Hop down to any pub and share a schooner with your Aussie (Australian) mates (translation: share a chat and a beer with your friends) and, before long, the reminiscing begins. You remember the good times with the bad, recall friends you haven’t seen in ages. Some living the good life and others not so much. But you still love them, and you raise a toast, wishing them the best wherever they may be. For those who have walked a less glamorous or even arduous path, there is a phrase that is commonly used: He’s been through the wars.
The conversation may go something like this:
Bloke #1: “Yeah, mate, what’s up with Jennifer these days? I haven’t seen her in a while.”
Bloke #2: “Yeah, no, yeah. She’s been through the wars, but she’s alright. Heard she’s back to the ole entertainment thing again.”
Bloke #1: “Now that’s a yarn I’d like to hear her tell…”
Somewhere in the phrase, there’s an appreciation that whatever scars we receive, they carry the hope of our potential to create character. I can think of few American phrases that we use that release us from the shame of how we get into our precarious messes and still hold esteem for the battle weary.
It’s the term that comes to my mind when I think of Christa Black. 
I know Christa from our time together “on the road.” She’s a talented violinist who has spent countless hours enduring the bliss of the spotlight and the grind of the confined and yet, exposed life on the tour bus. She’s toured with me, Michael W. Smith…even the Jonas Brothers!
Like many of the musicians supporting the artists you know and love, she has a story of her own. Let’s just say, she’s been through the wars.
Recently she penned her first book “God Loves Ugly” . It is a courageous account of her head-on war with an eating disorder. From struggle to insight, she has come out the other side with a story to tell. No surprise, the artist in her has set the story free to do it’s work.
Visit her here: www.christablack.com
