Becoming in the In-Between

UNFILTERED MUSING 04

It’s 11:45 PM and I’m still awake. Sitting outside with Sounds From The Heart of the Woods by Kacey Musgraves playing low in the background. The night feels still, but something inside me is shifting. I’ve been in a season that’s asking a lot of me — patience, surrender, trust.

My brain understands life best in analogies. Maybe because life is so layered and messy that metaphors help me make sense of it all — help me feel a little more connected to the world around me, especially nature.

I look for signs.
The palm trees remind me of the strength in being flexible during storms.
The cardinals fly in at the most unexpected moments, reminding me that my loved ones aren’t that far away.
And lately, I’ve been finding a lot of four-leaf clovers.

In high school, my Granny passed away. I looked up to her so much, and still do. My aunt gave me her Bible after she passed. The leather was worn down, wrapped in duct tape from years of faithful use. I opened it, expecting notes, underlines, maybe a prayer or two scribbled in the margins… but all I found were four-leaf clovers pressed between the pages.

The same thing happened when my Uncle Jack passed. A Kentucky basketball legend with stories for days, he once gave me his old college basketball textbook — yes, an actual textbook for basketball. I flipped through it hoping to find his handwriting. Instead? More four-leaf clovers.

I’ve found more of them lately than I ever have before.
Two five-leaf clovers even. (Never in my life until now.)

Right now, I’m in a season of personal shedding. I tend to overprocess, to feel everything deeply — and I’m letting go of old versions of myself as I step into something new. I don’t know exactly who I’m becoming, but I feel it happening. I feel the shift. More emotion. More uncertainty. More depth.

When I found those four-leaf clovers in my Granny’s Bible and my Uncle Jack’s book, it was during a time of feeling deeply. And those clovers — they felt like hugs. Letting me know:
All will be well. Love still lives here. Good things are coming.

And even though I don’t have all the answers now, I’m learning this:
Love still finds me.
Even here.
In the waiting.
In the wondering.

The world moves so fast, but time slows down when you’re waiting for a dream to unfold. There’s something sacred in that waiting. It’s where you feel more deeply. Where you’re soft. Vulnerable. But that’s when the becoming happens — when the rare parts of you begin to come alive.

I read something recently in Glennon Doyle’s new book We Can Do Hard Things.
She shared that when a crab outgrows its shell, there’s a short, delicate window —
a time between shedding the old and forming the new. In that in-between, the crab has to hide. Because it’s extra soft. Extra vulnerable.

That stood out to me because that’s exactly where I see myself right now. I’m between shells.
Tender.
Soft.
In process.

And if you’re there too — in your in between — I hope you take this as your sign.
Your four-leaf clover.
You are rare.
You are loved.
All will be well.
Good things are coming.

JESS