the heinous heat and desert-like terrain, that just doesn’t speak to me).

But.

The kiddos are happy and thriving.

We are settled in our home and connected with our neighborhood/community.

The hubby and I both have lovely networks of friends through parent life, school life, exercise life or neighborhood life.

And, of course, the hubby’s job has provided us with an amazing quality of life—thanks to a nearby office, flexible hours, and work that challenges him and keeps him relevant/busy.

Basically, what I’m trying to say is this: life is crazy these days. We are scheduled to the max and burning the candle at both ends most of the time. With our children at their current ages, it is never a dull day, and we’re often so worn out that we collapse into bed at the end of the day.

But it is a full life.

A happy life.

An abundant life, within these golden years of raising a family. 

And I am constantly aware of the fact that, despite the busyness of it all: It Is Well With My Soul.

After the hubby’s milestone business day on Friday, we were blessed by a relatively low-key family Saturday. It was slightly gloomy, the kiddos begged for some pajama time, we cooked and cocooned and it was so lovely—and necessary.

At one point, when the kiddos ventured upstairs, the hubby fell into a rare, coma-like sleep that only happens for him once in a blue moon. It was glorious to see his body just powering down after a really insane few weeks and months:

And as I was taking oodles of creepy-stalker/spouse pics :) I was struck by the parallels between this picture and this current time in our lives, versus the early days of our relocation down here. 

The below picture was taken after we’d committed to moving, had been through a hellish few weeks to ready and put our Dallas house on the market, hunt for and secure a house down in San Antonio, and plan for the hubby’s closure of one job and launch of another. It was certainly another time (amplified by a lot of illness in our household) that felt like a major turning point in our lives.

It’s wild to think back on our individual and collective feelings about life and our move back then, and to compare it all to now.

God has a way of weaving together all things for his greater purpose, and though I often don’t understand/agree with/appreciate his divine perspective at the time, I’m often able to see the forest through the trees at a later date.

I certainly feel like I can accept the Why of it all, related to our move, now. Or perhaps, better still, I’ve stopped trying to figure it out, because we’re just…happy.

That said, I desperately hope I can understand the Why of it all, related to another life event this past week that felt seismic.

My dearest friend in the world suffered an unimaginable loss, and the sudden nature of it—especially as it intermixed with the big feelings of the hubby’s business milestone—really left me raw.

In a way, it provided a hefty dose of major perspective, as life events tend to do, when we need them to the most.

My friend’s terrible tragedy reminded me of how fleeting life can be, and how very grateful I am to be living this overwhelmingly abundant life of ours right now, even on the (many) days when it feels overwhelming.

Moves, business, kiddo challenges, social obligations and intricacies, house disasters, expensive accidents…though it’s all part of shaping our days and our lives, NONE of it is the point.

LOVE is the point. 

THOSE we love is the point.

Living our life in a PRESENT way, and seeing the blessings, even when it feels like a needle-in-a-haystack kind of hunt.

I’m so grateful for the abundance of it all these days—even the abundance of responsibilities and stress—because it means we’re living life, FULLY.

And all is well with my soul.

More later (with a much lighter vibe, I promise!).

Until then…over and out from a GLORIOUS day do the kiddos off school! We needed this unstructured weekday in a bad way, and I think it will help us poker through another jam-packed week.

Over and out.