One day last week I actually had the thought, "Hmm, hamsters have the life. What I wouldn't give for my own personal bubble." Granted, being trapped inside an ever-spinning ball really wasn't what I was going for...maybe more like a Cone of Silence. Yes. Some days I would kill for a Cone of Silence.
Last week was our Spring Break Program at World Impact. We had 30 kids running around and I had 9 volunteers and several staff to direct and a crazy extroverted three-year-old doing donuts around the gym. It was a great week but the Introvert in me flew to my knees and cried Hallelujah! when the last child exited the front door on Friday night.
Between planning, organizing, hosting the volunteers, and running the program, and getting next to no sleep, it was a long two weeks of extroverting, which ended with our family and our staff getting the stomach flu...so I'm still trying to recover. Saturday, after our kid's program was over, we hosted an eye glass clinic for people in the community. I could tell I had reached my people limit. Some very nice lady was asking about my life story and I could give her little more than one word answers. I knew it was insufficient and I sort of half wished that I could offer more, but I didn't have the energy to elaborate.
In moments like this I become an angry Introvert, sick and tired of people and yet, ever so slightly guilty that I can't just keep on giving. I start feeling like I'm not any fun to be around (probably because I'm not) and I get jealous of people who can extrovert all day long and still have energy to give at the end of the day.
I've spent my entire life with this cycle. I like to call it The Introverted Funk. I'm in it right now. I'm short and impatient. I feel like crawling in my closet for a moments peace...but hey, I'll take a hamster ball if that's all that's available. I am filled with dread at the busyness to come. I'm so tired I could just fall over asleep at any moment.
It's time to pause and as my wise three-year-old reminded me today, "Mama, take a DEEEEEP breath. It's gonna be OOOOOK."
We've got so much to do that there's not much time for an Introvert to gain equilibrium, but I have to make time to survive. It does take more work for us Introverts to stay healthy. There's no sense in wishing I could be different when I get to the Angry Introvert stage, I just need to take the necessary steps to be able to engage with the world again.
I'm gonna take a deep breath and find somewhere to hide for a little while. If you can't find me anywhere, don't look in the closets it may be my only people-free sanctuary. Oh and if anyone has a Cone of Silence lying around, feel free to send it my way.
Wednesday, March 28, 2012
Wednesday, March 21, 2012
Forgiveness
I am not quick to forgive. I have, what my husband calls a "justice mentality," and what I have often called my "Holy Spirit complex." I want right to be done, wrong to be vanquished and the truth to be proclaimed...and preferably in my favor.
In my mind there is a right and a wrong, a winner and a loser. And what has really driven me crazy in life is that I used to believe that whoever brings the most truth to the table "wins." A few more years into life, however, I know that whoever brings the most crazy "wins." That just doesn't seem right. Add it to the list of injustices in the world.
I've spent a lot of time trying to force people to see the truth...sometimes actual truth and sometimes my own version, I suppose. When they don't see it, it infuriates me. It is even worse when I am personally hurt and not just pissed off at a more general injustice.
So, it's ironic that today I'm leading a devotion for some of our World Impact volunteers about forgiveness. It covers the passage in Mark 2 where a paralytic is brought to Jesus by some crazy friends, who actually dig a hole in the roof of the building where Jesus is teaching and lower the paralyzed man down to Jesus for healing. I'd have liked to be in that room and seen the first clod of dirt hit the floor. People start looking at the ceiling in confusion as little by little more sunlight and dirt starts pouring into their eyes. And then, all of a sudden, a man appears with four eager faces hovering over his still body. But, then Jesus does something very odd (and to stand out as odd when there's suddenly a man hanging from the ceiling says something). As the man's air-borne pallet hits the floor, He tells him his sins are forgiven.
What a let down that must have been for the man, hoping and praying that his limbs would start to move! I mean, imagine it! You haven't walked in years, if ever, and you're waiting for some tingling sensation to start in your toes when, instead, you get your sins forgiven. I'd have been disappointed. You would have too, I think.
It's humbling, for an unforgiving person, to realize that in God's Kingdom forgiveness is of first importance. Jesus does heal the man physically, but only after the important healing has already taken place. His dancing legs were not what gave him his freedom that day. Jesus' forgiveness did that. So often I go to God and ask Him to be freed of an illness, or burden, or a hurtful or irritating person or situation, when what my heart is actually in need of is forgiveness...both to accept it and to be able to offer it. Forgiveness brings peace and action to a world hung up in injustice.
Still, my justice oriented mind has a hard time wrapping itself around forgiveness. I like there to be consequences when wrong is done. Preferably swift and painful. But then...there were consequences. Someone did pay the price. I may wish it was the blockhead who wounded and pissed me off, but instead it was a perfect, sinless Savior. And He paid for my sins too. "Big," "small," it doesn' matter. Jesus hung on that cross with the force of every single sin.
Crap. That kind of takes the wind out of my prideful sails. It certainly doesn't make it any easier to ask for and offer forgiveness, but it gives me the motivation to work on making forgiveness come first in my life...I have a long way to go.
In my mind there is a right and a wrong, a winner and a loser. And what has really driven me crazy in life is that I used to believe that whoever brings the most truth to the table "wins." A few more years into life, however, I know that whoever brings the most crazy "wins." That just doesn't seem right. Add it to the list of injustices in the world.
I've spent a lot of time trying to force people to see the truth...sometimes actual truth and sometimes my own version, I suppose. When they don't see it, it infuriates me. It is even worse when I am personally hurt and not just pissed off at a more general injustice.
So, it's ironic that today I'm leading a devotion for some of our World Impact volunteers about forgiveness. It covers the passage in Mark 2 where a paralytic is brought to Jesus by some crazy friends, who actually dig a hole in the roof of the building where Jesus is teaching and lower the paralyzed man down to Jesus for healing. I'd have liked to be in that room and seen the first clod of dirt hit the floor. People start looking at the ceiling in confusion as little by little more sunlight and dirt starts pouring into their eyes. And then, all of a sudden, a man appears with four eager faces hovering over his still body. But, then Jesus does something very odd (and to stand out as odd when there's suddenly a man hanging from the ceiling says something). As the man's air-borne pallet hits the floor, He tells him his sins are forgiven.
What a let down that must have been for the man, hoping and praying that his limbs would start to move! I mean, imagine it! You haven't walked in years, if ever, and you're waiting for some tingling sensation to start in your toes when, instead, you get your sins forgiven. I'd have been disappointed. You would have too, I think.
It's humbling, for an unforgiving person, to realize that in God's Kingdom forgiveness is of first importance. Jesus does heal the man physically, but only after the important healing has already taken place. His dancing legs were not what gave him his freedom that day. Jesus' forgiveness did that. So often I go to God and ask Him to be freed of an illness, or burden, or a hurtful or irritating person or situation, when what my heart is actually in need of is forgiveness...both to accept it and to be able to offer it. Forgiveness brings peace and action to a world hung up in injustice.
Still, my justice oriented mind has a hard time wrapping itself around forgiveness. I like there to be consequences when wrong is done. Preferably swift and painful. But then...there were consequences. Someone did pay the price. I may wish it was the blockhead who wounded and pissed me off, but instead it was a perfect, sinless Savior. And He paid for my sins too. "Big," "small," it doesn' matter. Jesus hung on that cross with the force of every single sin.
Crap. That kind of takes the wind out of my prideful sails. It certainly doesn't make it any easier to ask for and offer forgiveness, but it gives me the motivation to work on making forgiveness come first in my life...I have a long way to go.
Wednesday, March 14, 2012
Are You a Woman?
A recent trip to the library went something like this...
Random dude walking around the library: "You're so tall!"
Me: "Yeah, I guess."
Random dude: "Are you a woman?"
Me: "Uh. Last time I checked."
Random dude: "You're so tall!"
And then he walked away. Such a strange encounter. I'm tall for the average woman, but coming in at just shy of 5' 10", I hardly classify as Man-Tall. And, I'm under no delusions that I will be winning Miss Universe anytime soon (well, anytime, ever) but I've never really thought I had a mannish face or figure. He didn't look obviously disturbed, but I'm guessing he was a few tacos short of a fiesta platter.
But then, I started thinking. I guess I can't blame the guy too much, because I've had to ask myself the same question a time or two. Not, in the I'm-in-need-of-a-sex-change sort of way, of course. More like, it's confusing to be a woman with a predominantly male personality (INTJ). I don't quite know who to identify with. I mean, I look at the world and process things through a lens that I usually share with other men, not women. But, I'm not a man (even if it's not obvious to certain patrons of the library). I like being a woman. I'm a wife and a mother. I enjoy traditionally feminine hobbies, like sewing and collaging, and one of my favorite movies is Pride and Prejudice (the 4 hours A&E version, of course).
One time, in a college small group at church, we had to share our favorite CD, book, and movie as a means to get to know one another (oh the joy). I can't ever say I have a favorite, so I shared some favorites at the time, Beyonce's latest, Stephen King novels, and John Wayne's The Quiet Man. One guy said, "What does that say about her?" And my pastor said, "It says she's a very complicated woman." A joke, but it stuck with me all these years, because, well, it was what I had always suspected.
There's nothing wrong with being complicated, it makes for an interesting life, but sometimes, when all you want is a straight answer it can be so confusing. I find this the most perplexing when I contemplate how to be who God made me to be. He made me a woman. But, he made me, in many ways, not like other women. A cruel joke, perhaps?
I went to a women's retreat this weekend. I dreaded the chit chat and the display of emotion, but I thought a lot about what it means to be a woman...what it means for me to be a woman. Dr. Don Davis lead a session entitled "Fierce Tenderness," highlighting strengths of women as seen in the book of Ruth. I loved it, and I hated it. He didn't use flowery words to paint a picture of a Kingdom woman and I thought, finally, an identity as a woman I can get behind! But then I try to apply it to my every day, being a missionary, being a wife, being a mother, and things get all jumbled up in my head.
Perhaps it bothers me so much because, by nature, I have a need to make sense of things...and I just haven't been able to make sense of it all. Yet, one thought has lingered since the retreat. Maybe I have always been afraid to embrace the "tenderness" of being a woman. I can totally get behind the "fierce, " but tenderness is not something I openly display. It requires vulnerability, and usually it requires an emphasis on relationship (and let's face it, I'm prone to pick task over relationship any day). Maybe I'm scared of what life-changes would be asked of me if I were to embrace the two approaches together. Maybe it would be easier if I did. Maybe it would be harder. Maybe it would make me look at my roles as a wife and mother and missionary differently, maybe....
In all the complexity I can hold on to two truths. God made me a woman and I was created to have a Kingdom impact. And, I suppose I have to let God work out the details in me one step at a time. I'm hoping it's sooner than later. And just in case there is any lingering doubt, let it be said again for the record...I am a woman.
Random dude walking around the library: "You're so tall!"
Me: "Yeah, I guess."
Random dude: "Are you a woman?"
Me: "Uh. Last time I checked."
Random dude: "You're so tall!"
And then he walked away. Such a strange encounter. I'm tall for the average woman, but coming in at just shy of 5' 10", I hardly classify as Man-Tall. And, I'm under no delusions that I will be winning Miss Universe anytime soon (well, anytime, ever) but I've never really thought I had a mannish face or figure. He didn't look obviously disturbed, but I'm guessing he was a few tacos short of a fiesta platter.
But then, I started thinking. I guess I can't blame the guy too much, because I've had to ask myself the same question a time or two. Not, in the I'm-in-need-of-a-sex-change sort of way, of course. More like, it's confusing to be a woman with a predominantly male personality (INTJ). I don't quite know who to identify with. I mean, I look at the world and process things through a lens that I usually share with other men, not women. But, I'm not a man (even if it's not obvious to certain patrons of the library). I like being a woman. I'm a wife and a mother. I enjoy traditionally feminine hobbies, like sewing and collaging, and one of my favorite movies is Pride and Prejudice (the 4 hours A&E version, of course).
One time, in a college small group at church, we had to share our favorite CD, book, and movie as a means to get to know one another (oh the joy). I can't ever say I have a favorite, so I shared some favorites at the time, Beyonce's latest, Stephen King novels, and John Wayne's The Quiet Man. One guy said, "What does that say about her?" And my pastor said, "It says she's a very complicated woman." A joke, but it stuck with me all these years, because, well, it was what I had always suspected.
There's nothing wrong with being complicated, it makes for an interesting life, but sometimes, when all you want is a straight answer it can be so confusing. I find this the most perplexing when I contemplate how to be who God made me to be. He made me a woman. But, he made me, in many ways, not like other women. A cruel joke, perhaps?
I went to a women's retreat this weekend. I dreaded the chit chat and the display of emotion, but I thought a lot about what it means to be a woman...what it means for me to be a woman. Dr. Don Davis lead a session entitled "Fierce Tenderness," highlighting strengths of women as seen in the book of Ruth. I loved it, and I hated it. He didn't use flowery words to paint a picture of a Kingdom woman and I thought, finally, an identity as a woman I can get behind! But then I try to apply it to my every day, being a missionary, being a wife, being a mother, and things get all jumbled up in my head.
Perhaps it bothers me so much because, by nature, I have a need to make sense of things...and I just haven't been able to make sense of it all. Yet, one thought has lingered since the retreat. Maybe I have always been afraid to embrace the "tenderness" of being a woman. I can totally get behind the "fierce, " but tenderness is not something I openly display. It requires vulnerability, and usually it requires an emphasis on relationship (and let's face it, I'm prone to pick task over relationship any day). Maybe I'm scared of what life-changes would be asked of me if I were to embrace the two approaches together. Maybe it would be easier if I did. Maybe it would be harder. Maybe it would make me look at my roles as a wife and mother and missionary differently, maybe....
In all the complexity I can hold on to two truths. God made me a woman and I was created to have a Kingdom impact. And, I suppose I have to let God work out the details in me one step at a time. I'm hoping it's sooner than later. And just in case there is any lingering doubt, let it be said again for the record...I am a woman.
Wednesday, March 7, 2012
A Recent Love Affair
I hate bandwagons. I'm so anti "following the crowd" that sometimes, unknowingly I still let the crowd dictate my behavior...I'll almost always do the opposite. When The Passion of the Christ came out, every Christian said I HAD to see it. I needed to SEE Christ's sacrifice to really understand it. I mean, isn't it the least we could do to watch His agony on the cross, when he actually suffered it for us? How could you say no?
I still haven't seen the movie. Partly because I refuse to believe that my faith in Christ will reach a pinnacle because of the film, and partly because I am intensely disturbed by blood and gore (just ask my Mom about my childhood trauma of watching Watership Down...yes it's a cartoon, but bunnies clawing each other is SO disturbing).
That being said, I just finished the Hunger Games trilogy. Shhh. Don't tell anyone, it might ruin my non-conformist persona. I was sure I would never read them because everyone was, but then someone in my respected circle recommended them, and, what can I say, I'm a sucker for a good story plot. And just like that I was hooked. I finished them in about 4 days, and while my husband insisted that I was "addicted" I maintained that they are easy, fast-paced books that make for an intense and quick read.
Between you and me, I was a little addicted. But then, that's nothing new when it comes to books.
There is almost nothing I love more than getting lost in a book. I find myself entering a new world and making new friends. Story expands beyond my natural horizons. As Introverts, we understand that the expanse of our minds holds limitless potential. I feel free inside my head, like anything is possible. I can, for example, take a journey into a futuristic, post-American culture, and experience the tragedies of war, the confusion and hope of love and be inside a character's head as she steps into an arena where she knows she will have a fight to the death. That's not exactly my daily experience!
When I come to the end of a good story, I know it has had an impact when I feel parting sorrows. Maybe you can relate. At first I feel a sort of grief. Like a rejected lover, my thoughts keep flitting back to the story, wishing there was still something to be said. Then, a day or two or a week later, I start to process the impact of my most recent love affair and I realize what an influence the seductive world of words has on me.
I used to think that a book could only mean one thing. I thought there was a right or wrong interpretation and only the author could really tell us what that was. But, my years as an English major and a reader have made me realize that the true power of literature is that it can say almost anything. A good story says what the author intended it to say, but woven into the language, the characters, the plot, there are truths about the world that allow for it to speak almost infinitely. The story, then, doesn't just live in type but in my mind and yours, in the way we uniquely identify with characters and in the symbols that imbue meaning into our lives.
That is why I love books. Not only because I can lose myself in imagination, but also because I can make sense of myself and the world by looking through different lenses, always seeing new things.
My affair with The Hunger Games was brief and intense, and I was sad to see it go. As a story it has a lot to say about war and oppression and human loss. Hardly literary classics, but, the story, embedded in a world of pink hair and futuristic weapons, still spoke to me about our limitations as people and how sometimes character development is realizing how little you have to offer without the strengths of others filling in the gaps. The story has lingered in my mind, bitter sweetly.
The movie comes out soon. I'm sure it won't be as good as the book but I can't help but want to spend just a little more time with my love. But, I'm going to pretend like I'm seeing it for very separate reasons from the rest of you, that way I can still feel good about my status as a non-conformist. If you see me there on opening weekend I might avert my eyes and pretend that you don't know me...for the sake of my pride just go along with it.
In the mean time, I'm searching for a new love.
I still haven't seen the movie. Partly because I refuse to believe that my faith in Christ will reach a pinnacle because of the film, and partly because I am intensely disturbed by blood and gore (just ask my Mom about my childhood trauma of watching Watership Down...yes it's a cartoon, but bunnies clawing each other is SO disturbing).
That being said, I just finished the Hunger Games trilogy. Shhh. Don't tell anyone, it might ruin my non-conformist persona. I was sure I would never read them because everyone was, but then someone in my respected circle recommended them, and, what can I say, I'm a sucker for a good story plot. And just like that I was hooked. I finished them in about 4 days, and while my husband insisted that I was "addicted" I maintained that they are easy, fast-paced books that make for an intense and quick read.
Between you and me, I was a little addicted. But then, that's nothing new when it comes to books.
There is almost nothing I love more than getting lost in a book. I find myself entering a new world and making new friends. Story expands beyond my natural horizons. As Introverts, we understand that the expanse of our minds holds limitless potential. I feel free inside my head, like anything is possible. I can, for example, take a journey into a futuristic, post-American culture, and experience the tragedies of war, the confusion and hope of love and be inside a character's head as she steps into an arena where she knows she will have a fight to the death. That's not exactly my daily experience!
When I come to the end of a good story, I know it has had an impact when I feel parting sorrows. Maybe you can relate. At first I feel a sort of grief. Like a rejected lover, my thoughts keep flitting back to the story, wishing there was still something to be said. Then, a day or two or a week later, I start to process the impact of my most recent love affair and I realize what an influence the seductive world of words has on me.
I used to think that a book could only mean one thing. I thought there was a right or wrong interpretation and only the author could really tell us what that was. But, my years as an English major and a reader have made me realize that the true power of literature is that it can say almost anything. A good story says what the author intended it to say, but woven into the language, the characters, the plot, there are truths about the world that allow for it to speak almost infinitely. The story, then, doesn't just live in type but in my mind and yours, in the way we uniquely identify with characters and in the symbols that imbue meaning into our lives.
That is why I love books. Not only because I can lose myself in imagination, but also because I can make sense of myself and the world by looking through different lenses, always seeing new things.
My affair with The Hunger Games was brief and intense, and I was sad to see it go. As a story it has a lot to say about war and oppression and human loss. Hardly literary classics, but, the story, embedded in a world of pink hair and futuristic weapons, still spoke to me about our limitations as people and how sometimes character development is realizing how little you have to offer without the strengths of others filling in the gaps. The story has lingered in my mind, bitter sweetly.
The movie comes out soon. I'm sure it won't be as good as the book but I can't help but want to spend just a little more time with my love. But, I'm going to pretend like I'm seeing it for very separate reasons from the rest of you, that way I can still feel good about my status as a non-conformist. If you see me there on opening weekend I might avert my eyes and pretend that you don't know me...for the sake of my pride just go along with it.
In the mean time, I'm searching for a new love.
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