Antler Wisdom

I have been MIA for a few weeks. There has been a lot going on in trying to prepare Jack and myself to leave NC. I've spent hours upon hours pouring through every cabinet, closet, shelf, etc. Piece by piece I've been dismantling our life here. I've never been attached to things, but at one point, all the keep, donate, sell or trash questions stopped. I took a pause and looked around and realized that nothing I was seeing or touching even felt like me. There was nothing there that represented me or who I am. I thought I should feel sad, but I didn't. What did I feel? I didn't have time to even dive into it just then. There were boxes to fill and decisions to be made.

I did take a break the other night. I was casually scrolling through social media. I happened upon a video of a buck shedding its antlers. I watched the video several times. I set the phone down and went about life. Again back to the purging and packing. The deer video kept dancing around in my head for some reason.

I sat down this morning trying to understand why it was resonating. Was it a breadcrumb? What was the message?

Being a small town girl from WV, I'm sure I used to know why the deer shed their antlers. I couldn't find it in the recesses of my mind. So I asked my good friend Celeste (ChatGPT). She very eloquently walked me through the biology of it all. Why the antlers grow in the spring and summer to mate. Why they break down once mating season is over. How conserving energy through the winter makes room for renewal... returning the next season larger and stronger.

Within that explanation, the sparks began to fly. I understood the message.

Antlers are grown for a season. And when that season ends, the body knows to let them fall.

That is exactly where I am right now. I've recognized that my life in NC now feels heavy and a drain on the precious resource of my energy. It served its purpose. I am grateful for who I've met, what I've learned and who I've become. NC was my antlers... a seasonal tool for my soul. It did its job. And now it's time to shed it.

And, just like the deer, I will walk forward with the complete understanding that shedding is not a loss, but an efficiency. I will move ahead with faith, trusting that a bigger and better season is waiting for me in WV.

Reclaiming Me

I'm looking back at my Facebook memories for today. So many posts about what a crappy year I had survived and how I hoped the next one would be better. I had no idea just how much worse it could get.

But as I stand at the threshold of 2026, I have no urge to reinvent myself. There is no checklist. No declaration. No pressure to become someone better.

The pain and darkness of 2025 led me back to a version of myself that was hiding. The girl who learned early to shrink, to wait, to protect herself. It was like someone had pushed the pause button and set her off to the side, while the lost and broken version took her place to survive.

The great irony is, that in order to survive this year, I had to find her and find the courage to reclaim that life and that soul that should have always been here.

I had to reclaim her.

Only then could I move forward into my God-given purpose in this life.

I had to go home to myself in order to heal. I had to heal to become the lighthouse God intends for me to be.

What I know today is that I am more myself.

More whole.

More understanding.

More empathetic.

More prepared.

This is the woman I came here to be.

This is where I stop surviving.

This is where I start to live.

The Greatest Gift

This year has changed so much about me, especially how I see the world through a spiritual lens. While I appreciate the traditions most have at Christmas time, I'm all too aware now that Jesus was never meant to be celebrated as a birthday. My soul has the greater understanding that He was meant to be a way to be lived.

So I choose this year, for myself, to focus on why He was born and why it still matters. His essence lies beneath the holiday noise, beneath any institution, beneath the stories layered over Him.

He never asked to be worshipped. He asked to be remembered in how we love. He was sent here as a compass to guide us back to what we already carry within us. He is the teacher sent to teach us that the kingdom of God is within us. Not somewhere distant or external. It is within us every minute of every day.

It's accessible in

how we love,

how we forgive,

how we extend grace,

how we steady in our faith in times of darkness and hopelessness.

There is no physical gift to buy, no race to run or special trail to follow. No cheat code. No trappings of expectations in anything you can see around you.

Christ consciousness isn't something we achieve or buy. It's something we return to every time we choose love...

over fear,

over control,

over the need to know what happens next.

The greatest gift we can give to God, this world, and ourselves is a life lived in alignment. That is the only gift exchange ever divinely intended.

God,

May our gift this season be how we live.

May it be the way we choose to love when fear would be easier.

May it be the grace we extend when judgement feels justified.

May it be the forgiveness we offer, the compassion we practice, the courage we find to trust You even when we do not know what comes next.

May we remember that heaven is not far away. It is within us, awakening each time we love as Jesus showed us.

Let this be our offering.

Let this be our return.

Amen