Have you ever been around a child or seen examples of people living a life where they think that everything around them family, friends, job, future is never enough? Where the grass is always greener and people always seem to have it all together except you or live lives that you would do almost anything to have. Or even have you ever wanted to change something about yourself so that your life was easier? I admit that sometimes I indulge in these feelings. Sometimes it is comfortable to be a victim... just like the little child who gets hurt and then waits to see his mother before he cries... he knows that when someone is there to hear him that he will be probably be coddled...
This victim mentality is dangerous. It is addictive and habit forming. How many people in the world walk around with a limp and destroy their lives because some kind of injustice (perceived or real) has been done to them instead of just picking up their lives and moving on with the expectation of hope, love, joy, and for those who believe in Jesus a future with Him as His servant. Think about all of the entitlement programs that are out there and the people who abuse them... (This is not a jab at entitlement programs but a statement of fact that there are an unknown number of people who abuse them).
Imagine if some of the most influential people in history just gave up because they thought that they weren't "enough" or that they didn't have "enough" or because they were the "have not's" Consider the most popular examples of Abraham Lincoln, Albert Einstein, Thomas Edison... what about your neighbor down the street or the rookie police officer who keeps on making mistakes on the job or even the mothers who are going through the school for hard knocks with their children?
The fact is that people are resilient if they would just try... world change happens to the people who keeps on dusting themselves off and keep at it over and over and over again.
Yet sometimes we need to know how and when to stop and to change tactics, directions, dreams...
It's like the in the Meisner Acting Technique... you can approach a person and attempt to get what you want but when that person isn't budging emotionally or is putting up a wall emotionally you must change your tactics... it's either change or you end up going no where and the acting scene looks fake and surreal...
Sometimes I wish I could really take my own advice that I give in my blogs. To really embrace it and just plainly apply it to my life and love others unconditionally. Have you ever given advice to someone that you know to be sound and true yet you don't do it yourself. It's like preaching a sermon and going out and living life that is contrary to what you just taught.... It makes you a fake, some could a traitor... but a traitor to yourself to your soul...
So I am in a season where I don't feel like I have enough and their is a burning passionate zealous hole that was previously filled by my ambition to succeed and do exceptionally well in an MFA in Acting program... That program and the knowledge and doors it opened represented to me or at least in my perception an opportunity to lay claim to something that is difficult, that many do not succeed in, and that is very very very hard to be apart of. It was almost like an exclusive club of the elites in acting... I even wanted to embrace the program with real organic humility... I entered into the program believing that I wasn't good enough to be in it... I kept this mentality through my year of studies and was sometimes paralyzed by fear that I would fail... and when I finally did fail it crushed my heart, my dreams, and left me wounded...
PRIDE and JEALOUSLY were the by products of this poisonous point of view in my year as an MFA in acting candidate... although it was mingled with a sincere desire to deeply love people and to serve them and God fully.
Can that even be possible? To mix contrary emotional states?
I have reviewed over and over again my year in the program and even went to far as to say to some people that I would have paid double the full tuition of the school to keep on going in the program and would have worked harder and longer than I ever did in the first year even if the faculty thought it would be to my detriment to continue in the program... that was how strong my resolve was... it wasn't about the money... it wasn't about the difficulty of the work... and I fully believe that I would have improved exponentially if I was given the chance, if I was given more time... I wanted it... I desired to succeed... my success and the status of being an MFA trained artist was (and still is) so attractive to me...
The above statement is full of some poisonous words and extreme pride... I recognize it and I know it is wrong to even think it or embrace this toxic idea, it still is a natural organic real response.
But even if I was given another chance... given an opportunity to finish the program would it be enough for me? Would I run off and try to achieve something else that would fill the burning hole in my heart?
I... must... run... after... Christ...
Christ is my "enough" even though sometimes I don't feel it in my heart. Has anyone else struggled to actually realize the love of God and really feel it deep inside them? I know that God is more than a feeling but I believe that God knows that humanity needs to connect emotionally with their Creator and loving Father and that He will open up His heart of love to us. Consider Jesus embracing children in the Bible and weeping over the death of Lazarus...
So I am on a journey... (again) without any clear direction for the future (again) in a place with no stability and structure (again)
BUT... Jesus is my rock... I want Him to be the rock and foundation in my life... I've tried very hard to accept that and keep that a constant reality in my life... to embrace true humility and run after Him with a devoted servants heart for others...
I'm not perfect... I'm not even pretty good... I'm just broken and I am desperate for restoration but I want it quickly and painlessly... which is probably not going to happen.
If anything substantial is going to happen in the life I have been given to serve God and others I must address the issues that keep me from succeeding and destroy them... drive them to the ground... and lift the burden and yoke off of my soul and live free in the hope, joy, love, and peace of Christ.
Jesus is my "enough" who is your "enough"?
Blessings,
Sam
I feel ya man. Somehow He will anchor you... (this is one of those advice moments that are hard for me to live out). Sarah and I are praying for you as you try to assemble the pieces into some semblance of an understandable picture. Thanks for being transparent with your recent story. It is tough when real life doesn't successfully line up with our projected and hoped for future.
ReplyDeleteAnd by the way, you are a talented writer. Keep developing this gift man!