Waking up

Most of the inspirations for this blog are sort of base off Jesus ah-ha! moment. This entry, however, is not. This is a little bit different then my normal blogs and so I caution the reader, if you choose to continue, know that this a more a confession then a revelation. It's me realizing it's time to wake up and put my big girl panties on. This realization is brought to you by an episode of Desperate Housewives.

At some point in our lives we are taught to believe that marriage is blissful, perfect, and you will always be happy. Sure, there will be times of struggle, but no matter what you will always have that deep connection with your mate that will pull you through and if it doesn't, you simply were not meant to be. We are taught that love is an emotion that comes, and it makes you always want to put your spouse first. At some point in our lives we are taught lies about marriage, and at some point we will realize it's all bullshit.

The day I married my husband I had no doubts. I believed I loved him more then the moon and stars and that I would always feel that way. The day I married my husband I was a fool.

Forward down the road some years and a baby and you come to where we are now. Distant. Empty. Tired. Broken. All of the things we were before we "feel in love." We have learned that despite what all the Disney stories tell us, one will never be good enough for the other. We can never meet one another's ever need and we will never make each other happy. We are learning that love was not that incredibly powerful emotion that brought us together, but it is looking at each other knowing our short comings, and choosing to stay anyway.

How does Desperate Housewives play into this you ask? During the last week I have been super sick, living on the couch watching Netflix. I believe it's episode 68, but Lynnette has been working the family Pizzaria while her husband is home in bed after back surgery. Her assistant manager, Rick, has been cooking her an amazing dinner every night and they have been flirting while enjoying each-other's company. In this episode, Rick addresses the fact that they have grown to have feelings for each other and Lynnette gets super angry. She says "Yes we were flirting, and that's all we can ever do because I am married and now it has to end."

That moment gave me chills. Here she is, with a strained marriage, five kids, and a gorgeous (and I believe younger) man is trying to steal her heart, and she honors her promise. I know so many can argue that she may have over stepped a boundary, but she addresses the fact that there is one there and that she has been dancing on, but refuses to cross. No matter how awful her husband has been, no matter how strained their marriage, no matter how pissed off she was at him, she choose to keep her promise.

Earlier in the show Tom, Lynnette's husband, invites Rick to lunch and calls him out on his affection for Lynnette. Tom informs Rick that he needs to quit because of his feelings for Lynnette. When Rick refuses, Tom tells Rick that all he is going to accomplish is putting a huge hole in Lynnette's marriage and cause her pain, but that eventually the hole will heal. Tom stands firm that no matter what, he chooses to stand by his wife. He chooses to honor his promise.

Insert wake up call. My husband and I have been working hard at saving our marriage for almost a year now, sometimes one party harder then the other. There have been moments of hurt, of weakness, of anger, but the one thing we've never done, is left. I have been a horrible wife somedays, a wife that most would consider leaving, but he never did. He's been an awful husband a few times, a lot of women would have left, I never did. We've honored our promise. I felt that "ah-ha!" moment and a sense of relief. Just because we don't feel all goo-goo gaga anymore, doesn't mean we don't love each other. The fact that we choose to stay married, we choose to not leave, we choose to do the work, that is love.

So love is work. Love is a choice. Love is a verb. In order for a marriage to work, you must work. That's how you earn those blissful moments, that amazing sense of safety and security, but working at it, together, and keeping your promise to stay. No matter what.

Echo

Sometimes I get overwhelmed by how my body and soul are so separate. I can see this image of  myself trapped in a large hollow cave screaming at the top of my lungs, but no one can hear me. In this picture, my body is the mountain in which the cave lies and I am my soul, tucked deep in the heart of the massive mountain.  I am smarter than the mountain, able to think, speak, move, rationalize. I am aware of how things are, unlike the mountain which is solely shaped by its surroundings of the outside environment. Unfortunately, I am trapped in this gigantic stone cage, not able to use myself to my full potential, and I am screaming to get out.

I hear my soul's voice echo, much like you would a person yelling from inside a cave. It calls out; "Love, with all you are, unconditionally. "

I can't say I am always good at listening to my soul. Much like a mountain, my body is also weathered and worn by the judgment and influence of others. I cave and chip to wind, the rain and the sun as they beat away at all the things I know to be true.  I notice the echoes fading as my soul becomes weaker and weaker.

Then I hear someone else; "I know you can do it. I love you. Love others: with all you are, unconditionally, as I have loved you." This voice stirs me. I can hear my soul's echoes become louder with this voice and I can feel my stone break away. The mountain moves. For a short moment I am one, body and soul the way I was meant to be. But all too quickly the storm clouds roll in, the hail and rain beat against me. Still there is that strong echo; "I know you can do it. I love you. Love others: with all you are, unconditionally, as I have loved you."

Why is unconditional love so difficult? Why is it so hard to see through a person's flaws, sins, inadequacies and see the beauty our Father sees in us?

John 13:34: “A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. ³⁵ By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.” 


I think one of my favorite things about this is that Jesus says this right before he sends Judas out to turn Him into the authorities. In my mind this is intentional. He doesn't say "Love one another, as I have loved you, until your brother sins against Me, then hate him."  Jesus knew what was about to take place. I think about what would have be different if Judas had not killed himself. What would Jesus have done when He rose three days later? I think He would have embraced him like the prodigal son. He would have loved him. 


My soul wants to love like Jesus. My body wants the opposite. So that battle continues, my soul screaming at the top of her lungs for this mountain to move. Praise God that he can move mountains, that He can speak to my body and my soul and teach me to love unconditionally! Praise God for Jesus living in my soul and His magnificent voice echoing through my body!

Neighbors

My mom and I were recently talking and I was (a little pridefully, if I am honest) correcting her misquoting of a verse: Matthew 22:39.  Mom had believed it said "Love your neighbor as I (being God/Jesus) have loved you." I corrected her with the actual scripture which is "Love your neighbor as you love yourself."  The next day while driving to work, I was going over the conversation in my head. I was thinking about how cool I was to be able to correct scripture to my mom of all people! Then it hit me. My mom was not so off base.  Her thought process actually made more sense then what the actual verse read as.

Why wouldn't Jesus have commanded us to love our neighbors as He has loved us? Isn't that the greatest love you can have?

Mulling over this question, I started to think about how people treat each other. I thought about how people who treat others like crap usually feel about themselves. Bingo! That is our problem: we do not understand how much God loves us, how much He wants for us to love and value ourselves, so we cannot love our neighbors the way God has called us. This realization brought so many thoughts over me. We are all doing the best we can to love on each other, but it is so hard to do when we cannot find the love within ourselves to put out. We are a broken people who insist on carrying burdens too big for us. This is why we need to lean on God.

As I recall, Jesus was not a doormat.  He rested when He needed, He prayed when He needed and He served when God told him. Jesus knew He was no good to anyone else if He did not know His limits, His value and His abilities through God.  By loving ourselves how God loves us, we will in turn love our neighbor as we love ourselves, which is loving each other how God loves us. What a beautiful thing.

Farts

On beautiful sunny days my mom, dad and I used to "go for a drive". Sometimes we would drive to the mountain, or the apple orchards, just somewhere beautiful. We'd be driving along, mom blasting Celine Dion or Fleetwood Mac and all of us just taking in Oregon at its best. Then my dad would fart. It would be the most foul, rank, rotten egg bomb! Mom and I would scream, dad would laugh all while mom struggled for a ciggarette and lighter to cover the smell.

I feel like I have been breathing farts. I know that sounds gross, but seriously think about what a distraction that is. Here you can be in a beautiful moment and it is ruined, ruined! I have been trying to focus on the beauty and truth around me, but it's so hard when you can't breath.  What's sad is that after time, you get used to the "smell." You may no longer be completely distracted, but it's still there, poisoning the air, ruining the moment.

I have always believed things about myself that have held me back from fully enjoying relationships, I had farts hanging around, if you will. I would be in a moment with someone bearing our souls, or sharing something joyful or beautiful and I wouldn't be getting it all. There would be this sour smell telling me "you're still not good enough," or "they really don't care, you're just the only option they had." Then up would go my walls, like covering my mouth and nose with the collar of my shirt. I don't want to talk, I don't want to breath, I don't want to love, I don't want to trust.

Someone rolled down the window. Someone did something so I could not only go back to seeing the beauty I saw before, but now I could breath and taste the beauty. Someone who didn't want me to miss a moment.

I think we often forget how God loves us. We think- yeah yeah, He loves me, died for me and forgives me.- It gets old. We live in the "what" and forget the "why". Why did Jesus die? So we could go to heaven and party? I don't think so. Will that happen? Yes. However, I have learned that there is so much more. He did it to be close to me. He did it because He loves all of who I am. He did it so that I can live a life chasing after His heart and feeling Him live in me. He did it so I can live in beauty without distraction of sin. Guiltless, without insecurity, without doubt and fee from the fog that sin creates in our surroundings. He did it so I can submit to my neighbor, so I can love freely. He did it so I can LIVE. I can experience Heaven on earth, I can experience life and relationships and breath and adrenaline and madness and joy!

I'm so ready for life. I am so ready to breathe.

Silence

I think people underestimate the power of silence. Many times it is not the words that are spoken that leave the most impact, but the words that left unsaid. Often people view silence as the absense of something, but what if instead, silence is so much of something that our physical bodies can no longer take in it?  What if silence is communication to your spirit?

When I think of the happiest moment of my life, I can not put words to what I was feeling. I was speechless. Silent. The same can be said for the darkest moments in my life. My spirit feels aching so deep there are no words, not even sounds that could describe to someone the amount of agony my soul is feeling at those moments. So I am still. I am quiet. When People think of "peace" they often think of quiet. That overwhelming sense that everything is going to be okay and the term we use is "peace and quiet." Anger is also communicated by silence. Massive amounts of distance and effort to keep communication to a minimum in order to "punish" the other person for their wrongs. Silence.

I have never heard a spirit. I have never been able to hear a soul. But I have felt them. I have felt the warmth a soul in a touch and seen the evil in one's eyes. I have physically felt a spirit touch me, but never have a I heard a word. My mind is full of words. It's constantly releasing random thoughts and tangents in the form of language or sound. But my soul, oh my soul takes over my whole body and takes whatever deep and wordless emotions I have and puts it through ever part of my being. That is when I can pray. When my mind has finally given up and my spirit is allowed to communicate with God, that is when I am the most in tune with God. When I am silent.

I know I run the risk of sounding like a complete hippy with this idea, and maybe I am. After all I am an Oregonian. All I know is, when there is silence I feel one of two things: something is so wrong, or something is so right.

Whispers

Last night was one of those nights where you fall fast asleep, wake up at some ungodly time and toss and turn until about a half hour before your alarm goes off, when you finally resume restful sleep. During these hours of drifting in and out of sleep, I heard a whisper. Normally I think these whispers are my own thoughts that I have ignored reverberating from the back of my mind, but this thought was too amazing to be my own. I can only guess it was His.

What is the point in having money and power if it only causes you to chase after more money and more power? What if you used your money and power to deeply impact others lives while still pursuing more money and power to deeply affect more lives?

I found this funny because as those around me know, I don't really have much money or power. So who was He talking to?  The image that was brought to mind made me laugh: Bono. What was really interesting was I felt him being stripped of all power before my eyes. This amazingly rich pop start who is an icon to many, was suddenly stripped down to this short, stange, greasy-haired guy with an accent that wore sunglasses inside. There is nothing especially fantastic or different about this man compared to a lot of people, he just got lucky. But what makes him very special is what he has done with the fruits of his luck. His RED campaigne with Starbucks among many other things. This is what the voice was talking about.

Even with the clarity of what was being said, why was it being said to me?  Is this foreshadowing into the things my future might hold?  Somewhere in my life is there money and power stashed that I have no idea about? Am I just a vessel for the message?  So many questions. But I know Him well enough that the answer is really none of my business. He likes to keep me guessing to keep me interested. The only answer I felt was: don't think about what your don't have, but use what you do.   Okay... What does that mean?

For now I am not sure if this whisper even requires action.  I do know that it has been resonating in my mind all morning, even though I did not remember it happened until I was sitting at my desk at work. Who knows, maybe these whispers are my own insanity induced by the inability to sleep, or maybe not...