Jill Shea

Hey beauts, it’s been a bit! Too long. How are you? How is your soul?

I am feeling relaxed and happy these days, and sometimes that just feels stinking good. I have been trying to soak up all of life lately and treasure it – treasure my people, my man, our home, the little things that make life big and juicy.

I just finished watching ‘Parenthood’ and OH MY GOODNESS GRACIOUS. I know I am seven years late to the game *insert monkey covering eyes emoji*, but we can talk about that later.

I try not to watch too much television (I deleted Netflix, I love it way too much – all my productivity goes out the window) but fell deep into the glorious waters of ‘Parenthood’. I get so bored with shows and movies – if they are a teeny bit boring to me, I’m DONE. But ‘Parenthood’. I will be recommending this piece of cultural GOLD to people for years to come.

Why is ‘Parenthood’ so good? First of all, it’s real. It authentically portrays the reality of being part of a family. So many shows are not deep in this way: they kind of skim over the family dynamics and this is not real. I love how layered ‘Parenthood’ is. I know other shows do not hone in on how families operate, and I love how ‘Parenthood’ is all about exploring the relationships and deep, real, difficulties that families go through.

The characters on ‘Parenthood’ fight. This is real. Families fight, and it is not comfortable.

‘Parenthood’ is so emotional. The way they use emotion connects with the way people process realistic life events. The storytelling is done so well. The casting is amazing. THIS SHOW IS SO GOOD.

The end.

I started out writing my post like this: This Father’s Day I did not get to see my dad and it was hard. But that is not how it ended up! This Father’s Day I got to see my dad! It was last minute and it was awesome. We went to one of our favourite coffee places and had meaningful conversation over super yummy beverages. We don’t live in the same city and that is hard. My dad is one of my best friends. To be frank, I am not quite sure what I would do without him. My dad is so special to me!

My dad has always been my number one fan. He has been my cheerleader when I did not even know that I needed one. My dad encouraged me to go to college and has always encouraged me to pursue my dreams. In this waiting season in life, he has been so present and steadfast. My dad has spent hours praying for me. My dad has taught me about unwavering faith in the midst of trials. My dad loves God so much – it inspires me to keep pursuing the faith that is such a treasure in my life.

My dad is fun. I can see where I get a lot of my personality from in him. My dad loves his family so much and I love my family more than anything. Again, not so sure what I would do without him or my whole family. We both love a good party. We both have a heart for community and gathering people. We both love people – he’s an extravert just like me!

My dad is by far and large one of the kindest people I know – it is an amazing legacy of generosity and sacrifice that he has gifted to his kids and others in his life.

I am so thankful for my dad.

So call your dad today! Tell him how much he means to you and what he has been in your life. Cheers beauts!

 

The other day we were at the hospital getting Nick’s leg checked out. He broke his leg, the poor guy! He is such a champ. I know if I had a broken leg I would be a champion whiner. When we were waiting to get called in for his X-RAY, I started chatting up a sweet lady. Her name was Joni, and she was there for her daughter’s leg. I was reading ‘Big Little Lies’ by Liane Moriarty and recommended it to her. We started chatting about our loved one’s leg injuries, books, and life. I asked Joni how long she has been married to her husband. Jonie responded with an amazing ‘59 years’. 

I know you are all dying to know – what has been Joni’s magic trick for having a healthy, happy marriage for this long? She said the first important thing is love, then the second is working at it. She also recommended date nights, which I love.

I am so in love with Nick – I love him now more than I have in our almost five years together. I had a vision of marriage that was Pinterest-perfect meals and amazing date nights. Real life is way more authentic and gritty than that. I want to learn how to embrace that grit more each day. I want to learn how to celebrate our marriage every day.

We celebrated our anniversary last night with the best fish and chips dinner (for me), and Nick had a burger. That supper was amazing. It was like heaven in my mouth. I was so happy!

I have learned so much on this wild marriage journey. It has been harder than I ever thought and makes me believe in Jesus a bit more every day because we love each other more.

I want to talk a bit about my faith. This does not come the super easiest to me. I struggle with that a lot because my faith is so important to me. I have done so much self-reflecting about it lately and wowie wow. I have realized that I cannot escape God’s grace. God is so good and faithful. No matter what I do, not matter what dumb junk I incessantly whine about, God has so evidently remained steadfast throughout every season of my life.

Lately, I have been astounded at how God chases us. He never forgets about us. He never leaves us. When I feel like I am crawling in life and I have no faith, God is still there, gently and lovingly pursuing me. Lately, I have been feeling like God mostly pursues me, haha.

When I was younger (a teenybopper then teenager after that) I was super condescending and judgemental towards other people. I did not understand why people could doubt or not even love God. Then real life set in and I realized that we all go through yucky periods and those are so directly tied to our faith.

I do not want to hop on my high horsie with regards to my faith. I want to love people without limits. I want to extend grace to everyone. I want to encourage everyone. I always want to be kind to everyone I meet. I struggle with mixing this with real truths sometimes. I never want to demean anyone or make them think I am better than them because I believe in God and cannot stop loving Him. I want to share my faith but at the same time I want to love and respect everyone – I think everyone deserves these two important traits.

Where do I go from here? I think it is important to be open to sharing your faith, but not relentlessly pushing it down other people’s throats. I want other people to know the amazing love of Jesus but need to accept that it remains a choice I cannot make for other people.

I can’t think of a title for this blog post and I want to talk about a bunch of stuff today. The first thing? FOMO. For those who do not know what this acronym means, it is ‘Fear of Missing Out’. Ugh. Fear of missing out. Guys, let’s get real about this. I have been STRUGGLING HARD with this lately. The biggest culprit? Instagram. Oh Instagram, how I love thee. Beauts, I really love Instagram. I texted one of my dear friends something like this today “I am trying to mentally prepare myself to delete Instagram.” I CAN’T bring myself to delete Instagram! It’s so beautiful! It helps you connect with people and find some more friends. Sometimes it is hard to properly understand Instagram because our culture is so digital these days.

But…

But…

But…

My scrolling on Instagram has not achieved much. I have connected with people and brands – but not in the deep way I desire to. It mostly makes me feel like I need a more fancy home with prettier things in a more exciting place. I wish I had that brand new Anthropologie dress and because I don’t I unknowingly put my worth in that. Instagram makes me feel like I would be more legit if we had babies. Our worth comes from who we are internally as people – who God made us. Instagram does not draw me closer to Jesus. Instagram does not help me grow my relationships with the people I most love. Though fun, the payback is teensy tiny.

I am ALL about the real-life life these days. My favourite thing in this world is sharing a meal with our people around the table. I love connecting with people in person and building relationships. I have been feeling overwhelmed with friendships lately. I want to be best friends with everyone and realizing that is not possible has been TOUGH.

I like how author Shauna Niequist describes it in her description of concentric circles. We should focus on our family first, then our friends, then everyone else. I am learning you cannot have a bajillion friends and that is hard for this extrovert!

Sweet picture by my pal Alicia, who is a heck of a photographer.

I want to encourage you. Right where you are. Right now. In the exact season, you are in.

Maybe you are a stay at home mom raising your precious babies. Maybe you just had a baby and it is a new, rewarding, albeit challenging season and you feel lonely being a primary care provider for your angel(s). Maybe work is bonkers. Maybe you have a friend or family drama taking up too much space in your precious 24 hours in a day.

I want to encourage you. You can do this. Just take it one day at a time. One step at a time. Sometimes it is not even hourly – sometimes you have to consciously have grace with yourself moment by moment (preaching to myself here). I find this super challenging. My super Type-A driven personality wants everything to be perfect and happen in what I view as perfect timing for said event to happen.

I listened to an awesome podcast the other day entitled ‘Be Delicate With Yourself’ by Leandra Medine, the CEO of Manrepeller. In the podcast, Leandra was talking about how her miscarriage affected her, and how she has experienced feelings of sadness and depression and needing to be delicate with herself. I was going through some wild emotions and talking to Nick about it. I told him I had just finished listening to this podcast and I was frustrated that I could not get to an emotional state that I wanted to achieve. Nick said, “are you being delicate with yourself?.” My answer was “no”.

Why is it so much easier to give grace to others rather than to honour ourselves and our bodies? Why are we not delicate with our own selves when our souls are most yearning for this type of love and care?

Give yourself grace today. You have achieved so much. You are so amazing. You are strong. You’ve got this. Take care of yourself. Go read a book and devour a tea (or coffee, if that is your jam. Coffee makes me bonkers so I will take a chai latte any day). Go do something that sets your soul on fire. Love yourself. Honour yourself.