Moments of Meaning

Grandma says God has a reason for me to be here, otherwise He would've taken me back long ago.

It's nights like tonight when I feel like that purpose is being realized.  Nights with heartfelt conversation, where the word heartfelt feels like more than a metaphor or more than an adjective.  These conversations feel like two hearts embracing at just the right moment.

These talks calm me down.  They feel like I'm being held right where I am.  I don't need to go anywhere.  Somehow I already feel myself missing it but I won't let it pass me by.

Nights like this You teach me about myself.  You're always that listening ear and I really feel it at such times.  Words flow from my lips like juice:

Am I just being so personal because I hope that eventually someone will get me?  That someone will catch me where I am and understand me?  Am I just waiting for that person know who I really am and love me there?

I want to be loved and I want to love.  This desire for intimacy is human.  I live in reality and I must remember that.  I live in today, not tomorrow, and certainly not tomorrow.  Something's beating inside my chest and it's not for the past or future.  The beating keeps me going today.

There is something calming, something soothing, about being here now.  I don't want this to end.  Still, let's keep moving, one step and then another.  Don't look at my footprints, nor the path ahead of me, I must just move with time.

And one last thing I just remembered, a quote from someone not myself though I'm not exactly who, "You view God the same way that you view yourself."  It's goes something like that and I believe it was from a professor at Denver Seminary.  To consider.

Speaking into clouds

Dear Reader,

I'm not sure who I'm speaking to so it shall be to you this time.  My life has been quite ordinary lately.  I haven't had much to going on but perhaps I can think of something.

Like last night when I was thinking about a time I don't really remember but I recall being told of it.  A time when I said something to the effect of "It seems like everything seems to happen to me."  This was when I was much younger, probably sometime in early to mid-elementary school years.  Apparently my saying gave my mother the impression that I thought I there was something wrong with me.  So rather than think that, she said, "You're just really special," or something like that.

But it does seem like so much happens to me and yet not enough.  And could this time be the reason that I sometimes feel like I have to be different to fit in?  Or that maybe if something happened to me people would care?

I don't want to think of that but is there truth in it?

There's clearly something broken inside me but I don't want to blame my behavior on something or someone else.

I'm probably just speaking words into clouds and no one will see them for days or perhaps months.

Oh, and another thing.  I read this this morning.  So no matter my desire, no matter my effort, none of this matters.  Nothing but the mercy and compassion of God.  So I must love mercy.

But I think that's all for now.  If I'm speaking into the clouds tonight their ears are already tired or they have better things to do.  And the wind blows steadily.

Wake me in Chiapas

Help.  I still want to help you.  The world.  I want to be light in a dark place.  I think I may have read this in the book that I'm reading right now, but it's a good one:

Don't blame the dark for being dark, blame the light for not shining there.

So I want to help.  I want to be the help.  Not so that people will look at me and see the great things I've done.  Not so that I will be lifted high.  I want to be the help because that is what this world needs.  If we will not speak for the voiceless, the rocks will cry out.  Their cry will be heard over our sighs of our "problems."

"I can't afford to spend so much money on gas."  "I don't have enough time to drop you off."  "I can't believe I stained my favorite shirt."  "She doesn't even know I exist."

Are these really problems?  I want to help where there are true problems.  Where people don't know where to turn.  Not where people are complaining about a life that could be better, but could be so much worse.

I want to climb on the trains with these kids.  I want to show them they're loved.  Something brought me back tonight to when I was reading the book Enrique's Journey by Sonia Nazario.  Are those kids to far away?  Are they too out of my reach?  Are they beyond my comfort zone?  Something has to be done.  Someone must tell them that they are loved.  No, someone must live love for them.  If all we do is tell people that they are loved, how will they know?  They must see it in us.  I want the glue sniffers, the traintop-dwellers, the shiverers, the orphaned, and the left-behind to know that they are loved.  That they are loved infinitely more than they may ever know.  I want them to be able to feel it.

Am I thinking too quickly?  Are my thoughts preceding rationality?  Or is that rationalism trying to convince me that I shouldn't do this?  That this doesn't matter?  The thing is, I know it matters.  The Lord hears the cries of these boys and girls, even men and women, who are so desperate for something more.  They'll leave what they have in search of something better.

I want to be an instrument.

Before arriving at church I was thinking more about waking up in a dream and how that would be but no, this is it.  Though I would like to entertain that thought, if only for a bit.  Have you ever thought what it would be like?  Waking up in a dream?  Why do we always wake up back in reality?  Why can't we wake up in the subconscious world?  That would be an interesting day.  People flying.  I would be jumping the height of skyscrapers.  Talking animals.  The possibilities are really quite endless.  I just think it's an interesting idea.  I think that's something I want to think into a little more some other time.  Maybe a book or short story on such an idea.

For now, just send me to Chiapas and show me how to be the most effective.  Perhaps another degree will help me meet these goals.  Let's see where this goes but I'm looking for something.  I don't want to stop if I'm not supposed to.  If this is what I'm supposed to do, where I'm supposed to go, I may need a push.  Help.  Help me help.

Dying Daily

1. more thing before I go
2. sleep.

This life sure is something.

I'm learning so much recently.  Sometimes what at the moment can cause me to feel so down and lost, can lead me into a point of such hope.  I guess the same sort of thing can be applied to the moments when I almost feel like something else is controlling me.  Those moments when I feel like I am controlled by desire, a desire for a good feeling.  Those moments are strange because I know they are fleeting, yet it's so difficult to abandon that desire.

I am learning that death can be a good thing.  This is not a desire for attention, not speaking around suicidal thoughts.  No, it's not that at all.  I am finding that these moments where I see something I had hoped for dying, I recognize that it was not something to hope for at all.  It too is fleeting.  Even looking for a relationship with meaning is not why we're here.

Do I want a relationship?  Honestly?  Yes.  But should I be actively seeking that out?  No, not right now at least.  If I am seeking it out in the way that I have been in the past then I will not find it.  It will not have the meaning that I want it to.  I must be patient and find who I am in Christ right now.  A relationship with a significant other is not where meaning in life is found.  The opposite may be what a lot of our society is trying to tell us but it's just not true.

I am made to love and to serve and that is what I will do.  Death is a part of this life and I would even venture to say that it is a part of this life that I need to invest more time in.  I need to die daily.  Let's work on that.  It may sound cliché to say it, but dying daily is such an important aspect to really living.  So let's make something of this life.

That seems to be all for now.  Just had to share that.  Something's coming and perhaps this is it.  Or maybe this is just a part of it.  But I feel it.  This life is exciting.

Swimming Again

It's time again to go swimming.  No, not in the waters of winter.  It's much too cold for that.  I'm going swimming in a life that is giving up to gain more.  I am going swimming in Your waters because that is the only place where life is.  I've been living too much on dry land lately.  It's too safe here.  I am guaranteed not to drown, but I don't like it.  I want to live where it's risky.  Where I have to trust You.

And what I'm giving up is something I've tried before.  I'm giving up the pursuit of relationships.  I cannot keep living as though there is one relationship that will solve everything.  One relationship that will make it all better.  I have all I need here.  Here in the waters of Your love.  That's what I need to remember.  Only a few hours ago I was thinking about how I had made it through over 24 years and only ended up with some shirts I like.  What kind of a way to live is that?

I had also thought, perhaps this quarter-life crisis is much closer to the end than I would like to admit.  That may be true, but I can't let that cripple me.  If death is closer than a quarter of my life away, isn't that more reason to be living it?  Still, everyday I must die.  I must die to the things that I'm putting on to avoid truth.  Why can't people see the real me?  Why do I sometimes feel I have to hide who I am?  Why can't we be who we are at the moments that we are?

So I'm choosing again to go swimming.  Swimming with You.  I'm diving into what is mostly unknown.  I don't need to know where I'm going before I get there.  I trust that You do and that's enough.  I don't need relationship.  Why do I keep pursuing it?  Am I lonely?  Sure!  That's alright.  Perhaps loneliness is a part of life.  Or even better, perhaps loneliness is the death I need to see beyond myself and into real and true life.

So.
I plan to not plan.  Within reason and without.
I will be okay with what's going on because it's all a part of a greater story.
I will not look at everyone I meet as a potential girlfriend.
I will start again.
And again.
And again.
And I will not let my past influence my future.

Though I will learn from my mistakes, my mistakes will not have power over me.  Even if they may not have been mistakes, they will not control me.  They are dead and I am alive now.  I am living where the water flows freely and no power can stop me.  I will break free, for these chains are melting beneath me.

I will swim again.

"We are once in a lifetime alive"

"This is the hole where most of your soul comes ripping out from the places you've been torn"

Yes I'm still awake, though barely.  I've wanted to write on here but haven't felt I had the time.  I felt today would be a good day to do so though, considering it is 12/12/12.

And, as usual when I wait too long to post, the inspiration is mostly gone.

Here's part of what could have been, had I written earlier:

I've been learning quite a bit about myself lately.  I'm trying to not be so self-deprecating.  I'm trying to live with a humble confidence, though it seems like an oxymoron.  Listening to myself speak, I think I have become very cerebral lately.  I think a lot within my ears and that makes for a lot of writing motivation with feeling.

Perhaps it is because I have been with myself a lot, that I get stuck inside my head.  And the fact that I also have had more opportunities lately to spend time with others and have taken advantage of them.  And I'm honest.  I speak what I'm feeling.  Most of the time.  So rather than just being stuck inside my head, I am sharing these thoughts that I've developed in my time alone and am learning to understand them better.  I'm learning to understand me better and even to be able to relate with others better.

There are also times (many times!) when I catch my heart dreaming.  I feel it trying to act as my mind but my mind knows better.  Still, if I let my mind's guard down, even for a second, my heart thinks it has the upper hand, and perhaps sometimes it does.

I've also thought perhaps my brain works differently than others'.  I have to explain myself so many ways.  Why can't I get it right the first time?  Have I lost touch with humanity?  Have I traded "comfort" for community?  Though, of course I know that, in a way, my brain does work differently than others' because all of us are different.  There's no need to get frustrated about this.  I can learn to live in community.

But community shall not be an idol for me.  At least, I hope not.  I do not wish for community for community's sake.  I wish for community so that I may better serve the Lord.  So that I may be a more effective servant.

I want to say more, but my mind has been tired for several hours now and it's been a long night as it is.  I also feel that what I've said here will suffice for now.

"I'm still walking the line the leads me home alone.  All I know I've still got mountains to climb on my own."

Hammers and Nails

So lately I've been in my head a lot.  And what I mean by that is that I have had a lot of negativity rolling around in my head and I can't seem to find a way to get it out.  It's like there is someone inside me trying to make me believe lies about myself.  How do I deal with that?

I've been taught to believe that alone I have no value, but when I am in relationship with God, I could not have more value.  Am I just getting stuck on the first part?  Or is it that I have been caught up in an obligatory love (which isn't love at all) for God?  I'm not sure exactly how to remedy this.  Sometimes when I'm driving, I find myself longing for someone next to me, someone to lock hands with.  This places weights on my heart and I don't feel fit to lift it from the depths.  I then feel that I am seeking fulfillment in something temporary, something that will just leave me with more holes than I started.

However, I know it will feel good.  The feeling just won't last.  So how do I escape that and look to the lasting Source of joy?

I can't take these infatuations.  They are foolishness.  They are empty and vacant with regards to love.  Though I feel that when sometimes when people see me, they see me with a "No Vacancy" sign.  That I just want to be with myself.  That I am a sufficient companion for me.  Still I know they know that of my self-depreciation.  So how can they see them both?  If they know I'm depreciating my value myself, why would they continue to hit the hammer with the nail?

Perhaps because I don't tell them of how bad I hurt.  And even in that, I feel that I talk about it too much.  That I come across as a constant whiner, and no one wants that.  That's what I've learned.  No one wants to be around someone who does nothing but complain and whine all the time.  But is it really whining?  I'm just trying to figure out who I am.  I'm trying to discover myself.  I'm looking in others to see me.  Why can't I look in myself to see me?  Sometimes it works.  Sometimes I do in fact see glimpses of myself inside, but too much of what I see from myself may not even be me talking and it's lies.  It's someone trying to convince me that I'm worth less than nothing.

So where do I go?  Will someone pull these nails out of my head?  I've done enough hammering myself and encouraged too many people to help me hammer them in.  I've even been the hammer to others, which adds nails to my own head just thinking about it.

And here's where I say I'm sorry.