One of those days



Ever have one of those days? Boy, I have lately, actually. more like one of those weeks. I have been unable to put my finger on it, but I have been out of sorts. I have been tired. I have been overwhelmed. I have been frustrated. I have been angry. I have been lonely. I am...self centered.
And as I was walking and praying, I suddenly had this moment of clarity: I am having a temper tantrum. As surely as a toddler who has been thrown off schedule by a holiday or a family trip gets cranky and out of sorts, I had lost that inability to rest in knowing things were the way they are supposed to be. My head whirled with decisions to be made, chores to be done, dreams to be fulfilled, apologies to be offered, changes to create...
It isn't that I am lacking for anything more than peace of mind or gratitude. I have been stuck in the "it's not fair" whine. For real, who told me it was supposed to be fair? Who told me that the world revolved around me? Why is it so hard to not slip back into this self centered skin? It certainly suffocates my spirit.
There are always chores to be done. Hello, I own a house and have a small zoo! There are decisions to be made as to how I can best use my time wisely to continue to nurture my spirit and those around me. Relationships are always changing, hopefully, because as individuals we grow and change. And dreams need to be dreamt....dreams for now and dreams for later. They keep me yearning to grow and learn.
But losing the gratitude for all that I have, well, that is dangerous. It creates this mindset that I did this, that I deserve this, that I can do it myself. Pride creeps in with its cousins resentment and self righteousness.
It is just another one of those days when the adult needs to take the child aside and remember a prayer of Thomas Merton:
Lord, thank You for what You have given me, thank You for what You have taken away, and thank You for what You have left me.


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Christ in His Distressing Disguise

Image
When I was much younger, I learned about this remarkable woman, Blessed Teresa of Calcutta, then simply known as Mother Teresa. As a teenager herself, she had chosen to serve God by leaving her home in the former Yugoslavia to go practically around the world to India and become a nun. There she taught school, but she was distracted by the poor on the streets. Longing to care for them, she needed to be released from her teaching duties. Eventually a new religious order, the Missionaries of Charity, was formed by Mother Teresa to serve them, the poorest of the poor. I wonder today what attracted me to her. I didn't know much about India. The pictures of the suffering, the cachetic bodies that barely resembled humans, puzzled me. Growing up with movies and air brushed photographs, as well as a skepticism of news and government organizations, it can be hard to believe. How can there be such incredible suffering in my world? Mother Teresa was doing God's work; I know that was exciti
Read more

Blog Carnival-Seasons

Image
It was all so much simpler in my spring.  I suppose it is for everyone.  That is why babies and puppies and newness are squealed over.  I have been struggling.  Spring has long gone.  The leaves are falling. I loved what I had, what once defined me. Without it now, I feel like a crab without a shell-              vulnerable...                            homeless...                                           dry in spirit. I know, that all is not lost. I know, things change. I know, that God,              who brought me from there to there once,              will bring me from here to there again. I know, the story is not over. I know, the season will change, again. I wish my heart knew all this as well. Check out more blog entries on Seasons at the Carnival .
Read more

Blog Carnival: Community

Image
Blog Carnival: Community Community is getting to be a buzzword that hardly seems recognizable.  It has become permanently connected with a metrosexual worship leader at the hip church which has an outreach into some impoverished place.  But is that community? Yesterday I wrote about Facebook's social networking site.  Did you know that there are more than 300 million active users and that 50% of their active users (returned to the site in the last 30 days) log on to Facebook in any given day and that the average user has 130 friends on the site? Is that community? Do we really have a community or do we talk so much about it and request friends by the busload because we desire it intensely? We were made for community.  Creator said it was not good for that first man to be alone.  Even Creator was not alone.  We need to walk with others.  We need our village.  We need them to not only walk with us and love us and share our burdens, but to challenge us, to force us to grow.
Read more