I have work to do, but I can't concentrate. I can't focus. What is it that I am looking for? What are these distracting thoughts about me about you about life. About the path of life. What is all of this about.

Last night, as I sat on the floor in sweet solitude with my pen and ink and paper, I had a new sort of thought. It was a thought associated with the thoughts that I have been having about why I am here, where I am going, about Paths. Walkways. Roads and plans. I began to wonder if my mindset, my eye on the certain prize has colored my choices, my steps. And I began to wonder if even though I was saying that I will come here to Boise to make new discoveries and to see where things lead, I was still very much committed to returning to the same path that I was on. I said I came here to adopt a new mindset of being less concerned with the path of production and accomplishment and fulfilling some set of expectations, but I don't know if I have really died to that yet. Really. I am sort of in this dilemma of why is it that I have chosen to continue on the path that I am continuing on. Really.

The question: Why am I choosing to return to Colorado, why am I going back to CSU to finish my degree. Part of me, when I ask that question, whispers, "Uh, hello, dear, but it is sort of obvious isn't it? Finishing your degree is what you are supposed to do. To not do that would be like, you know, quitting, flaking out. Not accomplishing what is expected of you in light of 'success'." And then the other side of me has to answer with this rebuttal: Am I finishing my degree just so that I can have something to do with my life? Am I wanting to finish my degree so I can have a secure future with a good job. Do I say I want to teach just becuase it is the only "career" that I want, since I have to choose? I mean, don't get me wrong, I enjoy teaching and I think being a teacher is a role that I am passionate about filling in this world, but I have learned something in all this time being around people. Am I seeking this structure to avoid the hard work of really focusing on relationships?

I want me life to be focused on relationship first. I want this to be my driving passion. "It is the love of Christ that compels us." I want love of the hearts of others to be my driving force. But the thing that I find is that it is really easy for me to get distracted. I think we set up systems in our world that breed these distractions. I am a book worm. Why? Because the sense of accomplishment that I get after completing a task feels a lot more secure that the rejection that I fear. It is a great deal more tangible.

But I don't really want to have that kind of security anymore. But I feel like it is so difficult for me strike a balance. How can I be a student and also be a person. How do I keep my busy school schedule from becoming my whole person? How do I avoid this isolation? How do I indulge my love of learning, reading, intellect, without letting it become more important than the deeper lessons that there is to learn from being with other people.

I am beginning to experience this world of just being with people and enjoying other people and it is all that I want. I feel that our age of information has done us a great disservice in communicating that there is greater fulfillment in earning money and getting our willies from a sense of accomplishment from paper success than the risk of opening our hearts to other people. We become comfortable in our cubicles behind our computer screens-- we become myspace profiles and we email so we don't have to face each other and we think this is safe and nice. And yet we wonder why we have internet addiction-- this type of connection never really satisfies.

And I am beginning to see that breathing the same air as someone else, looking into the eyes of another and hearing the nuances of their cracking voice is so much more life-giving. It is real-- it is soil in place of the plastic that chokes us.

And so as I think about going back to school, I suddenly feel afraid. I am afraid of getting sucked back in. Sucked into this resume-building, stress-induced intensity that perpetuates a system of death from safety. I have been so enjoying earning my livelihood from barista-ing because it helps me pay the bills, but the emphasis is being on a team-- we all work together to get the coffee made, the food served, and the floor swept. It isn't a matter of deadlines and failure to please others. It is a matter of being connected to one another. It is this cycle of helping each other run a business so we can all stay alive in this world. We aren't just serving this giant corporation and getting a paycheck every few weeks to make it all worth it-- we are all playing a part in our own livelihood and the livelihood of those around us. That feels very good. It is very fulfilling.

And so I think about going back to school and I think about the life that I lead here. And the last few days I have been thinking about how even though I have been physically here, I have still been spending a lot of energy maintaining my place in this system-- somewhere else. All that I have been seeking and striving for has been to make sure that I have something to show for myself when this time is done, that in the future, I will have this paper success. This stuff that I can show for myself. What I do for today seems to always be for something somewhere else, somewhere later.

I know I have written before about always planning for the next thing. After I am done with high school, then I go on to college, which is preparation for some career in some capacity, and once I get that big time job, it is in pursuit of the next promotion and then after that it is retirement-- the time that we have time to actually enjoy our lives, if we are able to after our ingrained lifestyles of stress anger lack of fulfillment for the sake of "the man." Who devised this system of enjoying our lives only after we have destroyed our hearts to the point of being unable to enjoy anything.

I know I talk about this a lot and now I have reached a crossroads where I have to intentionally decide how can I make my life truly reflect this idea. What am I doing to enjoy my life today? How much of my life is devoted to maintaining the promise of security for the future. How much of my life is driven by the fear of lack thereof?

There is a lot of focus placed on the importance of being "responsible." We must fulfill our obligations and we must place our lives in such a place that we have those obligations or else what are we called? Bums. We are answering to so many people about how our lives ought to be considering meaningful. What is a meaningful life? honestly? I think there has to be a balance somewhere, but I keep having this sense that we need to always be doing things with our lives that are ultimately driven by love. Even if it is a few layers below the surface, love must be down there.

So a life that is about relationships. I don't want to live a life where relationships are buried somewhere down below. I don't want to live a life where relationships are just a part. I don't want to live a life where relationships are the icing on the cake that make life endurable.

And so another thought emerges from this. If I am still finding that ultimately my life is based on this assumed path of " success" to "success," something is missing. I think this is the thing that really keeps me from being present. When my life is simply about breathing in the lives of the people around me, then tomorrow doesn't matter much, does it? The focus suddenly shifts from me maintaining my own security in isolation to learning how to be more connected to the hearts around my own. And it is this process of investing deeply without expectation, pursuing reconciliation until we find the end (which I'm not sure will ever be reached) and having a loose hand of grace when people move in and out of our lives.

It is a messy process, I find. A process fraught with pain and challenge and the continual need to build new muscles and a bravery to face the deepest of pains. And it is in no way methodical or formulated. And this is why I think we try to cover it over with the "really important" systems of success. Those ladders we try to climb-- maybe we are just trying to get away from the intensity of actual life, the life that goes on in our real hearts. And so we do get away, unfortunately, we get away from the heart that beats and we become hard and wonder why we feel so very dead.

So where will all of thie lead me? I do not know. Today I haven't really accomplished all that much, for which I feel a tiny twinge of guilt, but mostly it is refreshing to seek a balance of what really matters. If I were to do much more today, it seems that it would be out of a sense of obligation. I am experimenting with the idea of spending time enjoying my life every couple of days. I am experimenting with the joy of getting enough sleep at night and taking time to listen to my heart.

Jesus often spent extended periods of time away from the obligations and expectations of those around him-- when crowds were coming to him, begging for healing and teaching, he chose to retreat to solitary places. He wasn't consumed with fulfilling the expectations of others or maintaining any sort of resume-- he clearly rejected that sort of occupation. Being called insane by your family and a drunkard by the religious athority didn't really seem to bother him all that much. So maybe now I will begin writing my speech for tomorrow. just because....

being present. I'm still thinking about it today. As I mentioned in my last post, it was pointed out to me that I am not really being fully present here in Boise. And, as I mentioned in the last sentence. I've been thinking about it.

As some people like to point out (ahem) a question that I have been conitnually posing to myself these past months has been "why am I here?"And as much as that question seems to betray feelings of remorse or uncertainty about the fact that I am here, but i think really, it is a question indicative of an essential process of this whole experience. I have often found the question "why" to be of great value and I think this brand of "why" is important for me now and the lessons I am in the midst of now.

I think it is important to be asking, why I am here, now, in this place, doing what I am doing and where am I headed? I think that the way that I approach this moment is affected by what I have in mind for the future. And i wonder if there is a balance I must seek between planning for the future and being free to be present today. Giving myself to whatever presents itself today, choosing not to withdraw. withdrawal. Something about that idea feels breathless and empty. thirsting for something when that something is simply the glass of water in front of me that I am choosing not to drink.

I want to give myself fully today. I want to invest in the life that I do have here today. And I haven't been. And it is difficult for me to figure out how to give myself to the life that I am living day in and day out here which still knowing that is temporary. And not that I don't have a choice about even that, but that the things that I really do want do make it temporary.

Part of me thinks that most of this makes no sense, mostly becuase it makes very little sense to me. that is why it is still a question. I feel like I just took a bite of just a big question. So please excuse me if my words are not clear while I try to speak with my mouth full.

after a long evening with conversation with a good dear friend, i am realizing that I may not be as content as I thought I was and that I still have a long way to go even now. And I have been reminded that it may be wise to retrieve my mind and heart from where I will be in a few months to where I am in this moment, today.

Be present, she says. Be present. hm.

More and more I see my way of life shifting from following the right religious rules in case anyone ever checks my homework to a way of life driven and permeated by healing. I am seeing old patterns of fear and shame replaced by the desire to love, to know, to connect with those around me. I think less that God is left in a box in the corner for us to use to make ourselves feel good occassionally and I look for him more in the faces of people in the grocery store and and work and in school.

More recently, I have been thinking about the people that I have in my life. I find that I often find that my closest friends, the people I am around most and who know me the best are those like me-- I am not around people often who are not like me. I often wonder why this is and I know that the answer is that these are the people who are most comfortable for me, the people that I am drawn to and the people I feel safe enough to put my trust in. And this is an area that seems like an ongoing goal for me to make changes in.

I've been doing a lot of thinking about the people that I work with. I love my job, I love the opportunities to be busy and productive, but even more than that, it feels so good to be part of a team. And it is a team of people who are friendly and are interested in connecting with others-- including me. And it is enjoyable for me to see the growth in myself to be able to trust those relationships. And those relationships have caused me think more about God, about where he is to be found and the way his image shines in each of them, even though they might not know it.

Something has caught my attention this afternoon. Two of my coworkers are spending significant amounts of time caring for an elderly relative. One woman is working through the frustration of an un-diagnosed illness in her father that has taken his ability to live normally. Another coworker, a girl just my age, is living with her grandfather simply to care for him as he battles the challenge of old age. And for some reason, both of these situations is very intriguing to me. I think it is extremely inspiring, maybe a bit humbling, to watch as they do so much to care for their family. I'm not sure why my attention is so piqued by it, but I think it is something that I am simply going to pay attention to. There is something about this sort of sacrifice on a day to day basis that makes me feel alive. Even though the circumstances are difficult, there is something life-giving about it still.

Ethnos. Imago. I love the idea that our world is so very injected with the beauty and reality of God. I think it is the gift of the artist's eye that allows a person to look at the world as one integrated entity. I look out my window at the front yard, my car and the house across the street and I watch as dust devils swirl the floating snow of the cotton woods and I don't see individual objects as much as I see this thickness of white fluff against the green grass backdrop, mixed with the light blue of the house and turquoise of the suburban. There is a thickness to it all that seems to be full of the essence of reality somehow.

Sometimes when I am feeling very discouraged or depressed, I suddenly snap back to reality with the reminder that the world is so much bigger than my isolated struggles. I don't know why this makes me feel so differently, but when I begin to view my life as part of this big orchestra, this flow of rhythm with parts and players coming in and out and I just get to catch a little slice of a glimpse of it, this greatness of peace just washes over me. Everything feels a bit more hopeful and I feel less alone and that becuase of all of this, things are going to be okay. nothing is quite as big of a deal as it was before. The end of the world doesn't seem to be a real place anymore. Things become three-dimensional again.

And so today I am feeling blessed to be breathing in air in three-dimensional space. I am feeling blessed to be able to catch some small glimpses of the lives around me. I am finding that I am experiencing something new-- this feeling of being surrounded by people, by life. I am feeling so vibrant these days because I feel balanced in my connection to people. I don't go through my day just to get through the semester or to accomplish some task in case someone is checking my work-- no, I am seeking life, breath, joy, connection. There is this strange aliveness that comes from finding your heart near other people in open kinds of trust. I like it.

I have been feeling a great deal of balance lately. Balance. What does that feel like? you ask. It feels a bit like when you stand right on the fulcrum of the teetertotter of life, like even though the board may shift, you are safe, secure, that there is strength there to keep your footing. It is a feeling of peace that goes deeper than a feeling-- it is this sense that even when everything feels off, you know somewhere deeper that there is a footing, a place to rest your feet and find your strength-- even though you might not feel like you have "it," you know of a well where "it" is found. Maybe, even just a little.

These past few weeks have been very peaceful. I think back to places in my life where I felt very good but I did not feel secure. I was in this state of extacy and joy, but feared the day that I my ability to maintain it would finally wane and all would be lost again-- the blackness of the pit would return and life would be hopeless again. But I get this sense that an enlarged view of life makes one realize that the well really does run deep. Maybe it is a greater degree of trust, trust that when things look the worst, when they are the most unclear and confusing, they are only signs of the degree of clarity and joy that will follow. And I don't really know if this is true in all cases, but I just wonder if as the depth of our well of understanding of life grows, so does our trust, our security. When your world is big, there is less unfamiliarity to fear. But I think at the same time, maybe we also begin to recognize how much more there is to learn and experience.

So peace. Joy. Balance. I wonder if this is where true bliss is found-- in this discovery of contentment that Paul speaks of. When we are content, when we make the choice to simply breathe deep when we know how to do nothing else, there is this overwhelming sense of completeness. The wholeness that comes, filling your lungs, allowing yourself this one luxury.

I'm not sure what else I want to say today. I feel quite full today, which feels almost unfair, but oh so beautiful, so right. And what is my purpose in telling all of this to you, you who stop here to peek into my heart-- I hope that you too, are able to give into this peace. That you will find your heart at ease, that you will find your fulcrum in the midst of the swing of right to left. Take a few deep breaths and ask for the peace to know your own beauty and wonder.

Abba, I thank you for your peace, for your arms of safety around me here in this place. I thank you for putting people around me to love and support me, for all that you HAVE taught me in this time about community, about being a lover and allowing myself to be loved. I thank you for contentment and that in the midst of my uncertainty, you do prove to be faithful for TODAY, and that is enough. I thank you simply for you love and your provision for my needs and for the right to care for myself. Abba, I thank you that you are so big. I thank you that even when we stray from the opinions of others and the boxes we try to use to find security, you are still bigger than all of that. That you are as big as the sky and that we are able to freefall in your love-- a love that is so large that the only way for us to begin to take it in is simply to breathe it in-- to trust and hope and cry and be. And to be okay with all the others ways that we do not understand and the ways that we will never be able to explain it to anyone else either. Abba, I just thank you for your love. Love that I cannot understand, but a love that draws me into your arms. Love that takes care of me when everything else around me is crumbling and people are leaving me alone to my own devices. Thank you for your empathy for the cries of my soul. That you hear and you are a God of love, a God of release, a God who is big enough and strong enough to hold it all when we feel like it is too much for anyone else, and yet we are still holding it when it is too big for us too. Thank you that you pick up where we leave off. Beautiful. Abba, thank you for your simple beauty. If this is all we discover of you, I know it will be enough. Make me into a woman who understands this one little thing-- beauty. Thank you is not enough.

A great deal of my body is in pain from too much standing and too much walking this week, so sleep seems to be all so illusive. So what else is there to than to blog?

I am feeling strange, longing for a little sacred, but fearing that that will be out of the picture for a while. I gave away my Sundays. I thought they didn't matter, but I think I am seeing now that they do matter to me more than I thought. I care for my Sundays. Sunday on a Saturday doesn't quite work, it seems. The feeling is different. Things feel more quiet, more special. I have never really had a sunday in all my life that I really did work in the same way as another day of the week.

I am actually beginning to miss traditional church a bit, which is actually quite refreshing. All of this has taught me that most of the time I do not enjoy "church," but being away from it has taught me to appreciate it, despite my frustrations. Sometimes, occasionally, it can be refreshing. Especially after a long absence. It can be refreshing when it isn't one more thing to do, but it is a place to pour out in worship and to be filled when the message comes from a honest heart. I miss it. And I am sad, disappointed, that I am not really going to be able to go for a while, it seems.

Sacred space. I feel like that place of quietness is far away now. Which I think is okay, actually. I used to feel so guilty, so messed up when I didn't feel all that "spiritual," but I am beginning to see that these really are not the things that gain me favor in God's eyes. I am not a "bad christian," which translates to "bad person" because of it. I have the freedom to be free from it. Freedom. And I think when we are separated from these things, then we are able to truly return because we want to-- that is where the joy is found.

Joy. enjoyment. Celebration. I think we get so caught up in doing things that we forget why we do them. And it becomes a matter of guilt and shame, that we bear our crosses in hopes that we can still pay for our own ticket to favor in God's eyes, not because we know that new life comes from the perseverence of suffering with our Christ.

There are some things that have become so engrained in me. They could be rituals, and those are okay, but they could also be chains. Numb, blind, stuck rut-ness. Those trails that get embossed across the mind after being retraced time after time after time. And I think it has been good for me to be freed from those patterns, at least for a while, in order to have an opportunity to step back and observe what they really look like. So I can admire the pretty ones and begin to erase the ugly ones. To re-learn enjoyment.

I have always been intrigued with the idea that Abba longs for us to be people of celebration. That his purpose in putting us here on his beautiful, green earth is for the sake of enjoyment-- that he would have something to pour his love into and that we would simply be here for the purpose of loving him and all he is and all of himself that he had put into all that is. And I am convinced that more than anything, we are called to be people of celebration. To be people of enjoyment.

As I write this, I wonder at my own life-- how much of my energy is put into celebrating? How often is celebration the singular motivation of my heart? Am I living out of celebration, or am I living out of fear, hurt, resentment, anger, frustration, selfishness. What would my life look like if everything was about enjoyment, celebration? Even in the moments that there seems to be nothing to celebrate, how did we get too that moment? What lessons can we celebrate in it?

And another thing-- celebration is hard to do on your own. I mean really. What do we do when there is something to celebrate? have a party, right? And what, in its basic definition, is a party but the cause to bring people together. I think so often in our culture we miss celebration becuase it is so simple-- it is often the singluar task of breathing in the richness of life. It is the basic action of being in the presence of another. We enjoy things when we just take a moment to take them in-- nothing to produce, nothing to save, nothing to prove.

And so I wonder, even though I have to work tomorrow, if that action can still be sabbath in its own way. I think sabbath is taking a day to remind ourselves to enjoy, to celebrate and I think those things are best done simply by taking in that which is good. And what is church but coming together with others to celebrate that which is good? hm. I have heard some people talk about "sacred spaces" before and I wonder if maybe I have just found one. Maybe.

I am learning that sunday can look a lot different from the ways that I grew up seeing it. To be really honest, it is hard. I already miss the special feeling sunday has always had for me, but I wonder if this is just another one of those things that I have to die to in order to see it blossom into new life. The simple experience of Sunday just being different for a little while I think is worth the experience. It is worth trying even that out.

"Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan and was led by the Holy Spirit in the desert, where for forth days he was tempted by the devil. He are nothing during those days, and at the end of them, he was hungry." Luke 4

This passage was a part of my reading for the day and a ffew things about it struck me in interesting ways. In a lot of ways, I feel like the patttern of my life this semester has been a great deal of wandering in the desert and now I feel I have entered a new, green place. I've been thinking a lot lately about getting my needs met and the juxtaposition of silence and speech.

So this passage struck me in a few singular ways. Sometime ago, I read on FollowtheRabbi.com that any mention of the Jordan River is quite significant and the idea of "crossing the jordan" symbolized a certain crossing over in life, a turning point, a covenant, the turning over of a new leaf, if you will. And so the first thing I noticed here was that Jesus knew he was reaching a turning point. The paradigm had shifted.

Second, I noticed that he spent this time in the wilderness and although he was led by the Spirit, he was still ravaged by temptations, the beast of uncertainty. I mean, what is temptation, really? Temptations are presentations of choices about how we are going to get our needs met. He was led by the Spirit, but the choices were still there to make.

Third, when he finished his work in the desert, he was hungry. I mean, at first pass, this may seem obvious; not eating for forty days= hunger, pretty simple. But I think there is something deeper here. At the end of his time in the confusion of the wilderness, he returned empty. He had an accute awareness of what his needs were and the places where his own self-fulfillment ended. He was hungry, probably in more ways than one.

And I think when we immerse ourselves in this type of solitude, when we brave the unclear desert, we place ourselves in a position to return empty. Hunger. Have you ever been in that place? Maybe before Thanksgiving dinner, maybe after a long day of hard work. You return empty with the joyful anticiaption of being filled. After three long months of searching, your joy is so much greater when you find your hands full. When you allow yourself to become empty, everything feels clearer because there has been time to "clean the beach" as someone told me once.

Hm. Interesting. I can't help but look back at January February March and wonder. I was very frustrated at times, but I had this sense that the solitude was so important, even despite how unclear it was and how frustrating it was at times. I needed that opportunity to get hungry before I continued gorging myself on life. Could that be it?

Maybe that is why we get so frustrated in our culture. We get so busy, we gorge ourselves on media, accomplishment, production, that we forget the sweetness that is produced by the emptiness of the desert. We never stop to take a breath and wonder why the air tastes stale all the time.

So Jesus returned hungry. I like this idea. I like it a lot. And so I suppose the question that I must pose to myself now is how do I really work to maintain that rhythm in my life so that I have those moments of hunger?

friday night. It has been quite a full week. A very full week. Started a new job. worked eighteen hours. Started doing some filing. Finishing classes. Started at the teen center. Continued to teach classes at the art institute. most of my days this week have exceeded 12 hours. I am tired. I suppose it is like they say: when it rains, it pours. I feel like my whole life, my whole person has changed, my surroundings, my everything has shifted... again. I interviewed for a new job for the coming fall back in Colorado. I am doing what I can to find a new place to live when I get back.

I have been doing a lot of thinking this week inbetween driving from one place to another, in the midst of pulling shots and finding time to sleep, about who I am and what makes me what I am, whose opinions make me feel the ways that I do. Yesterday I was talking to someone about a painting that I did when I first got here, way back in January and it made me realize that a few months ago, a lot more of my indentity was grounded in what kind of artist I was-- my finished painting felt a lot like the image that I was putting forth about who I am. And I was thinking about how art often feels like so much pressure becuase we believe that what we produce makes us worth what we are worth-- our identities can be so tied to who we are as artists. But this semester, being less defined as a student, less defined by what I study, has taught me a lot about simply being a person first. I am not first an artist, I am not first a teacher, I am not first a student, I am not first a woman, I am not first a "religious person," and I am not first whatever my job is. I am first simply a person, a living breathing person. It changes from being a student who does this, this, and this. I am a created being first who does things compelled by love.

I am seeing in myself a lot of the ways that I rely on the opinions of others to define my happiness, my "okay-ness" with who I am, what I am doing. I am seeing that there are a lot of instrnaces where if I have the sense that someone has a reason to be unhappy with me or I begin to think that I have been a dissappointment or failed in their eyes, I am tempted to withdraw, shrink back in shame. But I am noticing a shift in my thinking at that point-- suddenly I am able to separate the reality of what I know deeply about myself from how I fear others are seeing me. I am seeing a change of my thinking from allowing my fears of what people might be thinking to honestly approaching what is true about my intentions and seeking reconciliation in any misunderstandings.

Being so busy now feels good and it takes a lot of discipline to really seek strength beyond myself to get through the day. I often have to remind myself not to complain, but to seek honest strength, to breathe deep and maintain rhythm in my life. I am learning about taking care of myself more, giving myself rights, allowing myself grace and empathy. When I allow myself honestly to acknowledge my own needs for self-respect and I allow myself the dignity of equal belonging, something changes. It feels a great deal like this is where so much of the freedom that I seek is found. I do my best and give myself grace when I fail. Things feel a little less scary. I suddenly have the right to say no to things that hurt, I have the right to separate myself from things that I am only doing becuase I "should." I can listen to my real heart without fearing how other people are going to interpret it. "What if they think ______?" feels like a less weighty question.

I have found in the past few weeks I have been at a great deal more peace. I am finding with experience that things usually work themselves out in the end and worrying, fearing, and manipulating are a great waste of time. And this peaceful place of contenment may be fleeting, but something about it is profound, all the same. I am at peace with my life, whatever happens, wherever I go and whatever there is to accomplish and figure out. I am seeing that a little hard work and persistence pays off in big ways. As Woody Allen says, "80% of success is just showing up." And I think a big piece of showing up is not allowing others to tell you that you are not welcome.

So I still do not know what the next three and half months are going to hold, but I aksed that they would be full of growth and I have a feeling that I am really getting what I asked for. Maybe. I don't know all that is going to happen, all the places I will go and the muscles that I will continue to build, but I feel again like I am facing a new day. This whole experience seems to be ever-changing as it is, so it feels sort of natural for these days to have changed tides yet again.

there will be more later, you can be sure...

fear not, I have not actually fallen off the face of the earth

So, it looks like I haven't posted anything here for over ten days-- almost two weeks, actually. That should be some kind of record, right? Right. So, for all of you who have been wondering, no I have not died, but my hard drive, however, is altogether a different story. Unfortunately, my computer has been out of commission for about a week at quite an inimportune time, but in some ways it has been a nice repreve at the same time.

April has been a busy month so far. It seems to be going so fast, I can hardly keep track of the days.. After three months of what felt like pure and sometimes excruciating solitude, I am now finding myself having to plan out almost every spare moment, squeezing every drop out of the day (which started at 4 am today). But as I was driving home this afternoon, I was thinking back on January February March and thinking that it was such a good time, even though difficult, they were months of quiet spent sorting out so much that I think that has so greatly added to the earthy abundance of these new days. The void sweetens the newness of my life now. Instead of just being busy, it feels like purpose. It doesn't feel like I go through the day enslaved to what I ought to do because someone told me that is what I must do-- I no longer am driven by that ever-illusive "man." So much of what I do seems to be driven by what I love. Love. I've been thinking a little about when Paul says, "it is Christ's love that compells us" and "The world will know you are my disciples by your love." And instead of drudgery, so much just feels like fullness of joy. Having purpose outside of just getting things done or going through the motions.

I look back on the past few months of my life and I look at who I am today and I feel like I come so far simply in terms of relating to people. To be honest, I'm not really sure how it came about in real tangible terms, but I have this sense that I understand a little more about what it means to connect with people and be in people's lives and simply care for people. To feel more at home with myself and to be comfortable finding belonging with others simply by caring about them. Something that I did notice when I went home that despite the same old diffuculties I faced while there, I had this greater sense of care for others. I genuinely wanted to know how my friends were doing. I wanted the kids that I encountered to feel loved and appreicated and valued. I felt brave enough to let down some guards and simply be with people. And that is a nice feeling.


Today I was teaching a class that a few weeks ago really frustrated me. A few weeks ago, I was teaching the same class and I felt exhausted, frustrated, and annoyed. But today, I noticed a change. After waking up at 4 in the morning, getting my oil changed and being told that I should have done that a lot earlier, having to also get a nail removed from my tire, and continuing my project of figuring out how to get my computer fixed, simply helping two elderly people discover color and making mistakes brought me so much joy. Joy. It feels accute after those months of frustrating quiet. Have you ever felt accutely joyful?

When I flew home last week, I had a great deal of time to think thanks to a layover in Portland. And something that I realized is that I spend a lot of time complaining and a lot of energy feeling sorry for myself. When things are hard, I get caught in this circle of trying to have my needs fulfilled through the pity of others-- no wonder it kept on circling back around on me. But really-- complaining. worrying. Whining. I'm really trying to stop. To just let things be hard. I think part of it is having this sense of shame that I own things that break and so on-- letting go of that and simply letting things be what they are have helped.

A few weeks back, I wrote about contentment. Having my hard drive break has been an interesting lesson in contentment simply becuase whatever I had on my computer is now gone-- there is nothing I can really do about that. I it has been refreshing to realize that I don't even have to waste energy worrying about that which I cannot change. It is gone. but it's okay with me somehow today.

To be honest, having not posted for these past weeks has been interesting because I feel like a great deal has changed. Things look different yet again. Tomorrow will probably look a little different too. But everything feels fresh. I feel free. I feel empowered, to use sort of a "professional" word. I feel like after all of my work, all my toil, things are moving, and that feels so good.

A few weeks ago, you may remember a number of sort of less joyful posts of confusion, fear, maybe a touch of anger and I look back on that time as really important to where I am now. I don't look back on that in shame for douting or anything-- I am so glad that I was able to pour myself out in that way because it makes my present joy so much more poignant. And part of me wants to go back to the old lessons of God's faithfulness, but something about that doesn't feel quite right yet. It is a touch in that way, but at the same time has an air of something else I can't yet put my finger on.

Maybe it is more a matter of process. Is it that picture of God's faithfulness as his ability to deliver whatever we want when we want it? I think maybe my picture of God's faithfulness is getting reformed into this idea that he is big enough to handle our doubts and he is faithful to provide our day to day while we lets us wade through our junk for a while. His faithfulness is less in the form of a paycheck and more in the form of holding our hand as we process through the great mystery that life is. His faithfulness is less about delivery and more about presence. It is the delivery of strength, simple listening, validation of whatever we find entering our hearts and minds, no matter how painful. Maybe. And I don't mean to say that it is this nice littl god who just holds our hand and makes us feel better and "convicts" us to have a better attititude-- I think it is an image of a God who doesn't push us away when our true junk comes out as ugly as it really is, a God who is waiting to hold us close, to put his hand right in the wounds, the faithful God who would take all of our pain upon himself and die so that we can be raised to new life.

And I wonder if these last few months have been months of death in order than the spring would bring new greenery, new life, new breath. This reminder than becuase we have died with him, we too may be raised to a new life. maybe.

"... for I have learned to be content whatever the circumstances." [Phil 4]

It is funny how much can change in one day. In one moment, in an instant. How for a while you are going along, making plans, viewing your life in such a way, pitching your tent on a certian patch of grass, making decisions and thinking of your future. And then everything changes. In an instant, you are reminded that someone else has a plan.

I've been thinking a bit about contentment, about grounding your heart and your life and your throughts and decisions somewhere other than the circumstances and people swirling around you. In the midst of all that has gone on in and through my life these past few weeks, I am learning yet again that it is so important to decide what is really true at the heart of me. That even though the counsel of others is essential, helpful, and trustworthy, ultimately, the decision is mine. Ultimately, the opinion that matters the most is mine. And sometimes that measn conflict. Sometimes that means having an understanding for those who simply do not understand. Remembering that in the end, I'm not reporting to any person.

Something that keeps coming back to me is a certain passage in Everything Belongs in which Rohr essentially says that any amount of trust in God ought to lead us to trust in ourselves. This idea of trusting that the feelings, impressions, and opinions that I have are valid-- I can trust my own assessments. I can trust the things that I like, the things that excite me, the things that scare me.

Today, I was observing that to try to please everyone around me is an impossible and frustrating task. In the midst of my own decisions, I often seek the validation or accountability of others simply to check that I am "okay." The problem, however, is that I am finding that everyone around me has a differing perspective and a limited understanding of me, my circumstances, and what is best for me. Only I can really be the true judge of my heart-- if anyone can.

And so I think that contentment is key. I cannot control my circumstances and I cannot the people around me. Sometimes things just are what they are. I think contentment takes a great deal of trust is something so far removed from the swing of my daily life. Contentment is the ability to put my full weight into that which I may not fully understand. To trust that in the midst of a sticky situation, in the midst of my speachlessness, that energy will come, words will come and there is grace for the moments when none do. Contentment is the ability to put my full weight into the forgiveness that comes when things go wrong. To ask for sleep in uncomfortable beds, hope in impossible relationships, distraction when hunger becomes too great. To know that these things are not really the point at all.

I've been thinking these past few days about my tendency to endure. I often challenge myself to see how long I can endure certain hardships, how long I can go before.... I get this sense that this is my duty, my obligation. To ask for a way out before my legs are jello and my lungs are sore seems unexcuseable. It wouldn't be right. And I struggle in American culture to know what needs really are. I often find myself second-guessing my needs. And I think that this sense of endurance gets dangerously close to replacing contentment.

I think the difference with contentment is that it doesn't ignore the fact that the needs still exist. It isn't a denial of needs and weaknesses, but an acceptance. I think when we stop scrambling to cover it all up long enough, we discover contentment. We discover contement in seeing that the need is there, but there is still a provider. It isn't living as a martyr, thinking I do not deserve to have my needs met, so I must deny them.

And so I wonder then, how does one crawl out of this deep pit? How do you re-learn when to seek help? I often struggle to determine how to allow people in my life becuase my meter is broken that tells me when it is too much for me to do alone. I never want to be asking help from someone without proof that I have done enough on my own to merit their mercy. I imagine them saying, "well, did you try this?" or "why should I help you, why should I put myself out there for you, if you aren't really willing to try on your own." God forbid there be forgiveness for a lazy person, right?

So contentment. Things are changing changing changing. All around, each day has a new face. And I think contentment is a matter of making peace with myself, having a clear picture of who things are and seeking the mercy for the moments that leave us suffocated and being thankful in the moments of rest. maybe.

"Cast your cares on the Lord,
And he will sustain you
He will never let the righteous fall
but you, O God, will bring down the wicked,
into the pit of corruption
bloodthirsty and decietful men
will not live out half their days

But as for me-- I will trust in you.

[Psalm 55]

"But Blessed is the man who trusts in the Lord,
Whose confidence is in him
He will be like a tree planted by the water
that sends out its roots by the stream
It does not fear when heat comes
its leaves are always green
It has no worries in a year of drought
and never fails to bear fruit"

[Jerimiah 17]

"Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace that transcends all understanding will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus."

[Phillippians 4]

"Put your trust in the light while you have it, so that you will become sons of light."

[John 12]


Trust. I sed to think of trust as putting your full weight into the hands of another. Daring to take a deep breath of the air that surrounds you. sinking you teeth in, falling into the arms of another. And I look at my heart and the wawy I have been acting these last few weeks and I don't see that same picture of myself. The image of the tree having no fear when the heat comes-- I don't see that as an accurate picture of my reality as of late.

But today I am at peace. Peace. Breathing deeply and evenly. It is funny how in one moment everything changes and suddenly, your list of priorities is radically rearranged. The confusion of your present life suddenly ceases in light of one moment. On word. One phone call. One. Things take on new light and you are forever changed.

But today I am at peace, and that is good.

Due to a family emergency, I am going to be heading home for the weekend. And even though the circumstances are not causes for rejoicing, I am so happy for an opportunity to be home, just for a little while. I am looking forward to a break from the pressure of the challenge here and a little change of pace with the hope of returning with fresh eyes. Peace that passes understanding. The renewed ability to put my full weight into the One who is trustworthy.

"Unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seeds." John 12

"[Paul's] entire life and preaching... were totally consumed with nothing but Jesus Christ-- 'For I determined not to know anything amoung you except Jesus Christ and Him crucified.' Paul never again allowed anything to attract and hold the attention of his mind and soul except the face of Jesus Christ." -- Oswald Chambers, My Utmost For His Highest, April 3

For the past year, the image of the kernel of wheat falling to the ground in death has been one of prevailing importance to me. It is an image of active, intentional choice to face the unknown, the headlong dive into fierce reality, the exhilaration of experiencing the unexpected and the unknown. It is an image of immense trust-- trust that shall I perish, I shall be reborn. Resurrected. Come out with new life.

Earlier this week, I attended a teaching in which the speaker said this: "It is not being dead that I fear, but the getting dead." And I think that is proufoundly true-- as I think of the dying kernel of wheat, I realize that the death is a release that I long for, but it is the movement of the dagger to the chest that seems like an eternity of weight. Impossible. We long for the freefall, but it is the jumping that is so impossible.

But I am reminded again of the quote from Miles Davis," If I ever feel I am getting to the point where I'm playing it safe, I'll stop. That's all I can tell you about how I plan for the future." I think our true movement and our true growth comes from moving from the areas of safety into the areas of unknown, where things are not laid out in perfect predictability, but we must trust in the hand of another to care for that which we cannot control. And I wonder if in the midst of my decision-making paralysis, the question of "Am I playing it safe?" would serve as a reminder of which road I should take. I suppose this is one way of keeping our eyes fixed upon Christ.