Self Forgivness: My new life goal.

I hate to sound like an over dramatic old lady, but sometimes I just get really overwhelmed by how quickly life goes by. I am about to begin my final year of my university undergrad. The last few years of my life have been eventful. I have enjoyed them. I have made a lot of awesome memories and a lot of awesome friends. I am not really saddened by the ends of these times because, as cliché as it sounds, I know that every end is a new beginning and I'm excited for whatever the future holds. What saddens me about this end is the heavy weight of guilt and regret. This is a feeling I have carried with me for a long time. I have suffered these feelings in regards to not only my young adult years, but also my teenage years and my childhood. I have been plagued for a long time by every good thing I didn't do and every bad thing I shouldn't have done. In every moment I am plagued by who I am and who I am not and these feelings have a tendency to choke me and keep me from living the moment to the fullest. Then I am plagued with regret because I think I could have done a better job at work or school or had more fun if I had been less distracted by self hatred. It is a complex but vicious circle.

As a Christian I believe that Jesus's death forgives all of the bad things I do and yet I also believe that Jesus shows us, out of love, the best way to live ant that someone truly living under his forgiveness will be learning to walk in his footsteps, so - to be honest - in many ways my faith has increased my guilt where it is supposed to free me from condemnation.

I am coming out of a tough summer. I have been working at a camp and feel really discouraged and sad all summer because I have been focussing on my weaknesses as usual. I've been negative around my fellow staff when I should have been encouraging them and I've been too tired emotionally to really do my job right and this has just added to my self hatred. As the summer comes to an end I am left with a choice. I can go into my last year of university full of regret because of how I have spent my summer and just keep the cycle going, or I can end the cycle here and now with forgiveness.

 I can worry till I am blue in the face about how Christianity really works and whether or not I am really saved, forgiven, and loved, whether or not I really  believe in Jesus, and whether or not I am being sanctified or I can just choose to live like I have been forgiven and forgive myself.

In the words of John Green, I truly believe that forgiveness is the only way out of the labyrinth of suffering.

I know a lot of people who believe that focussing on forgiveness can cause complacency where people just do whatever they want to because they are forgiven but I'm going to experiment this year. I don't think that will happen with me because I am already tough on myself making sure I am responsible, and I think  forging will just inspire me to forgive others. At any rate, being really tough on myself, trying to figure everything out, and focusing on my failures have not been working in my life. They have not been making me a happier, wiser, or more loving person. I have reached a point in my life where I can't take things being the same anymore. I don't want to live a life of guilt and condemnation. I am choosing to forgive myself.

This is my goal for the new school year. You are welcome to join me if you like, or you are welcome to think that I'm foolish, but this is what I'm doing. I still need to come up with a specific plan of how I can make this work, but I'm starting right here and now by forgiving myself for the mistakes I've made this summer. This has been as summer for learning and I was still able to do ok despite my dark mindset, and Jesus died for these mistakes too, so I'm choosing to forgive myself and learn from my mistakes.  

Dear little man

Dear Leonard James Allen Hannah, (Woe boy, that’s a mouthful!)

                Welcome to the world little man, and oh what a world it is. My hope for you is that you will always have a smile on your face, food and water in your belly, clothes to wear on your body, a roof over your head, and someone who loves you at your side. However, I’ve been around long enough to know that life doesn’t always go the way we would like it to. One thing I want you to know that I think you can understand - even though you are a baby and cannot yet read, write, or talk – is the concept of family. You can’t even say dada yet, but I bet you feel safe with your mum, dad, grandparents, etc. I bet you can recognise the faces and voices of your family. It is my greatest hope that you would count me as one of the people you can feel safe with. Here is the thing little man. I am far away right now and I don’t know when or if I’ll ever be chilling in the same end of the universe as you, but I will always come if you need me. I will always love you. Even if you cry every time I come near and never decide to love me back and even if you grow out of your good looks into an ugly alien, I will always love you. Like I said before, “welcome to the world little man, and oh what a world it is.” It isn’t always pretty, it doesn’t always make sense. It is my hope that you will find not just joy but also truth. Unfortunately I don’t feel capable of giving you wisdom. I don’t know for sure what the truth is. I can only tell you what I believe. I don’t know how to be joyful. I can only give you love little man, that is all I have. That is why, of all the things I could tell you about, I chose family. I am your family little man. I’m here for you.

With love from far away,

Auntie Riss

What is love?

I have struggled for a long time with the concept of love. Not romantic love just plain old straight up love for all others. I have written about this before on this blog, most notably here: http://aragtaghooligan.blogspot.ca/2013/02/what-is-love-anyways-how-at-21-i-am.html.  What is it, I wonder, and why or how do we do it? I realised this summer that I used to think it was an emotion. I talk about that in the other blog, how I believed that we love people when we see something good in them that we enjoy which inspires us to want to care for these people. I talked about how God loved us by dying for us when we were still His enemies and how I wanted to be able to love other people even when they didn't deserve it. To be honest I don't struggle to love people very often. It isn't because I have a good perspective of love or because I am awesome or anything. It is actually because I still cling to the view that love is a reaction to the good in people. I always try to see the good in others, this helps me to forgive the bed in them. I have difficulty accepting love from others because I don't see anything good in myself. I figure that people don't actually love me but acting like it is something they do out of a sense of duty. I have always thought this most about Christians because, like I talk about in my other blog a little bit, the Bible encourages us to love like Christ did. However I was talking with a friend today and I think I finally figured it out. Love isn't a reaction to the good in others and it isn't something you just do out of duty. It clicked when my friend talked about the baby my sister is pregnant with right now. "Are you going to love your nephew?" he asked me. "Yes," I answered. "Why?" He asked. "Because he is my family," I said and then he said the obvious "In Jesus we are all family." I have heard this a lot but it never really clicked. I still don't really understand how people can love me when I don't deserve it, but I have decided to let them. I have decided to believe them instead of feeling guilty about it, worrying that they are soon going to stop loving me when they find out what I'm really like, or thinking that they are just pretending to love me because they have to because if they really can love an unlovable person like me that isn't a sad or robotic thing, it is a beautiful thing that the world needs more of and maybe I should even encourage it.

Poetic Musings

I am sitting on the wooden bench again. I'm watching grass dance with wind. I'm zoning out and I've got my headphones on, but the laughter still comes whistling in. A line comes through the music and it is the question of my heart, "maybe, just maybe, I've come home." I have been so many places, met so many faces, and gotten so close to love, yet there is always a but. There is always a sort of darkness in my mind that just tries and tries to stomp out the light. I close my eyes and all these places dance on by. I'm remembering all the times of this here life. When I look backwards like this it seems so beautiful. I always see the sunshine, the smiles, and the laughter. I can feel the warmth and the love and I miss those times that have passed me by now, but if I could really enter those moments I'd be back in the darkness for most of it. If I could go back I'd be lonely even when people are around, because I rarely believe it when they say they love me. Now I am not there I am here and there are worries and fears there are trials and even a few tears on the seams of my heart but there is wind and rain and sun and this love that is always here waiting for me to believe it and receive it. What will I do? Will I embrace the moment? Will I love where I am and live in this moment with joy in my heart. Will I be thankful for the poetry of a cricket orchestra? Will I sing the song and dance the dance and shine the light I was born into the earth to bring?

Pondering out Loud

I wonder what it would look like if the core of our beings could be written in words. I would love for all the tangle of thoughts, actions, needs, and speech to be written down clear for my eyes to see. What are we really at our essence? Are we just a living thing? Are we just a collection of Protons and Neutrons making atoms making molecules making bone, muscle, organs, and flesh? And what is the point of this complex thing that we are? Are we just eating and sleeping to stay alive so we can do it all over again? What about our brains? Our brains can feel emotions, they can choose to like or to dislike, and they can busy themselves all day with questions or worry. What is the point to all this activity? It confuses, confuses, confuses. There is a darkness falling like smoke because of the tangle of thoughts and feelings as all within my brain mixes with all that is in yours. There are so many lines and levels. This life is so complex I loose track of what I feel, of what I want, and of the reasons why. What is it all for?

I believe we are here. We cannot change that unless we end our lives but there is so much that we could try to enjoy, so much that we could be thankful for, so much that we could do to make the world a better place. Perhaps we just need to choose to seize the day?

If we choose to seize every moment are we living just to enjoy life because we have it so why not? Is that all there is to it?

I believe something must have happened for us to be here. Something must have caused us to exist. I believe this something or someone is so great and powerful that it is beyond my comprehension but I believe it is still active and I call it God.

I believe we were created out of love and out of love we have been sustained and saved. It is because of love that we remain and can be freed from our stains.

And here we are in the middle of the confusing life I was talking about and we need to be thankful we are clean and we need to love back because we have been loved. We were made from love to love and out of love we have been healed on the inside.

When there are so many clichés why are the answers not satisfying?

When it is possible to keep it simple why does my brain overload with all the complexities?

There has been a gnawing within me for mostly all my life and I'm wondering what do I want? What will satisfy?

If I have food and water, warmth, protection, fun, and love (though I've never learned to believe it). What more do I need?

All the thinking, the desiring and the questioning, is it worth it? Is this a waste of time, is the answer much more simple than it seems?

To those who feel like God can't use you:

Hello, as you are most likely aware, my name is Laurissa. Today, I feel like telling you a story. I am not a very talented person. For the sake of kindness and love, most of my friends would disagree with me. They are right in the sense that God has pretty much given us all some sort of gift, but if you were to just look at me without much attention given it might be hard for you to tell what my gift(s) is(are). I am not physically fit or coordinated. I am not brave, I have no rhythm, I am tone deaf, I am not much of a leader or a teacher, and I am not especially good at team work nor am I very innovative. However, I work at a camp. An adventure camp to be specific. With lots of high ropes, water sports, archery, riflery, and a worship team. I am not certified in any of the special activities and I can't help with the worship team. How does this work? When I first came here last summer I felt like I had made a really big mistake. I felt like I could not be of any use here. I still feel that way sometimes. Just yesterday I told someone I don't like adventure and they said "well you're in the wrong place then." So why did I come back? I still ask myself that sometimes. It is tough sometimes being surrounded by people with a skill set that is either very different from yours or much more various than yours or both, but I am continually reminded of two things. Number one: it aint me who is awesome, it's God. So the first reason I am here is because I'm pretty sure He wants me here. He can use anyone anywhere, because He's God and he has chosen to use ME HERE and that might seem like an odd choice, but I'm ok with it because it's God and I'm thinking He knows what He's doing. The second thing I'm constantly being reminded of here is that He HAS given me some gifts. They aren't necessarily the same gifts as those around me. I don't necessarily have as many gifts or as much of a variety as gifts as others, and I'm not necessarily as well versed at using my gifts as others are, but I think He has given me gifts that He wants to help me learn how to use.

So that's my little speech, but here is the story I promised you:

Last year a couple weeks into camp I was feeling pretty down. I had tried really hard to get certified, but it didn't work so I was leading a lot of random activities that don't require certifications. People were trying to convince me that people were needed for these activities too and that there were not a whole lot of people who could bring as much enthusiasm and energy to these random activities as I could, but I didn't necessarily believe them. Then something quite interesting happened. I heard that someone was still needed to work one on one with a guest who was coming to the camp for the rest of the summer. I already had experience working one on one with people and it's something I love to do. Not only that, but just because of the way this camp works the only people who could switch over to this other job were female assistant cabin leaders which just happens to be what I was. However, I have a lot of trouble with confidence, so I thought to myself: I won't be good at this, someone else will do a better job. So I didn't tell them I wanted to do it and, though I didn't know it, they kept searching with no real leads. I did do one good thing though, I prayed. It was kind of a funny prayer, but it worked. This is what I prayed "Hey God, I really want to do this thing, but I don't think You want me to. I think You probably haven't called or equipped me to do this. You are probably going to provide someone who would be much better at this. However, just in case I am misunderstanding You, I want You to know that I really do want to do whatever You want me to do. Therefore, if You actually want me to do this, You know how my mind works better than anyone and You know how to change it and I would love for You to change my mind to suit Your will, whatever Your will is."

So a little while after I prayed that slightly odd prayer one of my boss/ supervisor type people came up to me and said they still needed someone to do this job and they thought I would be good at it, would I be willing? I was blown away. God knows that I have trouble saying no to people when they need my help, and He also knows that I needed to know that someone else thought I could do the job and that there was no one else available who was capable or willing to do a better job. He knew how to change my mind and He did. It was kind of funny in a way.

Anyways that is my story from last year. The moral is that God doesn't just utilise super duper awesome folks, he can utilise you too, have no fear. It's a lesson I'm learning again and again and again, but hey that's ok. Here's to continued learning.

Pros and Cons

Choices/Pros/Cons

·         Masters of Library Science

Pros

1.       It opens up a larger variety of work opportunities than the librarian technician college program.

2.       It would let me work in a small town where there are fewer librarians in each branch.

3.       It could lead to being the head of the children’s department which would mean puppet shoes and program planning.

Cons

1.       Masters programs are hard.

2.       Being a librarian involves computers.

3.       Libraries may be going extinct.

·         Library Technician College Program

Pros

1.       It is quicker than the masters program.

2.       It is probably easier than the masters program.

3.       It might make it easier to get jobs within big cities where there are more technicians hired than librarians.

Cons

1.       Being a library technician involves computers.

2.       Libraries may be going extinct.

3.       It would be harder to work in a small town.

4.       It wouldn’t let me be the head of a children’s department.

5.       It offers less of a variety of types of employment.

 

·         Teacher’s college

Pros

1.       It is just one year.

2.       It would let me work with kids.

3.       It would make my BA seem useful.

Cons

1.       There are no teaching jobs.

2.       I sometimes have a hard time explaining things to kids.

·         Staying in Peterborough after school and trying to find work.

Pros

1.       I get to stay in Peterborough with my friends, church, the lovely river, my favourite coffee shop, and the places where I love to volunteer.

2.       I would get a break from school.

3.       I wouldn’t have to work the job I found forever. I could always go back to school.

4.       It is easy to find a place to live there that is relatively cheap because I could keep living in student housing.

5.       I have enough money saved up to live for at least the summer maybe longer if I could find a place to sublet for a bit. If I couldn’t find work, I could always move back in with my mum in St. Thomas after my temporary rent was up and just be a bum till I make a new plan or work at Starwood.

Cons

1.       There are very few jobs in Peterborough.

2.       There is a lot of competition for every job.

3.       I don’t have a lot of lovely looking work experience.

OR

·         Go to college for a program other than library technician (For example: Early Childhood Educator, or that one job that takes a three year college program and has something to do with working in a class room with students with exceptionalities that I forget what the name is)

Pros

·         I can choose something I actually want to do instead of just doing something that is available to me based on the education that I did just because I wanted to do it for fun.

·         College is supposed to get you a job quicker than university.

Cons

·         More school

·         More money

·         More research

·         What if I still don’t get a job.