Looking for an Update? Look somewhere else

Perhaps now is as good a time as any.  Or maybe the best time.  The time when these thoughts are still near fresh on the frontal lobe of my mind.

I wonder, if I received news that my brain was deteriorating or my life would soon be fading, would it have meant anything?  So often I get stuck living with a hope for another day.  I think maybe I'll do better things when I have increased my knowledge.  Or perhaps my life will feel more meaningful when I am surrounded by friends and family.  But what about this life I live between walls?  Has it any meaning?  Has there been a purpose to it?  Has it even had an impact on what's outside?

I feel like a hammer gathering dust in a shed.  My handle shines new but feels worn instead.  Rust is the cover of my entire head.  The rest of me covered in a rarely disturbed red.  I want to be used but I just sit on the shelf.  I sit inside and hope for something to push me.  How can I be pushed further if I'm standing against a solid wall?

It's like I've lost connection or perhaps the desire for it.  But I know that I deeply desire it.  What's happening inside me?  Sometimes this just makes the interactions more difficult.  I'm not sure who I've become.  I'm lazier than when I would sleep away the days.  I want something more but know that I have it all.  Is it that I want outside my lot?  I look around and see what I have and what I don't need.  What's happened to the one who ran freely outside?  Am I dreaming the wrong dreams?  Am I just living for me?

Some days I feel desperate for something outside of me but I don't seek it.  So can that be true desperation?  Am I gasping for air?  I want someone here.  Without it, life gets boring.  But how selfish can I be that I let myself slip into boredom while the world hungers without end?  So I feel guilty and don't have a cure.  Maybe because I'm looking to myself for it.  Part of me believes a part of the cure can be to help others find theirs but I know that can't be all of it.  Thinking that that is my only antidote will just start me working again.  Working to achieve that which is unachievable by my own ability.

So I just want to sit under Your tree.  The Tree that is You.  I want to stay with You but I want so bad to be moving.  To be living.  To experience what life seems to be.  Is it because I'm looking through Your branches?  Because I'm looking to see the lives You've given others?  Or perhaps part of it is that with these windows of technology people only allow me to see of them what they would like.  So I imagine their lives are perfect, or something so nice, when really they're struggling just like me.

Could You maybe show me how lives can be boring?  Or how to make this exciting?  I want to explore what You've given me here.  I want to use what You've given to the full extent.  I feel that I'm just wasting it.  I don't want to waste it.  Please show me what to do with this life.  Still, I know You're not a pop machine, so Your will be done.  None of this is my choice or I would be dead and gone.  I would like to know what my next steps are.  Where I should go.  What I should do.  And I know You'll answer my questions, but who am I to ask You?

Still I can't help but feel You're working.  Even here.  Even now.

Connection Without Cables

The Internet has turned us all into sponges.  We'll soak up all the information that we want.  We're free to keep searching and discovering the things that please us.  But what of the things that we fear?  What of that which we disagree with?  What of the new?  There is so much new but it is also so easy to limit ourselves to what we like.

Some days the world would be better without it.  Some days I just want to go back to connection without cables.  What happened to that?  I don't mean wireless Internet or mobile phones.  I mean touching hands and grasping fingertips.  What happened to the days where the only way to get to know someone was to be among that person?  Now we can learn so much about a person just by following their digital trail.  But how much do we really know?  In this world of self-disclosure we can choose what the world sees of us.

I don't want to be locked inside my computer.  I don't want to be tangled in wires and cables.  And the irony is that I write this on a public journal for all to see.  But I do not mind.  I want to be found.  Found doing something that matters.  Found dancing among the storm that surrounds me.  I won't ignore the rain nor pretend it's not there.  I'll just teach it how to dance.  I'll show the world romance.  It's not found in pushing buttons.  It's not found in hearing voices.  It's found when the soul rejoices.

I want love to reign supreme.  To see it flow far from this stream.  To feel someone help me, I'm about to scream.  I want a surprise.  I want a dream.

But I don't want it on this screen.  I don't want to hide this scene.

Still, somehow I'm entangled within an invisible seam.  I'm the product of things I've seen.  I'm a product of the generation of green screen.  The world says no one will believe the things I have seen unless I give proof and explain what I mean.

But I don't need proof.  Am I not the one living this life?  There is something between my ears and I believe it is working.  This life isn't mine though I live it.  I don't often shake hands but I shiver.  I live inside and I quiver.  The world outside is intangibly mine.  It's as if it whirls 'round and I can't make a sound.  I keep my feet on the ground and am inevitably found as a spot on a sheet on a hospital bed.

So if you cannot read the thoughts in my head and if you've no choice but to hear them, I hope you'll heed well these words that I tell for I have nothing left but to say them.  If life be a race, then I'm running with scissors.  I can't tell where I'm going and too often I've missed her.  So now live upside-down.

Sincerely,
     Mister

The Carousel Was Always Spinning

"I still love you," You say to me time and again.  But so often I don't feel it, or I just look right passed it.  What am I thinking?  What compels me to run so quick to something I've barely tasted when I know the taste of what I already have inside?  Is it the excitement of the unknown?  Maybe sometimes.  And sometimes it seems to be the selfish desire for immediate gratification.

I enjoy times that I have with friends and in my life but the taste of something else comes so quick.  Something that is not my lot.  At least not yet.  Sometimes it's just my impatience.  I want so much to be with someone else.  Even if it's not a romantic relationship, I want to feel something there.  To feel someone there.  It appears that sometimes that desire is greater than my desire to be seen holy and blameless to You and that cannot be.  That is not as it should be.

I must first seek the Kingdom and You will work in me.  You will allow me satisfaction.  It will mean waiting.  It will mean being patient when I think I want something that is outside my lot.  I must be content with the lot that You have given me.  To look beyond my life and covet other's situations is to live in sin.  I do not wish to live in sin.  You have me right where I am for a reason.  I can look from my side of the fence but must not let it spark a covetous desire.

I so often come to a place in my life where I know that I must trust that Your timing is perfect but my flesh is so quick to say, "but when?"  I know You'll place someone in my life if that is Your will but I must live now.  I must learn to live today.  Perhaps it may not even be Your will for me to share this life with one person.  They are difficult words to admit but how else may I live?  This inside life, on top of cushions and in front of screens is doing nothing to seek the Kingdom.  Whose kingdom am I seeking inside these walls?  It appears to be no one's but my own.

So forgive me for living this selfish life of doing nothing but waiting.  It is somewhat clear why You haven't showed me yet.  My eyes might as well be closed most days the way that I am living my life.  I wait for something to happen and these in between moments are the worst.  I don't do anything.  The air outside could be made of love but I would have little proof.  These walls are seldom escaped and I have made them my prison.  Even deeper is the cell in my head.

But my lot is what You have given me.  How will I use it?  What are my next steps?  Please show me where to go.  I don't want to keep falling for these tricks of those outside.  I want to be content in that which You have given me.  And I want to learn to live in the in between time.  To seek the Kingdom that is all around me.  The Kingdom that is living and breathing the world and heavens over.  I want to feel value.  You're here.  I trust You.  Do big things.  Let me in on the world Your changing.  The change does not start today but maybe tonight is when I really join in.  When I jump on your carousel already spinning.  For too long I have been just laying on the bench, sometimes watching and other times with my eyes closed.  Please pull me on and take me spinning with You.  I want a life that is not stagnant.  A life that doesn't pass me by.  A life that is worth living.  I want to put to death this life of boredom and wake up a life of freedom and reality.  A life of joy.  A life that rejoices in sorrow.  A life that doesn't put on a happy face but wears authenticity.  Please take me with You.

This house doesn't burn down slowly

I'm going to write a little on here even if I don't have much to write about.  I'm leaving for a month tomorrow, away from the technological word for a bit, but it will be a great thing.  I feel like I've had some things to write about in the last few weeks but apparently the longer you wait for them, the more they evaporate.  So I don't really have many words today.  I have had some good times lately though.

I was a little concerned earlier this year about how my summer would pan out.  With nothing to do, I could easily fall deeper into the untrue thoughts I think and spend days on end without even leaving my apartment.  Instead though, it's only the middle the June and I feel like I've already had quite a full summer.  I got a new car.  My brother and his girlfriend came to visit me.  I got to visit family in Iowa and Minnesota.  I've enjoyed some ultimate with some people at church.  (I think I may try and find some people to do that more consistently with!)  With the help of some friends I've taken some courageous steps.

It's kind of crazy how much I've been able to do in these last few weeks.  I'm really quite tired right now but I have to pack because I leave tomorrow.  As usually happens when I wait to post, this isn't much of an update, or may have been a little waste of your time read, but while I'm away you're welcome to check out some older entries on my other Blog.  I plan to catch up on that when I get back.  As for now, I will go create one more post for it.

The Guilt of the Innocent

Why is it that those who need not fear the words spoken so often do and those who need to hear the words are present in body but not in heart?  Is that how the former become that way, by listening too much?

I think the guilt of the innocent is a bit of a tragic thing.  Those with so much potential are scared to move forward because they are unsure of how people will react or what unexpected thing could come as a result of their actions.  I believe that professionals are people who aren't afraid to make mistakes and sadly oftentimes I am still an amateur.

And though death is not a living thing, sometimes it feels as such.  When things are far beyond my control and anxiety gets the best of me, it feels as though death beats my heart considerably faster than normal.  It feels like death and separation, which is a version of death itself, grow inside me.  They grow to make an absence, an emptiness, and they leave me crippled and stationary where I am.  I can tell myself that it won't last, that nothing here does, but words within seem just short of hopeless.

In times of extreme anxiety it is difficult to come up with a complete and positive thought.  Usually, the only complete thoughts are ones of brokenness and lies.  Other than that, I may try to convince myself with truths I know, but it seldom works.  Anxiety means my mind runs and when my mind runs so do the incomplete sentences in my mind.  Things like "I know I can-", "I can-", "I can't-", "What am I-",  "I want to k-...", and "No, stop-".

So if you've reached this line, don't meet it with excessive concern.  I'm alright.  A life in shambles means I'm still living right?  It means I haven't receded into the chasm of nothing.  I don't need your sympathy, my heart is still beating.  Kind words aren't necessary.  From life, I am not retreating.  Perhaps just holding each other would be nice, though I know it's not something I should be (or will be) needing.

Don't overread me.  Perhaps it's just the guilt of the innocent inside me.

Satisfaction rather than emotional Attraction

April comes and with it showers. It is my hope that the showers will wash me over and perhaps even my mind will be clean of thoughts about you. I don't know how to live this life lately when I think about you so often. I'm hoping the showers will perform their given function, to water seeds of flowers. Weeds sprout up too but I'm hoping to pluck them from the root in order that they may be gone forever.

For those of you with a paperback copy of The Hunger Games nearby or enough dedication, my feelings may be described by paragraph 2 on page 112. This of course with a couple minor changes, one of name and another of sex (female rather than male). How is that for a "nerd" moment?

I can't tell you exactly how hard it is not to just send a quick text message of missing or to try and make public the feelings I spoke directly to you the other night. It's as if my heart thinks sharing with the rest of the world what I shared with you will somehow convince you that we can work it out. Forget the miles, forget the tasks at hand, the busyness of your agenda, and just allow my heart and yours to lock arms for a moment. What harm is there in that? Though, if it is not sincere I really think I would rather be here. Tricking my heart for a brief moment of satisfaction is not joy, it's deception.

Now it's time to seek satisfaction in not seeking anything but the only One that matters. Life is difficult. Love is too. Singleness is hard but waiting is worth it. Trust. Trust. Trust. Where else can I go? Escapism will only dig wider and deeper holes in this chest of mine. I must move forward and look upward. Looking back and too far ahead will only make this harder.

It's time to move on. You're out of sight but my mind's eye sees you. It's time to close that eye that seems to be rooted so deeply in my heart. A time off from emotional vision may do me good. Moving upstream may be difficult but if that is where the destination lies, it is worth the effort.

On inspiration and motivation

Why does inspiration come when the dream world is calling from an ever closer distance? There are so many moments that I feel could be used more effectively had I the inspiration, or perhaps the motivation, at those times. But I often don't. It's often as my eyes are lifting their lids like dumbbells on the final rep of the last set. Oh well..Life goes on..

I'm excited of what comes next but my mind is quickly fading into a state where words aren't from a complete brain. Words are quickly becoming those only dictated from the cerebellum rather than both the cerebellum and the cerebrum. So I'll leave the post here. Perhaps tomorrow, or sometime soon, both will work together more congruently and the inspiration and motivation will do the same. Until then, enjoy your cruise but don't get stuck in the web.