Writing a Personal Note to the Ones I Love

It’s official, I have changed my title from army fiancé to army wife and I couldn’t be happier or more proud!  We had a beautiful wedding and celebration with family and friends and I know this sounds really cheesy but it was so nice to be surrounded by so much love and support.

As I am sitting at home next to my husband (that’s still really weird to say!) writing thank you cards for all of the wedding gifts we received I suddenly realize I have so much to say to all of these wonderful people in my life and I’m wondering why I haven’t sent them a card telling them how I feel prior to now.  Why does it take a special occasion for me to send a thank you card to all of these people when they have obviously had such a positive impact on my life? 

There is something so special about getting a hand written note from someone.  I have a large decorated box filled with notes and cards from loved ones.  Every year my grandma sends me a birthday card and while I was always excited for the 10-dollar bill that was included in the card, my favorite part was the hand written note she wrote to me talking about life on the farm, her garden, her farm cats, and my cousins.  I still look forward to that card every year when my birthday rolls around.  My box also has a large envelope of letter from the love of my life.  While I am always excited for any type of communication with him while he is away, there is something so special about receiving a tangible letter from him in the mail.   I think it has something to do with holding something that he has recently held and reading something that he has so diligently written down. 

These hand-written notes, whomever they may be from, have always come in a time that I have most needed the love and support.  It makes me wonder, if these have had such a big impact on my life, why do I not write notes like this more often to the ones I love and care about. 

As I am writing these thank you notes I am ready to challenge myself to continue to write a personal note to someone in my life at least once a week.  My hope is that by taking a couple minutes to let someone know that I am thinking about them it may help to brighten their day by just a little.

Now I get that I may be overestimating the power of my words and the power of a card, but do you see the worth in giving people words that come from your heart? 

A love note to yourself:

As I wrote this post it made me think of the summers I spent at church retreats and summer camps, random I know!

One of the things that I remember doing multiple times at these retreats is having the opportunity to sit down and write a love note to myself.  This was a note that was seen only by myself.  I was able to express how I was feeling at the time.  I always tried to include words of encouragement and goals for the coming months.  We would seal our love notes, address them to ourselves, add a stamp and we would passed it off to our group leaders.

In the coming months, our group leader would randomly place our love notes in the mail and they would be off to find us.  By the time the note would come in the mail, I would be surprised to see it.  As life and stress took over, I almost always forgot the words that I wrote in that letter to myself only months prior.  It always amazed me that the love note always found me at the perfect time, at the time that I most need to hear the love, strength, and words of encouragement from myself.

This is something that I have continued to do with my bible study group and something that you could easily do with your group of friends.  Take some time to write a love note to yourself, exchange it with your friends knowing that they will eventually place it in the mail and it will find you when you need it most.  Trust me, it is so worth it!