Ordinary on Purpose

MD Albertson Mikala

Description

Beauty is Found in the OrdinaryThe world is shouting at us to be more. Strive. Achieve. Overachieve. Never stop pushing. As a family practice doctor, wife, and mother, Mikala Albertson appeared to be living a "perfect" life, but really her whole world was falling apart. Married seven years to an alcohol and drug addict while raising two young children and finishing residency, Mikala eventually reached a breaking point. And surrendered. In sifting through the shattered pieces of her life, she realized she had been chasing something that doesn't exist. Perfect is pretend. And what she desperately needed to embrace was ordinary. A good, hard, messy, gritty, lovely, ordinary life. In Ordinary on Purpose, Mikala shares her heartfelt journey in a raw and revealing way as she invites you to lay down your own endless chase for perfection and embrace this beautiful, messy life exactly as it is with our perfect, loving God right by your side. What would it look like to stop pretending to be "perfect" and be ordinary? Instead of always feeling overwhelmed and alone, you might discover the beauty of a good, hard life grounded in the radiant hope of God's unending love. Life happens in the ordinary, after all.

Informations

• Publié par: Baker Publishing Group
• Date de parution: 08 mars 2022
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781493436040
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 1 Mo

Extrait

Endorsements
“ Ordinary on Purpose is a stunning survival tale about how to regain your footing when all feels lost, and it’s proof that beauty can emerge from the ashes. The lessons humbly woven into each chapter are the reminders we all need in today’s chaotic world to always seek out the extraordinary in our everyday lives. Mikala is an inspiration.”
Whitney Fleming, author
“ Ordinary on Purpose is one of those rare books that feeds the two hungers so many of us carry: the need to know that we are not alone in our struggles, and the need to find inspiration in the midst of those same struggles.”
Liz Petrone, author of The Price Admission: Embracing a Life of Grief and Joy
“ Ordinary on Purpose is a must-read for all women. Mikala takes us on a journey of heartbreak, forgiveness, and all the messy parts of life—and shows us there’s beauty to be found in the ordinary.”
Leslie Means, creator of Her View From Home
“Mikala’s story is uniquely hers, yet anyone would resonate and find pieces of their journey in these pages. Her vulnerability is so powerful that you can’t help but reflect on the hardship and beauty in your own life. The concept of living an ‘ordinary life’ will never feel the same after reading this book.”
Kelli Bachara, MA, LPCC
“ This was the day I stopped pretending. YES. In Ordinary on Purpose , Mikayla Albertson gives us glorious permission to live this one life without pretense or fear, and as we walk with her through her fire, at the same time we learn how to walk through our own.”
Amy Betters-Midtvedt, Hiding in the Closet with Coffee
“Mikala Albertson comes to her readers as a friend with unflinching honesty and exceptional tenderness. She brings her whole self to us so we can in turn bring our whole selves to the world. Ordinary on Purpose gives us permission to stop pretending and to start really living.”
Jillian Benfield, author
“In Ordinary on Purpose , Mikala Albertson gives us permission to admit that perfect is pretend so we can finally exhale our secrets and breathe in truth. Through moving stories and with raw vulnerability, Mikala helps us to discover that the good life—the beautiful life—is right here in the ordinary.”
Jenny Albers, author of Courageously Expecting
Title Page
Copyright Page
© 2022 by Mikala Albertson
Published by Bethany House Publishers
11400 Hampshire Avenue South
Minneapolis, Minnesota 55438
www.bethanyhouse.com
Bethany House Publishers is a division of
Baker Publishing Group, Grand Rapids, Michigan
www.bakerpublishinggroup.com
Ebook edition created 2022
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means—for example, electronic, photocopy, recording—without the prior written permission of the publisher. The only exception is brief quotations in printed reviews.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is on file at the Library of Congress, Washington, DC.
ISBN 978-1-4934-3604-0
Scripture quotations are from the Holy Bible, New International Version®. NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.™ Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide. www.zondervan.com. The “NIV” and “New International Version” are trademarks registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office by Biblica, Inc.™
To protect the anonymity of individuals in shared anecdotes, names and identifying details have been changed.
Cover design by Brand Navigation
Cover floral image by Yaroslav Danylchenko / Stocksy
Baker Publishing Group publications use paper produced from sustainable forestry practices and post-consumer waste whenever possible.
Dedication
For Dan
When my heart broke, you held a few of the pieces tightly in your grasp for a while and kept them safe. Then one day, you quietly offered those little pieces back to me. We trusted God to stitch all the pieces of us back together like a patchwork quilt . . . more beautiful than before. He took our broken hearts and our broken marriage and created a love and tenderness I never imagined. Today I’m so grateful for the things that broke me. That broke us.
It was all just a part of our becoming. Now ours is my very favorite love story. I’m so grateful to live this ordinary little life with you. I love you.
Contents
Cover
Endorsements 1
Title Page 3
Copyright Page 4
Dedication 5
This Ordinary Life 9
PART ONE: SURRENDERING “PERFECT” 15
1. Widen the Circle 17
2. He’s Waiting 25
3. We’ll Do It Right 33
4. I Am Not Alone 39
5. Surrender 45
6. My Unraveling 56
7. Sunset Moments 60
8. Queen Martyr 66
9. One Little Box 71
10. Brokenhearted 80
11. I Want Ordinary 86
12. Jesus, Be Near 91
13. Tell the Truth 95
14. For Her 101
15. Making Amends 108
PART TWO: DISCOVERING BEAUTY AMID THE RUBBLE 117
16. Forgiveness 119
17. Dr. Stay-at-Home Mom 127
18. An Invitation 136
19. On the Run 142
20. Just One More 147
21. Our Very Fine House 152
22. This Perfect Stranger 157
23. Uncurated 162
24. Not Another Should 169
25. A New Season 177
26. I Never Knew 182
27. Let Go 187
28. He Means Me . . . and You 191
29. On Purpose 195
30. The Messy Middle 202
31. It Will Be Beautiful 208
Acknowledgments 215
Notes 221
About the Author 223
Back Cover 224
This Ordinary Life
Joy comes to us in moments—ordinary moments. We risk missing out on joy when we get too busy chasing down the extraordinary.
—Brené Brown, Daring Greatly
I used to think I wanted a perfect life. Needed a perfect life. For years I worked my tail off for it, actually. I suppose I was trying to drown out the little voice whispering in my ear for as long as I could remember, “ There is something very wrong with you.” I thought maybe if I appeared perfect enough, I’d prove that voice wrong.
Then one morning, while on hospital rounds during my family practice residency, the attending physician pulled me aside in the hall and, with worried eyes, asked, “Mikala, is everything okay?” I scanned my mind for an acceptable response. What is it we’re supposed to say?
I hadn’t been able to hide the panic from my eyes all morning. I couldn’t keep my attention focused on the questions and numbers and matters at hand, on all the hurting patients right in front of my face. Because the night before, I found a black sock tucked up in the beams of our basement ceiling. My hands trembled as I unwrapped it and discovered evidence of just how bad things were with my husband. Pills and powders and other terrifying things. My mind flashed to our newborn asleep in the crib upstairs. And that next morning during rounds when the attending fixed his worried eyes on my panicked face, I longed to tell him. The truth.
I wanted to scream it, actually. “No. NOOOOO!!!! Everything is not okay! Everything is broken! My husband. My marriage. My life. It’s all falling apart. Addiction is overtaking us!” But instead, I softly replied, “I’m fine. Sorry. I’m just . . . tired, I guess.”
Ah. There it was. That’s what we’re supposed to say.
I didn’t tell anyone about any of it.
I didn’t tell anyone my husband was on drugs and my marriage was failing. I didn’t mention that I was floundering through my training to become a family practice doctor and it was choking the life out of me. Or that I was struggling to hold it together for my two little boys at home. I never relayed how desperately lonely and sad and scared I was—positive I was the only one struggling. And I didn’t tell a single soul that, deep down, I’d convinced myself there must be something very wrong with me.
Nope.
I didn’t mention any of my painful truth to anyone.
I just smiled.
I worked a little more and pushed a little harder. I pretended. A lot. I showed up wherever I went and talked about kids or work or mom stuff or clothes or paint colors for my kitchen or how many pounds I needed to lose. The more I fumbled along through life, the nicer my clothes were, the better my hair looked, the wider my smile. And even though my life was crumbling down around my ankles, I strived that much harder to appear perfect.
Because isn’t that what we’re supposed to be doing down here? Isn’t our main job on earth to attempt to live the most perfect life possible? And wouldn’t anything less than perfect just seem . . . ordinary?
In truth, it felt like I was carrying a gigantic load. Picture me with six or seven or more big, heavy boxes of varying sizes, each slapped with a different label such as Motherhood, Wifely Roles, Addict Husband, Workload, Body Image, Self-doubt, Emotional Baggage . I stumbled around every day under the weight of this load, attempting to keep it all balanced and prevent my stack from toppling over. I made sure each box was sealed up tight so no one could see the ugly contents inside, and though I felt completely overwhelmed and exhausted and afraid and alone, on the outside I pretended things were fine. Perfectly fine!
I assumed that if I shared my real, messy, broken self with the world, people might not like me. People might judge me. People might talk about me behind my back. People might not want to be my friend. My real self, living this very real life, was too embarrassing. So every day I did my best to pretend.
Until eventually it all broke down.
My husband went to drug rehab. Again. And it became undeniably clear he was either going to get better . . . or die. Suddenly, all the boxes I was balancing came tumbling down, and my ugly truth spilled out all over the ground. In what felt like utter defeat, I dropped to my knees and began sifting. I raked through the pain and brokenness and sadness and fear and hurt and lies, and though my hands were cut and bleeding, I delicately began to pick up the pieces.
Only this time, instead of shoving my pain and brokenness back into boxes and sealing them all up tight, I chose something revolutionary. I decided to stop pretending, and I stepped out into the world as me . The very real, messy, most