The Essence of Me

I have a funny habit of running experiments on myself.  Before you jump to any conclusions,  I do not have little bubbling jars of neon liquids in my room (you're welcome roommates)  Its just that I like to gaze into the abyss that is the future, place myself there, observe how I think I'll react to a new situation, and then see if my hypothesis is correct in post-future retrospect.  That last sentence made absolutely no sense and I will now try to redeem it.  Here is a practical example:

When arriving at college, the expectations and reputation that I had gathered as the Chloe of Clarkston disappeared.  I knew this would be the case and so I was eagerly anticipating my actions, thoughts, friend choices, etc... to see who I would be.  Turns out, I'm quite like the Chloe of Clarkston. 

Instead of being disappointed that I didn't create some whole new personality, I'm quite relieved.  I am still spontaneously introverted, mysteriously happy in the morning no matter how much sleep I get, in love with my calender and post-its and color-coding, dedicated to studying to death, addicted to quality conversations, in awe of my amazing God, and loving the people around me.

Not much has changed, yet everything has changed.  Everything external is different, new, and changing at a mile a minute. The essence of me; however, has been delightfully consistent.  Of course, this means that I still am struggling through the same weaknesses but I have a new courage and drive to defeat them.  I am completely open to change (see last post) but do not see myself surrendering my color-coding pens anytime soon.  Speaking of, my calender is telling me that its time to continue my Genesis overload.

Until next time,
the Chloe of anywhere

Life is wonderful.

I feel like I have lived a month in the past week and could probably write a good deal on first college experiences but I am currently enjoying just living life instead of dissecting it.  So for now, I am putting away the scapel.  This does not mean that I have nothing to say.  My mind is whirling faster than it did before, just more about the width of the Fertile Cresent, how to balance equities, liabilities, and assets, and business plans then my normal introspective thoughts. 

The one rather self-reflective thought that has been making its rounds however; is about the way I percieve myself and my surroundings now in contrast to what my viewpoint will be in two years, one month, five days.  I certainly know that I am an incredibly different person than when I was in 9th grade, or even the beginning of 12th grade.  It only makes sense then, that I will change within the next four years.  I will see myself and everything else in this wonderful world very differently.  I will probably look back at my state of mind right now and give myself one of those condescending little half-grins.  I will probably read this in a year and laugh out loud. 

I completely realize how ignorant I am about self-realization, even when I think that I have myself figured out.  I used to reassure myself that I least understood myself.  Now, I reassure myself that at least I know that I don't understand myself.  At least I am aware that I am unaware.

I am far too happy to end this post on that negative note.  I am good, life is wonderful, and God is great. 

"If Time is of the Essence Then it is the Essence of Time that Ought to Direct our Stumbling Steps"

Before my trusty thumb drive, I used to email myself assignments and essays from school so I could work on them at home. I have some friends who, when they e-mail themselves, they attach a little note so they feel like they are getting email from their past selves. I used to do this, but honestly, I got tired of cyber-talking to myself. I do that enough in real life. I couldn't bear to send a sad little blank email though. Instead, I started making up quotes and giving them fake authors. They were always delightfully ambiguous. The type of quotes that would be plastered on the wall in a high school English room. The type that people would read, shake their heads thoughtfully, comment on its profoundness, then walk away without any lasting impact made because they mean absolutely nothing.

"The road to success isn't complete without a few flares along the way"  Charles Willson

"The feeling of pain never comes into the station alone--this is what makes it so unbearable.  Its friends are some of my worst enemies"  George Oversteen

I wondered what it would take to have a quote credited to you. To say something so worthwhile that it ends up plastered all over google when people search for quotes for their essays and speeches. Then I realized, no one will ever quote you unless you have some sort of credentials. For a quote to be truly powerful, then your name has to be powerful first.

This striked me as rather sad. It doesn't matter so much how beautiful or meaningful the quote is. If the wrong person says the right thing, it means nothing. If the right person says anything, it means everything. Judging the quality of what someone has to say based on who they are instead of what they have to say seems unfair at best. I like to write meaningless quotes with meaningless people attached. Yet if I actually had something of value to say, it wouldn't matter. My fake quotes would probably be taken more seriously, as long as I used a fake name that looked legitimate.

Happiness Revisited

It was rather cold this morning for August.  Driving with my back windshield fogged up because I'm too lazy to wipe it off and being awake and on the road before 8 in the morning made me feel like I was going to high school again.  However, instead of staying in the 50s all day like most school days, the sun came back and summer showed its face again. 

Today was probably just as nice as any other day this summer.  Playful sunshine and soft breezes, swaying trees and all that wonderful summer beauty.  Yet, because I woke up cold and had to put on jeans and a sweatshirt on this morning, changing into a skirt and sandals made the day seem so much more delightful. 

I find it sad that I can't appreciate how wonderful life is until I have something to contrast it with.  I don't see the sunshine until I've lived in the shadows.  I can't muster up any happiness if I never feel sad. 

Today was probably just as nice as any other day but today was more wonderful than any other day.  I have reflected back on my summer and realized it was even better than I thought.  Its been a fun experience and perhaps more importantly, a learning experience.  Even without test scores and grades to validate me, I am quite assured that I have learned just as much in the last two and a half months of living life than I did over the past year. 

I've learned how to balance my to do list and organization and obsession with getting things done with enjoying others around me and making the most of my limited time.  I've learned how to balance listening and talking, being home and being away, hiding in my writings and expressing myself out loud, staying aware of the world while staying delightfully oblivious. 

I've learned how to deem things irrelevant, such as having a balanced life, so I could live to extremes.  Quite obviously, I've also perfected the skill of contradicting myself.  At the beginning of the school year, I wrote this: http://86400seconds-smiles11.blogspot.com/2010/12/theory-3-happiness-is.html.  If you don't feel like taking the time to read it, I basically said that happiness was a worthless goal in life.  I still think joy is way more important yet hard to come by sometimes.  I have tested my theory and have lived an equally full life being indifferent to happiness as when I embraced it.  I'm not going to make happiness the main focus of my life by any means but there is more value in it than I originally supposed. 

Here is what I have found happiness to be good for:  Until I let myself feel happy, then I can't feel sad either.  Not feeling sad bothers me more than not feeling happy.  I suppose switching the order would make more sense, that it makes more sense to feel sad first so happiness means more when it comes.  Either way, a juxtaposition between the two emotions is needed, therefore happiness does have a valuable purpose.

Saying goodbye to family, friends, familiar places and memories in the next two weeks will be sad.  Yet it wouldn't be genuinely sad if those things didn't represent genuine happiness at one time or another.  This heartache is well worth years of happy memories. 

Side note:  This is my 50th post in the span of roughly a year.  Thank you all who make it to the end of these long-winded posts.

Rephrase and Rethink

One of the most frustrating feelings in the world: having something to say that you can't express.  It feels like your entire existence depends on this one moment of self-expression.  The words bounce around in my mind until they are tangled, torn, and troubled.  I rephrase and rethink.  I try to sculpt this mess of thinking mass into something someone else might possibly understand.  I force myself to look at it from a different angle, flipping the idea over and over again until I can't remember which way is up anymore.

It's exhausting, all this fruitless thinking.  So I try to distract myself.  I surround myself with new ideas, new people, new music, new books.  Yet everything I read or listen to seems to march me right back to that holding cell with my original thought, now just with some extra perspectives picked up along the way.  My distractions might be completed unrelated to my thoughts, but I'm reading and listening only to hear what I want to think about so inevitably, it comes around.

This stifling feeling of not being able to express what I want to is equaled only by a paralyzing fear of being misunderstood.  It is this fear that makes me hesitate before speaking, that can halt me in the middle of a sentence or conversation and force me to change directions completely.  My unspoken words never even got the opportunity to escape.

Yet there is something far worse than this combination of not being able to express myself or be understood.

What terrifies me most of all is this:  I arrange my ideas meticulously, polish them for hours, overcome doubts and hesitations, say exactly what I want to, and am perfectly understood--only to realize that everything I want to say isn't even worth my breath, that this completely consuming idea is completely insignificant.

A Soul in Shambles

I've had a fear of bridges for as long as I can remember.  It's an irrational fear but I can't go over a bridge without feeling like the car is going to plummet into a watery grave or I'll be completely impulse driven and walk off the edge.  Yet bridges can be beautiful.  We just drove over one that, while possibly fatal, overlooked a gorgeous valley with a peaceful river hemmed by trees that even the best Hudson River School landscape painter couldn't enhance.  I had this overwhelming sense of dread and fear yet a complete appreciation of the beauty around me.  That most aptly wraps up how I'm feeling right now.

My heart is heavy.  It's the type of heavy that makes it hard to sleep.  I usually sleep on my right side but with this lead-weighted heart, it feels like my heart will crush my lungs and I'm left gasping for breath.  I just mixed a physical and emotional description but its as close as I can get to depicting this feeling without actually giving you my heart.

This feeling of breathlessness and a heaviness of heart is because I am downright sad.  The wonderful people I've spent time with this week will never be in the same place with me ever again.  I'll come to visit of course, but things will never be the same (everything is forever changing, remember?)

I'm also downright terrified.  I've learned much about God and myself and life in a week (we will touch on this later) and as I approach home, I can already feel this slipping away.  The old frustrations and confusions and struggles are waiting to welcome me back.  Also waiting are my family, friends, to-do list, shower, and bed--all of which I'm eagerly anticipating. 

So here comes the beautiful river and trees and serenity part that lies beneath my deathtrap bridge of over thinking and fear and sadness.

This week was good for me.  Other than seeing everyone mesh and grow into a family and stronger children of God, I got to serve others in perhaps the simplest form of meeting needs.  The majority of my time was spent in soup kitchens ranging form a very high-tech program to churches with kitchens to a small facility in a shady section that ran like clockwork and seated 22 people yet fed 400 people in 3 hours.  I did some street ministry and prayer walks which were good but not life-changing, which was also perfectly fine.  Oh, and my partner and I dominated in euchre all week.  Good times were had by all (except possibly our euchre opponents).

So even though I'm going to miss my 3D Visioners like crazy, there is beauty in knowing they are on fire for God and will do amazing things for Him.  In an interesting stroke of timing, we just passed the exit of Grove City.  The idea of new friends and experiences and adventures is beautiful too--even if it is overshadowed by my fear of losing those I love so much now.

So even though I'm terrified of reverting back to my old self, with my soul in shambles, there is a new serenity in knowing that God can put it back together and I don't have to.  I'm a realist.  I know my struggles won't disappear in this life time.  I know my soul will be in shambles once again, and probably sooner than I'd like.  But I'm a realist.  I know that my God fixed the problem of an irredeemable human race and can surely fix me.

Since I abandoned my previous day by day structure (for an excellent play-by-play please visit: http://northoakschurch.org/?p=2339)  I'm sure I've missed some details and important revelations and good stories.  However, there is value to consistency so I'm going to relate in as concise of terms possible (a lost cause at this point, I know)  what I have learned during a week of serving God in NYC.

Lessons Learned:

• Just because my comfort zone is getting larger and larger and proportionally harder and harder to break out of, it doesn't mean that the things I participated in didn't have impact
• Serving others is ultimately about, well, serving others and about serving God.  Even if I didn't have a huge epiphany it doesn't mean that it wasn't significant.
• I need to slow down myself and my thoughts.
• When I pray for others, I become personally invested in their lives.  Therefore, I find it easier and easier to care about their well-being.  This gives new light to the idea of praying for one's enemies (or at least the people you'd rather avoid).  It's more than a test of forgiveness, it may just be the best way to eliminate having enemies.
• Release
• The thoughts that occupy our thoughts the most and dictate our actions are the things we "worship".  Yet these things do not love me in return.  They don't redeem me, tell me I'm beautiful or worthy, give me peace, protect me, save me, or offer eternal life.  But God does.  So why worship the things that enslave me and rob me of happiness instead of the God who will set me free and give me true joy?
• The value in being real.
• God puts me where I need to be for a reason.

Explanation

Hello all!  It was suggested to me that I explain the new name for my thought outlet.  The word penintime means "second from inmost" and the word latibule means "hiding place".  Since there is a hiding place for my thoughts that are about as close to me as I will allow anyone to know, it seemed right.