| Hello. I'm not quite sure what I'm doing here. There are many memories associated with this humble little site called Xanga, and I feel a small sense of something compelling me to type something here, for old times' sake. This is out of character for me... usually sleep trumps almost anything, but here we are anyhow. My writing style has changed quite a bit. I used to be an edit fanatic, continually processing my words as I went along, to the point where every correction and synonym replacement led my sentences down stranger and stranger paths. Towards the end, my paragraphs didn't sound like they were being spoken by my voice anymore. Nowadays, I just type and type and could care less how it would sound to an outsider... I'm the only outsider who reads what I write. And I really do feel like an outsider, weeks and months or even days after I return to an entry. Did I really have to be so dramatic? Or, why did I feel the need to abbreviate names this way, knowing that they would never, ever come across this entry anyway? Or, was this really of primary importance in my life, at this time, in this place? It's all a reflection on how quickly times flies. "Flies" is not even quite the word I would use... flies sounds very graceful. My days and weeks shift past my field of vision in successive waves of pictures, locations, conversations, musings, suppressed emotions and quiet growing. Warm weathered days, rainy mood nights. Never have I ever felt more like the "shifting shadows" described in Scripture... one week I can be abounding in joy, or abounding in love, and the next? Who knows? Consistency slips my grasp and frustrates me. I want to be real, I want to be me, I want to sound like me. Constantly. Who am I? --- There were definitely times in my life where I could step back and clearly, distinctly pick out how things had changed, shifted, decreased in importance. But it feels like this happens every day now. Every day, God confronts me with the violence of my unrighteousness, the fade of my step... the shocking, heart-stopping measure of His grace. His heart for both the rich and the poor in Spirit. Every day I am made smaller and smaller and smaller... it feels so good. Life is not a story about me. Life is not a narrative of my own lofty talk; life is not laced with a personal harmony and melody of notes of my own choosing. Life is not about me. Life is about Christ! I don't quite care how I sound anymore (inconsistency). I don't even particularly care if people hear my thoughts... it's weird. Good, I suppose. I still want to sound like me... I still want my sentences to reflect what I'm actually saying, what my body language is saying, what my heart is saying. This is no mean feat; I feel like I'm never quite hitting my sentences spot-on, with people. Maybe this is a lesson on needing to keep quiet and pay attention; maybe God is teaching me to become "lower still." Is this quest for self-definition, "self-actualization" in line with Gospel living? Yes and no, I suppose... it teeters dangerously on self-absorption and closed blinders to the rest of the world, or at least in my world. I do need to figure myself out, filtering out the bad and holding on to the good, but for right now, I'm content with figuring Christ out. I'll follow His voice instead. |
