I wanna be like Penny when I grow up.

With her beautiful twinkling eyes, ever present smile accompanied by love crinkles, feisty spirit, and good natured jesting with her husband, Penny is just the kinda lady I want to be.

Penny was a guest speaker at a conference I just attended. She shared from her wealth of knowledge and experience. She encouraged and she blessed. She told wonderful stories from the early days of the Vineyard Church movement, but the biggest and bestest take home nugget of gold I got from her, out of all the other truths she shared, was permission to just be a work in progress. And isn’t that what we’re all crying out for these days?

There’s this thing out there in the big wide world, that says we need to do it all.  And be it all.  We need to have ‘it’ all sorted, and have it sorted yesterday. 

And sometimes we can do it all.

Whatever ‘it’ is.

But none of us can do all the things we may wish to do, all of the time, no matter how hard we try, no matter how constant the pressure is, whether is it really there or simply implied…..

If you’ve been reading my blog for any amount of time, you’ll know I am a Christ follower. I love God and I love walking my Journey with other Christians. But even in some church circles, there’s sometimes this belief that you should have your life mostly ‘together’. And often this belief is accompanied by the thought that you should only share your struggles from a place of victory, a place of overcoming. 

But the fact is we’re all on a journey. Whether you’re a christian or not, I believe that we are all at different stages. We all have things we can do, we can’t do, things we shouldn’t do, things we should do, to be the healthiest and happiest versions of ourselves we can be. 

And I think we can all do with hearing what Penny had to say at a session yesterday. A panel of women were asked how they deal with anxiety and worry, and I felt like Penny gave us a very real and raw answer. She sat on the stage and very graciously admitted that she didn’t cope with anxiety and worry very well at all. That this is something she struggles with, and she relies on others to help her get through times when worry consumes her. 

This was in a nutshell giving us permission. 

Permission to not have it all together. Permission to have areas in our lives where we need to lean on others. Permission to be works in progress, no matter how far along our christian walk we are. Permission to be real and raw and honest. Permission to be ok with our flaws and troubles. 

Time and time again I’m reminded of community. Of friendship. Of reciprocity. Of people standing in the gap for others. And yesterday Penny reminded me of   the importance of vulnerability, of not ever having to appear as if life is always easy and good. Permission for that is a gift, and a gracious gift at that. 

I wanna be like Penny when I grow up. Just like Penny.