Everyone has a story, full of both “beauty and terror”, as Rainer Maria Rilke wrote. All of us have experienced some form of pain, grief, loss, addiction, things done to us and things we have done to ourselves and others from which we long for peace and healing.
The deepest part of us longs to know exactly what God intended when he wrote Jeremiah 1:5 “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, and before you were born I consecrated you.”—our Original Beauty.
In my upcoming book, Original Beauty, you will find a deeply intimate account of my life-long search and struggle to discover my own Original Beauty. From a “normal” happy beginning as a Daddy’s Girl, born on Father’s Day, to much pain, loss, tragedy, and addiction along the way.
For many years, I tried to cover over the darkness and desperation I so often felt through decades of keeping a smile on my face, and pushing myself toward high levels of achievement, first in Corporate America and then on the mission field in warzones and landmines of human trafficking.
I set unprecedented records for women. While I did accomplish much good for both my family and for those I served on the mission field, I now realize that it was also intertwined with a deep-seated hunger to find and prove my own self-worth, my value.
I pushed myself, often working 24 hours around the clock and rarely taking breaks—for years on end. There was always one more thing that I misguidedly believed that only I could do. Until I crashed and burned.
Feeling lost, but still unable to take the sometimes fake smile off my face and admit I needed help, I kept pulling myself up by my bootstraps by spending months on end in the field (losing 30 pounds at a stretch due to the extreme heat, no shelter, and scant food) and then coming “home” only to hop on more planes for back-to-back speaking engagements throughout the U.S. Canada, and Asia. At the same time, I accepted calls at all hours of the night from Sudan, as they are nine hours ahead of me time-wise.
For a time, I turned to alcohol, to feel something, freedom, and mostly, connection. Anything rather than facing the darkness and doubts that haunted me about God, his Church, humanity, and the questionable point of my own existence.
With the help of a clutch of faithful friends, a family that refused to give up on me, therapy, a horse named Rusty the True, Lily, my faithful black lab, nature, and several organizations, I found a way to not only face the despair within but also to lean into it—even embrace it.
Original Beauty tells not only my story of moving from surviving to thriving, but also gives a practical roadmap as to how no one—no matter what’s been done to you or what you have done to yourself and others—is beyond the Hound of Heaven, God’s, relentless grace, love, and mercy.
There is always Hope, if we open ourselves to the full gamete of life and look for how God can and will redeem it. “Return to us the years the locust ate.”, as he promises in Joel 2:25.
May you openly experience and embrace everything life throws at you, never giving up, until you find the peace and thrill of your own unique Original Beauty.
SPECIAL: The first 20 people who sign up at the link below will receive a free autographed copy of Original Beauty upon its release: https://kimberlyhighland.com/blogs/
Love, your sister along the journey,
k
Go to: kimberlyhighland.com for more information or to book a private session
