Kick in the Face

So here it is. The loss of power we're experiencing at work has the ability to slow everything down and give me a chance to blog. It actually had the power to stop time, according to the clock whose hands are hovering right on 2:43. This computer however is on the backup generator.

So, it's been that kind of semester. A long, tough semester with a lack of blogs. And as for this week, it's definately been that kind of week. A kick in the face by reality. The kind that gets your attention. As your future stands right before you waving its arms as if to say, "Hey how could you not have seen me," you begin to wonder yourself how you failed to recognize it. But it's been standing there, ready to dump its load of challenges on your back. Graduation, jobs, leaving. That's just the beginning. With my classes this semester giving me more problems than I've ever dealt with in school, my mind was already preoccupied. And now my grandmother, which could actually be read as "my second mother," is in the hospital undergoing a terribly rough megadose of Kemotherapy. It was something that I'd been expecting, something that was on the calendar in my mind. I knew it was going to be happening soon, but soon and now are so very different. The load of Worry is heaped on my back. And then, constantly finding rejection letters from companies in my email just added to it. A month till graduation and no idea where I'm going to be or what I'll be doing there. This was especially hard Monday, when I received an email from a company that I interviewed with. I thought the interview went very well and I'd followed up with them and everything. It was a place I thought I could fit and it would bring me back to Corpus. It would be so much easier to plan things if rejection letters aren't a reality. But there was the email, thanking me for my time and promising to keep my resume on file. It seems that many companies are going to keep my resume. I'd appreciate it if they gave it back to me instead so I wouldn't have to print anymore out. They're not going to use it. Thanks for the consolation gift... Bitterness and uncertainty add to the pile.

So with updates about Granna coming in from mom, yet another rejection letter sitting in my inbox waiting to be read, and the semester winding down, the future had presented itself and it wasn't something I was prepared to handle. The load is topped off with helplessness.

I went to bed Tuesday night, as I do most nights, with the aid of sleeping pills. I awoke well beofre my alarm went off on my one day to sleep in. Which merely means sleeping until 8:45. But, as I turned my head to look at my clock, my neck let out a pop, which is never a good thing to hear. It was at this point that a sharp pain that extended from my neck to below my shoulder blade began. The muscles that were already tight stiffened and refused to let me turn my head to the right and made it quite a task to rotate my right shoulder. I described it to the chiropractor later that morning and told him about the sharp pain in my upper back and the dull pain throughout the rest of my body. He felt around and told me that he was quite impressed how extremely tight the right side of my back was. He ended up doing his procedure which included adjusting me and massaging my muscles. He told me that I had a knot in my back about the size of a golf ball which was 3 layers of muscles deep. He asked, "Have you been under any stress?"

Stress can take form in many strange ways. Whether it's sending out your resume to companies in New Jersey because you're freaked out or it's your body that gives beneath the weight of the load you've been trying to carry. Well I get the point.

What happened? I usually don't get down or stressed by these things. They happen, normally I deal. I guess this feeling of helplessness overcame me. It's a tough thing to face, the future isn't in your hands. Uncertainty is not a comfortable place to be. So it's now that I need to remember that the future has never been in my hands and honestly it doesn't belong there. These circumstances, this future of mine standing in my path, mocking me had distracted me from where I should fix my eyes. Let me tell you that I'm a big fan of the book of James. One verse that I try to keep near to me is James 1:4. "Let your patience show itself perfectly in what you do. Then you will be perfect and complete and have everything you need." I mean it's on my facebook profile, it must be important to me, right? Dang, I wish. That mindset obviously was overtaken by my selfish nature. The Lord has been with me through everything, he's there as my source of strength. And when I don't bank on that, but instead turn and try to do things myself, I crumble beneath the load. Patience is key. It's something I thought that I had, but it's a battle to remain patient. Patience means reliance on God. It's tough. It shouldn't be, but with my simple, forgetful and just plain ignorant mind, it's something that I stray from. It's always been in His hands, I basically need to get over myself (which shouldn't be hard if you compare sinful me to my awesome, holy, and loving God) and just trust Him. A big part of this reliance comes from turning over everything to the Lord, including this huge load I'd been forcing myself to carry. And with reliance on God, comes patience. And with patience, comes no worries because I will be satisfied in Him. And with my burdens and my worries cast on His strength I will be happy, I'll be complete, I'll have everything I need. He will replace this load of worry and grief with bountiful satisfaction. What good is worrying, why do I need to be able to plan out everything right now? I don't. "But seek first His kingdom and His righteousness and all these things will be given to you as well. Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own." Jesus said that. Matthew wrote it down: Matthew 6:33-34. It's something I needed to write down as well. This is all something I needed to work through to understand how stupid I've been. I mean I know that God has a plan for my life and everything will work for His good. I believe that. But how closely do I hold that truth? Well, over the past couple of weeks, my grasp on that has been severely loosened. So now as I strive to regain that grip, I typed this. And it's an amazing truth that can save me so much strife. With all of this needless stress, what could be better than refocusing my eyes and seeing that this big, bad future that was staring me in the face has been resting in God's hands all along. As I said, it was mainly for my benefit, but I know some of you are carrying a much bigger load than I am, so hopefully you'll get something out of this too...

I know some people have said that since they never get to see me anymore, they'd have to find out things through my blog. And I haven't even been updating that. Well here you go, this is what's been going on. And for those of you that I miss a lot, but make myself so busy that I never get a chance to see you, I'm sorry. I want to make time for my friends, I no doubt will be ranting in future posts about graduation and all that, but I'd much rather discuss it with you in person. Face-to-face communication most definately was a better invention than the blog.