Big Hearts = Deep Pain

I have a big heart. I get it from my dad. When bad things happen to me or the people I love I feel them very deeply, sometimes I think I feel the pain all the way down to my toes. I am not someone who can turn off my thoughts or worries. When I’m upset about something it shows in everything I do, I’m not very good at hiding my true feelings.

          Lately I’ve been feeling like my big heart is a curse. I have several situations in my life right now that I have absolutely no control over, and it’s killing me because I can’t fix them. When someone I love is hurt I want to rush to their side and help them. If I see a friend heading down a path I know is unsafe I want to run to them and say, “What are you doing, you know this is a bad idea!” (and usually when it’s a friend, I that’s exactly what I do...whether they asked for my advice or not…) But this week I have a couple of my students that I’m worried about, and it’s a different kind of worry than I’ve experienced before. I can only imagine what it must feel like to be a parent and worry about your children. These kids aren’t even technically mine, and I can’t get them off my mind. I know that I am loving them everyday. And I know that I’m “technically” doing everything I can, but I just don’t feel like it’s enough.

          Monday night I went to Coffee Conversations at my church, it’s our ladies night out. The speaker talked about how we are never going to “be enough”. She went through the lies we tell ourselves…I will never be the perfect teacher. I will never be the perfect daughter. I will never be pretty enough. When I get married I will never be a good enough wife….and the list goes on. Then she said that God IS ENOUGH and through HIM we are enough. So tonight as I am feeling 99% defeated and like I’m not enough, I am going to remember that I serve a mighty, powerful God and He is enough. He is enough for me. He is enough for my students. And He is enough for you.

          So even though it hurts like crazy when my big ol tender heart gets broken I am thankful I have it. God gave me it for a reason. And I will continue to love, even when it hurts. It is my prayer that teaching will not harden my heart over time and that I will feel every situation my future students go through like I’m feeling them now for the first time.  

“If our God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give all things.’ –Romans 8:31-32

“I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.” – Philippians 4:13 **This was my Grandma and Grandpa’s favorite verse**

On a brighter note I have a couple cute kid quotes:

The other day I told my kids to put their initials on note cards they are taking for biographies we are writing. I modeled how I wanted this to look and wrote my own initials on the board, JB. I was quick told, “Oh my gosh Miss Bass you are so lucky! You have the same initials as Justin Bieber!”   -I was not as excited as my girls :)

And today when I was feeling down my autistic student lifted my spirits with this one. As we were packing up at the end of the day I told him to get his coat and his backpack ready to which he replied, “Miss Bass, I don’t got my coat and I don’t got my backpack, I’m travelin light!” I was so cute I didn’t even correct his poor grammar!