all there is

"It is the very pursuit of happiness that thwarts happiness." - Viktor Frankl

When we ask ourselves the question, "What do I want?" the answers we give points to the greater needs we have. "I want my car to stop making that loud noise" (so my need of self reliance is met, I don't have to depend on others to get around.)  "I want to go home heat up some leftovers, have a beer and unwind" (so my need of comfort,  hunger, and leisure can be met). "I want them. That is a given. Always. I want to be near to and be with them" (To what need this want satisfies...I cannot say because honestly no longer know...)

There are moments in life (and it can feel like a rare event) when you get exactly what you've wanted. The biopsy comes back negative, the acceptance letter comes in the mail, the pumpkin lattes are back at Starbucks and you would think that in that moment you'd be happy. What you've desired is what you have received; there should be exuberance that doesn't end especially after all the anguish, worry, and struggle that it often takes to get that moment in time. But as we hold close what we have so long waited for, somehow we are let down. Maybe it's exactly what we thought it would be or maybe it's not at all like we expected, but we discover we are still not complete, still not whole, still somehow disappointed. So we begin again, we formulate new desires, schemes, and plans trying to bring about contentment that doesn't cease, joy that doesn't lessen, a fullness that never wains.

At our core, at the foundation of every one of our natures, I believe there's hunger. Not just an "I could eat" apathetic kind of hunger but a ravenous, cavernous hunger that is dark and frightening. We gaze at nature - sunsets, starry nights, tumultuous tornadoes - because we did not make them and yet they are there. We are finite beings who long for the infinite. At the end of all earthly pursuits we remain unsatisfied because those things (as beautiful as they can at times be) don't eternally satisfy, our heart still aches. "He has put eternity in their hearts, except that no one can find out the work that God does from beginning to end." Ecclesiastes 3:11

We try to satisfy our hunger for the infinite by feeding it with the temporary - food, sex, technology -and for a time it appears to work until we discover that the more we feed our temporary hungers the bigger their appetite becomes. What satisfied before doesn't anymore, we need something different, something more extreme, more exciting, doing things we said we'd never do, choosing to forget boundaries and the meaning of self control.

What is the solution? What hope can there be against the tedium that can be life? We don't even know the depths of our own natures though we are deplored by what have only thus far seen within ourselves. We make promises to others that go unmet, we say words we don't mean to satisfy hungers that can't be fulfilled. We are stuck in what feels an infinite loop of work, paycheck, debt, work. Infinite joy is sacrificed for immediate pleasure. We loose our ability to even blush at the perverse becoming desensitized to corruption, tragedy, and greed.

Is there a source, giver, and sustainer of joy or is this all there is? What does your hunger tell you?

patience

the sun shine's out of your...

I watched too many Star Trek reruns during my two weeks off from school. Seriously.

Illogical. It's absolutely illogical and yet it feels like it's the only thing in this shitty world that makes any sense at all.

When we, to quote a Wonder Years phrase "like like" someone, what makes that happen? Is it all chemical? Neurological? How much of it is based on underlying factors hidden in our subconscious? Are we just animals? Is it all just physical? Where it starts isn't where it ends; doesn't lasting attraction need to go beyond appearance alone?

You're smarter than me or maybe you're just more honest, I don't know. You're probably absolutely right about everything - nothing in common, too different, bad timing, awkward situations - I concede, I surrender, you're right.

BUT... I still think the sun shines out of your ass (I wish I had the wit to pick another organ). The sun shines out of your ass, not despite any evidence to the contrary but because there isn't any evidence to the contrary. There isn't and there never will be. You're wonderful. Period. Couldn't change it if you tried. "Stubborn much?" you ask. Uhhh, yeah. Duh. But I'm also right. (It's my only child privilege and gift.)

I see the truth. You are the unordinary walking amid all that is average. It amazes me that people are around you all day and they don't see it. It boggles me. How can they not realize that they are meeting the most interesting person around. Seriously. I despise false sentiment so believe what I say.

One day someone will come along and they'll see what an exceptional person you are and the rub is that you'll feel that way about them. I'm jealous of this inevitability because I saw how amazing you are first. (Probably not first, such cuteness can't have gone completely unnoticed these years but allow me my delusion of seeing it first please.) You're quirky but not annoyingly so. Maddeningly stubborn I say rolling my eyes. You have deep convictions I don't always understand. A whimsy that volleys between romantic and endearingly goofy. You have just enough humility to prevent your being morose. In your heart I think you're more of a traditionalist than even I am though you wouldn't likely admit it. I know you are much kinder than I am, than many of us are...

No one had to point any of this out to me. I marvel at how all this and more came to be possible in one person.

I have overwhelmed my schedule with commitments, appointments, classes - anything to prevent myself the chance to dwell upon these things. It isn't right for me to ask for the moon when I've been granted several stars. I pray that knowing such a man exists at all becomes enough for me, that I not waste away pining for what can't be mine. xo

end to self-imposed suffering

When you go to the doctor to get diagnosed and hopefully cured of a malady, they ask for a family history. They want to know about cancer and chronic diseases, but there is a whole layer of family history that is left out when just genetics is taken into consideration. What about all the behaviours, mentalities, attitudes, and perceptions that are ingrained into our family histories? If we could say something about that part of ourselves- the mental anguishes, the emotional afflictions, the times of terror - and if we could share these things without fear of judgment or pity, I think it would go far to our overall well being. Unfortunately, we don't live in a society where mental disease and emotional dysfunction is taken as seriously as fever and blood clots.

My family history is filled with heart disease, diabetes, and cancer - all of which are terrible, devastating to the physical body, but it is the story of my families emotional and mental instability that I think leaves the greater scar. This scar is ugly and cuts right through my families middle. No one in my family is untouched by it. The inability to be truly honest, the erratic actions, the outbursts of rage, the addictive behaviours, the lack of personal responsibility, the perpetual banner of self-loathing - these are what destroy.

I can eat broccoli and stay away from white bread. I can exercise everyday and walk 20000 steps but it doesn't change that at the core of my families history and my own lies pain, fear, and mistrust. That can't be washed away with any detergent made by man or any pill the pharmacy can fill.

"Everything happens for a reason." It's an overused cliche; sometimes it seems like wisdom and at other times is salt in our wounds...

In the last week, there has been a slight shift in my thoughts but oh what a shift. There is a story of C.S. Lewis getting on the bus an atheist but getting off a believer, the point being that his personal conversion was quite with no fanfare to mark it. My conversion this week has been just as quite. I've realized something about myself and about God.

The greatest problem I face is my inability to believe that I am worthy - worthy of love, worthy of sacrifice, worthy of someones effort, affection, time - that I am worthy of life itself. That's the truth. I tear up writing that and reading it. At the root of my heart is blackness like a soil, but it is a soil from which nothing good can grow.

On Monday I was listening to some Christian music and as the words of truth and light played forth, I was overwhelmed for the first time in a long long time that Jesus (the eternal Son, the sinless lamb, the man of whom there was no deceit) willingly lived and suffered and died for me - FOR ME. For so long I had no trouble believing that Jesus existed and that he died but the most important part, the part that changes a heart, gives birth to new life, was missing. Jesus died FOR ME. Unworthy, insignificant, imperfect, deeply flawed - ME. Jesus died for me. And in that moment of realization, of accepting this significant truth, it is Him who was magnified not me. My worth as I had seen it dissolved away as my life became tied to His.

To be the geek I am, in Lord of the Rings, Aragon is told, "Put aside the ranger; become who you were born to be." I think all of us need to see the many facets of our family histories (a painful and devastating exercise) not so we can cast a finger of blame elsewhere but so we can see just how great the darkness is from hence God called out Light. xo

"For God, who said, “Let there be light in the darkness,” has made this light shine in our hearts so we could know the glory of God that is seen in the face of Jesus Christ." 2 Corinthians 4:6

our many tears

Words...are so inadequate...they just don't do justice...never come close to capturing the depth of...I who love words find them failing me...only tears say it all

Our many tears - sorrow, pain, grief, loss...joy...

I plead with you happenstance reader, don't wait, for God sake's don't wait! to bring love into this world, to acknowledge when love is present, to taste and savor love as it's before you. None of us ever really grasp our lasting impact but we all have one, one way or another. In the actual moment we often can't see but hopefully we are granted sight to see before our end all the love in our big small life.

What could be a greater privilege than to know you added love, kindness, comfort, and beauty to this difficult fleeting often inhospitable marble?

A wonderful success story to have loved anything more than you loved yourself...my greatest hope for us all.

Rest In Peace dear friend xo