It's been one of those weeks. The ones that inspire books like Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day, and turn into lyrics like "You tell me your blue skies fade to grey, you tell me your passion's gone away" from that Daniel Powter song that "American Idol" ruined. The whole lot of frustrations from this week makes me want to cry, pout and drown my sorrows in a tub of Trader Joe's Soy Creamy Cherry Chip ice cream (don't judge -- it's good!), but then I remember that God never promised that life would be easy. He did promise, however, to hold our hands through those bad times. It is that hand-holding that has gotten me through this week's bouts of traffic jams, panic about my future, exhaustion, and criticisms from my boss.
Well, that and a few other reminders that God is not only really great at that whole "lean on me" stuff, but also knows when to bring around small bits of joy when I need it the most.
While it is not always easy to find the bright notes in what can feel like a swirling sea of misfortune, looking back over the past five days, there are some things I can feel thankful about. Here are ten of them:
1. Mexican Coke - Made with real sugar cane, as opposed to corn syrup like the stuff made in the US, it's addictively delicious -- and the perfect cure for a case of the mid-day slumps.
2. Sarah, the receptionist at Bar Method - After just five minutes of chatting with her before my workout yesterday, I was all sorts of perked up. Plus, she called me "delightful" when I left, and as a result, I felt... well, pretty darn delightful!
3. Shana - My best friend from 4th - 11th grade who has reentered my life and become an incredible source of support as I figure out my next step. Just knowing that people are rooting for me to succeed is an amazing feeling. I feel so blessed that God has peppered my life with wonderful friends like her.
4. Tea & cookies with Joanne - This past Wednesday night, I got together with one of my dearest friends in LA for tea and treats at one of my favorite local spots, Susina Bakery. As we nibbled and sipped on our scrumptious purchases, I was reminded that sometimes the simplest pleasures are the most enjoyable. It doesn't always have to be tasting menus and expensive spa treatments. (Though those are nice too!)
5. My blogger friend Esi who posted the following comment on my "Diana Takes a Bite" blog post about this week's episode of "Top Chef:" "I think my favorite part about this show are your reviews the next day." I think my favorite part of yesterday was reading her kind words!
6. "Top Chef" - Watching those crazy chefs try to make magic in a pan brings me spoonfuls of joy. Pun intended.
7. Reruns - I was so glad that so many of my favorite shows were reruns this week so I could catch up on some much needed sleep! (Feel free to judge me for this one.)
8. E-mails from my friend Ali. I love having her to e-mail with during the day. It makes me feel connected to someone and that I'm not alone in the world of my yellow-walled office. (Even if she does sometimes send me messages about how her classroom has a questionable odor.)
9. Babies - I was overjoyed to receive an e-mail this morning telling me that a friend gave birth to a beautiful, 8 pound, 4 ounce baby girl. It was a squeal-worthy moment. (Just ask my co-workers within hearing range.)
10. Positive feedback about this blog. I was really nervous when I starting writing about such a personal and sensitive subject, so I am thrilled that it has been embraced by so many of my friends. Thank you for your kind words of support!
Do you have a praise from your week? Post it below!
Friday, January 30, 2009
Sunday, January 25, 2009
Changing the GPS of My Life Coordinates (One Post at a Time)
When I created this blog two months ago, I did so with the intention to touch other people's lives with a catalog of my own struggles and breakthroughs as a Christian. I thought that by sharing my faith, I might reaffirm others' by extension. It never occurred to me that the greatest impact might be on my own relationship with God.
That's not to say that I wasn't aware it might be a potential positive side effect of my blog. Anything done in the name of the Lord can be seen as an opportunity for spiritual growth, and this was part of the reason I wanted to start a blog about my faith rather than another one about food or about my dating failures with the boy who didn't offer me a ride home or the boy who took the leftovers (don't ask).
Yet today, as I sat in my usual pew at Bel Air Presbyterian Church listening to Pastor Mark Brewer preach about becoming what we worship, it occurred to me that my blog is already starting to impact the way I live. It is, to quote Brewer, "changing the GPS of my life coordinates."
Because I am now writing about my relationship with God, I have begun paying closer attention to His voice in my everyday life -- and more importantly, listening to it. I let the rusty Honda Civic get over on the 405 fwy, I pause to smile at a stranger (and not just the cute male ones with dreamy eyes), and today, I got together with an old friend who I let drop from my life when it started becoming "too hard" to spend time with her. Seeing her wasn't easy, but I knew in my heart that it was what God wanted me to do. He wanted me to show her the love that He gives all His imperfect children -- even the really bratty ones who decorate their grandmother's white walls with Crayola art (oops).
But beyond the exponential growth of my WWJD-inspired behavior, the process of thinking and writing about God's presence in my life has also strengthened my belief that He actually is there. In his sermon this morning, Pastor Brewer reflected that expressing something intensifies the feeling -- like when a boy tells a girl he loves her or vice versa. I know I certainly feel angrier when I vent to my mother about the jerk who took my primo parking spot in front of my apartment -- much angrier than if I merely kept the LA atrocity to myself.
Similarly, by putting voice to the jumble of faith-related thoughts in my head, I am transforming them from miscellaneous musings into coherent ideas/beliefs. That was God telling me to offer an encouraging word to a friend going through a difficult time at work. That was God telling me to be grateful for my stable job. And that was God telling me that as much as I love writing about the risotto I made for dinner last night on my food-related blog, it is the "breadcrumbs" I leave here that are the ones that really matter.
That's not to say that I wasn't aware it might be a potential positive side effect of my blog. Anything done in the name of the Lord can be seen as an opportunity for spiritual growth, and this was part of the reason I wanted to start a blog about my faith rather than another one about food or about my dating failures with the boy who didn't offer me a ride home or the boy who took the leftovers (don't ask).
Yet today, as I sat in my usual pew at Bel Air Presbyterian Church listening to Pastor Mark Brewer preach about becoming what we worship, it occurred to me that my blog is already starting to impact the way I live. It is, to quote Brewer, "changing the GPS of my life coordinates."
Because I am now writing about my relationship with God, I have begun paying closer attention to His voice in my everyday life -- and more importantly, listening to it. I let the rusty Honda Civic get over on the 405 fwy, I pause to smile at a stranger (and not just the cute male ones with dreamy eyes), and today, I got together with an old friend who I let drop from my life when it started becoming "too hard" to spend time with her. Seeing her wasn't easy, but I knew in my heart that it was what God wanted me to do. He wanted me to show her the love that He gives all His imperfect children -- even the really bratty ones who decorate their grandmother's white walls with Crayola art (oops).
But beyond the exponential growth of my WWJD-inspired behavior, the process of thinking and writing about God's presence in my life has also strengthened my belief that He actually is there. In his sermon this morning, Pastor Brewer reflected that expressing something intensifies the feeling -- like when a boy tells a girl he loves her or vice versa. I know I certainly feel angrier when I vent to my mother about the jerk who took my primo parking spot in front of my apartment -- much angrier than if I merely kept the LA atrocity to myself.
Similarly, by putting voice to the jumble of faith-related thoughts in my head, I am transforming them from miscellaneous musings into coherent ideas/beliefs. That was God telling me to offer an encouraging word to a friend going through a difficult time at work. That was God telling me to be grateful for my stable job. And that was God telling me that as much as I love writing about the risotto I made for dinner last night on my food-related blog, it is the "breadcrumbs" I leave here that are the ones that really matter.
Wednesday, January 21, 2009
Patience: The Greatest Virtue of All?
I have never been patient. When I was a young girl, my parents used to have to physically restrain me from opening my Christmas presents before my brothers woke up, and I would regularly throw fits when I had to wait my turn to play Nintendo Super Mario Bros.
In other words, I was a brat. (My brothers have the scars on their arms to prove it.)
While I am much more mature today (I only throw fits in my head when I have to wait for something), I still haven't quite mastered the patience virtue that my mother, an elementary school teacher, commanders with such ease. I get frustrated when I'm stuck on the 10 FWY going 5 mph, I get cranky when I have to wait too long for a table at a restaurant, and I get irritated when a movie has too many previews at the theatre. Like many in my general age bracket (and coincidentally, most age brackets), I crave instant gratification -- I want what I want when I want it.
The problem with the whole "instant gratification" kind of mindset is that life doesn't work that way. More specifically, God doesn't work that way.
For the past twenty or so months, I've been struggling with what some might call a quarter-life crisis. I'm not sure if what I am experiencing can fall neatly under that label, but I do know that I feel scared about what I'm doing with my life. I worry everyday that I am not using the gifts and talents God has given me in the right way -- professionally, socially and spiritually. While I know that Earthly pursuits - ie. fame, money and a fancy career with fancy business cards -- aren't the point, I can't help but think there is more out there for me than my current 9 to 5 job. And not just because I really hate all the filing.
But even beyond the whole career woes and questions of "what am I doing with my life?", I feel a general sense of malaise that things haven't turned out the way I planned when I graduated college nearly four years ago. I didn't expect that life would be this hard. That I wouldn't be promoted into greatness at my first job, that I would lose friends as quickly as I made them, that my roommate would move out, that I wouldn't immediately find the love of my life (or even someone to love for a minute). At times, the whole lot of it makes me wonder if God has forgotten about me. And then I go to my Sunday church service, and Pastor Mark Brewer says something that seems so absurdly relevant that I know He hasn't. That I just have to practice a little of my least favorite virtue, patience.
This past Sunday, Pastor Brewer preached the gospel of Habakkuk, a prophet who complained to God, "How long, O Lord, must I call for help, but you do not listen?" (Habakkuk 1:2) when the leaders of Judah were oppressing the poor in his nation. As I listened to his lament, it didn't escape me that I have been thinking, though not saying, those same words about my own life. In the end, God answers Habakkuk, telling him that the solution he seeks is coming, but not until the right time, and in turn, Habakkuk praises the Lord, and prays, "I will wait patiently for the day of calamity to come on the nation invading us... I will rejoice in the Lord, I will be joyful in God my Savior." (3:16-18)
Sitting in my pew on Sunday, I was overwhelmed by the way the sermon seemed to be speaking directly to my current situation. It was, in one of God's mysterious ways, the answer to my prayers for help and direction. God hasn't abandoned me, He hasn't forgotten me, but He is working on a different time schedule than me. I need to be patient, to trust, and to have a little faith that when the time is right I will find my way -- through His way.
In other words, I was a brat. (My brothers have the scars on their arms to prove it.)
While I am much more mature today (I only throw fits in my head when I have to wait for something), I still haven't quite mastered the patience virtue that my mother, an elementary school teacher, commanders with such ease. I get frustrated when I'm stuck on the 10 FWY going 5 mph, I get cranky when I have to wait too long for a table at a restaurant, and I get irritated when a movie has too many previews at the theatre. Like many in my general age bracket (and coincidentally, most age brackets), I crave instant gratification -- I want what I want when I want it.
The problem with the whole "instant gratification" kind of mindset is that life doesn't work that way. More specifically, God doesn't work that way.
For the past twenty or so months, I've been struggling with what some might call a quarter-life crisis. I'm not sure if what I am experiencing can fall neatly under that label, but I do know that I feel scared about what I'm doing with my life. I worry everyday that I am not using the gifts and talents God has given me in the right way -- professionally, socially and spiritually. While I know that Earthly pursuits - ie. fame, money and a fancy career with fancy business cards -- aren't the point, I can't help but think there is more out there for me than my current 9 to 5 job. And not just because I really hate all the filing.
But even beyond the whole career woes and questions of "what am I doing with my life?", I feel a general sense of malaise that things haven't turned out the way I planned when I graduated college nearly four years ago. I didn't expect that life would be this hard. That I wouldn't be promoted into greatness at my first job, that I would lose friends as quickly as I made them, that my roommate would move out, that I wouldn't immediately find the love of my life (or even someone to love for a minute). At times, the whole lot of it makes me wonder if God has forgotten about me. And then I go to my Sunday church service, and Pastor Mark Brewer says something that seems so absurdly relevant that I know He hasn't. That I just have to practice a little of my least favorite virtue, patience.
This past Sunday, Pastor Brewer preached the gospel of Habakkuk, a prophet who complained to God, "How long, O Lord, must I call for help, but you do not listen?" (Habakkuk 1:2) when the leaders of Judah were oppressing the poor in his nation. As I listened to his lament, it didn't escape me that I have been thinking, though not saying, those same words about my own life. In the end, God answers Habakkuk, telling him that the solution he seeks is coming, but not until the right time, and in turn, Habakkuk praises the Lord, and prays, "I will wait patiently for the day of calamity to come on the nation invading us... I will rejoice in the Lord, I will be joyful in God my Savior." (3:16-18)
Sitting in my pew on Sunday, I was overwhelmed by the way the sermon seemed to be speaking directly to my current situation. It was, in one of God's mysterious ways, the answer to my prayers for help and direction. God hasn't abandoned me, He hasn't forgotten me, but He is working on a different time schedule than me. I need to be patient, to trust, and to have a little faith that when the time is right I will find my way -- through His way.
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