One of the incredible vignettes of life I have gotten to watch was the development of my four daughters and each womans core culture from being a teenager until they became women on their own.
I took notes because it was a fabulous journey and celebration to behold.
The bedrooms they had were the laboratories of discovery they experimented in and it is a fascinating study to evaluate a girls bedroom as she becomes her "true" self and explores that, to watch and see what she chooses as her own unique culture in way of reading, music, entertainment and self decoration...
The trick is to understand that you only get to watch by invitation and if you fail to value the process, you will be left out of it, so I kind of let them do their own thing with no rules, no strings and no snarky comments.
Leahbeth decorated with trophies, awards and stuffed exotic tigers and pillows, she wore business suits and competed in National Business and education events, she listened to a lot of music but that was never the biggest part of her world, she watched the Real World but rarely spent time in front of the T.V. since she preferred actual real time social connection.
Rena covered the walls with Victorian porcelain dolls and flowers, read books like crazy, loved true crime stories and unsolved mysteries, listened to just about everything and was really my first child to have both old music and new, from the Monkees to Metal, she dressed very casual and almost never spent time doing makeup or hair and loved old movies, Audrey Hepburn and I love Lucy...
Courtney cut out bible verses and poems and taped them everywhere, she read almost as much as Rena, but oddly enough she really enjoyed my "Get Fuzzy" books, and watched the Simpsons and Home Movies, really laid back cartoon stuff, she always dressed very conservative and modestly and was the second of my girls to be Homecoming Queen, but it was not a trophy event for her as much as it was a game to play and joke about...
Ariel wrote in the boldest colors and biggest letters her own name and "Faith, hope, love" (which took several coats of primer and lots of work to cover), dressed in shorts and cowboy boots, loved to dance, and was my most athletic daughter, so there was a lot of "team" and sports decorations and clothing style, she loved Dallas Football and U of A basketball, listened to lots of stuff, but most of it was high energy music that had a competitive edge, spent less time in her room than on the couch and needed contact more than content...she just liked to hang out...
What is fascinating is to extract the core culture of each woman now and see how it relates to her teenage journey...
Leahbeth is a Lawyer, her drive is to change our culture through the political and legal process, so if you look at what she collected as a teenager, you can clearly see a drive for unique influence, power, and justice, she is a tough negotiator but has an incredibly high value for relationships which makes her very successful in her chosen direction.
Rena's core identity is somewhat more difficult to extract but the elements of classical values, individual beauty and a love of the natural beauty and simple joy is there...she is on her way to become a teacher which is very ironic since she gave all of her teachers fits, her family style is very relaxed, and has an emphasis on individuality, but requires reality so she does not allow drama, but allows the dramatic, its a unique and distinct culture and to this day she listens to much the same kinds of bands that I do, we are both very progressive in our taste.
Courtneys core culture is peace, and of all my kids she is the most prophetic, so the Word of the Lord and the stability of His word and the culture that values that is clear, there are no extremes allowed in her world, she just does not get extreme behavior, she requires stability and consistency but also has a very high standard of truth and personal integrity that defines her world, you don't get to be messy or stressful in her culture, Courtney still loves to laugh and her primary drive is to be a mom and raise beautiful children.
Ariel simply shouts "I am Me" and the most basic values of life, Faith, Hope and Love are truly her main culture, if you can't simply be real and stay connected to the most basic identity and simplicity of the Kingdom then you won't get her...family, love and life are her main decorations...she still is a huge sports nut and very competitive, her current energy arena is pinball, and she engages people not so much in a space as in an activity...her culture is still in process as is all of the girls, but its fun to watch and really impressive to see her do it on her own after having 3 very powerful sisters go before her.
Its been fun to watch how each of them projects the kingdom through her own unique personality...
I told Rena last about a prayer that I have prayed for each of them from the time they reached their teenage years, and I in fact pray for everyone I love...
"Lord, break their heart"...and at a first glance it seems like a really sadistic prayer to pray, but as I have prayed it I have seen God do it and the beauty is that once it has happened I have never worried about if they would stay in His will...see once your heart is broken and God comes and dwells with you, then your internal culture is forever spoiled, you will be ruined for anything else and I know that faith and a walk with Him becomes inevitable.
So the added element changes everything...and makes the teenager who became a woman even more powerful...
Marky...not so much...but his heart has been broken as well and it changed him from a boy into a man.
I love getting to be a scientist of the soul and just watch the petri dish of life grown incredible things...even when it means I have to clean up brightly colored paints and dried flowers all over the place.
