Freedom, Boundaries and Loneliness

Freedom
One thing that we have felt since moving here is a tremendous amount of freedom. We have been living a certain way for about 25 years now. I'm not sure how or why, but suddenly, the door flew open and we took advantage of that opportunity to escape. What were we escaping from? The mundane. The boring. The same-o lifestyle that we felt trapped in. We fled as quickly as we could. The door would have opened sooner if we'd been watching, but we didn't know we were trapped. Once we saw it, and felt it, we were outta there. It has felt like fresh air. New breath. Life. Choices. Freedom.

 Boundaries
One HUGE lesson that we are still learning through this process is boundaries. In fact, I can say that understanding boundaries has changed my life forever. Knowing how much of myself to reveal to others, how much to say, how close I let people get to me and my life and my family - it's all about boundaries. The more people I let in, the less I enjoy the safety of those boundaries. My family is the most important thing to me. My immediate family - my husband and my daughter. My boys no longer live here, but they are next, and they are the end of it. I no longer answer to my parents or my siblings in terms of how I live my life or what decisions I make. Rather, they have the decision to come alongside me and support me or just be quiet. It's my life now... Oops, back to the freedom thing again.

God
Before I talk about loneliness, I want to address where God stands in my life in the midst of this freedom and these boundaries. He that the Son hath set free is free indeed. We are not to be slaves anymore, but walk in fellowship with Jesus. He gives us freedom, but we don't always take it. We are to lay aside the weights, we are to put the past behind us... but we often don't. The great thing about God, however, is that He keeps working with us until we finally can! And He wants us to have boundaries. He doesn't want us spilling ourselves all over the world. He puts people in our lives who love us, accept us and help us. People we can trust. People who have our best interest at heart. These are the folks who pray for you and will help you at anytime of day or night. Those are the people you can let in. Everyone else must be kept at arm's length. Loved but not inside the boundary of my life.

Loneliness
With a new town also came other changes. My daughter is now in school and my husband is working about an hour away. I have homeschooled for 20+ years. So, I've been lonely. Not everyday, but probably half of the time when I'm home, I'm feeling lonely. I am tired of crying and it won't do any good to feel sorry for myself, but it's really been tough. So, I've decided to pursue a job of some sort. After 25+ years of staying home to raise and teach my children, I'm stepping out... it should be interesting, but anything is better than feeling alone, bored and poor. Right? :)