About six months ago, I told Jason that it was really important for us to celebrate my big 4-0. I wanted just he and I to go away and spend some time together. What I didn’t want was for my birthday to just be another day or another birthday.Ladies, I know you will get this - this is a big deal – for me to actually want to spend time with Jason. The reason being for many years in our recovery, spending time with him alone was the very last thing I wanted to do. Too vulnerable. Too risky. Just too much.Sure, some of this was simply because I was recovering from the unthinkable. I also know for myself, it was more than that – it was also because I never learned to be fully known, fully intimate, and fully vulnerable.Over the course of the years, this landscape has changed (hence the reason I deeply desired to spend time alone with Jason for my 40^th). Thanks in part to Jason’s patience and persistence. I also wouldn’t be where I am if it weren’t for a safe place where I’ve practiced being fully known with a group of women. My sacred inner circle.So Jason went to planning and I stepped back and enjoyed not having to deal with the stress of prepping a trip. In the midst of the planning, Jason realized how grateful he is that we don’t keep secrets from each other anymore. Planning my surprise reminded him of hiding certain parts of his life from me. He was so ready for the big day to come when he could fill me in on our plans.That day came today. As I write, we are headed west on a plane, taking us to our warmer than Denver destination. Jason filled me in on all his searching and planning and stressing. During the midst of our conversation, I looked at him and said, “wow, you must feel really vulnerable doing all of this”. And he agreed, completely.I for the most part sat in this very seat in shock. As I tried to put my internal feelings into words, what I realized is – I felt vulnerable too. And more than that, I questioned my worthiness in all these plans that he so carefully pieced together.Worth.For me, explaining and conceptualizing worth is challenging. Worthiness is knowing, believing and living out the fact that I am enough. No matter what I do or don’t do in a given day, because I am a child of God – I am enough.It seems for me – that somewhere between those years in Sunday school and present day, I forgot about this. Or maybe I never fully conceptualized this as a child. I am a baby Christian after all. What I DO know, is when I listen to my boys’ music and when I read Jesus Storybook Bible to them – it’s loud and clear. God loves us more than anything else and we were born into this world as worthy. There is absolutely nothing we could do or not do to take it away.So why, then, has it been so hard for me to live my life out of a place of worthiness? To live from a place of deep security and wholeness? To believe that on my 40^th birthday, I am worth others going out of their way to celebrate me?This is something ladies that I’m currently wrestling through.And here’s what I think – it goes alllllllll the way back to Adam and Eve. When Eve ate the apple and sin entered the world, the wounding began. It’s from the wounds I’ve endured – both thanks to my sins and thanks to other’s sins that my worthiness slowly, over time, started to crumble.So it’s not enough (no pun intended) to just repeat to myself – “I’m worthy, I’m enough.” I’ve got to go deep. Identify the lies I believe in my head that are causing my insecurity and thus my lack of worth. Then trace those back to the wounds I’ve endured.With that insight comes validation and empathy. With that insight, I can start to replace the lies with the truth. And with that truth, I believe I can start to slowly piece together my worth as God intended it to be.I’ll keep you posted!xo-Shelley