Five Minute Friday: Real=tears?

I had two purposes in starting this blog. One was to share resources, challenges, and stories about raising girls. The other was to discipline myself to write. Writing organizes my thoughts and focuses my day. It takes the lessons God is teaching me out of blurry and into focus. Today, and maybe many future Fridays, I will focus on that second goal. A blogger that blesses me who writes The Gypsy Momma, hosts Five Minute Fridays. Each Friday she posts a word, then challenges other bloggers to write for five minutes flat without worrying whether it is write or not. Today's word is REAL. When we are done, we visit the blogger who linked up before us, and encourage them in their comment section. And though I didn't write about it, the word REAL reminds me of the Velveteen Rabbit, and that story had tears too. Thank you for reading the challenge, link up if you want to join us or go encourage some of the other bloggers who participate.

Leaving the women's prayer meeting I felt frustrated. Prayers for sick relatives, for which house to buy, for children to be potty trained. I wanted to pray about those things. But I knew that each of those women had deeper hurts, deeper prayer requests. Fear, protection, insecurity, whatever held them back,  they wouldn't share.  Maybe makeup covers more than blemishes. 

The next week, I knew from the way that meeting haunted me that I needed to speak. And I knew I would cry. I always cry. For my personality, real rarely comes without tears. And I knew my make up would run. When I walked in, I scanned the room for the nearest tissue box. And I shared, from my heart, some of the hard stuff. The things I could not leave at God's feet, thoughts that fought all week to take captive. And I cried. 

And then, some one else shared, with tears, about her parent's divorce. And then someone else about her food issues. And suddenly we loved each other more deeply when prayed, even if the real prayers were for sick relatives. 

If we are not real, why expect others to be?