Life of Pride
Honest thoughts on life and loveLast night I watched the movie
Amazing Grace, and then I slept for nine hours. I feel remarkably peaceful on every level right now. Since I have been unusually exhausted this past week, I am taking advantage of this temporary window of clearheadedness in order to sum up the conclusions of the last few months.
I spoke with Mr. Escobar, my movie project mentor, yesterday. He asked me if I wanted to go into movie work after graduation. I didn't know how to answer, because I am torn two different ways right now. I am trying to decide both what God wants from me as a human being and what He wants from me as a woman. This is confusing for me as a high-IQ woman who wants to get married some day and love a family. I know that I possess some talents that are rare for either men or women. Language, words, and the abstract world are for me colors and music to be shaped. I
see. Dr. Hake told my parents once that I had an "uncanny" ability to do this. One thing is for sure - it comes from outside of me. I cannot reason it into existence. It just is. Thus, I pray for words every time I sit down to write.
Last night after
Amazing Grace, I was stunned. Carried away. It wasn't so much the movie itself, but the conviction: "That's the sort of movie I want to write." But I am afraid to give myself wholeheartedly to this end because I am a woman. I want to be willing to give up whatever I am doing in order to help a husband. I have seen in my own family the results of a business based around the wife's talents and genius without strong spiritual leadership stemming from the husband, and I don't want to duplicate it. I
fear duplicating it.
My other major talent is with people. I can often "read" them too. I told Christy the other day, "When I look at a person, I see something beautiful inside. I want to touch that beauty." This is part of my personality as an ENFJ, a Teacher-type. I see potential, and I long to develop it. In the excess, which I have to restrain, this turns into an inclination to "fix" folks. They can be more. They can
always be more. Only God knows what that is, and only God-given wisdom can focus my teaching instincts rightly.
See, my complement is supposed to be an ENFP, a person very like a Teacher-type, only concerned with people's spiritual well-being instead of with the development of their talents. I am only slightly tongue-in-cheek when I say that this means I am supposed to marry a pastor/evangelist someday.
I have many more thoughts, but they will have to wait. It is time for me to attempt a two-mile run with my team for the adventure race.
I am tempted to tell myself that I am pathetic because I started working on a ten-page essay last Saturday and as of today I have only 7.5 pages to show for it. But then I realize that I didn't have the faintest clue at the start of last Saturday what I was going to write, and now I have 7.5 pages! Besides, I have written 32.5 pages altogether since the semester began, not counting poetry and miscellaneous. That's not too bad.
It's the same way I am beating myself up because I can run only 1.7 miles at once right now, instead of the many miles other people can. I forget that this is most endurance I have had for five years, and that a month ago I could finish barely half a mile without stopping. I guess I'm doing OK.
Besides, to beat myself up for my best efforts is to be ungrateful to God for what He has decided to give me right now. Who am I to tell God that His gifts aren't good enough?
My current theme verses:
"Keep thy heart with all diligence; for out of it are the issues of life. Put away from thee a froward mouth, and perverse lips put far from thee. Let thine eyes look right on, and let thine eyelids look straight before thee. Ponder the path of thy feet, and let all thy ways be established. Turn not to the right hand nor to the left: remove thy foot from evil" (Proverbs 4:23-27).
On a random note, people were skating out in the soccer field today. That was surreal.
We have today off from classes, thanks to snow and ice. I approve. I need to finish my Faith & Reason essay. Will I? I don't know. I'd better. It's just so hard to change my mind from one sort of writing to another. I've been so focused on my screenplay for a month and half that academic papers feel alien. But I'll bet I can do it. I have only 8.5 pages left.
Yesterday I stood up for five and a quarter hours - four hours at my scanner job in the kitchen, and 1:15 in Chorale. Still, in the evening I managed to do my weights workout and run 1.6 miles. That's more distance than last week - and I ran it faster! :D
There's a lot of exciting stuff coming up. God willing, I'll be able to start filming my movie by the end of spring break. Also in the middle of March, Ultimate Frisbee intramural league begins. I thought I was going to miss out, but one of my good friends is starting a new team. It's fun organizing for that. Possibly even more exciting is "The Forge," an adventure race coming up on April 28th. In a single Saturday, teams of six people will run 2.5 miles, bike 10-12 miles, navigate a compass course, and do a couple of other things that are not yet set. I'm on a team! We get to plan all that out as well, which is something I ought to be good at. I know a lot about food, training, supplements, all that good stuff... because I did several Body-for-Life challenges when I was 18.
I don't think I'm going to grad school this year. I don't want to. I've told my mom for a few years now that I would much prefer to work at PHC after graduation. This isn't just wanting to stick around. I wouldn't want to do that. But there really is something special happening here, and I've felt a fervent kinship to it from the start. A new job is opening up - Alumni Relations Coordinator - and I think I would be perfectly suited to it. I've applied, and I will know by the end of March.
March looks to be a turning point for me. Meanwhile, I have to live out the rest of cold February.
I'm exhausted, but I can't sleep. I woke up randomly half an hour ago at 4am, and my eyelids keep closing, but my head hurts.
Last night I kept waking up also. In the middle of that, I dreamed, and I remember the dream. I never remember my dreams. It was more like a vision, it was so clear.
"I" wasn't really in the picture, but from my viewpoint I was gazing up at dark, layered, dramatic clouds that covered the sky. I was expectant; I knew something was going to happen. Almost immediately, a hole opened up in the clouds, and a pillar of light shone through. I felt an intense rush of joy, and my breath left me. "It's Jesus!" I thought. "He's coming, and
right now I can stop struggling."
Then somehow the whole picture turned sideways so that I could see straight up through the hole in the clouds, like a tunnel. Jesus wasn't there. It was only light.
I was so disappointed. No, I was devastated. It was a combination of feeling ignorant (how could I have possibly thought it was Jesus coming?) and straight-up sadness and loss of something beautiful that I had grasped for just a second.
Still, it could have been. When He does come, maybe it will look just like that. So the dream was a gift as well.
Wow, what a bad attitude I had over the last few days. I'm not sure where it came from, but I suspect it had something to do with the draining effects of giving blood. I am also not sure where the bad attitude went, but I feel like people are praying for me. I had to make some tough decisions again; it seems like that's all life is right now.
I was so blessed by volunteering at the Purcellville Teen Center tonight. The kids were actually glad to see us. I had made a sort of challenge with one girl, Anna, that I could bring a book she would like. Today I stopped by Final Draft, the used-book store in P'ville, and found a selection of three choices. She chose
Ramona and Her Mother, probably my own favorite of the ones I had bought. I hope she likes it, since she is grounded and can't come next week.
And I am sad, deeply sad. I can't begin to understand the hurt and deadness in some of those kids' eyes. I just want to love them. So much prayer is needed...
People don't often think to invite me to cool, fun things. Like concerts or dances. I get picked last in Frisbee. I wonder why this is? I have never been to a popular concert, so I don't know how to take myself. I'm a good dancer, but I've never had a chance to learn with a guy who also likes to dance. I enjoy Frisbee, and I do OK at it. I feel like I'm missing out on part of life. There's more
human stuff going on that I should understand.
I want to learn to ski! I want to surf! I want to climb a tall mountain and swim in the ocean. I want to travel around Europe and see Inca ruins in South America.
There is a time for every purpose under Heaven.
Today we have a snow day at school - the first all school year. I want to work on my screenplay all day and watch a DVD in the evening. I'm having trouble working on the screenplay. I'm seized up with self-doubt right now. Can I do this project? What makes me think I'm a writer? Mr. B. emailed me back to say he can't mentor this semester after all. Some people I was really counting on can't help. A Mr. E. in the area told me last Thursday that he could help out with equipment and such, and I emailed him on Friday. I haven't heard back from him yet. Other students are working on their own movie stuff here on campus as well, dividing resources.
Right now this project rests on my initiative alone. What makes me think I can do it?
This morning I looked out at the snowy fields behind Founders Hall. After a second, I pushed through the doors of the dining hall and struck out across the white powder. Someone's footsteps led out into the soccer field; I followed them all around the field's perimeter. A deer's tracks ran across the human ones. I stopped and made a snow angel. Then I came back in.
I have hot chocolate. It is warm in my hands. I think I can write now.
I'm so jazzed. I've been jazzed all day. Last night, Maggie D. and Taylor S. convinced me to come to the P'ville Teen Center as a volunteer to hang out with the kids and keep order if necessary. I am so glad I went. Those are kids with so much potential, and almost all of it untapped. We met three in particular - Jeffrey, Dante, and a boy who calls himself "Satan" - for whom my heart especially reaches out. Their lives up to this point have been absolutely undirected and full of misery. "Satan" kept trying to shock us with gruesome stories and phrases. I told him he couldn't be Satan, because Jesus hates Satan, but Jesus would love him. He told me he would kill me in a heartbeat. I told him he didn't frighten me. And he didn't. He was just tryin' to make me go away. I'm not going; I'm coming back next Friday.
This morning I read this verse in Acts. It comes after Paul and Barnabas have been preaching to the Jews and Gentiles at Antioch and winning many to Jesus' side. The city then expels the disciples:
"But they shook off the dust of their feet against them, and came unto Iconium. And the disciples were filled with joy, and with the Holy Ghost" (Acts 13:51-52).That's how I feel - filled with joy and with the Holy Ghost. That hour and a half at the teen center renders all my troubles into perspective. What are my troubles? Basically, I don't know whether to work for a year, hang out with my happy & loving family, or go to grad school. Those kids don't even know that their entire lives have value. I am blown away with my blessings and overwhelmed with the imbalance between my life and theirs. I have been given so much. What will I do with it? Oh Lord, I don't deserve any of it.
... So many things to say, but I can't. I'm sorry. That's all. I'm sorry.
...
