The seeds of the Lovely Letter Co. were planted almost 8 years ago. Yep, this thing has been in the making for almost a decade. I was a college freshman trying to acclimate to #AdultLife. In the midst of trying to figure it out, I found myself attending a calligraphy workshop with my roommates where we’d attempt to recreate those inspirational life quotes we were pinning all over Pinterest. I think I expected to create something sorta pretty. You know - pretty enough to post on Instagram, only to be remembered again years later in a moment of reminiscing. Yep, that one. I figured this was just a moment in time - LOL - I could not have been more wrong. Those 2 hours flew by. I was lost in my own little world as I practiced writing every word and phrase I could think of. As I continued writing, I was falling more in love with the process of creating and even more obsessed with what I was creating. I had unveiled a new part of myself that I didn’t know existed. For the first time, in a long time, I was eager and excited to create. I didn’t know why this feeling existed. I just knew I couldn’t ignore it.
I didn’t realize it at the time, but something big was stirring within me. At my core, I’m a perfectionist. The Home Edit kind of perfection where everything is perfectly in line at its ultimate peak of beauty. It was always this kind of perfection that kept me from creating. I believed I was too much of a perfectionist to be an artist. I wasn’t easy-going enough. I didn’t have that special eye. Heck, I even dropped two art courses in college because I was “failing” by my own standards - I couldn’t get my grade higher than a C, and I was constantly being critiqued by my professors and peers. No one understood what I was creating, so what was the point? Even more deeply ingrained in me was this idea that it wasn’t worth creating because someone could do it better. Forget those moments where I had been previously “successful” in creating beautiful things; those were just pure luck. I accepted who I was, believing to my core that my perfectionism was a stumbling block to being creative. I didn’t realize it at the time, but I had accepted conditional lies that were determining who I was and what I ought to do. What I had thought of as just pure lucky moments of creativity, I now understand were subtle glimpses into who I truly was. It took a random calligraphy workshop to show me that I wasn’t living out the purpose the Lord had specifically designed for me. That instead of living in complete freedom, I was living in bondage.
I realized somewhere along the way that perfection wasn’t this virus I needed to kill. It wasn’t perfection I was desiring. Instead, my true desire was to be immersed in a beautiful world. One that included color and order. I simply wanted to marvel in beauty - the very thing that God did for humanity at the moment of creation. When you look at things from this perspective, there’s nothing wrong with that desire. In fact, this idea of being immersed in beauty from a perspective as a creative, rather than perfection, offers me so much more freedom. It’s funny - the very thing that was meant to bring me life, freedom, and healing led me into a place of shame. I guess that’s just how the enemy works.
Maybe you can relate. Maybe you’ve found yourself torn between two worlds - what the world has told you ought to be and the truest desires of your heart. Maybe you’re still waiting for your breakthrough moment, for the heavens to open up and deliver your calling directly to you. Wherever you find yourself in this process, I encourage you to really consider this one question - What are the desires of your heart? I don’t mean your desires to accomplish certain life goals or who you want to become. I mean what are your down-to-the-core truest desires of your heart? The ones that breathe life into your entire mind, body, and soul. Look hard. I promise you they are there. Still can’t find them? Consider why that might be the case. What is suppressing your deepest desires? What is holding you back from being able to unveil the most beautiful parts of yourself? What shame are you hiding behind?
You guys, these are some tough questions to consider. This is the kind of soul digging that most are incapable of doing. Sure, these ideas might be too real, and maybe even too painful to consider. Even so, I strongly encourage you to meet with the Lord on these things because it is worth it. Think about it - The creator of the universe is calling out to you. The very being that created you is inviting you in. He is asking you to wrestle with these things so that you might live in your purpose. All you need to do is accept His calling and do the work. There’s a life filled with true freedom waiting for you on the other side.
(The phrases taped on the inside of my journal were from that calligraphy workshop, 2016)