Prepared to get in Trouble for my Honesty

There must be something wrong with me because Jesus doesn't give me very much joy.

I'm the worst Christian ever.

There must be soemthing wrong with me because I don't really have a testimony.

The story I tell when I am compelled to do so is a fabricated one of false dichotomies between stupid me and post epiphany me.

I've never had an epiphany.

It's all just a lie.

If there is anything beautiful in what little testimony I have left, if there is a testimony, if it has any truth, it lies in the fact that Jesus has never let go of me and that I have never given up on Him completely BECAUSE he has never given up on me completely.

However, there has been no transformation.

If you've read these stupid posts that I shouldn't have written you will see that my heart is gross and sinfull, and, above all, selfish.

You will have noticed that God is not the center of my life.

My behaviours have not changed. I still sin.

I am not overflowing with joy because of Jesus, even though I should be if you think about it logically.

I am selfish and dramatic and ever since I was about 13 years old I have been caught up in a self centered world of stupid selfish grief, doubt, and sin.

I must be defective.

And I'm probably a horrible person for saying this because I'm supposed to say that God is so big He can change the heart of even the worse sinner and He is cause for joy and all those things are true, I still believe them, but they haven't pierced my life, and I hate that, and I hate me.

ARagTagHooligan who is probably too honest and is going to get in trouble because I always get in trouble for being to honest.

Thoughts About Death.

I remember how hard it was for me to make friends in first year. People who know me now might be surprised by this. I like to claim that I am very shy, but no one will believe me! Today I am very outgoing and know a lot of people in my classes and at church. I talk to everyone and have tons of friends, but, in the first two months of first year, I only knew a very small handful of people well enough to say hi to them in the halls. Of those people, there were only three that I would sometimes eat with and another guy I only knew from class who I used to randomely have super deep convorsations with. This is embarassing, but I remember wandering around campus hoping against hope that I would bump into him just because I was really lonely and missed talking to people about really deep stuff.

One time I saw him and we were small talking about school and stuff and we somehow got to talking about pecismism, optimism, problem solving... and death.

He said that death was just another problem to be solved.

I was so confused by that statement. I had never heard anything like it before in my life.

I was born into, and also raised in, a christian home. I was taught that death is just another part of life and that, for a Christian, it isn't scary at all because it means you get to party with Jesus.

I still don't know for sure if this guy was an atheist, but different things I knew about him made me think he was, and so, being shy, I didn't say anything about my religious beliefs. However, I did tell him that I didn't think death was a problem at all. In fact, I think I was a little too honest because I also mentioned something along the lines of the idea that I was excited to die because it was a lovely escape from life. I probably shouldn't have said that.

He was totally confused and blown away by this statement.

He was a very expressive dude. He started waving his hands around in the air expressing his disbelief in words and then grabbing hold of a short wall and hoisting himself up in the air then down again as though he was so upset by my statement that he had to work off some energy in excersise.

That was one of the most interesting interactions I have ever had.

Before that, it had never really struck me that some people are afraid of death or think of it as something to be fixed. Even my hippy agnostic friends talk about it as being a healthy continuation of life. They believe in reincarnation or peaceful nothingness and think of these as being natural and beautiful things.

However, all this being said, I do think that death poses a major problem that many Christians seem to ignore.

As a Christian, I don't think of death as being a problem for the dead, but for the living.

In the last convorsation I had with my dad before he died, he confessed that he had thought he was was going to die a few days before that when he had his first heart attack.

My dad was (is?) also a Christian, so he told me he wasn't afraid to die, but he said he didn't want to leave behind his family.

After he died, everyone told me that my dad was in a better place and that we, his family, would be taken care of by God.

All of this is true, and it should be comforting. I suppose it is kind of odd that my thoughts aren't completely focused on the joy of the grace, forgiveness, love, promises, care, and provisions of God. I guess, as I have said before, the problem is that my heart is gross and sinful and focused on what it thinks it wants instead of on what it needs.

This sinful heart cannot help but think that death sucks for the ones left behind. Even if I know I will see my dad again, even if I know that dad is partying in heaven, even if I know that God is taking care of me, I'm still not happy. I want to be with my dad now. That is selfish. Horribly selfish, but it is the reality of human emotion, and, like always, the question becomes: what do I do with my horribly selfish heart that is keeping me from the fullness of joy?

I geuss there is only one thing that I can do: beg The Holy Spirit to change  my heart while focusing on the beauty of Jesus by thinking about it, reading the bible, and listening to other people's thought on the subject.

I'm trying people, I really am, but sometimes I just want to be honest and write out my real thoughts and feeelings about life.

I think it is also important to note that Christians don't have to be (and aren't) happy all the time. Jesus wept when Lazareth(sp?) died, so maybe its ok to be upset about death. Maybe sadness is just a natural thing we have to experience.

I don't know.

I don't know much of anything.

ARagTagHooligan

How do I Escape Ephiciant Robot Living?

My to-do list wears me out, not because the things I have to do aren't fun, but because there is a certain time within which I have to get them done. Something you should know about me is that I despise ephiciancy. I have a lot of very ephiciant friends who do not understand why I hate it so much. In their eyes, ephiciancy is good because it ensures that the least amount of time, energy, and money can be used for the best results. However, I am convinced that, even if ephiciancy does take less energy than anything else, it requires a much more difficult kind of energy. I'm also not sure I even believe that ephiciancy takes less energy because all the energy you save on the job is used up in figuring out what the most ephiciant method is. Planning takes a lot of energy.

What do I mean by "a much more difficult kind of energy"?

Like I said, I don't find the things on my to-do list to be stressful. I ENJOY listening to lectures, participating in seminar discussions, doing readings, and forcing my thoughts into papers that make sense. However, when the focus becomes getting something done on time (being ephiciant) I find that all the joy gets taken from the task. I don't just find this in school, I find this in every area of my life. I prefer to be able to just do something spontaneously and be completely overwhlemed by the joy of doing it, instead of being focused on the need to get it done. I don't want to be a robot!

I've tried to focus more on the joy of doing something than on the anxiety attached to the deadline, but it doesn't seem to work.

I mean, I HAVE to get things done on time in order to graduate and make sure that I get something for all the money I have spent on school.

In many ways my to-do list is freeing. It helps me stress less because now I know when I'm going to get everything done. The consequence is that I feel like a robot. I can't just do something when I am inspired to do it. I have to force myself to do things when the to-do list tells me to do them. This makes me feel like my heart is being turned off. It is hard to find joy in an action that you did not get to choose to do because you wanted to. It is hard to find joy in life when you are just blindly following a to-do list. How can I feel like I'm alive when I am a robot?

How can I let go of robot living when I am stuck in a society that demands ephiciancy if I don't want to be homeless???????

Thoughts on the Every Day

Thoughts on the Every Day

My eyes open to a messy room and my mind remembers a list of this day’s to dos, and I groan. I get things done and I erase them from the list and I’m tired so I go to bed without cleaning my room. There is night and then there is morning so that it can start all over again.

 I almost always worry as I work. I worry that I won’t get everything done on time, or done well. I worry that nothing I do will help decrease world suck. I worry that I will fail school and will be unable to find work. I worry a lot about running out of money. I am (probably unnecessarily) afraid of homelessness and starvation. I worry that people will look down on me. I worry that my friends and family will abandon me and that I will never fall in love. I worry about my silly selfish heart, and I feel guilty for all this selfish, untrusting, worrying and then worry some more as I wonder if my heart will ever change in a noticeably life altering way.

I want to be a new woman. I want to love others more than I love myself. I want to be confident in the only one whose love for me matters, and I want to be brave enough to acknowledge Him – Jesus – in all that I do. I want to loosen my grip on my money and be more generous with it instead of attempting to find hope and security in a few pieces of thin cloth and plastic. I want to focus less on human notions of success and more on letting Jesus use me as he will.

There is a daily battle in my life. Every day, when I open my eyes and the worries climb into my mind, I have to remember that I am loved and forgiven. I have to accept that forgiveness all over again, while attempting to remember which things don’t matter. I have to let go of my worries about school, my purpose, money, what others think, and my own failure to be good. Instead I try to trust, follow, trust some more, follow some more, and accept His perfect gift of forgiveness and love, and place my confidence not in my own ability, but in that gift.

It’s hard to do all this, especially when my body is so used to mechanically obeying the old worries. I complete the things on that list, scratch them off, and add more, all because I want to succeed in the eyes of others and find security in money and human love. Some days it feels like my whole life is a robotic process designed on the old ideas. I crave a dramatic life changing shift, but it’s been my experience that, for me at least, change is slow.

It could be that there is something wrong with me.

It could be that this is just how it is.

I don’t know.
ARagTagHooligan

Pre-Birthday Blog Post

Pre-Birthday Blog Post!

Tomorrow I will be a year older.  It is very strange to think of my own birth.

A lot has happened to me over those years.

I have cherished beautiful friendship, a loving family, and a beautiful God. I have experienced the difficulties of fighting and learned a bit about the power of forgiveness. I have also learned about death in a very personal way. I have not traveled very much, but the travels I have made have opened my eyes a little more than they were before. I have learned a lot about this crazy world in schools which also taught me the benefits of hard work and the reality of anxiety. I have worked a lot with children and learned from them the importance of imagination, chaos, patience, flexibility, dedication, persistence, energy, and, that confusing word, love. I have battled with questions that are so much bigger than myself and rejoiced in realizations so small that I am now embarrassed to admit what a long time it took me to understand.

Through the wonders of hindsight I have realized that these experiences are taking me somewhere. Although my foresight is not far enough to illuminate for me just where it is that I’m going, still I’m trusting God and holding on, and doing my best to enjoy the ride.

I am thankful for these experiences because of the joy and the learning that they have given me. However, I am a little bit nervous that I haven’t learned from them as much as I could have. I think there are a variety of reasons for this lack of true education. The first reason is that my brain is very slow. I have to work hard for understanding. It doesn’t come in an instant like it does for some people. The second reason is that even when my brain catches up to reality my heart seems to lag behind. I feel that I could fill books and books with the wisdom my life experiences have taught me, but I worry that none of these lessons have actually changed my behaviors. When I look at my life I see a stubborn heart that refuses to let go of a life lived wrong because of ignorance. You aren’t ignorant any more child; you have seen the light, why can’t you wake up and dance with joy and then change your habits? I worry, oh I worry, but I know I cannot save myself from my own stupidity. All I can do is cry out for more grace from my Abba, and pray that he will change my heart. I’m trying to hold on to the truth, but oh it’s hard.

ARagTagHooligan

Hello People of the Internet

Hello people of the internet!

Hmm, what should I write about myself? For starters, I can tell you that I have decided to take up blogging because I have a lot of thoughts running through my brain which are in need of an appropriate outlet.

I think about all sorts of things. I think a lot about God. I am a Christian, see, but I will be the first one to tell you that I don’t have it all figured out. A lot of my thoughts about God are questions, but I also think a lot about how amazing He is, how thankful I am to know Him, and how much I want to get to know Him better. There are many things I don’t understand about God and I have experienced a lot of doubt in my short life, but that life has led me to the realization that no matter what happens, and in spite of all of the questions in my mind, I will never be able to stop believing in God…but more about that later.

I also think about my purpose a lot. I’m studying my undergrad in a humanities program at a Canadian University. (I feel no need to be specific here.) However, my role as a student is important because it means that I’m right at that stage where I’m trying to figure out why I am here and what I can offer the universe and how I can go about making money so that I don’t have to be a starving homeless woman.

I am quite an honest person, and so I shall admit that, sometimes, I think about guys and relationships. Yes, I do sometimes think about specific guys who are such incredibly kind and responsible individuals that I can’t help but admire them. It is embarrassing to admit this, but I am only human. However, those are personal thoughts and I will NOT be sharing them on the internet. I may write about relationships in a more philosophical way, though. I don’t know much about them, but they intrigue me and the subject of love is something I have been trying very hard to understand ever since I was four years old. I have always been a touch philosophical/analytical/odd. I remember once when I was four I told my mom that I wasn’t sure if I loved her. I assured her that I wanted to love her, but that I did not want to lie and tell her I loved her if I actually didn’t and unfortunately I didn’t know how to tell if I loved her because I didn’t understand what it meant to love someone. I really hurt my mom’s feelings and I feel bad about it now, but the embarrassing truth is that love (in all its many forms) has gotten no easier for me to understand over the years, so, every now and, then I might talk about it.

I may talk about the passing of time.  Growing up makes me wonder a lot about the temporality of the universe and what that means for me.

I may talk about social issues, but probably not because I see the world through my heart and not my brain. This can be a dangerous way to look at politics, so it is probably best if I stick to discussing my own personal thoughts and emotions.

So there you have it.
Probably no one will read this, but it will feel good to get some of these thoughts out of my head.

ARagTagHooligan