We Can Do Hard Things

We can do hard things

A couple weeks ago some wonderful friends of mine had a party just to celebrate the mantra “We Can Do Hard Things” coined by http://momastery.com/blog/.  I had never heard this before but it quickly has become my new motto.  We all sometimes have hard things in our lives, every day has many challenges, but every once in a while life takes you to the edge of hard things and you aren’t quite sure if you CAN do it.

This week on twitter I saw a post from a sweet little college student saying that becoming an adult was ‘hard.’  You have NO IDEA.  Yep, being an adult is hard.  

Sometimes life is just hard and there isn’t an easy fix.  I notice how difficult this is for others who are watching our lives as they are filled with anxiety in seeing our world that is only getting harder and there isn’t really an end in sight.  They try to give answers or they try to suggest new things or they just stay away.  I get it.  It’s awkward because our life is hard.  It just is.

What is funny (not really) is that our life is actually harder than people even know.  Here is an example.  I was driving into Ocean View one afternoon last week, on a busy afternoon.  In this time of day people are walking all over Ocean View, coming home from school, going to get food for their family, or generally just hanging out outside.  This is an every day norm as life on the streets are alive.  This day one young man was walking across the main road that I happened to be driving on and had two dogs walking with him not on a leash (this is normal).  He looked at me as I drove and took a slight pause in order to walk behind my car just as I passed.  One of his dogs also paused and another did not.  And in an instant I ran over a daushound puppy.  I felt it and heard it.  Kieren was in the car and immediately the dog was shrieking.  I stayed calm and didn’t let Kieren get out of the car.  My initial thought was that the dog’s insides were obviously outside which I didn’t want to see, but knew I needed to get out of the car.  It wasn’t my fault as I was driving on a normal busy road, but the puppy wasn’t protected by this young man and the accident happened.  He was holding the dog, there was blood, but no inside guts.  And the young man just GLARED at me and walked away.  WHAT DO YOU EVEN SAY?!?  Luckily one of his friends began to talk to me saying he was taking the dog to his family now, and then I remembered I could also talk and told him I lived in Ocean View at the Methodist church.  So I asked him to come later if they needed help.  And they did need help.  So now I have a new relationship with a young rastafarian man whose dog now has a horribly broken leg and needs surgery.  I have helped with X-rays and initial vet costs but can’t help further.  It is the WORST.  Like the WORST.  Seriously with all the challenges we are facing, most of which we don’t share about because we don’t believe in airing all our hangnails and stomach aches, but I did not need to add RUNNING OVER A DOG to our list.

But this is life.  Life happens.  Sometimes it is blissful and beautiful and sunshine.  And sometimes it’s not.  Sometimes you are having a really hard day and then you run over a dog.  But as our randomly suck-y week continued I was reminded of my new motto, “I can do hard things.”

This is it at the end of the day.  When life really hands you difficulties, like REAL difficulties, you have to just keep showing up.  Life is hard but WE CAN DO HARD THINGS.  For me I have Jesus Christ with me every moment and I feel His strength and presence with me.  I cling to His Word and the promises that I believe are over my life.  But there is no magic wand with Jesus.  You just keep getting up and keep showing up to what you have been given.  AND even in the hard things there are so, so many beautiful and miraculous little moments.  Even when life is really hard, it is also really good.

We can do HARD THINGS.  We can.  I can.  You can.