Looking for Lovely:Collecting the Moments that Matter
Annie F. Downs is another of those authors who shares the true nitty gritty of her life.
She lays it all out in this latest book. Though a popular author she found herself in a place she calls her broken crazy. Her honest sharing of the journey to finding herself in a place that she can love and embrace herself and her life through finding the lovely in the middle of the hard. At the end of each chapter she challenged the reader to look for lovely in their everyday life as well.
I must admit that Annie’s style of storytelling is very compelling but I the overall story seemed disjointed to me. I did love the way she tied it all together at the end of the book. One of the most important statements she made was, “When I found lovely in me and in the world, it changed everything.” This book was her journey to this realization.
Annie classified herself as a quitter. Realizing that everyone does not view quitting the same way she did caused her to seek people who were not quitters and learn from them. She found nonquitters define it differently. Nonquitters don’t quit when it gets hard, they just take a pause and then go back to it again. They keep trying until they get it. She could not relate but she did desire to understand perseverance and develop it.
Endings was one of the areas of Annie’s life which was hard. They made her want to quit. Quit developing new relationships, quit the hard work of caring for others. By learning to persevere she learned to live with both the hard and the good. She shared that what helped her learn to finish is to see God in the people you meet and in the moments, you have to let them leave. Believe God, He is who holds things together, including those friendships, those memories and your heart.
Grace was a lesson Annie had focused earlier in her life so adding perseverance to grace led her to an even greater understanding of both. All grace can make you lazy but all perseverance can cause you to be judgmental. Grace with perseverance gives you permission to not be perfect but to strive toward excellence. They can even be partners to bring growth.
In the end, Annie calls us all to be the type of woman who is “Locking eyes with the one who has choose me. We have looked for lovely and found it. We have resolved to be the kind of women who do not quit, who do not give up, but women who strengthen our minds and our hearts to let the work God is doing in us come to completion.”
I highly recommend this book to young adults. Her communication style and life experiences will be one many millennials will definitely relate to.
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