Day 77- Still...

I am not going to recount my day... suffice to say it was difficult. I am STILL... overwhelmed!!!!  However the highs out weighed the lows.  A wonderful evening with friends, laughing, relaxing, the CD with my pictures all wrapped up in such delightful detail....and that brings me to my blogging for today...

Tanya, brought me my package.  The way she delivers her "product" is amazing.  First she gives you the preview on her blog and then she brings you the real thing.  It was a small box with a red satin ribbon around it and her signature sticker holding it closed, (very classy) then you opened it and the detail was just so exquisit that it would take way too long to try to describe.  Let me just say it was so apparent that she had spent so much time on it.  She had spent a lot of time working on this gift for me.  Wow, what a blessing. Notice I was just mentioning the wrapping.  The contents are priceless, proof of this experience, pictures I can use to work on brochures and send when I get a speaking engagement, but the wrapping was divine.  It reminded me that the outside, the wrapping does matter.  If there was nothing in the box it would not be as valuable for sure, but if you could have seen me opening the package... I was gently, untying the string, very gently and slowly opening it as I absorbed every detail. If she had walked in and handed me a CD in a CD case I would have been excited and looked forward to looking at the pictures, but the way things were done I savored every second of opening the gift. It some how even added value to the contents. 

I have for so long believed the (C) that my appearance didn't matter... It is crap!!!! I know I have blogged about this before but I needed to again.  I know if the contents of the package are nothing, no matter how fine you dress it up, it is still missing the main event. I know we shouldn't judge a book by its cover... but that statement is for the observer not the observed.  Big difference.  Jesus made birds in bright beautiful colors. He made flowers, sky and the starts.  All have function but all have beauty that is unnecessary for function. There is so much beauty in all he made and yet then we say, "how we look doesn't matter"? Really?  It should not matter most, but it matters.

I think the biggest pile of (C) that I have been hugging onto is that it doesn't matter... UNLESS it is what others think of you or of how they think you should be... and than it defines your worth.  Tomorrow I am getting my hair cut, and I know when I come back to my grandparents, Grandmother will mention that I didn't get it cut enough.  That it is too long.  It will bother me, even hurt me.  I know it is going to happen, and I know it shouldn't, but it will.  Everytime I am doing my hair, I can hear my grandmother Chalmers (who has been dead a long time now) saying how people with long gray hair look ratty!  When I wear things that are slightly low, (anything past my collar bone) Grandmother will give me a talk on modesty. I realize my grandmothers idea of looking great is a old lady hair cut, short and curly and turtle neck shirts.  You know the look right?  I know I don't want to look that way, so why do the comments hurt so bad, why do I care?  Not sure, but this is for sure!!!!! IT IS CRAP!!!  I need to be myself, I need to be willing to carefully spend time on my packaging, and make sure it is done so that it is pleasing to me. Tonight as I opened Tanya's wonderful package for me, I thought about how the quality and even the style of the packaging reflected the style and the talent of the contents within.  Just so, if I try to make my outside such that everyone else is pleased with it, then it won't reflect me. If Tanya's packaging had been a completely different fell from what was inside it would not have been nearly as special. When I went to a 4 day seminar on public speaking they critiqued us on our appearance. I was terrified.  I had shopped and tried my best to find an outfit that was public speaking esk....I bought a black pant suit with a crisp white shirt and great heals.  When it came time for critique, I was almost hyperventilating.  The woman very kindly said that I needed to dress with personality that matched my personality.  She said, "When I look at you I am expecting, serious, strong, buisness, void of emotion, then you speak, and you come alive, are funny, and emotional and colorful! Your personality doesn't match the outside."  I need to be me inside and out.  I need to discover my style, my look, and then ROCK it!!!! I need to be freely me.  I am not saying we shouldn't consult each other or talk about it with each other, but we need to have the confidence to then pick the "US" and do it, or be it. 

I know that for some reason, I want to or tend to value and hug onto the (C) others want to throw at me and ignore the real me. So having my hair done tomorrow is important and I should have it done just as I think would be best, not my grandmother!  Because if my grandmother had wrapped up the pictures that Tanya had taken it would look ridiculous and it would not at all be the beautiful gift that it was. If I let her get in the way of me being me, than I won't be nearly the package I should or could be.  God created us to be unique individuals and I need to honor His creation in me.

So here are a few pictures of tonights amazing package...

First the package...

Then the content...or the inside... just a few of many many favorites!