Leaning

Sweet conversation.

Sitting upon what my friend has dubbed the "vomit couch" yesterday, I did just that. I churned out my thoughts and fears and frustrations and processed through it. Not all the way, but for the first time in awhile I spewed to someone who wasn't my family. It was like a breath of fresh air.

I just cannot shake the thoughts I've been having about grace moments and curse moments. What do I number as grace and what do I number as curse, and what moments do I just let pass me by? Overlooked. Cheapened. Unvalued. I've said it before. I am trying to number because I'm trying to look. To let my days carry their own weight.

Sometimes I look ahead to the next year and a half of college and I think, "how can I make it through?" Not that college is a miserable thing, at all. But I'm antsy. I long to be somewhere where I fit better, where I feel known more. And it's overwhelming to look ahead and see abyss. So I count. I start trying to look at the value in the today. To find grace in it all because I have to. Because if today isn't able to transfigure, then when will it? I've made it to nine. Because most days I forget to look. And I think the not numbering has been just as weighty as the numbering because it shows me how often I just move on, how I forget with ease.

An encompassing word I would use to describe the past few years of my life is redefinition. In other words transfiguring. God has been taking the "Christianity" I forged in high school, and making me lean into it and find beauty. It's been a long process. Time-consuming. Heart-consuming. Some days utterly exhausting, and some days completely exhilarating. And I know very well I am just in the midst of it all. I know this because I see my selfishness. I see how compelled I am to look at myself, what I need, want, value, hate, and to define "good" by that. Maybe leaning into the ugly of my life looks like leaning into the frustrating places and ask to see the beautiful. It means I have to lean hard into Him. And I worry that won't be enough, that I will still be dissatisfied.

Can you had a single hour to your life by worrying? (Matt. 6:27) Does worry ever add anything? Sitting on the vomit couch I asked that. I looked at what I have been fretting over. And all I saw was the worry had taken from me. It had taken life, experiences, and sight. By letting my fear consume me I have willingly blinded myself from counting, and therefore seeing things accurately. It hasn't added anything to me. Insecurity has done nothing but take from me. But realizing that won't stop tightening of my stomach and the whispers in my head.

I have to ask the questions. To look. To lean hard into the fear. And I don't know quite how to do that. Sitting with Friend yesterday was a step into that. I verbalized it out. All of it. The fear, the excuse, the realization. And I saw. Seeing allowed me to ask. It's convinced me of a place I need lean hard into to find grace. To find accurate vision.

Maybe none of this makes sense to anyone else. I never thought I would be so impacted by just the thought of counting graces. But I am. And that in and of itself is a grace.

#10. Vomit couch

Paying Attention

One of the reasons I love blogging is that it allows us to put ourselves out there. Jaded, confused, angry, aching, ecstatic, needing, full....all of it can just go somewhere for others to see. And not just see, but somehow be invited into with perimeters. Blogging allows people to see our processes, and lets us unpack our journeys if we so choose to do so. I think there is something divine about that. 

A mother of 6 posted this morning about her mom/daughter relationship. I have never met this woman and although we share a name (ahem, spelling aside) and an understanding of the Gospel, we don't share much else. But somehow in this little blog-o-sphere, I was second-handedly invited into her story. I love that. I love that I get to "meet" women and be fed somehow by their realities and battles. Some days I skim, and some days I read a post three times through, but these friendships are available to me. 

I know face-to-face relationships are vital, but somehow these written ones have become important too. And sometimes a lot more real than that face-to-face ones. It's a pseudo-mentorship. I get to see the walk that people go through, hardness and all. 

I bet y'all think I'm a total creep by now. But here's the thing. I see the gospel from these people. When I stop looking for it, I get online to read and lo and behold they remind me. Not because we had a conversation and they knew my need, but because they are being faithful to sharing without expectation. And isn't that what the gospel is? 

Isn't it coming to know our need more and more the further up and in we go? Isn't it facing our junk because it needs to be faced? Isn't it allowing other people to see the wreckage of ourselves and allowing them to see the hope that develops through the process? 

I am reminded constantly of the moreness that I want, by complete strangers. And not because they are phenom people who got it going on, but because they display to me the honesty and reality of who they are and invite me in to see their process. And isn't that what community is? Inviting each other into the daily-ness of us and choosing to walk together without expectation. Pointing each other forward with freedom in love and the grace to become. 

I understand that there is a chunk missing. The need to be known well by someone is not lost upon me, in fact, it's something I know deeply.

Last post, I quoted One Thousand Gifts a ton. I recently started my list to a thousand things I am grateful for. I didn't start because she did it in the book and it helped her. I didn't start as a hopeful entry point to grow. I started because of what she said, "I pay tribute [to God] by paying attention." I want to pay attention more. I want to be ever-looking. Eyes opened to the gospel in the every day. Because I need to be pointed back to God constantly. I have a wandering heart. I forget. I am a victim of soul amnesia. And numbering makes me look. It causes me to slow down and pay attention. 

I've felt restless this past week and I haven't been able to figure out why. And as I'm sitting here writing, I wonder if it's because I'm breaking down a little deeper. Maybe when I start paying attention, I'm able to need Him more because I'm asking to see Him more. 

 

Settledness and rest hasn't been a part of things lately. I feel caught in between. But I'd rather be here asking, waiting, and uncomfortable than wandering. I think so at least. It's easy to type that. 

I think that's where reading blogs has mattered to me. When I'm feeling so restless, I am able to take a peek at other people's restlessness, peace, hope, angst. I'm reminded that this is a process. That God is present in the process because regardless of my seeing Him in mine, I can go see Him in others. And it documents my own. This past year and some months of blogging has given me reference points. It's given me documentation that God shows up. And it reminds me to keep being faithful to the process because that's vital to the result. And it's made me pay attention. 

#9. Being invited into a strangers process by blog.

Soul Amnesia

My parched soul is overwhelmed today. I've been reading the Word, and a book. The book I talked about before. The one on Eucharisteo. Amazing how God can rip up your soul while filling it so deeply. Reminding me of the point. Awakening the desire.

A lot of this post is going to be excerpts. I want you to read her words. To soak in them. Because they have been life to my soul. I've written before of my views about beauty. And somewhere along the way, I forgot. This woman, the one who lives on a farm states away, has reminded me of the soul-stirring, love-evoking, search for beautiful things that really leads me to seeing God clearer. More wholly. She has reminded me that the easy fix doesn't exist and so we have to ask the question of how to see grace clearly, accurately, as more than ease or not experiencing the worst of the worst.

And I look down at his ugly-beautiful [referring to her sons maimed hand]. And I see what I am. I'm amputated. I have hacked my life up into grace moments and curse moments. The chopping that has cut myself off from the embracing love of a God who "does not enjoy hurting people or causing them sorrow" (Lamentations 3:33), but labors to birth grief into greater grace. 

God is good and I am always loved.

Because eucharisteo is how Jesus, at the Last Supper, showed us to transfigure all things--take the pain that is given, give thanks for it, and transform it into a joy that fulfills all emptiness. The hard discipline to learn into the ugly and whisper thanks to transfigure it into beauty. The hard discipline to give thanks for all things at all times because He is all good. 

All is grace because all can transfigure. 

All is grace because all. can. transfigure. He is ALL. GOOD. 

I soak that up like a good tan in the summer. Though I'm not in a season where I am disparaging in depravity, I know those who are. I talk to my sister and hear of the hell some of her students are living in. I walk with a friend who is dealing with the pull between her old world and her new. I ache for them, and then I have to remember the grace. Not that if this got worse it wouldn't be grace, but that the ugly is grace too, because it has to be. It has to be able to be transfigured because that's what God promises. To look at the people who absolutely drive me insane and see that as their ugly-beautiful and remember that I am that too. This concept of grace puts us all on the same level, none better, none worse. And it leads us to a place of being compelled to act for others in love. To love justice and mercy and walk humbly with our God (Micah 6:8). To be a place of rest for hurting people because we understand the need and that grace doesn't leave us in a self-protecting place. 

I am beset by chronic soul amnesia. I empty of truth and need the refilling. I need to come again every day--bend, clutch, and remember--for who can gather the manna but once, hoarding, and store away sustenance in the mind for all of the living?

And is that not me? I am the one hoarding. Soaking in Truth a few times a week and calling that full. I forget my need, lose sight of my starvation, and allow life to be swallowed up by mortality (2 Corinthians 5:4). She refers in her book constantly to Manna. The food only available each day. She reminds me that the sweet bread is only available daily. Enough for a time. And my soul forgets. It forgets its hunger for life. I miss sight of fullness, forsaking it for cheap substitutes. 

Isn't beauty what we yearn to burn with before we die? What else so ignites, hot flame? Beauty is all that is glory and God is Beauty embodied, glory manifested. This what I crave: I hunger for Beauty. Is that why I must keep up the hunt? When I cease the beauty hunt, is that why I begin to starve, waste away?

I had told it once to a questioning son that theology is but that born of theos and logy--God and study-- and theology is to study God. I had always thought of the hefty concordances on the high shelf in the study, but isn't this, too, the deep study of the Spirit God? The revelation of God over the farm? [referring to the search for beauty]

I pay tribute to God by paying attention. Beauty requires no justification, no explanation; it simply is and transcends. 

And her words resonate with my soul. Bring tears to my eyes, and the question of how to refute soul amnesia. She's right. She calls me out. How do I constantly miss the beauty in things--the God in things. It's because my eyes aren't looking. They are darting to and fro for cheap entertainment. For ease. How much harder it is to live a life where I am constantly looking for God. It involves mindfulness that I don't possess, thus it involves constant looking up to Him for the mindfulness. I have held onto the thought that studying God in beauty is just as much the pursuit of theology as it is in books for a year now. My heart jumps to see someone speaking of her own journey to that truth. The truth that the fields I mindlessly drive by, the endless blue above me as I look down, the sunrise I daily ignore on my way to class, the cup of coffee I drink, the vastness of the world around me, it all contains some semblance of beauty. I shallowly live amidst it without ever really looking. 

I feel overwhelmed with that reminder today. With the reminder that as I look for God in beauty, as I look for God in the ugly, as I look for God in my starvation, fullness, desire, apathy, and love, I am pursuing life rather than mortality. I am living the full life. I am creating a life that allows Him to work and I am fostering space for bigger things than me. 

Part of my soul amnesia diagnosis is remembering that God is in everything. That pursuing God doesn't  just look like what I learned it should in that warehouse room in Sunday School. It encompasses reality. All reality. And it leads me to a place where I don't shy away from "types" of people. In fact, it erases that word from my vocabulary. It allows me to see us all as ugly-beautiful. It teaches me to care deeply and love fervently. It teaches to me to live a life of rest and allow God to lead me where I'm supposed to be. It reminds me that I don't have to try. 

And how my soul has needed to know that. How it always needs to know that. This is grace because it can transfigure. It can go from being ugly to being beautiful. God treats my soul amnesia with a restful time in a coffee shop with thirst quenching reminders from a mother of six living on a farm. 

Posture

Merry Christmas to one and all.

And although this is the day we have deemed to, in the words of Relient K, "celebrate the day that [Jesus] was born to die, so I could one day pray for Him to save my life," it isn't what is on my mind so early-late this morning-night.

As I'm lying here in my childhood bedroom attempting to sleep I was thinking about humility. I have a myriad of quotes in post-it note form on my computer screen. Many of which are C.S. Lewis. I'm telling you the man was brilliant. One of them reads, "Humility isn't thinking any less of ourselves, but thinking of ourselves less."

Spurred on by a conversation with a friend, I was lying here, trying to imagine what that looked like. A mental image popped into my over-active imagination of an eager face looking at other people with feigned interest. It seemed forced and shallow. And you know why I think that is? Because my nature when I first begin to ask a question about the look of an action is to imagine the look of the action. I know that seems overly-obvious and stupid, but hear me out.

Maybe what I do so often isn't ask the question of, "how does this play out in my heart?" but rather, "what should this thought play out to in my life?" or rather, "what will people think of me when they see me acting this out?" And as sickening as that looks as I write it out, that is almost automatically where my mind goes all the time. It's about the posture I take.

The other day my sister-in-law and I were talking about how much we compare ourselves to other girls. What resulted from this conversation was the reminder that to be healthy isn't to necessarily feel like we are the creme de la creme, but to consider ourselves of equal value as the rest. I think the concept is the same for our faith. Maybe humility isn't raising or lowering ourselves on the "Christian totem pole" but maybe it's not needing to focus on ourselves and being able to take in the steady rhythm of life while walking with God as best as we know how.

Every one of you reading this probably is like, "well duh Emilie." But it's kind of a fabulous thought to me. I've thunk it before. But the word "posture" came to mind tonight and stuck. When I imagine posture I imagine the Princess Diaries when her grandmother ties her to a chair with handkerchiefs. It was about her appearance, and in that scene, and basically throughout the entire movie, she is not a graceful woman. When we try to posture ourselves, or place ourselves in a specific light, we tend to focus on the actions. It becomes about who we talk to, what we read, where we go to church, what information we know about whom; all these little factors with which we use to define ourselves and use to either tear ourselves down or build ourselves up.

The other side of the coin is looking beyond our posture. Asking for healing so we can root out our incessant needs to rate other people and ourselves and base treatment upon that.

Sara Groves sings this Christmas song "To Be With You" and it's one of my favorites. In the song, she says, "we gather round the table, we close our eyes and sing 'Praise God from whom all blessings flow.'" And it sticks with me for no other reason than the subtle reposturing in my mind that happens when I look at the celebrations that are occuring yesterday and today and choose to say, "Praise God from whom all blessings flow." It grounds me. This year I don't need a big theological anthology to make me enjoy the season. I just needed to be reminded of God by a 300 year old liturgy.

I think maybe that's a big chunk of the walk that I miss so often. I think it's part of the reason I blog. I am a fickle person and I constantly need reposturing to look at things clearly. Writing is like a magnifying glass for me. It causes me to collect my thoughts in a pile, examine them, and sort them into their reserved places. Some of them are unripe and go back through the grinder, some need the finality of "publication" to settle deeply within me, and some, well, some are fresh and new and just need to be tossed out to see what's next for them.

So with a critical eye, I deem this thought one to be churned for awhile. Gnawed on. And for that, Praise God from whom all blessings flow.

Eucharisteo

I spend much of my time comparing. Comparing my life, faith, body type, hair, clothes, friends, etc. My mind whirs constantly with similitudes and variances to the point where I always find inadequacies. Either within me or others. This reality of myself produces a lot of ingratitude. It causes me to live a life where every good thing comes with a "but". The absence of joy and contentedness is quite evident to me, if not to others looking in.

I also have recently pinpointed in myself a major lack of motivation. I want to do, to craft, read, and think, to enjoy life in the ways that I know to be life-giving. But I often choose to sit and watch Hulu or waste my time on Solitaire, they are cop outs. So this break I am trying immensely to fill my time with actual life-giving activities, not cheap time-wasting fillers.

One thing I'm trying to be better about is reading. I love to read, I always have. I think there is something enchanting about being invited into someone else's story, whether it be fictional or reality. It allows one the ability to escape their own reality for awhile and step into another perspective. I learn a lot through reading, not only through the information it provides but the magnitude of watching information impact other people's lives. It inspires me and causes me to ask good questions of my own life.

My sister suggested One Thousand Gifts to me recently. I always take recommendations from my sister seriously because she has a beautifully honest heart that begs for true answers. She is someone who has seen hard things and chooses to face their realities and ask God for the hard answer, the true answer. She inspires me. So when this book was mentioned, I immediately wanted to pick it up, and I'm so glad that I did.

Ann Voskamp writes of Eucharisteo in her book, the greek word for Thanksgiving. For me, this has always been another cheap Christian platitude. And starting the book I was skeptical. What does she have to say about being thankful that I don't already understand or haven't found to be completely cheesy? Three chapters in and my skepticism is now a red shade of embarrassment on my face. She's got me gnawing. Chewing the cud. This woman begins a list of one thousand things to be thankful for. Again, something in my mind I would have processed as cheesy. Cue the deepening shade of red.

The longer her list becomes, the more she experiences joy. The contentedness of a moment of beauty through suds and cheese. And it's not the event or scene that leads her to this joy, it's God being the source of it. Finding that time was meant to be embraced, not hurried. When we rush and speed we are choosing to overlook the God in the moment. We aren't seeing things clearly. Living the slow life is an idea that my mind has gone to a lot, but it stops after the concept. I struggle to find what that really means. I think to live without anticipation is to trust. Maybe when we slow down and choose to find merit in the moments we have we are choosing to see God better. Making a cognitive decision to look to Him and find satisfaction regardless of the circumstance.

For years now I have not been able to connect two thoughts. The first being that God is God, that He is big and has created existence, that what I do isn't inconsequential. Two, I live a life here on earth, surrounded by people who experience hurt, anger, sarcasm, laughter, and joy. Not a lot of times have I felt as if each of my experiences here connected to the bigger picture. And when Ann talked about her list, God started connecting some missing links. Her growing list caused her to slow down and see God in things, and so began connections of the here to the eternal. The seemingly insignificant here began to point to the ultimately magnificent there.

And that's where that leaves me right now. I want to start looking at the minute and begin to be led to the crucial. I want to stop using cheap fillers and do life-giving things with my time. Isn't that the point? To live the God-life by finding things that point us to Him?  For me it manifests itself in creating, writing, reading, playing piano, etcetera. I tell my small group girls all the time that they need to find the things to them that are life-giving, that point them to God, and then to do them. Ironically it is difficult to do, because laziness is easy. But I'm discontent right now, laziness hasn't led to life.....go figure. Romans 12 speaks so much about a full life of caring, loving, of not comparing and belittling others. I don't do those things naturally, especially when I am more concerned with living an easy life rather than a significant life. I want to see God in the minute though, to slow down my living and expectations. So I'm trying to choose it, asking God for the want to choose it, and making myself try a little harder. These thoughts are still shallow in my mind, but I wanted to throw them out there. The regurgitation to you helps make it a little more concrete to me.

I find I don't quite have to words to end this post. My mind is a jumbled mess of thoughts about the subject and I can't close it down. So here is the good-bye for now. Short and abrupt.

Threats

I've been thinking the past few days about the life I really want. Finally on my drive back to school on Sunday one word popped in my head. Rich. I want a rich life. Not in a cha-ching cha-ching kinda way, but full, meaningful, weighed heavily with value. And then the natural proceeding of questions settled in my brain--how does one define richness? How do we pursue a rich life? What is the rich life?

Two Sundays ago, sitting in the hard wooden pew of my church, Kevin Cawley planted a thought in me that I've been gnawing on like a bone since then. Where does anger/anxiety come from? He said they are rooted in the fear of losing something that we value. It comes from feeling threatened. And how often does what I do and how I act completely allude to that? Let me answer you, all the freaking time.

I believe in knowing why we do what we do. Motive is everything. And when I start to think about when I feel anger towards people or situations, I can feel the weight of fear coming with it most of the time. And even more so I see that for me, most of the times I feel threatened are when my security is threatened. I get protective and needy when I don't feel important or valued, I get snippy when my time is not spent how I choose, I get sassy when people make fun of the way I act, dress, or things I do, along with the tons of other idiosyncrasies I have developed from my fear of losing the things I cushion myself with.

The fact of it is, that anger and fear only comes when the things being threatened are gods to me. When the importance of my security, comfort, pride, etc. has exceedingly more value and promise to me than God Himself. Sick right? But so so true.

Twinsies have come into my life this semester. They are two of my favorite people I have ever met to date. And part of the reason is that I feel no threat from them. They are kind, funny people who love well and often. And it's completely natural. It's humbling to be around them and feel the freedom to be and enjoy things fully without the competitive monkey of comparison on my back. They are a gift.

And as I think about those friendships, I catch a glimpse of how a non-threatened life could be. A life where there isn't a need to be the best, feel the most important, have "the look," say the right thing, find the right person, or portray the right image. A life spent in complete rest, security, and thus, enjoyment. That's a God-centered life. Those things go so much deeper than situational emotions, they're a deep-seeded spirit within a person. The Twinsies seem to have some sort of Otherness about them. I want it.

Just because this pride and paganism manifests itself in security issues in me doesn't mean it isn't out there in a million other ways either. Most anger and I would dare to say all anxiety is completely rooted in the fear of things we value being threatened. When we value things so much more than the giver of them. Those moments just scream that we don't believe God is big enough. The holding onto other people, things, ideas, as being our hope does something to us. It creates monsters of self-sufficiency who would dare to do almost anything to stay well padded from actually needing God.

I finished the Narnia series this break, and in the last chapter of the last book the line, "further up and further in" is used a lot. In the book it's referring to the New Narnia, the allegorical portrayal of heaven, and as they keep running through it everything keeps getting bigger and more vast and all the more exciting rather than smaller and more finite. Sometimes I think that as I keep walking forward, life should become simpler and more concrete, but the further up and further in I go it just keeps getting more expansive. I'm afraid of it sometimes, I'm fearful that all the expanse is just too big and I'm never going to find anything rightly. But really, I think the opposite side of the coin is that if it kept getting smaller and narrower I would feel confined to the ideology and one-wayism I have desperately been trying to get away from.

I need God to continue showing me the expansiveness of going further up and in, while likewise knowing that He is standing right next to me being my hope that this isn't too much. Maybe that is part of the rich life. In my mind, I perceive richness as peace. The older I get the more I'm finding that the things we do are usually about the pursuit of contentedness, and rarely do they achieve that purpose. Peace comes from the Peacemaker I guess, who understand the bloodiness that needs to take place to actually have it. He understands that peace is hard, but ultimately it's worth whatever the loss or ripping out of. Peace is mentioned so much in the bible and I've never really looked at it as being something I deeply long for, but that's really it. It encompasses so much, rest, contentment, hope, joy, and more. It's a catchall word. So maybe the rich life is really a life of peace. Something to think about.....

Ten

What is it about drizzling rain and 43 degree weather that begs for a mid-day Starbucks run? Whatever it is, I answered the call. I'm not an extremely impulsive person, but as of late I have become much more so when it comes to getting out of Bolivar. No particular reason why, I just really like coffee. And cities. And smog. Well, not really smog, but I like going places and not knowing people and being able to shrink into the background.

For some reason, this time of year brings out the nostalgic side of me. In the generic sort of ways as far as holidays some, but mainly for stages of life. Like the days when my best friend and I would just go sit in coffee shops for hours, eat Chick-Fil-A and sit in Barnes and Nobles for hours comparing books and authors. Those are some of my fondest memories. They were days of rest, thoughts, fun, and enjoyment. Sometimes I try to recreate the sensations of those days, but to no avail.

My mom has this 10-10-10 concept that I've heard for years when anxiety started creeping up on me. In ten days, this will probably be over, in ten weeks, this will be a memory, and in ten months, it's going to be a non-existent blip on the radar. Basically it is just a reminder that life is going to keep moving forward, and the hard stuff is going to become a story, and the good stuff is going to a fond reminiscence. And it's true. High school definitely had it's downs. My blatant insecurity, fear of not fitting in, and immature judgment. While I know those were there, they aren't in the forefront of my mind when reminded of those times. It's the good memories. Warm summer evenings playing volleyball until the lights turned off, hours spent in the sun on the lake, driving all over Kansas City for good coffee, that's what I remember.

This subject came up with a friend the other day, which is probably why my mind has gone there today. Sometimes I think I forget that this is a just a miniscule part of the big picture. In months, today won't be a big deal. Life keeps moving on, and the bad stuff will be distant, and the good will still be good. I think that's why God tells us not to worry so much. Because in His infiniteness He sees the big picture and knows that these little things, the messy relationships, that low test grade, your embarrassing fail of epic proportions, are all going to be over soon enough, and we'll move on.

I guess that's how life is meant to be though. We're not supposed to spend our time trying to recreate the past, or to freak out over the present, or anticipate the future. We're supposed to ask God to give us enough for today, and ask to see further down the road so we don't get so caught up in the todays. All of our todays will eventually be yesterdays. Bon Iver has this song called Holocene, I'm going to leave you with a line from it I have really liked lately. It just reminds me that I'm not really that big of a deal.

and at once I knew I was not magnificent

strayed above the highway aisle

(jagged vacance, thick with ice)

I could see for miles, miles, miles