The Box

I remember watching Little Women back in 1994 and during the movie the main character, Jo, tries to get her writing published.  It's her dream to be a published author.  She tries to write a fictional fantasy about dungeons and dragons a story where Lords and Ladies go on a quest to find love, slay dragons, and more.

She approaches publisher after publisher and each time she's turned down because her name is Josephine March, she's a woman and women don't write.

I think the movie had a large impact on me growing up.  I see myself as a lot like Jo but also like the oldest child in the story, Meg.  I don't fit into any particular mould of who I feel I should be as a woman and especially I find, who I am as a Christian woman.  I'm feisty though I appear quiet. The difference between me and Jo is that Jo's character is outspoken and pushes boundaries and takes her own path despite the risks where for myself, though internally I may feel a certain way, I also feel a certain pressure to live up to other people's expectations.  I guess I'm a people pleaser, but despite how I try, I fumble like Jo, and I don't necessarily live up to everyone's expectations.  

It's hard being a passionate progressive Christian woman.

It's possible that all of us experience these kinds of feelings at one time or another but maybe we don't talk about it when we don't quite fit in a box.  We're kind of between a few different ones. Too conservative for one, too progressive for another.  Maybe it's more common than I imagine and we're all sitting around feeling weird and slightly out of place at times or like we don't really know what we're doing?

This could be partially why we often find ourselves on Pinterest clicking through pictures of other people's perfect houses, perfect cookies, perfect children, perfect. . perfect. . perfect.. .

Which box will we fit in today?

Do we really have to choose just one?

I often feel a deep burning in my heart.  It's a passion perhaps a strength but at times a curse. Sometimes I say something really stupid because of it but, like I said, I'm feisty and sometimes I just feel angry about some injustice or just mildly irritating and slightly disappointed like yesterday.

Yesterday I was looking at Christian women's retreats online and I realized why I don't fit in. I'm not in the box.  My box is perhaps orange and their box is, I don't know, purple.  Their idea of fun is sitting around making crafts and painting their nails and although I wouldn't be totally against those things should the opportunity arise where I was already somewhere it wouldn't be on my top 10 list of things to do with my time and it's unlikely that I would travel somewhere specifically to do those things.

Well, I read the retreat form wrong.

I started reading the women's retreat information and my eyes skipped a few lines and I saw "skeet shooting" and "riflery" and my heart skipped a beat.  Although it's not really something I would think to sign up for regularly it sounded totally interesting! I was pumped!

. . And then I saw that I was reading about the men's retreat. . . 

Yup, don't fit in any of those boxes. . .

*sigh*