ABOUT ME

Hey there and thanks for stopping by! My name’s Lori. What’s yours?

I’m a born and raised Kentuckian with a rather unique set of skills. I’m a grass-mowing, wood-stacking, house-roofing capable woman. However, I much prefer mothering my children, tending my succulents, and writing about life.

I like to say my life mimics a patch-work quilt—a tapestry carefully stitched together from the frayed, worn, and washed-up pieces of life. While some of life’s experiences have left me feeling fractured and broken, I’ve discovered the truth that I am NOT a broken human—I am whole human who has experienced broken circumstances in a broken world. But I am NOT defined by my circumstance—I am refined through them.  I am NOT a failure of a human—I am a human whose failures have produced resilience. (And the same is true for you!)

The truth is, I have experienced many beautiful, loving, and wonderful seasons in life, but I’ve also experienced a vast array of tragedies. In 2017, my husband Chad died from the terminal illness known as ALS (Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis), leaving myself and our children to build a new life from the shattered pieces.. Even after Chad’s death, we’ve had trials come in waves that have tried to drown us. But we’re resolved to be overcomers. Even as the waves crash, we are resolved to look for the goodness of God..

I firmly believe no pain is ever wasted, and I’m so passionate about this belief that I’m willing to peel back the layers of our hardest suffering to show you the beauty we found underneath. My hope is that you’ll come away from these writings with new eyes to see your suffering through, too.

As we journey together as overcomers, here’s a few more things about me…

FAITH

I believe in the Holy Trinity—a triune (three-part) God. God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. I believe humans are created in God’s image and as such, we too are comprised of three parts—body, mind, and soul. I believe the only real path to living life abundant is to pay equal attention to all three parts in order to care for our entire unified being and to have a full, flourishing embodied experience.

As I share my story, I cannot help but tell you all the ways I found God—or perhaps more accurately, all the ways God found me.. If your beliefs or faith look different than mine, you are still welcome here. I pray you find encouragement and feel less alone knowing someone else has a story that is desperately messy and breathtakingly beautiful too.

WORDS

Words have always been healers for me.

For as long as I can remember, written words have been the primary means by which my deep soul-wounds have received binding. Words provide rest for the wanderer and warmth from the cold. They’re the embers that light the timbers, setting fires ablaze inside our internal landscape.

Words connect us across continents and inspire us to create—often reviving the lifeless parts of self that were designed to bring forth beauty all along.

I pray the words you read here will be a salve for your soul and bring sight to your spirit, but above all, I pray you’ll see life anew, despite the terrain through which you must travel.

FAMILY AND FUN

Over the years God has let me be mom to four beautiful children—two I birthed, one I inherited, and one I shepherded for three years. All of them my children.

I enjoy coffee, watching the sun rise, and soaking up all the sunsets I can muster. I enjoy craft making, furniture painting and pretty much all things creative. In fact, I like creative things so much that somewhere along the line I received some expensive-looking piece of paper, filed somewhere in my not-so-expensive-looking house, verifying that I’ve been rendered capable of stringing together a sentence or two. I’m also the managing editor for a local life-style magazine. I truly find so much joy in writing!

What I really want you to know is that I’m so glad you’re here! I’m eager to share about my life and learn about yours. So please, pull up a chair and let’s sit a spell. Just you and me. Let’s think, read, discover, and discuss this thing called life together. I know it’s rarely tidy or easy or pain-free, but it can still be beautiful.

You are not alone.

With Joy,

—Lori Jude