I looked back at my first note for the year in my notebook (not my journal). January 2, 2025. Apparently, during a meditation after yoga, I saw the color “army green”. I looked it up and wrote in my entry. “The color army green means moving forward against adversity and oppression of all kinds.”

As I reflect on this year up until now, I realize I have been moving forward against many trials and tribulations which are indeed warlike. It does feel like oppression. It is adverse. I didn’t think I was going anywhere. I didn’t think I was making any progress. Yet, all along I see, as sleep and I rise, in the midst of spiritual warfare, mental battles and physical attacks, I have been moving forward. Through tears, through anger, anxiety, depression, grief, therapy, sermons, more responsibility, buried under a pile of other people’s problems, friendly fire from family, yoga, meditation, mindfulness, reading, teaching-BREATHE HERE-I have been pressing through on my knees and on my belly LIKE A SOLDIER.

Ceasefires are short. I rest as much as I can. I enjoy as much as I can. I need more laughter, more enjoyment for the remaining year. And I am going to have it come high hell or water because I have already been experiencing them both this year. I have been taking off my boots and pouring out muddy water. I have been singed in the fires and I do smell like smoke but, I am still here. Tattered and worn, I do look like what I been through (sometimes!) and I feel it, too. I hope, I pray, that I can be washed and rinsed on the long cycle these last 3 months.

~Nikki