I just let go And I feel exposed But it’s so beautiful Because this is who I am ~ Plumb It has been a long six months of not being vulnerable through this blog. I must admit when I started at the beginning of the year it was quite scary just putting my thoughts where anyone could read about who I am striving to become. It definitely made me more accountable to work on those areas of my life, but sometimes I felt overwhelmed with how God was using it. There were times I felt like He was pushing me off a cliff and expecting me to know how to fly already. His strong but tender words “Trust Me” were not always reassuring, especially when the other voices around me were louder. Without even trying, I stopped posting and I believe it was all part of His plan. I needed these six months to think about the little blog “series” I had said I would write: past, present, and future. I wrote in April about the importance of having a past and why it is important to measure how far we have come. Present was supposed to come next, but I was very intimidated by the very word because I had no idea how to talk about it. I had always wondered why many people write about how to learn from the past and how to plan for the future, but skipping on the “how” with the present. Now I have known why. This time has allowed me to figure out I had no idea what to do in my very own present circumstances. God used this sudden awareness and took me through a six month adventure where “I come from under the hill, and under the hills and over the hills my paths led. And through the air. I am (s)he that walks unseen.”(The Hobbit, p. 204). However, now I will take off my golden ring so that you may clearly see what my journey has entailed. Instead of writing a long post that could go on forever, I have persuaded this full-brimmed mind of mine to divide my discoveries on the idea of living in the present into several posts. What I think is most important to write about first, however, is the fact that we all live in different circumstances. It is true. We all live in different circumstances and we all get affected by them. This undeniable reality has been one of the very many reasons why we use the well-known word of our society -- tolerance. Today it is extremely hard to talk of one’s morals or beliefs without someone in the crowd announcing that we need more tolerance. Now I am not trying to get into the whole debate on how much tolerance needs to be given on anything, but I am trying to make a point of what our society is saying. We are at a point where we are recognizing that everyone has a different story and what their circumstances have been, are, and will make up who they are. Therefore, we have concluded that the other person is in no position to tell the other how they should live their life since they cannot fully relate. Now let’s look at my circumstances these past six months. I am a college student who studies online and has a job on the side doing background acting. I live at home with my parents and am a very stubborn person. Add all the factors of me being stressed with grades, working in a Hollywood world, a young adult under parental authority, and a personality not the easiest for everyone to get along with. Bam. Life can get pretty tough on my side of the hill.... quite quickly! I was learning new ideas and new habits through everything around me while trying to keep with the morals and beliefs I had called my own. It was a season of me trying to fit everything into a healthy perspective. Through these circumstances God had to teach me more than what I wanted to be taught. By doing this I had to go through a process where all my yucky insides showed itself to the world. I became really frustrated and disgusted with myself on many occasions, especially since I am not a person who happily volunteers to be made vulnerable all the time. Yet, through the various tests and trials I was able to see who I really was and where I needed much work done in my life. Sadly, sometimes that is what it takes to get me to see who I really am and the cost at times is hurting those around me. Thank goodness for a merciful God. The most important thing I learned about circumstances other than God using them to make us grow was the realization that my circumstances do not define me. They do not define me. Do not. Unless I allow them to. By making the decision to believe that God is greater than my circumstances and can rise me above them is where my identity lies. Yes, I went through some hard lessons in my circumstances but I had to listen to God and let Him tell me that He had a vision greater for my life than my stress, my confusion, my struggles, and even myself. There is so much hope in that realization. Once I started to adopt this belief about having an identity in who God was making me become rather than where I am now, confidence was my new friend. I was more confident in becoming that vision He created, while understanding that my trials are truly blessings. Through my present circumstances of these past six months, I have discovered a very creative side of me I never saw before. I now believe I can do anything if I have God’s blessing. Some days I am not so enthusiastic, but it is a journey I am still trying to hike through. One of my favorite quotes was said by my Pastor, who has been such an immense influence in my life: “If you are not passing the test in your world, you don’t get a bigger world.” God uses our circumstances to make us grow into the person we are to become, but they do not define who we are unless we allow them to. What are your present circumstances? How are you presently dealing with them? Walt Disney is a great man to observe in this scenario. As a young man he had many failures as a cartoonist, but “he had an imperishable optimism that allowed him to overcome failure” (Walt Disney: An American Original, p.15). He never let his failures define who he was and was to become. Years later he told an engineer who was being shown the Disneyland proposal and claiming it to be impossible, “You know better than to kill an idea without giving it a chance to live. We set our sights high. That’s why we accomplish so many things. Now go back and try again” (p.263). We do not have to be who the world believes they have to tolerate. We can be who God created us to be; be a greater person than what we see at the moment because we refuse to allow our circumstances to define who we are.
"There were doors all around the hall, but they were all locked; and when Alice had been all the way down one side and up the other; trying every door, she walked sadly down the middle, wondering how she was ever to get out again. Suddenly she came upon a little three-legged table, all made of solid glass: there was nothing on it but a tiny golden key, and Alice's first idea was that this might belong to one of the doors of the hall; but, alas! either the locks were too large, or the key was too small, but at any rate it would not open any of them. However, on the second time around, she came upon a low curtain she had not noticed before, and behind it was a little door about fifteen inches high: she tried the little golden key in the lock, and to her great delight it fitted!" ~ Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, pg.16-17
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AuthorHello, I am Christiana! Archives
May 2017
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