4160 Stay Open
Create Your Now with Kristianne Wargo
It can be one of the hardest things we ever do — keeping our hands unclenched when everything in us wants a tighter grip. Staying open when life has taught us that open means vulnerable, and vulnerable means hurt. But here's what I've learned, and what I'm reminded of in every new season: the moment we close ourselves off is the moment we stop becoming who God created us to be. So today, I'm asking you to stay open — open to His leading, open to growth, and open to the beautiful, unexpected things He has waiting on the other side of our yes. We are creatures of self-protection. It's wired...
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4159 The Woman in the Water
Create Your Now with Kristianne Wargo
When was the last time you looked at yourself, really looked and didn't flinch? It's not the quick glance in the rearview mirror to check your lipstick or the passing reflection in a storefront window where you tug at your shirt and keep walking. It's the kind of looking that requires stillness. The kind of seeing that asks you to stay. Because you, my friend, are the woman in the water, and the only reason you can't see her clearly is because you won't stop stirring. We live stirred-up lives. We stir with busyness. We stir with worry. We stir with comparison, scrolling through someone else's...
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4158 Knocked Down But Not Knocked Out
Create Your Now with Kristianne Wargo
Life has a way of catching you off guard. One minute you're standing tall, feeling like you've finally got your footing — and the next, something comes along and sweeps your feet right out from under you. Maybe it's a phone call you weren't expecting. A door that closed when you were sure it was about to open. A season that turned harder than anything you could have prepared for. And there you are. On the ground. Catching your breath. Wondering what just happened. Knocked down but not knocked out. A lot of us have been there more times than we'd like to admit. And if you're one who has that...
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4157 What You Can't Control Doesn't Get the Final Say
Create Your Now with Kristianne Wargo
You already have what you need, right now to create your now. There is no reason to wait for tomorrow, nor when the circumstances shift, or when that one thing finally falls into place. And yet, there's this pull that creeps in and whispers, but what about that thing you can't fix or control? There you are, standing at the edge of a perfectly open door and still looking sideways at the wall beside it, wondering why it won't move. This happens more often than we like to admit. You know what's in front of you. You know the next step. But something uncontrollable grabs your attention, and...
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4156 The Secret of Being Content
Create Your Now with Kristianne Wargo
"I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty. I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want." ~ Philippians 4:12 Contentment didn't land in Paul's lap like some spiritual gift he unwrapped one morning. It was forged and tested, including shipwrecks, beatings, imprisonment, and hunger. He was refined through every season that could have, and maybe should have, shaken him loose from his faith. Desire to be supported and encouraged by other like-minded women? Join us at the . ...
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4155 Celebrate Your Spouse
Create Your Now with Kristianne Wargo
When was the last time you actually celebrated your spouse? Not on their birthday or your anniversary. Not some calendar-mandated holiday where Hallmark reminds you it's time to show up. This is a random, ordinary, nothing-special kind of day, when you look at the person doing life beside you and say, "I see you. And I'm grateful." Celebrate your spouse! Now, if you had to think about it, you're not alone. Desire to be supported and encouraged by other like-minded women? Join us at the . #RelationshipBuilders #CreateYourNow #LoveAndMarriage We love our spouses. Deeply. But a lot of times,...
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4154 Before the Bell Rings
Create Your Now with Kristianne Wargo
There is something about the start of a new school year that carries both excitement and weight. The backpacks are packed, the outfits are picked out, and the alarm is set for a time no one in the house has seen in weeks. But before the bus pulls up, before the shoes are tied and the lunches are grabbed, there is a window of time that belongs to you and your family. And what you do with it matters more than you might think. It's before the bell rings. It's that morning window, the window that doesn't just happen. It is built. And if you are a parent staring down the start of a new school year,...
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4153 One More
Create Your Now with Kristianne Wargo
I know you're tired. I know that thing you've been carrying — that weight you keep picking up every single morning, even though nobody would blame you for setting it down — I know it's heavy. And I know you've told yourself more than once that you're not sure you have another round in you. But here's what I also know: you have one more in you! You're still here. Desire to be supported and encouraged by other like-minded women? Join us at the . #Inspiration #CreateYourNow #DailyMotivation You're still listening to this. You're still showing up. You're still breathing and fighting and...
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4152 The Woman in the Mirror
Create Your Now with Kristianne Wargo
There's a moment — and if you're honest, you know exactly the one I'm talking about — where you catch your reflection and the first thing that crosses your mind isn't kind. It's not always about what you look like physically, although sometimes it is. More often, it's deeper than that. It's the look in your own eyes that says, I thought I'd be further along by now. It's the quiet measuring of the woman in the mirror that happens when you compare who you are today against who you imagined you'd be at this point. And just like that, the woman staring back at you becomes not enough....
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4151 Design Your Day
Create Your Now with Kristianne Wargo
Why is it that we can pour ourselves into everyone else's schedule, everyone else's crisis, everyone else's to-do list, but when it comes to our own day, we just… wing it? We wake up, already behind before our feet hit the floor, and we spend the next twelve or sixteen hours reacting. Putting out fires. Managing the chaos. Surviving until we can collapse back into bed and do it all over again tomorrow. And somewhere in the middle of all that surviving, we forget the most important thing. Our own day. The one God gave us. The one we will never, ever get back. So design your day! Psalm...
info_outlineIt can be one of the hardest things we ever do — keeping our hands unclenched when everything in us wants a tighter grip. Staying open when life has taught us that open means vulnerable, and vulnerable means hurt. But here's what I've learned, and what I'm reminded of in every new season: the moment we close ourselves off is the moment we stop becoming who God created us to be. So today, I'm asking you to stay open — open to His leading, open to growth, and open to the beautiful, unexpected things He has waiting on the other side of our yes.
We are creatures of self-protection. It's wired into us. When a relationship wounds us, we build a wall. When a dream falls apart, we stop dreaming. When a prayer seems to go unanswered, we quietly stop asking with the same boldness we once had. And none of that makes us bad people — it makes us human.
Desire to be supported and encouraged by other like-minded women? Join us at the Kairos FREE Online Community. https://createyournow.com
#Inspiration #CreateYourNow #DailyMotivation
But God didn't design us to live behind walls. He designed us for gardens. Open spaces. Expansive places where roots can stretch deep, and branches can reach wide without apology.
Proverbs 4:23 tells us, "Above all else, guard your heart, for everything you do flows from it."
I think we sometimes misread that verse. We take "guard" and turn it into "barricade." We interpret protection as isolation.
But guarding your heart doesn't mean shutting it down. It means being intentional about what you let in — and equally intentional about not letting fear be the gatekeeper.
There's a world of difference between a guarded heart and a closed one. A guarded heart says, "I'm wise about where I walk." A closed heart says, "I'm not walking at all."
Think about the seasons in your life when the most growth happened. I'd be willing to bet they didn't come during the comfortable, predictable stretches. They came in the seasons when you were stretched beyond what felt safe. When you said yes before you had the full plan. When you stepped into something knowing you didn't have it all figured out but trusting that the One who called you would be faithful to complete it.
That's Philippians 1:6 in action — "being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus."
He started it. He's not walking away from it. But He does ask us to stay open to how He finishes it, and that "how" rarely looks like what we expected.
Staying open requires a particular kind of courage — the kind that doesn't demand answers before it moves. It's the courage of Abraham leaving Ur without a destination pinned on a map. It's the courage of Mary saying, "I am the Lord's servant. May your word to me be fulfilled," when nothing about the angel's announcement made earthly sense.
These were not reckless people. They were surrendered people. And surrender is what staying open looks like when it puts on shoes and walks out the door.
The K.I.S.S. ~ Stay open!
I'll be honest with you — I've had seasons where I wanted to close the door on something God was clearly doing because it didn't fit my timeline or my comfort zone. Maybe you've been there too. Maybe you're there right now. You can feel Him nudging you toward a conversation you don't want to have, or a forgiveness you don't want to extend, or a new direction that feels too risky for this stage of life. And every fiber of your flesh is screaming, "Close the door. Lock it. Throw away the key." But the Spirit whispers something different. He whispers, Stay open.
Staying open doesn't mean staying naive. It doesn't mean you ignore red flags or abandon discernment. It means you refuse to let yesterday's disappointment write the rules for tomorrow's possibilities. It means you hold your plans loosely enough that God can rearrange them without having to pry them out of your white-knuckled grip.
As Corrie ten Boom once said, "Never be afraid to trust an unknown future to a known God."
That's the whole thing, isn't it? We don't have to know the future. We just have to know Him.
And when we know Him — when we really anchor ourselves in His character and His faithfulness — staying open stops feeling like a risk and starts feeling like the safest place we could possibly be.
Because closed hands can't receive. Closed hearts can't be transformed. And a closed mind will walk right past the blessing God set in its path because it didn't come in the packaging we were looking for.
So wherever you are today, I want to encourage you — stay open. Stay open to correction. Stay open to new mercies. Stay open to the relationships, the revelations, and the redirections that God is weaving into your story right now.
You don't have to have it all figured out. You just have to be willing. And willingness, my friend, is the fertile ground where God does His very best work.
"Be present. Be incredible. Be YOU!!!"
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Cover Art by Jenny Hamson
Photo by Canva.com
Music by Mandisa - Overcomer
http://www.mandisaofficial.com
Song ID: 68209
Song Title: Overcomer
Writer(s): Ben Glover, Chris Stevens, David Garcia
Copyright © 2013 Meaux Mercy (BMI) Moody Producer Music (BMI)
One Songs (ASCAP) Ariose Music (ASCAP) Universal Music -
Brentwood Benson Publ. (ASCAP) D Soul Music (ASCAP) (adm. at CapitolCMGPublishing.com) All rights reserved. Used by permission.