From the Goose Blind

Originally published December 4, 2022.

This year has been one of pondering. Of anticipating but not knowing. Learning to be present in the wait, keeping anxiety at bay.

The goose blind - a hole dug out of the ground, boarded up with old barn boards and plywood - is where we sit and wait. And in the waiting I'm finding more time with my thoughts than I'm accustomed to. Getting a chance to practice what I preach about refocusing on truth when the lies spiral.

I also just so happen to be reading John Mark Comer's Live No Lies.

In the beginning of the second of three sections (the devil, the flesh, the world), JMC says this:

"It will take time—years, honestly—but you can rewire your neural pathways to organize your mind around God’s Spirit and truth. You must. And it’s a responsibility that we often don’t take nearly seriously enough."

Around me the crinkle of snack bags, hissing heaters running on propane tanks, the sun rays glisten through slits in square cut openings where we all take turns peeking through, absorbing the sunrise, and watching for flight. I read in quiet to pass the time. So much time. The highlight reel of Instagram shows the beautiful spread and a nice pile of geese from the day before, but it doesn't catch all the quirks of the in-between where many of the memories are made, and the endurance of the hunt is reinforced - and our minds are being formed in the stillness (for better or worse).

As I slump into my seat, my habits bring me back to another social media scroll as my cheeks thaw from the icy wind - my mind finding another spin down a negative channel:

What if this is all it ever is?

Could I stand to come back, another year, another groupmate with another joyous addition, another story about the happenings at home, the things they're missing, the things we aren't. Would our world be enough if all it ever entails are the two of us in our mundane day to day, a few hunts and trips a year, a new furry friend to play fur mom and dad to. Building toward something we don't know where will lead or who will become benefactors.

Struggling with infertility is a nasty fight. It's hard to be open about because many simply will not understand it. The simplest I can describe it, is that it completely shifts your perspective on all of your future plans, what you thought would be your life and legacy, your friendships, your view of self and identity, and more. Some days there is peace, but many there is struggle. Not always predictable which will go either direction. And which kind of day it will be for your spouse on top of it. It is so hard.

Right now, it's even hard to write without tears. The agony doesn't always cripple me, like the hook in the foot of the goose that just fell from the sky, but it is always there, much like the hum of the propane running through the heater.

It makes spiraling into negative thoughts easy. Especially when the scroll begins, and the comparison trap entangles me.

My prayers shift. I go back to what Live No Lies, and through it, the Spirit, are trying to teach me. I don't have control over the wait or when the geese fly. But Someone I know does. And He loves me immeasurably. And He hears my prayers, and is even moved by them (see Exodus 8).

Yet, I still find myself at times shifting from a prayer of confidence, Lord, grant me the desires of my heart, these deep, lifetime longings...to: Lord, can't you release the desire from me if it simply never will be? Why is it so easy for them but so hard for me?

Do you hear the back and forth? It is a daily battle of my mind. Daily.

The wait surely teaches us. When it comes to geese, we learn: flight patterns, feeding windows, migration tendencies, and how much they've learned through the season. If it were easy every time, we may not come back as often and we surely wouldn't have gained as much wisdom than by seeing the ways they come and skirt from our calls, change with the wind, and the movements of the swarms around them.

Maybe, in my waiting for something far less painful, less life-altering, from the goose blind....I can learn something about the waiting causing my heart its greatest aching over the last couple years...the waiting that doesn't have a clear end or trajectory, with so many unknowns.

Where may the flight pattern be shifting?

Where can I shift my own thoughts (and stop the spiral in its tracks)?

Where are the forces beyond me, much like the wind, sun, and weather, (namely, the Holy Spirit) shifting me from where I thought I was heading to something different, perhaps, greater than I planned?

Where might He be saving me from flinging bullets, or lurking predators?

Where might he be using me to shift in ways that I will someday use to teach or help someone else?

The answers, I don't know. But the stillness: I am learning. An anxious heart doesn't bring birds any faster than it does the deeper longings of my soul.

Jumping from "what-if" to "why me?" to "what can I achieve and do to fix?" leads down a never-ending spiral...

Remember: "BUT God" (Gen 8:1, Gen 50:20), "He remembers..." (Ps. 105:42), His love is better than life (Ps 63:3)...

all his goodness...

all his promises...

all that He is...

and how close He remains with us...

stills my heart, in the quiet of the blind, protected from the wind and away from all the noise, and reminds me: He is sovereign, and He will pull me through this.