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As I look back at my life I've struggled with the word no.  I always thought that nice people didn't use that word.  That it meant you were difficult, selfish.  I'm learning something quite the opposite.

Moms In Touch is this year and it's got great women in the town.  I mean really great women.  Women I love to dig into God's Word with,  women I laugh with, who I pray for and whom pray for me and my children.  But bringing Hunter is difficult.  He gets bored and our life is already super busy with preschool, Wednesday morning Bible Study and Wednesday night Awana.  So, this year I think I'm going to pass.  Every time I think about going, I get stressed.  Jesus said "His yoke is easy and his burden is light."  Yet, my yoke and my burden don't feel light.  So, I'll go next year.  To make a decision, even though it appears so insignificant, is huge for me. 

Then there's the issue of a greater no.  The people who are in our lives that sometimes truly cause us nothing but pain and sorrow.  What do you do with that?  Do you allow them to keep hurting you?  Do you keep quiet so you're not perceived as the "difficult one"?  I've been wrestling with that as of late.  My instincts is to be a good girl, to keep quiet and to accept people and their flaws, to "understand" why they do what they do.  But, something in me is changing.  It's just not willing to stand by and let people have their way.  I am growing fiercely protective over myself and my children.    I'm beginning to see that it's okay to keep people out of your life if they don't even try to bring joy, support, love.  If all they expel is toxicity, then why would I expose myself and those closest to me to that?  And I'm starting to believe that I am worth something, that Someone paved the way for me just like He did for everyone else.That I have a voice and I can use it.

That it's okay to say no.