Something really wonderful happens when you take the time to sit and lay things out in front of you.
When I first got home, it was so exciting being back and seeing my favorite faces and anticipating new adventures. Then, it started to sink in that I was home and that I actually needed to get back in the swing of things - and I was grateful.
And now that I'm getting used to being home, having a job, living my crazy life...there are a lot of things that are coming up that I'm having to process.
Ever since I was little, my life has kind of revolved around my need for attention. Not necessarily 'approval', but more than that - I wanted to be different and stand out from a crowd, but I wanted it to be in a way that would be socially...grand? (Still trying to find a better word than that). I wanted to be a person that could talk about myself and make people say 'whoa'. Which probably sounds completely selfish, and it was! But since 'being selfish' is frowned upon, I just kind of absorbed the idea of becoming 'successful' into my personality and didn't pay attention to the actual reason I wanted to be a scientist, take my degree or make a lot of money. I didn't care about the money at all - it was nice, sure, but it didn't make me any happier when I came home at the end of a brutal day that I only got through by holding my breath. I loved my degree, but it wasn't ME at all.
I realized somewhere down the line that I wasn't actually selfish, that the only reason I wanted the eyes of everybody around me was because I grew up with not very much at all, and I kind of hated me for it. I always looked at myself as someone who was good, just not good enough; someone who could do every single thing, but only kind of, and never excelled at any one thing. I was pretty, but only kind of pretty. I was okay at sports, but only kind of okay. I was smart, but only average. And I HATED that. Just once, I wanted so badly to be awesome at something that people would notice and associate with me. I wanted to be the best scientist, or the best artist, the best girlfriend or even the best piano player...and the moment it would become obvious that I probably wouldn't ever BE the best at whatever it was I was doing, I would check out and give up and slack off. Which is a pretty crappy personality blip, I know.
You know what's awesome though? When I started exploring who this Jesus guy was and what God says about me, I started realizing that all my personality flaws weren't actually flaws - they were just signposts. Signposts that pointed me away from all of the things I was trying to be good at, and towards the actual truths about who I am. See, I adopted a lot of things into who I am as things I couldn't do. For example: I couldn't be the best at sports, so I became someone who was not an athlete. Or, I couldn't get a dude to stick around my craziness, so I became someone who was too crazy for anyone to ever love me. But all of those things were just walls around me - not truths.
I was thinking some things through the other day, and I got a picture of a foundation versus a wall. Think about it, a foundation is strong, keeps the house from falling down, and stands strong against any attack. A wall on the other hand, is built completely separate from the house, isn't part of it, but shelters it from an attack. A foundation enables the house to be affected by it's surroundings, but a wall shuts everything out. Both take work to build, but a foundation actually requires the builder to dig up the dirt underneath the surface - a place we really don't like to go. So we build a wall, because it's an easier source of protection. The wall becomes the personality, the us that we express to the world. But we leave our foundation undeveloped, because we figure we don't need it with the carefully-designed wall we've built up around our hearts so that no one and no thing can hurt us.
Here's another difference though: a wall that's being attacked requires constant upkeep, and a foundation is constant - harder and riskier to build, but strong. We like the wall, because even though we have to constantly maintain it and be on-guard, it means we're untouchable. Having a foundation leaves us exposed, relying on something that we hope is strong and steadfast, but that we really can't trust until we've seen it tested. How can we know our foundation is strong unless we open ourselves up to attack?
That's my relationship with Jesus. He said in the Bible that when we truly believe in and rely on Him, it's like building a house on a rock - a foundation that is steadfast and strong and unshakable in even the greatest storms. But the scripture still says "when the storms came, the house stood strong". So...it endured a storm, was hit by crashing waves, endured the trials. The wall kind of prevents us from enduring anything, because it keeps everything out. It seems like a good tactic for protecting ourselves from being hurt, but it also keeps us from building our character and becoming the strong forces of nature we were literally designed to be! We were created to subdue the earth and everything in it, and yet, we spend most of our lives hiding from it.
I've dealt with a LOT of crap in my life. A lot. Maybe not as much as others, maybe more than some - it doesn't matter though, because the wind and waves of every person will look totally different! What is the same, is the truth that when you endure suffering, you build character, because the wind and waves are going to strip away everything that really isn't anchored in who you are, and leave only what is raw and real. And it's not a jolly, happy process.
When I was in Lima chilling on the rock-beach, I got another metaphor: There were three types of rocks on the beach - the ones that were in the sea, the ones that were on the shore that got hit every so often, and the ones that were so far up on the shore that they were always dry. All rocks, but they were all different. How? The rocks in the waves were smooth, colorful, shiny. You could pick out the flecks of bright color in them - the green, red, yellow, purple. Even the ones on the shore, when washed by the waves, were colorful and bright and shiny. The ones that were dry though were jagged, dull, and all brown with dirt...BUT if you chucked one of them into the water, it would become shiny and reveal the bright colors of their own.
What's my point? Being in the wind and waves is crappy and violent. You get tossed from one place to another, thrown into other rocks that break pieces of you away. It's not like you just happily lose a piece of you that was horrible to begin with, because the things that are NOT YOU have usually taken such a foothold in your life that it IS part of you, and revealing the REAL you requires a violent crashing to break those pieces off again. But it also brings out the flecks of color. Pieces of you that were always there that you and others just never paid attention to because it was hidden by the dull brown-ness of your surroundings, hidden by all the things that weren't you. People with walls that keep everything out, suppress their emotions, keep people at arms length - they're like rocks so far up on the shore that no waves will ever reach them. They're beautiful, but no one will ever notice HOW beautiful because they're too afraid to let themselves be revealed. People with foundations are like stones that live in the breakfront of the waves: constantly being tossed back and forth, constantly being tried and tested, constantly growing, but strong, steadfast and true.
I know a LOT of stones that live in the breaking waves - Amazing people who I've been so, so blessed to have as mentors. I think I'm at more of a spot where I'm on the shore, getting the odd storm, or when the tide comes in I get rattled around. But there are so, SO many people in the world with their hearts blocked off in fear of being torn down. We can't expect people to just take down their walls - that's SO dangerous for them, leaving them exposed to storms without a wall OR a foundation. But we can come alongside them and help them build their foundation, while we simultaneously encourage them to take their wall down. It's a balance, it takes patience, and it's hard work. But we HAVE TO have our own foundation in place first.
So what's the result?
The other day, I was freaking out about how I was going to find a job. My mom looked over my resume and wondered how I was going to find something, when I have no experience doing some things (serving), and TOO MUCH experience for other things. I sent out resumes to small positions and never got anything. But when I finally picked up my courage enough to walk in and hand an employer my resume in person, she sat me down and talked with me a bit and gave me an on-the-spot interview. She told me her associate manager told her not to hire anyone without experience, but that she was going to hire me because of my boldness, my positive attitude, my love of people and my openness and integrity. Maybe a serving job isn't that big of a deal - but that's not why I was so crazy excited. I'm SO excited about this job, because I got it specifically because of everything I am. I didn't get it because of what I could do, or what I've done, but who I am as a human being - and BECAUSE I got it for those reasons, all I have to do to be successful and fulfill my boss's expectations is BE me. So, that's pretty cool. It doesn't make me a boatload of money, but I get to go to work and just be myself - not strive, or be anxious, or stress out. I have relationships with people that are seeds, and growing - slowly but surely - and it's painful and annoying to be in such a slow-growing community, but I also know that the people who are actively involved in my life are there because they want to be, because of who I genuinely am.
And if people are wondering why I'm writing all of this even though I'm back home, here's why:
A LOT of people I consider to be incredibly wise, with strong foundations, who are actively involved in my life have called me out to be bold and tell my story. I'm not sure why - but I do think there are a lot of people where I'm standing who aren't as willing to be open about it, so here is my story! A little piece anyways...I'm pretty sure if I wrote the whole thing down it would take as long as I've been alive to get it all down, and then I'd have to find the right words for stuff...so, piece by piece I'll get it out :)
Love you guys! Have an awesome week/weekend!
-B. <3