break the cycle
six and a half years ago i lead a spring break trip through my school to go serve the homeless in washington, d.c.. i had no idea what to expect from the experience, but knew it would be one that would help grow me. little did i know that it would be a large contributing factor in this huge change in my heart. before the trip i thought about the homeless, volunteered to feed them and everything, but the trip gave the homeless population faces and personalities, it made the issue a reality and i am forever grateful for the opportunity to work along some wonderful organizations that snowy week in our nation’s capital.
but this entry isn’t about my trip, it’s about breaking the cycle. i start out with my story in d.c. because it was that week that our host gave each of us a lock washer. a lock washer, you ask? yes, a little circle you can buy at a hardware store, or amazon (you can click on the link to get a better picture). she gave us this simple piece of metal to remind us to break the cycle. if you look at it it’s not a complete circle, it sort of twists where there is a break. i wrote in my journal the night she gave it to us we can get caught up in a daily routine and we need to change that every once in a while. i was a bright 19 year old 
but it’s true, comfort and doing the normal can be just as dangerous as proactively doing something bad. while routines are nice, they lose excitement and don’t challenge.
i hate the thought of living life without challenges and living a life of comfort, but i let it happen all the time. comfort sneaks in, gets settled and just hangs out before i even realize that i am doing nothing to challenge myself or change up the daily monotony that can become a part of life. it is fascinating to me that i can hate the idea of something but live it out so often.
tonight at our community group meeting i talked about how i wonder sometimes if i can even create change in a horribly broken world. i’ve been reading and reading and reading a ton about lots of horrible things that are occurring in the world for school and there are moments where i get paralyzed by the idea of even making a dent in the plethora of problems in the world. but i believe that a group of dudes and Jesus were able to feed more than 5,000 people with five loaves of bread and two fish and i bet you that little kid who had the basket of food initially didn’t think it was possible [john 6], he probably didn’t think he could be used in such a way… i always bring myself back to that story, it’s probably my favorite in the bible. i don’t conduct the miracle, i just need to be there and willing to take the risk to help make it happen. but alas, i will hit a wall tomorrow i’m sure and want to run away from the challenges set before me but i will always have a constant reminder from that little piece of metal.
i wanted to share with you what was given to me six and a half years ago. feb 28th, 2003 – i received that lock washer and put it on the ribbon bookmark in my journal (which i still use today). every time i open my journal i see this little metal thing wrapped in ribbon and take a moment to think am i breaking the cycle?
p.s. this entry reminded me of the song “comfortable” by john mayer. if you haven’t heard it, take 99 cents and download it on itunes now. it’s really a great song and while it’s about relationships, i think comfort applies to all aspects of life.
plant a seed…
i have adopted a new motto recently, i say it all the time. i tell people to “plant a seed”. it’s kind of like paying it forward except why wait to have someone do something nice for you to do something nice for someone else? just go out and do it!
immediate gratification is something that is drilled into our heads as being a good thing which i think makes us not want to invest in things without an immediate return. people want the fruit right after planting the seed and well, unless the seed is horribly genetically engineered or something wacky goes into it, i really don’t think that’s possible.
i’ve learned a lot over the past year in interacting with people of all sorts of demographics that i can invest and invest and invest but may never see what comes of the investment… in a bible study a few weeks back a man said that when you give money to a homeless man, it’s not the value that’s important, it is that i am giving control over and trusting that the money will do some good. it’s not my place to judge and immediately stereotype the recipient of the money, it’s only my place to know that i am blessed and that i trust that the money will go to good and God will have the responsibility of judging, not me.
what i am trying to challenge myself to do (and believe me, i have room to grow in this) as well as a lot of the people i interact with, is to plant seeds EVERYWHERE. something small to you may mean the world to someone else. and the worse thing? not really, but i know you’re thinking it… you may NOT be around to see how the plant grows! trust that every seed you plant will be sowed, if you have the opportunity to sow, then do it, but if not it doesn’t mean you should withhold kindness.
it’s what we’re called to do. LOVE. i challenge you to do it. give someone a hug who needs it; drop a card in the mail to someone who you haven’t talked to in ages; ask someone how they’re doing and really mean it. go ahead, plant some seeds!
what makes me, me – part 2
Most of our community group meetings open up with an icebreaker type question. Last night’s was “What Is Your Favorite Holiday?” See, I have a problem with Christmas (not because I don’t want to celebrate Jesus’ birthday) because it’s 5 days after mine and well, I like celebrating birthdays but it always was hard to do when I was young because Christmas was always the same week. Heck, it’s still hard to do now because everyone’s already left for their vacations… I never got cupcakes in my kindergarten class, rarely got birthday cards outside of immediate family and best friends and yes, I’m still dealing with those issues
my election day tracker (hand made!)
Anyways, I thought it about it and went through the year and thought when was the last time I wanted to throw a party for a holiday? ELECTION DAY! So yes, I let part of my inner nerd out and said Election Day. The response from the room was what anyone would expect So I went on to explain about my wonderful Election Day party that I planned in my head for like a year… I even made a huge color in map with white boards above it to keep track of electoral votes!
Let me explain why I like Election Day.
1) I love government and politics. I majored in International Studies with an emphasis in Political Science in school but prior to that I was a straight Poli Sci major and took a course in Campaigns & Elections. I learned a lot about what goes into campaigning cause we had to work one and everything and had a new outlook on it all.
2) Yes, I am only 1 vote. BUT IT’S ONE VOTE! If I didn’t vote, there would be one less. AND elections are starting to get so close now (i.e. Minnesota Senate Race 2008, Presidential Election 2000, etc.), what if someone wins by just 1 vote? You’d be glad you voted!
3) There are so many people in the world who are not blessed to live in a democratic society where they can freely vote. Or if they can, they might get shot while going to the polling place if they are supporting an opposing party. We are lucky. I can go to my local polling place with full confidence that I can vote for whoever I want, freely. It does makes me sad when people don’t vote, but that’s their choice. I’ve gotten in crazy arguments on it before just because we are lucky to live in a democracy and there are people who would die to have the chance to vote.
Election Day is a great holiday. No we don’t get the day off work and no, there’s no gifts but it’s still exciting to see the poll numbers come in at the end of the day and know that I helped contribute to them
ctrl+alt+del
these three buttons are what i turn to when my computer even moves a second slower than it should. today while in the midst of sending emails at work my outlook decided to freeze as it does at least twice a day everyday. yesterday i just sat and waited for my computer to catch up with all the commands i threw out at it; today that wasn’t the same story. i was in a hurry. hurry to get to what? i have no idea. send another email, prepare for a meeting, who knows? probably for NOTHING. when i press those three buttons and end the program as its trying to process it really does create more work but it’s immediate gratification, there is movement on my computer as opposed to blank screens for a minute or two. when i exit out mid-email, i lose the email which means i’ll have to re-type it. why do i always jump to the ‘quicker’ option when in the end it’s not all that much quicker?
last night my at my community group meeting we discussed the sin of sloth. the conversation was spurred by an article in relevant magazine by jeff cook (can’t remember the month, it was in the last few, kings of leon was on the cover) about sloth in today’s world. the article says “sloth is not about laziness, it’s not about taking time to rest or failing to be a good little capitalist. sloth is about indifference-indifference toward the soul, indifference toward other human beings, indifference toward the world, indifference toward God.” we live in a world that keeps us so busy and in need to be immediately gratified that we become indifferent because we don’t see results quick enough. the verse that slapped me in the face while studying sloth was proverbs 18:9 “one who is slack in his work is brother to one who destroys”.
you are probably asking, but working and not working are completely different, how is one who works slothful? after reading into it a little i got a different view on the subject. sloth is being indifferent but it can also represent the hyperactivity that we immerse ourselves into with no objections. the article also says “sloth is a zeal for what is trivial, and it infects both the fanatic and the apathetic with the same disease.” me spending 4415646 hours on facebook is just as bad as me sitting on a couch doing absolutely nothing which is also just as bad as me being obsessed with money and my job because they all 1) take me away from pursuing a relationship with God and 2) take me a way from doing God’s work in this world.
we do ctrl+alt+del all over our lives because things don’t move fast enough. and we judge that if someone’s moving slower in life (or just not in our direction at our pace) then we are better off and try to fix them. we want to fix EVERYTHING when maybe they don’t need to be fixed at all and all we need to do is just wait it out and not expect our seeds to sow overnight (or outlook to recover in a second). i just need to sit, breathe, and enjoy the stillness of life; appreciate all the things God put in our world that we overlook so often because we speed by.
so this week, i am keeping track of how much time i spend on the internet (including writing this blog). i told my community group that i would send them that time, not sure if they thought i would be serious but i am keeping track for me. the internet is a HUGE distraction for me in life and i admitted that i struggle with prayer and so the time i’m trying to not spend on the internet i am trying to spend in prayer. i am human and may fail but i’m still going to try and fight my everyday distractions.
and maybe tomorrow i won’t try to ctrl+alt+del my computer when outlook starts freaking out again…
people
the last several weeks have shown me that people should be more important than any material items that we horde in our lives.
over the last month i had the opportunity to visit some of my closest friends and just hang out and talk with them. two are now married, one is back in africa for a year, and many others are preparing for their next chapters in life. it always fascinates me to see how my life intersects with other lives and how some stick and some don’t.
throughout high school and college i lost a lot of friends because my priorities weren’t right. i was more focused on doing things and getting stuff done than spending time investing in friendships. i look back and am sad that i would let things get in the way of me spending time with people i cared for. i live in this trend though, i like to stay busy, join things and over committ; i see myself falling into the same trend now and taking time out of my life to visit my friends and family over the last month has been the best thing i could have done.
relationships are like anything you work to achieve – work for a paycheck, exercise for health, etc. friends don’t just come and stay, it’s important to take time out and call and write and tell them happy birthday. i am definitely blessed with the amazing people i have and continue to surround myself with
this makes me think it might be a good time to revisit my new year’s resolution and make sure i’m taking time out for the important things…
he doesn’t even need a blackberry…
a few years ago a friend and i went to an art exhibit at cheekwood called “100 artists see god”. it was a very interesting exhibit. not all of the artists were christian, not all of them even believed in a god. it’s always amazing to see how different people interpret something. some were very negative and some were really weird and some really spoke to me.
one of the pieces was a photograph of amoeba music in hollywood on sunset (my favorite record store in the world). it’s almost like the one i found on the internet (pictured), that’s not the picture that was in the exhibit though. it was HUGE and the title by it was “god as a great organizer”.
i have participated in a lot of discussions lately and been very reflective over the past few years of my life and was reminded of this image. anyone who has been to any crazy huge record store or any store for that matter probably understands that there is a lot of time and tedious work to make the shopping experience easy on the consumer. if i walk into a record store and know what i’m looking for, i would be able to locate it easily because they are usually alphabetized. amoeba music has thousands upon thousands of new and used cds, vinyls, dvds, etc. my guess is that it took some thought to have it as organized as it is.
BUT God has an even harder job at organizing, He organizes my life and even yours.
think about it… look at your life, look at all the twists and turns and intersections with other people, it blows me away to think about it. it’s like standing at the shore of an ocean and seeing just endless water, it’s incomprehensible. yet, He organizes it with our best interests at heart and in a way that helps us grow. God truly is a GREAT organizer and so much more. to be sitting here in nashville, tn writing this this very second is nothing short of a miracle. so next time you see some great organization, think about the even greater organizer in your life
what makes me, me – part 1
i had this vision to write some blog posts about what motivates, inspires and just makes me, me. here’s my first installment…
i started college as an undeclared major and took classes to be everything from sports medicine to philosophy. the first major i declared was political science, i was so excited but there was something about it that didn’t keep me in it. so i went the responsible route and declared a major in business administration (yea, i know it’s laughable, i am not a businessy person). while about to fail out of my macro or micro economics class (professor let me leave with a withdraw/pass) i was in search of what i was supposed to study. a friend of mine told me to take an international relations class that summer, that’s when the blindfold had been removed from my eyes.
while in that class we watched a documentary on the rwandan genocide. i had never heard of this before and it made me SO ANGRY that anyone would let something so horrendous happen. i didn’t know what to do with myself after seeing it. that summer, i was an RA for the apartments on campus and i went to my director’s office and just went off. i talked to her about my disbelief in my country letting something so atrocious happen. she proceeded to give me a book to borrow… “good news about injustice” by gary haugen. the book changed my life.
something that makes me sad about many is that when one encounters a horrible statistic or learns of something such as a genocide they get overwhelmed and think the world’s problems are too big for them to fix so they erase it from their heads and move on with their life. my heart and mind don’t work like this. if i learn of something i want the world to know even if it’s not sugar-coated.
this book does an amazing job at combating the thought of if it’s too big for me to fix then i won’t do anything about it. do you think cliffs were made in a day? no, it took years and years of errosion. that’s what we need to do.
here’s a small paragraph of the book (by no means does it give it justice)…
the great miracle and mystery of God is that he calls me and you to be a part of what he is doing in history. he could, of course, with no help from us proclaim the gospel of Jesus Christ with lifeless stones, feed the entire world with five loaves and two fish, heal the sick with the hem of his garment and release all the oppressed with his angels. instead God has chosen us–missionaries, agricultural engineers, doctors, lawyers, lawmakers, diplomats and all those who support, encourage and pray for them–to be his hands in doing those things in the world that are important to him. (page 34)
through out the book he reiterates that God is a God of justice. He hurts for everyone that hurts, me with my sometimes small problems and people who are enslaved for their whole lives. He loves us all equally and we should do the same and love each other equally.
this book and learning about the rwandan genocide were big contributors to why i declared a major in international studies with an emphasis in political studies. not the happiest of subjects to learn…
there are times where i get frozen by the overwhelming thought of all the troubles of the world. a huge part of growth in my life has been to realize that even if i personally cannot change the entire world i can do my part and change the world of one person or help influence a group of people. i am beyond grateful for learning what i did and still having the thirst to learn more about what goes on in the world.
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“remember those in prison as if you were their fellow prisoners, and those who are mistreated as if you yourselves were suffering” (hebrews 13:3)
i think my heaven would sound like…
all 4 finishing out the night with a song
i think it’s the movie “where dreams may come” where people go to heavens that are created by them (correct me if i am wrong). well tonight was probably close to what mine would be, at least what it would sound like.
for those of you who don’t know, i ABSOLUTELY love music, well at least i used to and there are times where a show will bring out my inner music lover. tonight i got to see the lead singers of thrice, saves the day, the get up kids and bayside – dustin kensrue, chris conley, matt pryor and anthony raneri (respectively). while i am not a big bayside fan the other three bands are some of my favorite bands, so tonight was such a treat. i kept telling my friends that this is what heaven would sound like.
it always amazes me how music can be like a bullet that goes straight into my heart. tonight chris conley (of saves the day) sang “don’t know why” and i NEVER would have guessed that that would be a song that would be sung tonight. but immediately i began to tear up, this song brought back a painful memory of a time in my life. i sang a ton of songs tonight but that one was too hard to sing. i love that music can bring a memory up instantly even a tough one.
all in all, i love music but i forget how much i love it sometimes when i am surrounded by it. tonight i was a kid in a candy store, listening to what my heaven would sound like it’s good to be happy sometimes even if my voice will be gone tomorrow because of it.
inauguration day
i spent most of today in and out of sleep (i have a bad cold) but was sure to stay awake for the inauguration of our country’s 44th president.
being a complete political nerd i celebrate any political occasion but to see so many people celebrating too blew me away. politics is one of those subjects that you shouldn’t discuss and it’s in casual conversations everyday! i love that people are beginning to have hope in a political system that, to me, is truly amazing. our country’s history is an amazing story that has brought us a very long way in a very short period of time.
where i live i am not surrounded by many people who have shared my support for barack obama but i hope that we do stop thinking about ‘me’ and focus on ‘we’ as has been greatly discussed in the last several days. our new president’s call to service is a wonderful request and i hope people can get out there and serve.
here are some links on how you can find a place to serve:
- http://www.volunteermatch.org/
- http://www.dosomething.org/
- http://www.usaservice.org (there are dozens of other organizations here – http://www.usaservice.org/page/content/opportunities/)
so let’s hope for the best in the next 4 years. no more selfishness (which should help the credit/loan problems our country is deaing with) and more togetherness.
hello, my name is nicole and i don’t have everything together
yesterday’s message at church was about the fear of judgement. being a christian i feel like i almost have to live with the façade that i have everything together, that my life is great but in all honesty it is not. in the book “unchristian” an overwhelming theme (in the beginning at least… haven’t made it to the end yet) is that christians are viewed greatly as being hypocritical and not authentic.
“so own up to your sins to one another and pray for one another. in the end, you may be healed. your prayers are powerful when they are rooted in a righteous life.” (james 5:16 – the voice)
also yesterday during the service our pastor quoted another person about giving the gift of going second. we need to reveal all of our inner junk. the stuff that we cover up because we don’t want anyone to think that we aren’t really believers or anything. you know, there are those times where all it takes is one person to open up to really get the conversation going? that is giving the gift of going second, i believe.
the problem with keeping struggles, sins and stresses in and not sharing them is that they just eat you up. this isn’t good for your relationships, health or anything as i have experienced in the past year immensely.
so, here i go…
- in the past year i have tried to take control of my life back from God (even though that’s kind of impossible) because i was mad at somethings that happened and to be honest, i probably have been staring at a closed door too long that i’ve missed all the other ones He has opened.
- i don’t ask anyone for help. ever. i could be in dire emotional stress and have been and will just let it eat me up because i don’t want to burden anyone with the broken record that i have become (repeating the same prayer requests over and over).
- fear has become a huge factor in my life decisions, especially since my car has been broken into (i wasn’t even in there when it happened). but i can’t even go walking on a trail by myself with the fear of being burglarized.
- sometimes i think nashville was a mistake. which hurts because i have made some great friends and have grown a ton but still wonder if i made the right decision.
- i know i can be happy, i think i choose to not be happy because it involves risk.
there it is. a bunch my junk out on the table. it actually felt good to write it all down. it will be scary to press the publish button because then you can read it. i totally believe that Jesus died for my sins but i struggle as every human being does with worldly things and selfishness and so much more.
and so to you my friends, i would like to tell you that it is ok to not have it all together. something that was the theme of last week (i think to prepare me for yesterday’s message & today’s blog) was that no matter what, He doesn’t give up. even as i am kicking and screaming and begging to go in another direction, He is patiently carrying me through all the tough junk at a pace that will help me be the best person i can be. luckily, even though i don’t ask for help, i have an amazing community of people around me who are ok with me sounding like a broken record even if i don’t want to sound like one.
even though i hate asking for it, i will ask for your prayers to battle these struggles and to just be patient with what lies ahead. i will be praying for you and what you are going through.
