Come to the Table: A review of Bread & Wine

I was honored and overjoyed to be an early reader for Bread & Wine, Shauna Niequist's newest book. Shauna's previous books, Cold Tangerines and Bittersweet, have inspired, encouraged and shaped me over the past few years. Hers are the books on my bookshelf that I like to call "extra loved." Creased pages, bubble bath soaked and red wine stained. They never stay on the shelf long, as I constantly pick them up to flip through their worn, familiar pages, hunting for an impactful quote or simply needing a quick refresher on one of the many gems I uncovered within.

Her words, utterly weightless, fly off the page and flutter straight into your heart. I think it's her vulnerability and authentic voice that leave you hungry for more nuggets of wisdom and truth. And it was that same acknowledgment of her humanity and call to a life of authenticity that kept me hanging onto every broken and beautiful word of Bread & Wine.

And in the spirit of authenticity, I must confess that as an early reader I was supposed to post a review of Bread & Wine on my blog no later than one week ago. I started the book the very day it was delivered and finished it the next. With so much to say, I'd been longing to blog about it ever since. But alas, life happened. And I put it off, over and over, always feeling like there was plenty of time for it. And after reading three of Shauna's books, I think I can say with confidence that she would understand. And remind me to be present over perfect and to give myself grace. So rather than apologizing for a delayed blog post, I'm just going to tell you why Bread & Wine is an absolute must-read love letter to life around the table.

As a self-proclaimed foodie, I love food and everything about it. I love the tastes and the smells, the textures and the colors. I love that food is both a love language we speak to and an art we create for those around us. I love that food allows you to get your hands dirty. Whether eating slippery barbecue ribs or kneading floury dough. There's an earthiness to food. It's elemental. Starting with mere powders you can create something that breathes life. I love the way different ingredients come together to form intoxicating smells, the sizzles and pops when you drop bacon in a hot pan, and rhythm of chopping onions and peppers.

I love that anyone can cook. And that the most delicious dishes never come from a recipe but from experimenting with this and that while dancing across the kitchen and pouring in extra love.

Most of all, I love the way food nourishes in a combination of physical and spiritual fulfillment that can only be characterized as divine. With food, we can say I love you, I'm for you, I'm sorry, and I'm here. We do that, as Shauna knows and expresses, around the table. By inviting the people we love or even those we just met to join us in the sacred act of sharing a meal together. And while passing plates and filling wine glasses, we share not only a meal, but a conversation that forms community. Food is the element that breaks down all barriers, reminds us of our common humanity, and brings us together to fill each other up.

My heart has always known this, but Bread & Wine brought words and understanding to my burning passion for eating, cooking, and feeding people. One I always assumed was just the fat kid in me dying to come back out to play.

Yes, this book is filled with delicious recipes. I've already made the dark chocolate sea salted toffee, and it is as heavenly as it was low maintenance to make, an odd combination in desserts. I did my own spinoff on the risotto, and was shocked that it came out not only edible, but absolutely scrumptious despite the fact that it was my first try at the Italian dish. The recipes are wonderful, easy to follow if you don't speak the culinary language, and full of helpful tips for first-timers.

But as Shauna proclaims, "This isn't about recipes. This is about a family, a tribe, a little band of people who walk through it all together, up close and in the mess, real time and unvarnished."

It's so easy to let our busy schedule and messy home and imperfect lives keep us from opening the door. Shame creeps in so quickly and we think everyone else has it all together and that if we open our homes, we'll be discovered for what we really are: human. But you know what that does? It tells those around us that they can come in as they are. Unmasked and messy. It invites them to be vulnerable and admit they aren't perfect either. It opens the door to authentic community, something I'm convinced after reading this book we were absolutely created to experience.

You don't have to make everything from scratch. You can order takeout or simply put some cheese and crackers on a plate (this totally counts as dinner in my book, and I'm sure Shauna would agree). And you don't need fancy china to gather around the table. Or even a table for that matter. I live in a tiny one bedroom apartment and most often serve dinner on the floor, since the only table I have is a bar  overlooking the kitchen that seats two.

Shauna's not talking about entertaining in a way that reinforces the facade of perfect or the myth that one can actually have it all together. On the contrary, she says "I'm talking about feeding someone with honesty and intimacy and love, about making your home a place where people are fiercely protected, even just for a few hours, from the crush and cruelty of life." It's about "creating a soft and safe place for people to connect and rest."

We all have that power. Whether we consider ourselves cooks or not. Whether we have a dinning room table that comfortably seats 20 or a living room couch and floor that uncomfortably seats 10.

Amid advocating for life around the table in the midst of imperfection, Shauna gives us permission that so many of us so desperately need.

Permission "to be tired, to be weak, to need." Permission to stop believing the myth that we're in control. Permission to fear change, but to step toward it anyway. Permission to "taste and smell and experience the biggest possible world, because every bit of it, every taste and texture and flavor, is delicious."

Permission to accept help. Permission to dare to journey into the unfamiliar. Permission to take it one baby step at a time. Permission to dance between feasting and fasting. Permission to release what our fists have too long been clenching. Permission not to know the details. And to be a bit anxious about it. Permission to slow down and rest. Permission to be "present over perfect." Permission to nourish and be nourished, just as we are.

And to do it all at the table. Together. In our own home and in the homes of others. With two holy ingredients: bread and wine.

Bread & Wine is in fact a love letter. To life around the table and so much more. It sings a song of truth in a world of fake. Truth that flutters off the page and takes root in your heart, transforming you and even those around you if you let it.

Stepping into bits and pieces of Shauna's story, you come to know her as she really is. Not just spunky, brave, creative and loving. But often messy, tired, overspent, shameful and scared. Human. Broken and beautiful.  Just like each of us. Her vulnerability allows her voice to paint the pages of this book with a picture of another way of living.

Bread & Wine is an anthem for authenticity. A call to community. An invitation to life around the table. A sacred space, "the hospital bed, the place of healing [that] becomes a place of relearning and reeducating, the place where value and love are communicated."

I'm tired of running full-speed, striving for perfect and hiding from community.

I'm ready to come to the table.

Are you?

Exposed brick

Exposed brick
a wall
that welcomes you
into its story
singing its song
with its cracks & crevices
a mysterious invitation
into its past
and the past of others
who have drawn near
warm in hue
and heart
its holes say "home"
its imperfections
a call to
vulnerability
an anthem of
authenticity
drawing you into
your true self
as you stare hard
into its openings

Why cover something
so naturally beautiful
so unique
impossible to replicate
why hide its powerful past
behind a mask of plaster
to do so would deny
the world a glimpse
into its soul

But what's inviting
in another
what draws us to them
towards their light
is what we hide from
ourselves
the authenticity
in this rustic exposed brick
is inviting
enchanting
approachable
yet I avoid showing
any of my cracks
I cover
all of my holes
with thick plaster
I mask
any resemblance of past
with fake
hiding my baggage
like my darkest secret
instead of
my best story
most inviting feature
warmest aspect

Exposed brick
covers this coffeeshop wall
a powerful reminder that
we offer the most
to this broken world
when VULNERABLE
we are our best
when AUTHENTIC
We must expose
ourselves
our pasts
our hearts
We must embrace
our cracks
our holes
our damage
It is what makes us
us
what gives us
character
warmth
and appeal

Exposed brick
doesn't hide behind plaster
hear the call
to authenticity
see the
incomparable worth
of your fractured state
expose it all
invite the world into
your story
welcome them into
a new way of life

Exposure transforms
Redemption awaits

Turning the Page

I’m learning that life is like an adventure story. Divided into countless chapters, the end of each leaving your fingers flipping to the next. Every chapter bringing you more questions than answers. The plot growing more complex. The stakes only rising.

With every new chapter you start, you’re certain you’re going to figure it out this time. Convinced you have the ultimate answer. The perfect path to get to that happy ending. The brilliant plan to get you to the final destination you’ve dreamed. And time after time, you enter into the next chunk of pages only to find your predictions proven wrong by unexpected circumstances causing new twists and turns in the plot.

That may very well be the only predictable part of life: it’s unpredictable nature. And the guarantee that you just won’t get more answers until you take the next step.

Because each chapter doesn’t just precede the next, it creates and shapes it. It’s the characters you meet and the battles you fight and the foreign lands you visit that both allow and lead you to the opportunities, people and places in the next.

Without a single chapter, the entire ending would be changed.

Your story depends on every chapter, paragraph, sentence and word which compose it. Large or small, long or short, seemingly significant or not, every experience in your life shapes you and impacts your journey. Not just in learning some lessons along the way. But in paving a once nonexistent road for you to travel.

I’m nearing the end of a chapter. And like most, it’s turned out to be a lot shorter than I expected. In fact, I was ready for this one to continue for much of my story, and pretty shocked and confused when I realized it wouldn’t. That it wasn’t supposed to. Because there was something else in store for me. Another adventure calling my name. One I never would have heard without living the one I currently am. And just like last time, it’s requiring a huge leap of faith. Because even though I hear the call and recognize my name, I have more questions than answers. I can’t see exactly what it looks like. It’s not at all what I had planned or prepared for. And I have no clue where it ends.

But that’s the reason why we read adventure stories, isn’t it? Why action movies are so exhilarating and hard to turn our eyes from. Not knowing (what will happen, how it will turn out, where you will end up, if you have what it takes) is what makes it an adventure in the first place. And what gives us the energy, thrill and rush.

The uncertainty is liberating. It makes us feel alive. Because we were created to live a life of freedom and whimsy and risk. We are not called to safety. We know this in our spirits, and that’s why we love adventure stories. They strike a chord of deep longing in each of us to live our own.

And if every chapter creates the foundation for the next, then I don’t want to stay in this one longer than I’m meant to. Its only purpose was really to prepare me for the next. To stay would be to settle. To remain stuck on the cold ground instead of flying free into the warm sunrise.

Instead, it’s time for me to turn the page. And step boldly in the direction of my destiny. Intentionally entering the next adventure of my life. Accepting the challenge. Embracing uncertainty. Knowing only that this chapter has created the opportunities that lie before me with purpose and prepared me in all the ways that it could. Understanding that as important as this season was in developing me and shaping my life, the next will be equally transformative.

I’m only a few chapters in. My story is just beginning. And I want to live it in freedom and whimsy until the moment I flip to its final page. An ending I will never experience unless I start the next chapter.

It’s time to say yes to uncertainty. It’s time to turn the page…

And what does that look like? I don’t know exactly. But layer by layer, piece by piece, a picture is evolving and coming into view.

It all started with a silly childhood dream to travel the world. Funny thing about your wildest dreams…they don’t disappear. You might not be able to see it from where you currently stand, but that flame is still flickering in the depths of your heart. You can bury it down and try to replace it, but your biggest dreams are woven into the very fibers of your soul. They have the miraculous ability to stay alive, even when you starve them. And I think it’s because God feeds them for us.

One of the coolest things about following God is that He wants to give you the deepest desires of your heart. The harder you run after Him, the more your spirit aligns with His. Eriwn McManus explains this well:

“Here’s the liberating reality: when you are passionate about God, you can trust your passions. God uses our passions as a compass to guide us. To put it crassly, when you are madly in love with God, you can do whatever you want. I’m convinced this may be the best contemporary translation of Psalm 37:4.”

In this season of uncertainty about my future and my place in the world, one you could probably get away with calling a quarter-life-crisis, there are only a few things I still know I love:

Traveling. Writing. Cooking.

They nourish my soul with energy and inspiration. They fill me with joy and light and life. I am my happiest and most authentic self when I travel, write and cook. Each of these crafts allows me to see deeper into my mind and heart, live more out of my spirit, and look more like the person I was created to be.

When things don’t make sense anymore, you have to go back to what you know. And though it may be very small, it’s the only launch pad for your destiny.

Rather than trying to enter further into a destiny that may never have been designed to be mine, I’m taking a step back, to dive head first into a season of contemplation, exploration, self-discovery, and inspiration. In the single context where my life makes more sense: travel. Because through seeing more of the world, I see, discover, and come to know more of God, and my true self.

So what does turning the page look like this time around?

In July, my dear friend Morgan and I will be leaving Nashville to travel for an extended period of time (a year, maybe more, maybe less.) Leaving behind everything we know to see the world, find creative inspiration, and discover our true selves. But wanting to absorb each experience on this journey, letting them truly shape and transform us, we won’t preselect the destinations to come.

The first stop is Italy, a country I entered a love affair with quite some time ago. And then? Who knows.

To not plan the details of this trip is a huge struggle for someone like me, but I know letting them go to embrace uncertainty is critical for true transformation.

The journey is fast approaching. And though it often seems like a crazy, far-fetched, absurd and ridiculous idea, I can feel it in my bones that an adventure is exactly what I need. Bob Goff’s words express it well:

“I used to think knowing God was like going on a business trip with Him, but now I know He’s inviting me on an adventure instead.”

I’m accepting His invitation.
Saying yes.
And turning the page…

Street Side Sentiments

There's something about street side seating. Even from the inside, at a table near the window, now raised leaving a large open space. Air flowing. Voices carrying. I'm right up against the city streets. A part of the action.

My eyes follow their steps, their gaze, their gestures. For a moment, I can step into their stories, the passerby's. The movement is refreshing. My eyes, liberated from the screens, rest at ease, fixed only on space, object, and light. The shops, restaurants, bars and even cars are signs of life. Reminders of our nature.

We are not meant to be stationary, stuck or trapped. In our environment or by our circumstances.

We were created to move.

In power and grace, impact and ease.

To fly, adventure, roam and be.

But never to suffocate in stillness.

Only to breathe easy, constantly moving in a steady flow forward.

You don't  catch your dreams sitting down. Like fireflies, they're flying fast in front of you. You must chase after them. Completely prepared, expecting to receive them.

So get up, grab your mason jar, and go after 'em.

You want to be one of them? Strolling by with a skip in your step?

Leave the street side table.

Get up.

And get on the street.

THE CREED

* 3/11/13, Blue Ridge Mountains, after reading "Running on Empty" *

I will no longer run on empty. 

I acknowledge that I have an addiction to busyness and performance. I admit that it has emptied my tank, often leaving me exhausted, broken, and full of insecurities. It has pushed me away from God, polluting my perception of Him, clouding my ability to see, hear or feel Him.

I have been striving for perfection and pushing to achieve. Killing myself to meet the expectations of others, which were only ever false assumptions and impossible expectations made by my own worst critic, me.

I have constantly chosen:

doing over being
noise over quiet
running over resting
pushing over pausing
busyness over stillness
projects over prayer
flesh over spirit
perfect over me
work over God
stress over peace
performance over presence

I have become my own worst enemy. Embodying everything I hated in everyone else. I've absorbed the pressure of the world so deeply that I can feel it in my pulse. I've believed the lies of the American workaholic culture so strongly that I hear its relentless whisper in my ear.

I chose to grow up before I needed. I traded in childlikeness for responsibility at ane arly age, only as a result of my own longing to do, perform and achieve. And the faster I ran, the more of myself I lost. Always thinking I wasn't enough, I pushed the real me down, buried it deep under layers of fake that said, "I've got this," "I can do it all," and "I'm unbreakable."

Adults complimented my maturity, but always added that I should slow down, stop and smell the roses, I've got my whole life to work. But I charged on, full speed, running on empty.

Because at that point, I was crumbling underneath. And to admit I no longer had control over my own life, that I couldn't handle the pressure, or that I wasn't in fact perfect...would destroy the image I'd worked so hard to build and keep up. And if I was only worthy because of my performance, then who would love me when they found out I was actually...a failure?

And so I ran and ran and ran. Always on empty. Always striving to keep up the facade of perfect performance. And always losing moments of life and joy. Not to mention self-respect. The emptier I was, the more self-hatred I felt in the form of thoughts of failure.

Today, I say enough.

Today, I admit that I have a problem. I am addicted to busyness and performance. And I have lost myself on this race to perfection.

Today, I choose to change.

I acknowledge that nothing I do or don't do will ever change how much God loves me. He will never love me less than He does in this very moment, and He will never love me more. His love is unconditional, and my striving and achieving does not impress Him. It saddens Him deeply. He longs for me to receive His love, be still, and know that He is God.

Today, I relinquish my false sense of control over my life. I acknowledge that God is almighty and allknowing. He sees into the depths of my heart and knows me, the real me, which He loves immensely. He also sees far into my future, which He has planned for my good. He is and always will be in control of my life. He reigns over Heaven and earth.

He plans my future, not me. He guides me along the right road, not me. He makes my paths straight, not me. I don't know what tomorrow will bring, and I never will. I give up the facade of knowing what my future looks like. I return my life into the hands of my Father who formed me as He wanted for the plans He created.

I vow to stop planning every detail of my life. To surrender my future to the one who created and knows me inside and out. I say that I know not what tomorrow will bring, and I know not which way to go. But I trust in the plans you have for me. And I choose to listen and follow Your voice, wherever it may lead.

My only plan is to follow You. My only purpose is to be with you.

Today I vow to choose:

being over doing
quiet over noise
resting over running
pausing over pushing
stillness over busyness
prayer over projects
spirit over flesh
me over perfect
God over work
peace over stress
presence over performance

I will slow down. I will rest, shut up, and listen. I will be who You made me to be. I will not hide. I will not pretend. For that dishonors the Creator.

I have an addiction to busyness and performance.

And today, I surrender it to You. And I ask You to come close and fill all the holes that have fed this addiction. The false lies I have believed about my lack of worth.

The world has told me I am only lovable when I perform well and when I am perfect. But You tell me I am a radically beloved child of God, who You could not possibly love more. You delight in me. The real me. And long to see me childlike, whimsical and full of joy. You long to be with me.

I declare this as the only Truth worth living by:

I am a radically beloved child of God.

I will not be anyone or anything I am not. I will not worry, stress, or fear others' opinions, expectations, or approval. About my performance or my future.

I am a radically beloved child of God. And I was not created to run on empty. I was created to live a life of joy and passion with my beloved. And that is the only thing I will strive to do.

Today, I say enough. I know who I am, whose I am, and who I was created to be.

I will no longer run on empty.