My six-word memoir.

If I could write six words to sum up the last six plus months that have been personally trying and draining and up and down, it would be the following.

Learning grace through receiving while failing.

Because I fail, daily. My actions don't deserve, daily, but I receive, daily. Whether from my husband or God or even my dog, I receive grace when there hasn't been much grace given on my end.

And sometimes that makes me mad.

I get mad at myself for not giving out enough grace but stealing it for myself when I need it most. I get mad for not getting it and continuing to just do and say ungraceful things to others. I get mad because that's not who I am, right? I get mad that I have to fail to learn and that the failing hurts really, really bad.

As I was writing this, I was reminded of the verse in the second chapter of Corinthians where God speaks of His grace being sufficient. While digging a little deeper, I read the context of the verse in The Message translation.

...I was given the gift of a handicap to keep me in constant touch with my limitations... At first I didn't think of it as a gift, and begged God to remove it. Three times I did that, and then He told me, My grace is enough; it's all you need. My strength comes into its own in your weakness. Once I heard that, I was glad to let it happen. I quit focusing on the handicap and began appreciating the gift. It was a case of Christ's strength moving in on my weakness. Now I take limitations in stride, and with good cheer, these limitations that cut me down to size—abuse, accidents, opposition, bad breaks. I just let Christ take over! And so the weaker I get, the stronger I become. 

My handicaps? Anxiety, worry, control, fear of failure, fear of not being heard, fear of fill-in-the-blank.

But I know that when these handicaps cause me to fail in this world, I am picked up by His grace and I receive and learn and am sent off to take another step.

Sometimes I don't get it. Sometimes my mind and head and thoughts take over. But I am learning through receiving, which is the only way, really.