doppelganger?

Hmm. I mistyped my blog address tonight and came across this -

http://arevolutionwithoutdancing.blogspot.com/

I guess someone else liked that quote from V for Vendetta, and it was a rather popular quote from 5 years ago.

An abandoned blog with only six posts, and a somewhat obnoxious layout, but I wonder, is she my Oregon alter-ego? If I had grown up in the Northwest or moved there for college, would my life look anything like hers?

I once was riding a train and a car just like mine was driving beside it. I imagined that it was me in that car, from another time, and I was watching my past or future self from the train. I like to imagine alter egos or selves from different times interacting. Maybe it's narcissism, but I think I just like to reflect on my life and ask, "What if?"

voice of inquiry

This morning at work, several coworkers surprised us all with awards for everyone - creatively made on decorated paper plates. Some were serious - the "Strength" award for a coworker who has been battling a serious disease; some were inside jokes - "The Spooning with Rotter Award," many were quite funny; and all reflected some aspects of the person's character or personality. There were plenty of laughs and smiles.

I received the "Voice of Inquiry" award, complete with a medallion and red, white, and blue ribbon that allowed me to hang the award around my neck. "This person always asks questions in our staff meeting, and voices the questions that I often would want to ask," my coworker said before presenting me with the award. I laughed when I received it - because it's certainly true, I do ask a lot of questions in our staff meetings! I'm always seeking to understand clearly, and have no problem voicing questions to receive that clarity.

To be honest, after the initial laugh, I felt a little disappointed with the award. Do I really want to be remembered when I leave this job as the girl that asks all those questions? I'd rather be remembered as someone who was caring, positive, encouraging, etc. But if I'm really honest, I haven't put my all into this job. I've done an adequate and at times very good job with it, but it's not where my heart is. For many of my coworkers, this job represents the beginning of their career in student affairs, but for me, it's a means to a different end. I've got some great coworkers and believe that I work well with everyone, but I've felt like an outsider at times. Which is ok. I lived here for three years before starting this job, so I already had my life, my academic program, my community. This job has never defined me, nor should I let one award define me.

Thinking about it further though, this award does reflect one of my greatest strengths - communication. I'm constantly using verbal and written communication to be understood and to understand. And in this job, part of that is asking a lot of questions to make sure that, and others, understand. It's also something I tell the RAs I supervise to do - "If you're not sure, just ask! It's better to ask about something you think you should already know than do something that you're not sure about." I value questions in my job, in my relationships, in academics, in my spiritual life, because maybe questions don't always lead to clear answers, but they can lead to better understanding.

After our meeting, I thanked my coworker who made my award. He thanked me and said, "Thank you! You've shown me that it's ok to ask questions." Which I guess is a good thing. In a meeting room of 30 plus people, including our supervisors, asking a question could be intimidating for someone who's more shy than I am. But I'm not shy - I love to talk, ask questions, of anyone, anywhere. Being the voice of inquiry for a team is a good thing.

Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness

I've been thinking some about how my being an American has shaped me, my values, my beliefs, my expectations for how life should be, how I create meaning in life, etc, and how this is so different from someone who is Ecuadorian, Turkish, Iranian, or Bangladeshi. As Christians, I think that we like to believe that our beliefs and worldview match a Christian worldview, that our beliefs and how we see the world is entirely shaped through Christ and the Bible. I think that our cultural worldviews often shape our view of Christianity more than the vice versa.

In the US, we live our lives pursuing happiness. And I think sometimes it makes us miserable. It's in our constitution, that everyone has the right to pursue happiness, and I think reflects a cultural mandate that our chief purpose is to be happy. That if we're not happy, if we suffer, if we feel depressed, then something is wrong with us or the world and it needs to be changed. We make most of our decisions by asking, "Will this make me and others happy?" "Will marrying this person make me happy?" "Will this career make me happy?" "Will living in this city make me happy?" "Will doing this hobby make me happy?" And that mindset certainly affects how we approach Christianity - "Will believing this make me happy?" "Will Christ bring me happiness and fulfillment and a good life if I follow Him?" Many Christians continue to try to squeeze happiness out of the gospel as if that were its main purpose, and others walk away when they're not happy.

And I see this as very cultural because some cultures don't pursue happiness like we do. Some individuals don't expect to be happy all the time, if at all. My friend was telling me about a line from the movie Beyond Rangoon (which I haven't seen), where the lead character (an American woman) is talking with a Burmese political official who tells her basically, "In Burma, we expect suffering. We're not shocked by it. We don't expect happiness." Some cultures are better at accepting suffering. My Iranian friend said that this is true of her culture and many other cultures. She said that this is reflected in media, in movies particularly. In the US, most movies have a happy ending. Not all, but a lot of them do. We want to see happy endings because we expect that for ourselves. But in other countries, movies are more tragic. They end with death and mourning and wailing, because that reflect their expectation from life. In the US, we are shocked by suffering and tragedy. We protest and cry out, "Why do bad things happen to good people?"

I'm not saying that we should just lay down and accept suffering and not try to end it. We should be seeking to end injustice and cure cancer and AIDS. There is much needless suffering in the world, and we shouldn't just shrug our shoulders and be indifferent. But perhaps we should be more accepting of our own personal suffering. Perhaps I should be more accepting of personal suffering. By disposition, I'm a pretty optimistic person. I like being happy and I can easily find positives in many situations. When I'm unhappy, I just want to be happy again as soon as possible. I've found myself frequently unhappy this week, often without being able to do anything to change the circumstances that contributed to my unhappiness. I found that the times when I just accepted my unhappiness, when I just acknowledge, "Ok, I'm unhappy right now, and this sucks, and I want to be happy, but I'm never promised happiness, so I can be unhappy right now," were my most peaceful moments this past week.

And does this reflect the kind of outlook I should have as a Christian? Looking at the early church in the New Testament, the church seemed to expect suffering, but there was also much joy. Joy in fellowship with other believers, in pursuing a new way, in enjoying the blessing of the Spirit and salvation. But that joy went alongside the suffering of Christ, the suffering of following a narrow way.

Nothing I'm saying is new or revolutionary. This is all influenced by psychological theories I've read or studied, conversations I've had, or sermons I've heard preached. I'm just trying to examine myself more in light of these thoughts, trying to understand my cultural expectations for what my life should be like, and hold those in light of what could be more true.

Reviewing 2010

A year ago, I posted about things I'd like to do in 2010. Not resolutions, just things I thought would be great to do in 2010. Let's see how I fared last year . . .

• Be more active - take yoga classes, ride my bike more, and swing dance again. – Yup, I was more active in 2010 than I had been in previous years! I took a couple of yoga classes, but didn’t stick with them, but I did bike pretty regularly during the summer, took swing dancing lessons, and consistently went swing or salsa dancing once or twice a month.
• Grow an herb garden that stays alive. – Fail. I attempted to grow herbs twice and they died both times. Then my RA thought I liked plants and gave me an orchid that also died within a month.
  
• Start an investment fund. – Uhh, this still needs to happen.
• Propose my dissertation. – Yes! I totally did this and it was a great accomplishment!
• Get a new job. – Yup.
• Find a new roommate. (One of mine is graduating, I love both my roommates!) – Well, my new job includes a one bedroom apartment, so finding a roommate wasn’t necessary.
• Clean the catbox more often. Maybe I started doing this, but my cat continued to pee on the carpet, so this is probably a fail.
• Have less boy drama. (I probably say that every year, which is why these are just things to do, not resolutions). – Hmm, depends on the definition of “drama.” If by drama, I meant not get super emotionally involved and heartbroken by some dude who’s just going to dump me, then I guess I kinda did this.
• Bake bread every now and then. – I made banana bread once over the summer. Does that count? It had peanut butter and chocolate chips and was really yummy!
• Apply for internship OR decide what to do and where to live in 2011. – Yes! I applied for internship, and had 11 interviews J
• Buy a used roadbike and ride a marathon/race on it. – Got my Trek 2300, courtesy of Craigslist, but still haven’t ridden that marathon yet.
• Read more non-fiction, non-academic books than I did in 2009. – I at least started more non-fiction books than usual, so I’ll consider that a success.
• Complete the Celebration of Discipline by Foster with my church small group, and start to practice more of those disciplines. (I'm sure there some fodder for some good Lenten practices in there) – We read this book through April or May, but I never finished it. I fasted a couple of times and confessed my sins more often, so this was semi-successful.
• Take a daily photo. (check out my facebook account for the link to my flickr account, or comment and I'll email you the link) – I did this through March or April before I lost interest.

So, this is about a 57% success rate, which I'm actually pretty proud of. It seems like so often I have ideas of things I want to do or try, and then laziness or busyness with other priorities kicks in, and I don't do those things. Or I start them and don't finish them. So having set out these goals for last year and accomplishing over half of them does feel like quite an accomplishment for me. I made major career accomplishments (finding a new job, applying for internship, proposing my dissertation). I made lifestyle changes (starting to dance again more regularly, buying a bike, at least starting more books). It seems like every semester I resolve to be more physically active, but this was the year when I finally took steps in that direction by pursuing activities that I actually enjoy. I attempted some things (growing herbs, taking daily photos) that I didn't stick with throughout the year, but were still rewarding activities while I was doing them. I'm proud of myself for taking daily photos for at least a few months, because it was a new creative venture for me. I also challenged myself to write more on this blog, and I'm proud of that too.

What about you? What did you do last year that you were proud of?

whole

There's a me who's kinda crazy and fun. Who wants to be spontaneous, who wants to do things because they're exciting and out of the ordinary. The me who wants to be sexy and a little wild. The fiery redhead. The party me who wants to make my own decisions as an individual and who doesn't want to be told what to do.

Then there's a me who is grounded, and wants to make wise decisions. Who wants to surrender, who wants to be giving and sacrificial. The me who wants to submit to my community and seek God's direction through them. The planner. The me who wants to do the "right" thing.

Then there's God who loves me. Who accepts me. Completely. Who created me and loves every part of me. And yes, He also wants to change me, but not in a way that I'm not me anymore.

And I recently recognized that unconsciously, I've believed that God didn't love that "party" side of me. That He didn't value my spontaneity as much as my sacrifice. And I've felt guilt over that part of me, that it was wrong or sinful and needed to be changed or needed to go away. And I'm coming to see the error of that way of thinking. There is much that is good about my "party" self and much that would be good about receiving God's love for all of me and for loving myself completely. I think that it will bring great freedom for me and freedom for me to love others more fully.

At times, I've found myself divided. Different people, different cultures, different circumstances bring out different sides of me. I feel like a chameleon at times, not that I've been acting fake or untrue to myself, but that I only show certain parts of myself at certain times and with certain people.

So I want my selves to be integrated. I want to love myself for all that I am and all that I'm not, I want to love myself in the way that God loves me, I want to remember and really recognize that He loves every part of me that He created, not just the parts that fit more closely with the religious culture around me.

Dressing my best - Tuesday, May 11th - Legs! Fair skin!

I have a love/hate relationship with my legs, but this week has encouraged me to try to show more love to my legs. Sadly, I have spent much of my life feeling ashamed of the perpetual paleness of my legs, often feeling uncomfortable wearing shorts or skirts the showed too much skin, exposing the blinding whiteness of my legs. From my friends, I alternately receive comments that I shouldn't be so shy about showing off my legs or comments that my legs are so pale, and "Gosh, can you even tan?" making my pale legs a great source of embarrassment.

When I first saw this picture from Tuesday, I was embarrassed at how pale my legs look compared to my olive-skinned, Italian-descended friend. However, thinking about it more, we're both gorgeous women, we just have different looks and body types and skin tones.

It's time for an attitude change. Though not radiantly tan, I have great legs. My legs are long, lean, and muscular enough. My legs are beautiful, functional, strong, and sexy! And I'm also coming to appreciate the alabaster shade of my skin. I often observe pale beauties, such as this model from www.modcloth.com with envy that they can look so strikingly beautiful with their paleness.

I've decided to stop envying these models, and enjoy the fact that I can also look strikingly gorgeous as a pale-skinned, red-haired, blue-eyed, thin woman! A big reason why I can pull of the henna-dyed red hair is because of my fair complexion, so I'm thankful that I have a look that is so versatile. I think that redheads are absolutely gorgeous, anytime a redheaded man or woman walks by, I'm always checking them out. It's been exciting for me to embrace the look in the past several months. So, I decided this week to show off my great legs, with this dress from H&M -


Trying to show off my dress at the bar where I sang "Bohemian Rhapsody" at karaoke night with a few friends -

A pretty "leggy" shot from this angle -

Lovin' on my ivory legs -

So, I'm thankful for this exercise to love my body for all that it is. I hope that in the future that I will feel less shame about my fair skin when I'm surrounded by tan friends, but instead feel thankful and blessed that I have a such a unique, beautiful look. I hope that my friends reading this post can also be challenged to love the parts of themselves that they may not always see as beautiful.

other people's love stories

I often feel like I just keep playing a weird part in other people's love stories, over, and over again. I'm that girl the hero thinks he's in love with, and then he meets someone else, or he realizes he's still in love with that other girl he thought he wasn't in love with anymore. Or I'm the quirky friend urging the heroine to follow her heart or stay careful or chase her dreams. Except in this rom-com, the quirky female friend doesn't fall in love with the awkward male friend. Not yet at least.

And likely someday I'll have a love story of my own, where I get to play the heroine and I get to share romantic adventures with the hero. And those who's parts I've played in their love stories? They will be the strange characters in my love story, the boys who didn't love me enough or who lost my love, the boys I fell for but who weren't meant to stick around. They will be Sally's Joe, or Prince Humperdink (ha!) or Kathleen Kelly's Frank Navasky. Some of them will be Franks, the dutiful boys who would have stayed with me had I not let them go, but more of them are Joe's.

But for now I'll be Parker Posey or Judy Greer or (worse) James Marsden before 27 Dresses.

This is the story of the boys who loved you
Who love you now and loved you then
And some were sweet, some were cold and snuffed you
And some just laid around in bed.

Some had crumbled you straight to your knees
Did it cruel, did it tenderly
Some had crawled their way into your heart
To rend your ventricles apart
This is the story of the boys who loved you
This is the story of your red right ankle.

But wait, why does my story have to revolve around love and romance and relationships? Who said that the only story worth telling is about a man and a woman falling in love? Ok, everyone says that, it's all over our culture, everywhere you turn around. But do I have to buy that, hook, line, and sinker? Why should I write my story around someone else? What kind of a frail human actually holds that kind of power in my life, that I would want to write my story around him? Why should I believe that my biggest desire, my greatest source of fulfillment is in falling in love?

The first few paragraphs of this blog are sadly easier for me to feel and believe at times, but despite all the confusion I feel, I really do believe that the above paragraph is more true. That I have a life to live, and purpose to pursue and it's happening NOW, whether I'm single, engaged, married, a mother, a daughter, a student, a psychologist, a sister, whoever I am, I am me and I have so much to give and offer to those around me. I'm just as much me now as I would be me if I were married or with a Ph.D. in my hand. Why do we keep believing that single people are just married people who haven't found their "better half" yet? Why do I swallow these lies again and again?

Sometimes, I'm freed from those lies. I spent most of this semester remarkably happy to be single, loving my life and my relationships, and not even really desiring to be in a relationship, because having a dude around would just mess up all the good things I've got going on, and he's got to be really worth it for me to mess my life up for him. I wish I felt that happy and content this consistently now, but lately it still comes in moments and waves. It comes in moments when I'm surrounded by my family that loves me, when they wrap themselves around me with love and support. And it comes in quiet moments, when I sit on my bed and type and contemplate these things and when I stretch back onto my pillow and pray and remember that I have all that I need, that my Father doesn't withhold any good gifts from me, and that this is good. That it's good to be me, a student, a counselor, a friend, a sister, and I don't need to be anyone else right now. It's good. And those boys that loved me or who didn't love me? Well, it's good for them to be themselves, they're not some pawns in mine or anyone else's story, they're valuable humans created by God, just as I am. If I'm just a character in someone else's story, it's not a silly human fable, it's a divine story, a sacred story.

Besides, Parker Freakin' Posey is pretty freakin' fabulous.

Dressing my best!

I'm participating in Dress Your Best Week with with Academichic. Stayed tuned as I add fashion posts about how I'm dressing my best to highlight the aspects of my body that I love the best - my eyes, hair, legs, butt, and feet!

Things to do in 2010

I dislike the term "resolution" because it invokes a sense of dreadful pressure, that I have "resolved" myself to do something, to carry out some new task or habit, which if I don't live up to it, I will feel defeated, guilty, and discouraged. True, we should feel sorrow when we disregard our word, break promises, and fall through on commitments, but this western tradition of New Year's resolutions seems to bring more negative emotions than necessary. To avoid unnecessary shame and defeat, this is not a list of resolutions. I am not resolving to doing any of these things in the year 2010. Instead, this is a list of things that I would like to do in the coming year. Hopefully in 2011 I will look back at this post and rejoice that I did most of these things. Also, these are just a list of activities I'd like to do, not any goals about my character or inner person. For more on that, please refer to my previous post, which relates to how I would like to be a better lover in the coming year.

• Be more active - take yoga classes, ride my bike more, and swing dance again.
• Grow an herb garden that stays alive.
• Start an investment fund.
• Propose my dissertation.
• Get a new job.
• Find a new roommate. (One of mine is graduating, I love both my roommates!)
• Clean the catbox more often.
• Have less boy drama. (I probably say that every year, which is why these are just things to do, not resolutions)
• Bake bread every now and then.
• Apply for internship OR decide what to do and where to live in 2011.
• Buy a used roadbike and ride a marathon/race on it.
• Read more non-fiction, non-academic books than I did in 2009.
• Complete the Celebration of Discipline by Foster with my church small group, and start to practice more of those disciplines. (I'm sure there some fodder for some good Lenten practices in there)
• Take a daily photo. (check out my facebook account for the link to my flickr account, or comment and I'll email you the link)

Yup, those sound pretty good for now.

If I were a British school girl living in a cartoon universe . . .

. . . I might look like this -
Courtesy of Tom Siddell, writer and artist of Gunnerkrigg Court, a webcomic that I enjoy. He offered to create personal drawings for a small fee to make some money off of the comic. I'm happy to support his work, and am delighted with his rendition of me as a Gunnerkrigg Court student! The comic itself is a beautifully drawn and intriguing tale that still manages to bring laughs and delights despite its often dark mood. Its basic premise reminds me somewhat of Harry Potter, with a young girl who joins a mysterious boarding school after her mother dies, except that there's no Voldemort and no Dumbledore, which is key. Gunnerkrigg Court offers no simplistic distinction between good and evil, and it's often unclear who of the characters to trust. The plot centers around stoic Annie's (short for Antimony) adventures in the school itself and the equally mysterious forest outside, uncovering clues about the school, the forest, the inhabitants of both, and her family. Elements of mythology and alchemy symbols are woven throughout the chapters, and themes of manmade science vs. natural magic are emphasized. If you're going to read it, I recommend starting from the beginning. When I was first introduced to this comic a year ago, I tried to read the most recent ones, and was pretty lost until I read all the way through.

I'm such a fangirl, and I've just outted myself if you didn't already know that about me.

word vomit AKA 3 posts condensed into one

Self-compassion. It's the idea of realistically loving oneself. Not just self-esteem which could turn arrogant by only focusing on the good, but being humble enough to recognize one's faults and mistakes and forgive oneself, not punishing oneself, but caring for the self. Not self-indulgence, but self-care. I see so many ways that when I'm stressed or lonely or sad I become self-indulgent, eating ice cream, watching television, drinking lots of coffee, drinking alcohol, staying up late on the internet, many of those deliberate behaviors because, "I deserve this." When really, the most caring thing to do for myself would be to go to bed, eat healthier, exercise, and engage in activities that truly refresh my body and spirit, like prayer, journaling, reading. But often I choose indulgence because my flesh craves it, and these things seem to promise satisfaction, but they are empty and only occupy me for moments, and leave me still wanting. But where is the line between treating myself and enjoying life's simple pleasures and acting self-indulgently? Maybe it's the motivation. If I'm filling my body and mind with something because I think it will help me to escape sadness, stress, or loneliness, then it's probably self-indulgent. If I'm doing something because it's loving and caring toward myself, because it truly feeds my soul and refreshes me, then it's probably self-care. God, grant me discernment. My friend recently said that often how we treat others is how we treat ourselves. I want these two things to be congruent. I don't want to treat myself better than I treat others or to treat others better than I treat myself. I want to forgive others and self, and I want to feed and water and care for others and self.

An agent of change. Or maybe a conduit of change, a vessel through which real and transformation can occur. As a counselor, I want to be this. I'm great at being empathic, at providing a warm, safe place for others to share their pains and thoughts and feelings and feel understood and not judged. This is a great quality about me, and that's the first step. But I want to move from that, I don't want to be indulgent of my clients and those around me either, I want to help move them toward change. Which I don't really effectively know how to do. When I do see change in others, it seems random, and motivated by outside forces. I don't know. And it's frustrating too when so many people, myself included, don't really want change, but just want to feel better. I say that I want to change certain things about myself, my life, and my relationships, but often, the familiar is comfortable. Even if it's stressful and sad and disconnected and unsatisfying, changing it would be icky and messy and maybe this little pit will get a little more warm if I lay here a bit longer, maybe not, but the climb up is strenuous, why don't you make the climb first and throw down a rope and pull me up? I do feel myself growing and changing, but I also feel myself resisting the growth. What am I resisting? What am I avoiding? Responsibility? Accountability? Awareness that yes, I really am a dirty, ugly sinner?

Who reads this blog? When I started this over two years ago, I had this plan to stay anonymous. I'll be crackers and cheese instead of my name, and I'll post cryptic poetry that no one will ever know what events and what people in my life inspired the poems. But the anonymity quickly faded, and my posts became more personal, more real, more genuine. And I made friends through this blog, Martha, Ben, Anton, I'm so glad that this blog brought you into my life. I am thankful for you. And it's allowed me to keep up with old friends, Cara, Britt, and Laura especially. I love you deeply. And there are other friends, and I enjoy you too. But it's still stayed a tight, somewhat exclusive circle. I still don't use my name. I don't have a link on facebook. Until about a month ago, if you're reading this, it's because you have a blog too, and we're somehow connected in that way. Recently, my friend from high school, Emily, started a blog to chronicle her year in Bangladesh, and she started reading my blog. Since then, a couple of other dear, close friends who don't have blogs have discovered my blog and started reading. I never was deliberately hiding this from you, it just seemed so separate, this blog life, different from the life that I share with you. But it's the same in a way, so it seems natural and good and right that you are reading this now and that this blog circle is opening up more.

But I somewhat like having this blog stay somewhat exclusive. It gives me a freedom to write in honest, real ways that I might not if I knew that anybody who knew me on facebook would find this blog. But I do wonder . . . many of my church members, including pastors, have blogs. Occasionally I browse them, and recently found that a couple of neat girls who I really like also have blogs, so I added them to my google reader. But I'm scared to comment on their blogs, to open the floodgates for my brothers and sisters from church to read this blog. Somewhat, I'm afraid of what they may think when they read these words. Which is silly, because with this church family, for the first time I've really embraced openness and honesty and light and rejected darkness and secrecy and fakery (it's a real word, even if google doesn't recognize it). This church knows me more intimately than any church ever has, and I rejoice in that. When someone asks, "How have you been?" I answer completely honestly. If it's been crappy, I tell them that, and if I say, "It's been really good." or "I've been doing well, lately," oh believe me, I mean it, and let's rejoice and celebrate that together. But that kind of intimacy is still kind of frightening, and it's tempting to hide a little now and then or to worry that I'm sharing too much.

But mainly, I'm afraid to expand my blog community to include my church community because I compare myself to their blogselves. So many of their blog posts focus on spiritual topics that it seems like they write about godly things all the time, so they must be thinking about God more than I am. And I write about roach spray and weddings and weird dates and cultural identity and applications and movies and bars and music. Things that seem so worldly, so not-glorifying to God. I'm afraid that if you compare our blogs, I won't look like a good Jesus-follower. I somewhat take pride in being a good Jesus-follower, because if I wasn't, I'd be a bad friend, a bad daughter, a bad sister, a bad girlfriend, not worthy to give advice and counsel, not worthy to be a wife. Gosh, these have got to be lies, but they feel so true sometimes. That's probably my biggest fear, that if you read this blog, my final mask would be torn down, and you would see me as someone who isn't completely devoted to God, at least, not in the way that you seem to be. As I write this, I know this is a lie, that none of us are worthy, all of us stray, but it's easy to think that I stray further than you do, that you are closer to the Father than me, that you love Him more or better. And I know that God is in these writings about weddings and dates and bars and applications, because God is big and complex and I shouldn't limit his involvement in only things that traditionally seem godly.

As I write out these honest fears, I feel close to making the leap to include you, my church, in this blog life of mine. And I feel like I can do that without changing the content of my blog, while still writing what I want to write. So, if I do take that step and you are reading this, know that I love you, you are welcome here, you are welcome into my life.

green, living, and growing

It must be genetic. Like my cousin, my thumbs aren't green either. My roommate is gone for the summer, and at the very last minute she asked, "Hey, can you water my ivy? It just needs it every two weeks." This seemed like a really simple request, I mean, of course your roommate is responsible enough to water one plant every two weeks, right? Poor little ivy went an entire month without water. I noticed this about a week ago. This little guy by the sink was looking very droopy and brown, and I realized that it had been at least a month. How ironic, it sits right by the sink, all day long, watching me rinse my dishes, fill up my Brita pitcher, etc, but never receiving any of this overly abundant water to quench its own thirst. I think it's starting to recover. A few of the leaves on the ends of it look green, which might be new growth, who knows. Ivies are supposed to be hardy little plants, so I think it'll make it.

I think I'm starting to recover too, and I feel like there are parts of me that are becoming more green and coming back to life again. I finally feel like I can breath easy and receive water for my thirst. This past week has been good for me. This weekend is good too. At least for the present, I'm letting go of worrying about making friends, finding things to do, running around, trying to outrun my loneliness. You can't outrun loneliness, by the way. Or at least I can't. I'm not that fast of a runner. And the running just gets exhausting. So for the time being, I've stopped. And you know what? When you stop running from loneliness, sometimes it stops chasing you. Instead of trying to find people to spend my Friday and Saturday evenings with this weekend, only to be disappointed when someone's busy or when my ex shows up, I'm resting. I'm working on my papers due next week, hanging out at coffee shops, watching X-Files, making rice krispie treats, journaling, reading, relaxing, and praying.

I'm praying that I'll understand God's love for me more, that I'll see myself as he sees me, that I'll see him as I should, that I'll start trusting him again, that I'll let go of my fears, and really have faith that he will take care of me and give me all that I need. I don't think this will all happen in one weekend, but I'm trying to get to a place where I can rest my confidence in God, and love myself as he loves me, and not seek constantly seek approval from others, and be ok with being alone, and still need others, but not needing others. I think when I'm in this state, a lot of these worries will become insignificant, and I'll be open to receiving from God and others, and eventually able to freely give. I've been giving, or at least going through the motions, but at the heart of my giving is loneliness and feelings of being unneeded, and through giving, I've been hoping to be filled with something else, whether it's just filling up my time or giving me a sense of being needed for a few hours.

I feel good about this. I don't feel lonely. I don't feel unloved. I don't feel rejected. I feel at peace. Not overly happy, not excited, not thrilled, just peaceful.

About a month ago, I noticed that at the bottom of my blog I had this quote from a Rich Mullins song: "I am home anywhere, if you are where I am." I want this to be true, and today, I'm starting to believe it.

a room of one's own

The title of Virginia Woolf's famous essay, which according to Wikipedia means "any author's need for poetic license and the personal liberty to create art." For me, it means personal liberty, having a space (concretely or abstractly) that is truly one's own and no one else's.

I'm trying to find that here in College Station. Motivated by loneliness and a need for connection, I've spent a lot of energy pursuing community and relationships with others. I'm still pursuing these things, but lately, I've had an urge for personal freedom, and for creating my own world here. There's something really freeing about doing something purely because I want to, not because someone invited me, not because I was asked to do it, not because I'm hoping to impress someone, but simply because I chose to do it. I'm such a social creature that I don't have a lot of these things. When I describe how I spend my time, it all revolves around people. Sure, I have hobbies and interests in music, movies, theatre, art, traveling, but most of how I choose to spend my time revolves around other people. It's not a bad thing and I don't resent that. I love people, so I'll take any excuse to be around people I enjoy!

Every Saturday at 5, at a park in a low SES section of Bryan, there's a group of students who host a potluck for the people in that community, some of whom are homeless, and most of whom are in poverty. Since I heard about it back in January, I'd been wanting to go, and about a month ago, I attended it with my church small group. I went to it again, without my small group, this past Saturday. No one invited me, no one was expecting me, I just wanted to go. I had decided to go early on in the week, but when the actual day arrived, I was tempted to skip. I had slept in, and hadn't started on my paper due Monday, but I'd already bought groceries to cook. The idea popped into my head that maybe I should cook the food and deliver it to someone's house who I know is going, but stay home and work on my paper. But I couldn't do that. I had other motivations for going, to connect with people who are different from me, to serve, to build God's kingdom, to be loving and giving. But my tenacity in going really came down to the fact that this was the only thing all week, or all week perhaps, that I had purely chosen to participate in. Everything else I did this last weekend was because a professor had asked me to do it or a friend had invited me to do it. Sure, I still had a choice in those matters, but going to this potluck with the one thing that I had made up my mind to do by myself, without being asked. And there was no way I could give up that kind of freedom and empowerment!

So, with school being less demanding, and me being single and not tightly connected to group of friends, I definitely have the freedom to pursue things that I enjoy and that are important to me. Looking back on my time with Andrew, I realized that pretty much the entire time we were together, almost everything we did were things that he wanted to do. This wasn't a bad thing, this wasn't any weakness of mine, or me conforming and changing myself to a guy. It was simply the circumstances - Andrew had a set group of friends, and I didn't. He's lived here longer and knows the things he likes to do, and I'm new here and haven't quite figured out what I like to do around here. Like I said, it wasn't bad, I don't regret that aspect of our relationship, but when I date, I'm used to having a life other than the guy. I'm used to and prefer bringing him into my life while he brings me into his, instead of just me joining his life because I don't yet have a life of my own. Maybe I'm exaggerating a little. It probably wasn't that way 100% of the time, but it definitely was the majority of the time and that definitely was the trend that I see.

So, here's to freedom and finding my own life in Bryan/College Station! Here's to having a room of my own! When I'm not working, studying, writing, seeing clients, running errands, or doing household chores, there's lots that I want to be doing. I want to be asking people to meals, having friends over, hosting sleepovers, swimming in my friends' pool, inviting friends to movies and concerts, cooking for homeless people, cooking for myself, biking, drinking wine, drawing mandalas, going to yoga classes, going to prayer meetings, reading for fun, and whatever else comes to mind! And then maybe, the next dating experience I have, I can say, "Hmm, Saturday night. Well, I've got this potluck that I'll be going to from about 5-7. We could hang out afterwards, or you're welcome to join me." I'd be cool with that.

my first experience with age regression

I had a conversation with my eight year old self yesterday. She (I?) spoke to me from where she was sitting by the bushes in the backyard and told me I was beautiful, which surprised me and made me blush. Then she (I?) told me, "You're not a kid like me. You can do more than I can do. You can do a lot." There was a tone of admiration and wonder in her (my) voice, mixed with a little bit of impatience. She didn't ask me for anything, but I gave her a hug, because we both could use a little love.

Neither of us said another word, until I walked toward the gate, and before it closed behind me, turned around to say, "Thank you."

What did I learn from this experience? That I'm still afraid of being inadequate, but I'm not a child. I can do more than I once could, more than I realize.

you were happy

"I don't know if this will make you feel better, but you were in my dream last night and you were happy."

Thanks for putting up with the emo-ness of my previous blog. It's been a rough week, but things are getting better. Physically and emotionally I'm feeling better and I'm starting to gain more peace about what has happened. It still hurts, but I feel hopeful. I really do believe that this was from God and the right thing for both of us, and I truly believe that God has good things in store for me. Very good things. Thank you so much for the kind words and prayers, and if those could continue, then that would be awesome. Ya'll are truly wonderful - just knowing that I have friends who care about me and support me helps tremendously.

I know that a time when come soon when I will be free from hurt and loneliness and confusion. There will soon be a time when I feel completely content and satisfied and know that I'm not lacking anything. Even if that time only exists in others dreams and precious moments of peace and clarity in the present, I will soon look in the mirror, smile, and say, "I am happy."

"You were in my dream last night and you were happy."

belonging

Happy April Fool's Day! March has past, and I only wrote one blog entry that entire month. I guess spring break was pretty busy, and then things have stayed busy since I've been back at school. I'd like to write about what's been on my mind a lot, the ministry my church is starting with women at a strip club, me looking to buy a house and all of the uncertainty and excitement that goes along with that, my romantic relationship and how that's going, and all the things that my pastor is preaching about dating and what I'm learning through all of this.

But the truth is, I could probably start a post about one of those topics, and wouldn't finish it today. Maybe I'd finish it tomorrow, or maybe it would sit as a draft for weeks and those weeks would turn into months and suddenly it wouldn't seem relevant to post at all. Looking today, I have 6 posts drafts just from the past 4 months. 6 posts that were started, never completed, and all but abandoned. Maybe instead of starting something entirely new, I should resurrect these posts from the past few months. I've chosen the most complete one to breath some life into. It was written January 25th, 2008. This was just a couple of weeks into this spring semester. Here it is:



Belonging

A couple of days ago, I wanted to write about how I was feeling more at home here, and how good that's been. But since then, I've found some more loneliness creeping in. I'll give writing about good things a shot, and maybe I can recapture how I felt two days ago.

When I came to TCU as a freshmen, I dove in headfirst, meeting people, getting involved in organizations, even serving as a welcome-type person for one organization! In some ways I was your typical college freshmen, eager to do anything and everything. In other ways, I was atypical. I was confident in my eagerness, confident that I belonged here and would feel at home, confident that I could hang out with seniors and be accepted. I think because of this confidence, I was frequently mistaken for an upperclassman. I don't really remember feeling insecure that first semester. Another freshmen that year (who is know one of my closest friends) later told me that she was intimidated by me when we first met. "Wow," she thought, "This girl already knows so many people and has so many friends, why would she ever want to be my friend?" Fortunately, her assumption was wrong. Sometime halfway through that semester I realized that despite all the activities I was involved in, despite all of the people I had to hang out with, I didn't have a close friend. Realizing that I was missing this and that the seniors I had been hanging out with would soon be graduating, I started praying for a close friend that I could spend college with. God soon answered that prayer, and that girl who had first been intimidated by me became the friend that I can't imagine spending college without. My second year, I developed close friendships with other young women who I still try to remain close to.

In addition to these close friendships, I also valued all of my other friends and acquaintances at TCU. I've never been one to put myself in a bubble, and I knew lots of people on that small campus, and lots of people knew me. Walking from my dorm to class, I'd probably say "Hi" to at least 5 or 6 people I passed that I knew. One friend walking with me one day was really surprised by this, "Dang!" he exclaimed, "You know everybody here!" For my first three years especially, I loved this atmosphere. I felt right at home and felt a deep sense of belonging to this campus. Perhaps I'm idealizing this time, because I do remember individuals and groups of people that I wanted to feel more at home with, and that I wanted to get to know better, but never did. I did experience rejection during that time, and it hurt, but I always I had friends to fall back on and I never felt like I didn't belong.

When I first arrived at this new campus, with over 45,000 students, I doubted that I ever feel that same sense of belonging. The first few weeks were very strange, walking to work and class from my parking lot and only being met by strange faces. Finally, I'd arrive at work and be greeted by a familiar face. I would often think that I saw someone from TCU. Not close friends, just once of those acquaintances that I always enjoyed saying "Hello," to. On this campus, strangers often say, "Howdy," to one another when they make eye contact. At first I timidly responded if I responded at all, but now I respond with a smile and an enthusiastic, "Howdy!" or "Hello!" It's not the same as seeing a familiar friend, but just making a brief connection with another human is satisfying.



That was January 25th, this is April 1st. I was beginning to feel hopeful, beginning to feel like I could connect with others in this new place, beginning to feel at home. At that point, my friends from church, Travis and Amanda, and just started to invite me to hang out with them more, something they hadn't done at all last semester. I was beginning to feel more included, and meeting more people through my church. January 25th was the night of Travis' birthday party, when I first connected with Andrew, and saw a lot of life in him and wanted to get to know him better. Since that time, we've started dating, I've hung out a lot more with church friends and made lots of friends, mostly through Andrew, but I've also deepened relationships with people in my small group, gotten involved in a ministries that have led to more connection with women in my church, and have gotten to know more 2nd and 3rd years in my program better. Overall, I feel much more myself, much more comfortable, and feel like I belong both in my program and in my church. Even on campus, I see more familiar faces. Last week, there was one day when I saw three people I knew. Three people! This was huge, because usually it was exciting if I saw one person on campus that I knew. And to see three people, at different times, wow!

I'm feeling more at home here, and this is a really good thing. Still though, I spent a lot of Christmas break praying for a good Christian girl friend here. And, surprise! I got Andrew, which is great and wonderful and every day I'm thankful for what we have, but where's that girl friend I was praying for? I've met lots of girls through church, and couple of them I felt like I could really connect with, and maybe something more will happen with one of those friendships. It really does take time. I guess I could be more proactive, ask some of these girls to hang out instead of just waiting to see them at church events. I'm pretty proactive with spending time with families in my small group. Why is it easier to invite myself over to a family's house for dinner than to invite a girl to coffee or lunch? Maybe I'm used to friendships happening more naturally. Maybe I'm slightly prideful and want them to be asking me to do things. Maybe I'm complacent and stay busy and forget that I could use another person in my life. Part of me wonders if I need to a find a good close girlfriend here. I have Andrew, though I've never been one to substitute a boyfriend for friends. I do have lots of friends to hang out with, I'm never bored on the weekends, I have adults that I can turn to for good advice, and I keep in touch with a few of my close girl friends from back home and still turn to them and they rely on me too. Some of these close friends are going to come visit me over the summer, which will be awesome. Who knows. Maybe in three months I'll look back on this post and write a post that begins something like this:

"That was April 1st, this is July 1st. Back then, I felt like I was missing having a good girl friend, now I feel . . . "