Standing in complete awe

After going through a bit of a dry spell I cannot help but be utterly and completely blown away by His mercy and grace. These past couple days have got me thinking that I should be careful what I pray for because I was not ready for things to work themselves out like this, but they have. He loves me and leaves me in absolute awe of Him! I just cannot seem to wrap my little mind around it.

The sermon at Grace Point yesterday could have not been more fitting or perfect for what I am struggling with right now. Jeff is doing a series he is calling 60/60 where the concept is for everyone to pray every hour on the hour following the concept that we may become one that the world may know. The prayer is specific for the week based on the topic that he is preaching on and yesterday it just so happened to be called "I Admit." The sermon addressed that we need to be able to discover the root of our desires, then identify the disconnect of those desires, and lastly we need to focus on returning to the heart of God. Nothing could have been more perfect or relevant for me to hear. Because it is a personal struggle I woke up this morning reluctant to set my hourly reminder and pray "I admit..." every hour on the hour, but I did. My reluctance to pray the prayer was quenched by the following verse that I have been carrying around in my pocket for over a week now:

No temptation has seized you except what is common to man. And God is faithful, He will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear. But when you are tempted, He will also provide a way out so that you can stand up under it.
~1 Corinthians 10:13 ~

So I started praying the prayer at 8am this morning and repeated a muffled prayer or utterance of, "I admit..." every hour following. Admitting your struggle even if it's only between you and God can be quite intimidating and frightening, because it means that you acknowledge the wrong in it, the so called disconnect. I did not think things would work themselves out as quickly as they did, but they did. My prayers were answered. It's not easy, but the first step to fighting this struggle of mine has been taken and I feel like God carried me through it. Actually I know He did. I cried today, and will probably cry some more, but I feel comforted and loved by Him...

Living beyond mere existence

So I haven't written anything in quite some time. Not sure why, because it's not that I've been too busy. I guess my mind has simply been preoccupied.

This chapter of my life is coming to a close and a new one is about to begin and I feel stuck in an odd limbo because of it. Honestly I'm not too happy with where I am right now emotionally. Not sure why, but I've been living on my own agenda the past couple weeks and it's not working out for me. It leaves me feeling insecure, alone, and having desires of filling the void with superfluous things. Don't get me wrong because things in my life are going incredibly well and I definitely could not ask for more as far as my "outer layer" is concerned. My life is perfect and I am blessed beyond all measure. But it's the inside, the heart, that is struggling a bit right now. Because everything keeps happening and things are seemingly going so fast it feels like I can barely keep up, which leaves me feeling like I'm just existing... existing one day at a time and waiting for the next to come. I finish one routine and wait for the next to start. It's a cycle that happens one day at a time and then starts over the next. Somehow I'm left feeling like I'm merely existing and not truly living. It's really a terrible feeling because I know I am called to go beyond just existing, but I'm not sure how to break free of it right now. This is a personal struggle that comes up time and time again in my life, and I know that I simply need to see it through and need to refocus my attention and get back on track. Part of me is really upset with myself because I have just gotten really lazy and unfocused. For me the root of it all is whenever I simply get comfortable with things and stop putting forth effort. I am so caught up in what's to come that I have forgotten to focus on the now. Currently I am not living to my full potential and I'm somewhat just wasting away. A bit overly dramatic I'm sure (but that's just me)... I just need to refocus!

As for my "outer shell"... goodness, I'm so happy I could burst! I will write about that soon, but for now I need to get off here and focus some.

To be continued...

Random collection of some thought-provoking quotations

"The spirit of truth will not allow you to enjoy sin ever again... he will wreck you from enjoying sin ever again, when sin creeps into your life as a child of God the spirit of truth inside of you will begin to breathe and it will war against it until you repent... so if there is no repentance in your life, there is no grieving, there is no war, there is no spirit." -Matt Carter

"Until we are broken, our life will be self-centered, self-reliant; our strength will be our own...only when we enter our wound will we discover our true glory." -John Eldredge

"You literally sacrifice your soul and your true power when you insist on controlling things..." -Stasi Eldredge

Lazy Friday morning and future thoughts

It's a lazy Friday morning and I decided I should write again since it's been a little while.

My PT applications are all off. It is out of my hands and it is a terribly frightening but also exciting feeling. Last week mom came in my room and asked me what was wrong (I must have appeared frazzled). I simply pointed over to my bed that had multiple manila envelopes on it stuffed, essentially, with the past three to four years of my life. That is the, for a lack of a better term, weirdest feeling I have probably ever felt. Along with that feeling came the panic where I began to wonder if all that I have done is good enough. Will I even get an interview? I sure hope so...

People have been asking me which school I want to go to and it is no lie when I respond, "the one that accepts me." If I do end up being accepted to more than one school then I will need to be choosy, but until then I'm just left hoping I get in somewhere. I also firmly believe that if I get in more than one place it will be clear where I need to be after my interviews. For the first time the uncertainty does not scare me in a numbing sort of way because I am confident that I will be guided in the right direction. This whole thing is so exciting I could burst!

Also had a birthday last week. I swear, the older you get, the faster time seems to fly by. Not that I'm old by any means, but these next couple years are going to be some monumental ones in my life. I'll be graduating with my bachelors degree in just two months (bought my cap and gown yesterday!), will start hearing back from PT schools within the next one to two months, will hopefully have interviews and will get in, which means I'll be starting PT school next year. If all goes as planned, which realistically I know rarely happens, I'll be graduating with a DPT degree in three years, and then...? Well I'm hoping marriage and family to be quite honest. So with all that coming up it seems like time should slow down a bit so I can process it all and keep up.

What's my plan B you may ask? Well for now I am planning on taking things as they come. The year 2009 should be interesting because I have no solid plans as of yet. I do plan on taking some classes at a community college in the Spring to meet some outstanding pre-requisites and I definitely need to work, but beyond that, who knows? And of course a visit to Switzerland is also on the agenda, since I'll be spending Christmas here in the States and not there (only the second Christmas I'll have been here since I've lived here, which is a huge deal to me and it's gonna be hard not going home for Christmas). Beyond that, if I don't get into PT school, well then I will try again. I don't really have much else to say about that because right now I do not plan on not getting in.=) Optimistic? Yes! Overly optimistic? Probably. But it's keeping me sane right now and as a person who does not deal well with uncertainty it is my only survival technique.

Now this post has gotten quite lengthy. My apologies to anyone reading it.=)

I think I'm gonna get up and do something with myself. Get this beautiful day started.

My path

It is most certainly crunch time as far as PT applications go, but honestly I'm quite relaxed about it. Maybe too much so. For some reason I have a level of inner peace that I cannot put into words. I simply feel safe, comforted, and confident.

Over the past couple weeks, if nothing else, my confidence has grown. Not only am I falling in love with God, I'm also truly learning to love myself. That certainly sounds basic and it probably is, but I am just now learning to truly take time for myself and focus on who I am and need to be. It feels really good and I like who I feel that I am becoming. From the outside looking in it's probably not any sort of monumental change, but I feel much different. I feel more at peace and ease with myself and who I am. That's a really good feeling!

There is a path that lies ahead and though it is uncertain I feel confident. In an odd way I know exactly where I am going even though I do not have a clue where I'll end up. The path does not frighten me like it usually would because I know I am headed in the right direction no matter what happens. Not sure if that makes any sense.

Sometimes I wish I had something eloquent and meaningful to convey to the world. Unfortunately that is often not the case, but I guess the true reason for this blog of mine is to serve as an outlet for my thoughts.

Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate.
Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure.
It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us.
We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant,
gorgeous, talented, fabulous?
Actually, who are you not to be?
You are a child of God.
Your playing small does not serve the world.
There is nothing enlightened about shrinking
so that other people won't feel insecure around you.
We are all meant to shine, as children do.
We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us.
It is not just in some of us; it is in everyone.
And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously
give other people permission to do the same.
As we are liberated from our own fear,
our presence automatically liberates others.

A Return to Love - Marianne Williamson

Broken Mess

All the driving that I've been doing lately has given me ample opportunity to do lots and lots of thinking (and singing=)). Believe it or not, I'm enjoying the default "me" time where I can focus on what's going on in my mind...and the road of course. Driving home last night I was overwhelmed with a wave of emotion that is quite difficult to describe. The emotion lead me to tears and it calmed me in an incredible way, yes, gentle and calming tears.
I kept thinking that after that initial infatuation phase seems to come the reality phase where you realize that to truly make things work you must make some substantial sacrifices. That is most certainly where I am with God right now. He's challenging me at the core of my being, my weakest point, and it's hard. Part of me wants to run away and do my own thing, but I've been there before and it left me completely empty and broken. I do not want to walk down that road again, but I'm terrified that I will. In my mind I know what to do and what is right, quite often I do. Unfortunately my mind and heart sometimes have difficulties finding a pathway to one another and being on the mission together. How do I get the two not only to communicate but to agree and follow through? The struggle lies is becoming selfless and giving up control and simply laying down those ugly desires of the flesh.

No temptation has seized you except what is common to man. And God is faithful; he will not let you be tempted beyong what you can bear. But when you are tempted, He will also provide a way out so that you can stand up under it. - 1 Corinthians 10:13