guilt is a worthless emotion

I sit here this morning remembering just how many times I've said that to someone, and how many more times I've thought it.

If I truly believe it, than why am I guilt-ridden?

I've been forgetting lately that it's ok to be imperfect, because I feel that my brand of imperfection is not welcome here. At the least it's different from everybody else's.

You know, of course it is, but I get the feeling every once and awhile that I am suspect because of my tendencies; that my orientation toward mercy is naive or insufficient and therefore blasphemous and wrong. Sure, it's insufficient and it probably is naive. Does it follow that it is wrong? Am I betraying the God I thought I was loving by following the nature he assigned to me before I drew breath?

I am betraying him by letting my social situation throw a massive wrench in my faith in his perfection. I do know that.

As I type this even, I am losing my train of thought because I am nervous about the reason I will give for not being at church this morning. To be on the defensive is not an attractive place for me to be. It corrupts me quickly and easily. What I am trying to figure out at the moment is whether my defenses are legitimate or whether they should be overcome. Just because a situation or circumstance puts me up in arms does not mean I shouldn't be there; I am imperfect after all, as are my defensive reflexes. Is this a challenging opportunity for growth? Or am I losing myself in the pursuit of perfection?

So, this morning, I pray for discernment and faith. I pray to reconnect the relationship that I miss. I miss it.

Happy Sunday :)

hindsight, meet foresight. foresight, hindsight.

I am learning. So many things about so many things. It's wonderful, I'm tired, and I am waiting for more.

Come gather 'round people
Wherever you roam
And admit that the waters
Around you have grown
And accept it that soon
You'll be drenched to the bone.
If your time to you
Is worth savin'
Then you better start swimmin'
Or you'll sink like a stone
For the times they are a-changin'.

Come writers and critics
Who prophesize with your pen
And keep your eyes wide
The chance won't come again
And don't speak too soon
For the wheel's still in spin
And there's no tellin' who
That it's namin'.
For the loser now
Will be later to win
For the times they are a-changin'.

. . .

The line it is drawn
The curse it is cast
The slow one now
Will later be fast
As the present now
Will later be past
The order is
Rapidly fadin'.
And the first one now
Will later be last
For the times they are a-changin'.

[Bob Dylan]

But where has the chamomile tea gone?

Quite a bit has happened to me since I've been here last - I've gone from whining about drawing to stressing about rent and how much my feet hurt from standing on them all day. I've discovered the real world, via moving to a town 7 hours away from home to start fresh and find myself. Or dig myself out of myself, I suppose.

So where is this elusive self? Who, exactly, am I? I think to find an answer is to miss the point. I think asking the question misses the point. You are who you are; you are how you behave, what you feel, and what you love. It changes daily and the closest thing to definition awarded us seems to be a hazy and dynamic outline. I'm slowly adjusting to, and learning to appreciate, the uncertainty and security that brings, oddly enough. The two do actually go together. If I am not something, I cannot be constrained by trying to fit into that something and thus am more completely myself.

I should write a self-help book.

(Jokes, friends, jokes)

But I will always be tempted to fit in somewhere. And letting go of fitting in doesn't mean I won't ever be comfortable or right for some place or someone, a good fit will simply be left to fate and more meaningful for it.

Right?

Oh, to find the balance between doing and letting things be done.

Ready . . . Set . . .

I come to you tonight when I should be drawing. I keep talking about how I should be working on my sketchbook, and I've decided that I'm going to stop talking about it and either do it or not do it. I've also decided to deepen my resolve by talking to you about it.

For now, I'm listening to Patty Griffin. If her music was a religion I would have converted about a month ago. 

I am chomping at the reins, my friends, and as soon as they break I will lurch forward, stop cold, look around in bewilderment, and frantically try to put them back on so I can pull on them again. It's funny how I know that and cannot keep from chomping anyway. I feel good, though - I can tell that my patterned exam-week apathy is not going to generalize to any area beside academics. I'll have a couple of days to deal.

I am so excited for the future, but as much as I didn't want it to happen I will be leaving a part of myself here. It's like editing. You write your first draft and you're pretty happy with it, you know? It's not great, but it communicates what you want it to and the more you read it, the more comfortable you are with it. Then, it comes back with scribbles and marks everywhere and you cut, paste, and shift around until the same piece is almost unrecognizable. A distant cousin to the first, maybe. And again, you're satisfied. It's good. But there are more marks and notes when it returns to you. Entire paragraphs get deleted, and new ones added. Ideas nixed, connections created. And it flows even better than you could have ever imagined when you sat down to write the first draft. 

Carving! Life and editing are both like wood-carving. That's what I was trying to say. 

Hooray for stacked metaphors : ).

I'm going to go draw now.

Computers and labs and spreadsheets, oh my!

I've been working on my thesis for the past few days almost exclusively, minus (kind of) studying for my social psych test, so I'm taking this opportunity to rest before I have to work on my presentation. I realize that my short break has turned into a two to three hour break, and I'm alright with that. I'll work tonight. 

My life, of late, has been very full and challenging academically. Personally, it's been very happy and relaxed; the combination of which has made for the best series of moods I've had in awhile. A fantastic change of pace from my restlessness pre-Spring Break. I think visiting WVU helped, and I think being invested in my thesis has been really helpful as well. 

Ah, The Beatles. So much better.

I feel centered. And capable and happy and content in a very self-aware way. It's a nice place to be - comfort without naivete. I always end up sacrificing happiness to get rid of the blindness that seems to accompany it. Not that it necessarily has to, but that's the pattern I've noticed in my life. Hooray for closet extremism : ).

I've been going to Mass for the past couple of Sundays. It's the tradition I needed, you know? It has a weight and reverence that contemporary Christian culture just doesn't understand sometimes. Not that you have to go to Mass to find that kind of reverence, but I just feel like Catholic services are so beautiful. I'm currently in a place that is settled enough that weak guitar chords and empty harmonies just can't reach it. I suppose that's a little harsh, but I just really struggle with modern churches at times. They rub me the wrong way after awhile. I know that eventually, when I am somewhere for a long enough time to invest in a community I will, but until then I will continue in my lack of commitment. If I'm not able to be fully sustained by a church body, I would much rather come late on Sunday and sit in the back, take in what I need to, and leave without talking to anyone. I realize that probably creates an undesirable spiral, but undesirable is a relative term. 

I should clarify - all of this may sound like I reject the idea of community in general. I do not. I hold it in such high esteem that I have a problem settling for anything less than almost-perfection. Hence my problem. I just feel that a church community should be raw, open, diverse, loving, moving, and active. I'm going to find one. I'm going to find that place that opens me up and teaches me how to love. Right now, Mass does a better job in that area than the churches here. But that's just life - no one's perfect, no religious institution is perfect, and I will attend the ones that match where I am in my life. I will take from them what I will, and their doctrine will expand and solidify my ideas about the world, my faith, and my religion.

Wow. Well there you are : ). Sounds a bit defensive, doesn't it? I suppose it is.

I told myself I was going to start working at seven, and it is now 7:30, so I'm going to leave you to your evening. Enjoy : ).

the depart[ure]

Alright. Today was a good day. I just watched The Departed, and am therefore sitting on my couch with What Not to Wear on mute, listening to my newly acquired Bob Dylan and blogging. Seek comfort much?

I can't figure out if it (the movie) was the empathetic catharsis I needed or whether it will trigger a complete overload. I guess I'll find out tomorrow, won't I? These things take awhile to sink in. Fantastic movie, because it was very raw and very unapologetic. 

I'm letting life settle in still; it's working it's way there slowly. I-uh, I think that I just haven't been properly prepared for life. Not to throw blame, just to say I don't think being prepared for life is possible. Or desirable, on further inspection, because isn't that what people always claim is the fun part? Either they have no idea what they're talking about, or I'm missing the point. 

At the moment, I'm pretty sure it's the latter, and I think that I've used all my book knowledge, all of my theory, to build a wall that has very successfully kept me from the real world. I think I built it very quickly in response to being turned on my head, and I don't think I had the mental or emotional capacity at the time to realize what I was doing. I didn't realize the implications of the wall; I didn't realize how long it would take me to take it town. I threw it up, but I'm having to take it down piece by piece. It's a tall wall. Rickety and precarious, as well - talk about detail work.

Now, it is important to communicate this: music still makes me smile when I'm alone in my car. My heart still grows when I realize how real and great my friends are, and I still love the way sunlight moves between tree branches. I am myself, and myself is scarred and a little broken. I am elitist, I am really intense, I am overly concerned about my relationship with the world at large, and I am a complete and total softy. I follow my heart and it gets me in trouble. I organize the little things in my life because I don't ever want my life to be totally organized. I forget who I am and where I come from all too often. Probably daily.

I'm currently rediscovering those things; I think I've finally accepted the fact that they got away from me without my knowledge, says the control freak. And now, the journey! When did I decide that the cycle had stopped? Silly me. 

I am officially exhausted, so I think I'm going to drift off to sleep with my earphones in and my mind a thousand miles away. 

I don't care what consequence it brings

I have been a fool for lesser things

[billy joel]

caffeine. and happiness.

Well. I am remarkably better off than I was a few days ago. Two (2) tests and a paper done, one (1) pair of fantastic green shoes (I'll be talking about them for awhile), and one (1) pair of comfortable grey khaki's, and life is officially good, ladies and gentlemen. 

Tomorrow I'm off to visit an old friend in Cullowhee. Ca-lauw-ey? Ca-loo-wa-hee? Ha. It's Cu-la-wee. Anyway, it will be awesome and I'm going to watch Ghost Hunters and High School Musical 3. 

And then, off to West Virginia for a tour of my potential home for the next two years! I'm terrified and excited. I've realized that I've given my admission/rejection to this program a lot of power over my emotions, and I'm in the process of recovering from that unhealthy devotion. It's just a school, I'm just a candidate, we'll see what happens. If nothing else, it will be wonderful to see my mom and aunt and visit a cool town. oh yeah, and wear my new green shoes . . .

Hooray for the little things that make a difference. Truly, all I needed was a break : ). 

I'm off to class. I'm sure I'll be back soon.

furnished souls (part deux)

It's always interesting to read over my posts from high school. I have some very profound moments, and some very angst-y ones. It's also interesting that I decided to start using capitalization in my last post. I think I'll continue - it's probably about time.

I do want to talk about this idea of furnished souls, though. It was the title of one of my old posts, and I have no idea what it meant to me at the time, but I think it's a really cool concept. It brings in the heart-house metaphor, actually; you start out with an empty room and slowly different pieces of furniture are added and taken away as you get older until you finally settle into the best arrangement. If I had to pick the part of the process that I'm in right now, I'd say that I have an arm chair and maybe a lamp, but I'm getting ready to buy the couch. It's a big decision. It's also a big commitment. A commitment to myself, further, which brings up my struggle this summer about being able to devote myself to . . . me. It's very hard for me to do, I'm realizing, because I've trained myself to think that if I don't pay attention to what others want intently, they won't want me around. I bet you anything I'm worried that if I stop paying attention, people will leave. Such a people pleaser, and on such a deep and dangerous level!

This is not to say that I don't think my friends are really my friends. If there is one thing I've learned in the past few years it is the amazing loyalty that a good girl friend provides. No, I'm simply teasing apart why I've been so . . . prickly, lately. Not even prickly, though - it's more of a rawness. Not in the authentic, this-is-my-soul way, but in more of an ow-don't-touch-that way. It's fear, insecurity, overwhelmedness. I think it may be part sleep-deprivation, though that's only been in small increments. As I stay up to blog rather than going to sleep. 

Right.

Do you know what it really is? Catastrophizing. According to spell check that isn't a word, but I think my point is communicated. I should compartmentalize, and I am just now recognizing that.

Exposure is one of the most basic, hardest things. In a very solidifying way, I suppose. Jury's still out : ).

have no fear for giving in

have no fear for giving over

even if your hands are shaking

and your faith is broken

even as the eyes are closing

do it with a heart wide open

I wonder if this will come off as melodramatic. I hope not, and that is not my intention. I think I just need to practice. Communicating myself, I mean. Not that I've not been communicating, you know? I just haven't been communicating well or accurately because I'm afraid of what will come out. Funny, that - it sets me farther off sometimes. 

Well. I think I'm going to go sleep. Note: music is as good for the soul as TV is bad for it, I think.

'Night.

 

a new deep

I only have about 10 minutes before I have to go to class, but I thought I would share a new epiphany. 

When I was in high school, I thought 'depth,' with regards to a level of comprehension, represented this dark, claustrophobic place that was comfortable and hole-ish. My idea of depth was very melancholy and safe, looking back on it. Now, I've discovered that depth is definitely undefined, but it is not necessarily dark. It's more of a haze. And what's more, it's terrifyingly open-ended, rather than the corner I assumed it to be. I think depth is like the light at the end of the tunnel, actually (forgive the cliche) - it represents an expansion of the field of vision. Further, until you are right on the cusp of leaving the tunnel, you have no idea what it will look like except that it will be bigger than your tunnel. 

As soon as I made the decision to apply to graduate school this year I knew it was the right one. Granted, it took me awhile to accept that I'd actually made a decision, but within a day I was set. That's pretty telling, I think. Here's hoping it all comes together in the next three weeks. 

Oh my. 

I think there is a lot more going on with me in general right now, but I'm going to save it for the journal that I forgot to bring with me to campus today. Perhaps tomorrow morning I'll just journal at the coffee shop and then get work done for the rest of the day. 

Happy Thursday.

simplicity and sincerity

i climbed a tree, the high kind

there's my house in the city

there's my car that will break down tomorrow

and don't start something now

cause i won't cause anything at all

phhhhh boy. happy valentine's day. i feel like my self-awareness chart has hit the part in the exponential curve that skyrockets. so i'm soaring, which is what every girl wants to feel, but i'm soaring with myself and my rapidly increasing self-knowledge. slight bummer. sometimes that knowledge is comforting, but most of the time it isn't. 

i just watched nick and norah's infinite playlist, which i loved. it made me realize that i'm not longing for what i think i'm longing for. most of this is loneliness. there might be about 2% that is specific to my situation, and the other 98% has been with me forever and only flares up when it knows it has a chance to get to me. i hate that, because that means so many different people could hurt me simply by working through that 2% to trigger the 98%. it doesn't take much, does it. i also hate it because it makes me put every similar situation into one pile so that i can hate them all and ascend to martyrdom that much quicker in my mind. 

but life, really, is going so well. my future is wide open in front of me, i am invested in projects that i love and can really give myself to. why would i stare into the distance, you know? why would i daydream? why would i need anything else than what i have right now. 

and yet : ).

i suppose i should just let my heart do what it will and build up my logical reactions rather than logical preventions, hm. focus on labeling and sorting rather than stopping. i'd probably be surprised, maybe a little relieved.

i'm going to finish my book and work on my sketchbook. and i'm going to go.

[loney, dear]

oh, life. part 437550.

funny story.

the sermon this morning was on sympathizing with others, putting yourself in their place, basically what i outlined in my last post. great, right? humility and selflessness are two things i really love and strive for, so i felt encouraged, supported, and right in my thinking. 

then, through a (short) series of mishaps, i ended up feeling angry and stuffy and bitter and just awful, really. UPSET. granted, my upset was an appropriate reaction, but my entitlement was not. i think people assume those things are the same, but being upset is completely different from feeling entitled. upset is hurt, it is a personal reaction to a situation - feeling entitled is insecurity, it is vengefulness. if i don't condone that in others i certainly don't condone it in myself.

this communication thing is going to really drag me through the mud, isn't it? i've got to learn how to communicate with people, especially people i care about. i'm on my way, but you have no idea how deeply ingrained this keep-quiet-and-deal-with-it pattern is ingrained. or maybe you do : ).

i've gotten away with being partially honest with people for a long time. not that i haven't been myself, and not that i haven't been genuine, but i always keep this one part hidden - like i have a storm shelter under the house and i'll let people jump on the beds all they want as long as they don't TOUCH the storm shelter. but now, i'm faced with a situation that necessitates the opening of the shelter door. it's time to clean it out. if i don't open the door, the house will have to be closed up for a long time. and if i do, i still might have to close up shop for a bit, but at least the shelter will be clean. best case scenario, i might end up being able to have everything open for everyone. just imagine! the freedom.

I sigh with frustration with myself. such a simple thing, such a true, simple thing and i am railing against it with all of my might. pride and fear are two very powerful motivators, my friends.

well. i feel so much better than i did three hours ago. i just hope i can work my way through this emotional block - it's a relatively big wall i'm trying to push down at the moment. 

sometimes that mountain you've been climbing

is just a grain of sand

what you've been out there searching for forever 

is in your hands

when you figure out love is all that matters after all

is sure makes everything else seem so small

[carrie underwood - i know, i know, but it fits, does it not?]

from pessimists

my life, of late, is a study on selflessness. perhaps that's why i've been thinking about sophomore year so much. i think at points during that phase in my life my application of selflessness looked a lot like masochism, and i'm very aware of the danger of falling into old habits presently. my reoccurring struggle with selflessness is in its definition. well, really, it is more in the day to day fulfillment of that definition, because that is where i miss the mark, in everything, 99.7% of the time.

i think selflessness is a sacrifice of self. i think that means putting others' needs above your own. i think that means being willing to get hurt if it will help someone else, if it will encourage their heart, if it will help them recover from something they've lost.

masochism, right?

see, not necessarily.

the kicker is that all the while, your self has to be wrapped up in the only one who can hold it together through all of those things. this does not mean a reckless chucking of the heart to anywhere but here and calling it faith. the real meaning of selflessness is not an avoidance of self's existence, it is a conscientious placement of the self, my self, in God's hands, so that he may put it wherever it is needed. and more often than not, my friends, my heart is needed elsewhere. did you notice the subconscious interchanging of the words "self" and "heart?" that was not intentional, but it is the most accurate description of how i view both of those things.

the desperation in selflessness comes from a lack of trust in the one who has your heart. or it may be that you've misplaced your heart thinking you've put it in his hands. i think the latter may be partially true in my present circumstances. i'm not sure the person at which i'm throwing my heart is the big man upstairs : ). i'm not sure that the person is not him, either, but that's the thing, isn't it.

i cannot escape the charge i feel to give. i think it is true and right and i think that giving of my heart is something that i couldn't avoid if i tried. in fact, i think most of my intense struggles have come from a misallocation of the resources i've been given. meaning, i don't ever stop or shift from that mindset, i just put it toward inappropriate things.

and, you know, none of this is to say that i've learned nothing, or that my mistakes were only that. they've all been really great growth processes and i wouldn't erase them if i could.

i think, right now, all i can do is continue using my heart for what it's been made. giving. i think i need to stop asking why questions and start asking how and what questions. how best can i love people? what do they really need from me? i think if i do that faithfully and with my full heart i will have a wonderful, rewarding life. and i can hope that some day, someone will act as the one whose charge it is to support and protect that lifestyle, you know? maybe some day, but i mustn't expect that of people.

just to see you smile

i'd do anything

that you wanted me to

when all is said and done

i'd never count the cost

it's worth all that's lost

just to see you smile

[lady antebellum/tim mcgraw]

hoo boy. here it goes (again).

i've never done well with transition, but i think i assumed college would change me. i think i felt like a new environment would breed a new personality. the more i think about it, the more i realize that i had a goal in mind, as far as who i wanted to be in college (and now, after college). in so many ways i've approached that goal, and in so many ways i'm exactly who i was when i pulled up to school freshman year. 

i think i need to realize that there's nothing wrong with that - just because my personality is consistent doesn't mean i'm hopeless, right? ha. but really, that's where my despair comes from, that's the part that overwhelms me - the idea that if i really am tied to this personality, then i will never grow into what i want to be. as good as i am at picking out others' potential, i fail miserably at turning that inward. and i fail at trusting that he made me this way for a reason; it's a hard thing to believe when you have front row seats to the jessie show. 

well, here's the thing - i think i focus my perfectionism inward because i don't believe it's right to ask that much of other people. and yet it's fair to ask that much of myself? of course not, but i never claimed to be logical.

that's a helpful realization. i hadn't thought about that before.

a season of growth, ladies and gentlemen. i haven't had one like this in quite awhile : ). i suppose i say that a lot, but every one is always different. and this one is very reminiscent of my high school seasons. i think that's a good thing, though it may not sound like it.

alright. to motivation! and more writing! on a slightly less personal topic. and in a slightly more challenging form. 

happy monday : )

to know

this holiday season has been one of intense mental struggle. i feel like my entire adolescent drive to find myself resurfaced and has crammed itself into three weeks of racing thoughts and tired eyes. 

i wonder if this crisis has anything to do with the (unfulfilled) expectation that my self would become more clear as i entered the adult world.

i believe i had a more sure and accurate picture of myself when i was in high school than i do now. my picture of others has become much more accurate, but it feels like i made a trade - one for the other. knowledge of the world gained by sacrificing knowledge of myself. hopefully now the pendulum will begin to swing back toward internal knowledge.

i read back over my last post and had to laugh - i don't even remember what crises were presenting themselves to me in november. i can guess, but how similar of a place i'm in a month and a half later! is there no progress in this life?

i'm tired of thinking. i say that knowing that it is and always will be my escape of choice, for to think about something delays doing anything about it. i've fallen away from everything that i had come to identify with, and when i come home that becomes painfully obvious. and home to me is no longer my parents' house, it is these mountains, this culture, this openness to life and knowledge of the world beyond that simply does not exist in my chosen exposure to academia. i can only hope graduate school will occur in a place that is positive and nurturing. i can't take seven more years of this inner conflict.

i've re-read a description of my personality type and have realized how far away my life is from what it should be in order for me to be my most productive and happy, hence the previous paragraph. my temperament, and i believe this description is correct, is one that values the positive aspects of the world. the atmosphere i've been in for the past four years has a very negative energy to it. i do honestly think that the disconnect caused by that conflict is one that's done a lot of damage in my emotional life. this year, i've been involved in the process of reclaiming myself emotionally, i think, and i sincerely hope that process continues and gains momentum in this new year.

i wonder if self-awareness and awareness of the world and others can co-exist. 

i hope so. there is a large part of my heart that truly believes they cannot, but the small part of it that doesn't overrides it.

perhaps i've found my resolution for 2009 - achieving greater self-awareness without sacrificing my consideration of and for others. last year it was to appreciate the beauty in the world. i think i accomplished it fairly well; i did lose my inward focus, after all. 

i should write a letter. 

happy new year : ).