Some days, I'm hit by overwhelming waves of sadness
Just a reminder that I have to deal with my madness
What do I do when I just want to sit there and cry?
Do I cave to those feelings or do I at least try?
Try to snap out of it, try to reach out
So unsure of myself, racked with self doubt
Will this never end?
I complain to a friend
She reminds me that I've been through this before
But all I can think of is that there will probably be more
Where can I go to find healing from this disease?
Will You take this thorn from my side if I ask with a please?
Do I have to live this way, this life in the pit?
Or can I find relief, if only for a little bit?
It's not all downhill, there are even some moments of bliss
But I long to be delivered, delivered from this
This is not who I am, and yet it consumes my thinking
Is it any wonder that bipolars often self-medicate with drinking?
To have a little buzz, and forget about your cares
To escape from the sadness, the sadness that tears
Where do you go when you feel all alone?
When you annoy yourself when you talk, as on and on you drone
Why should others have to listen to your complaining?
When you feel deep down that you really must be draining?
Where do you turn when you feel you can no longer cope?
When you feel as though you're at the end of your rope
God says he draws near to the broken-hearted and down-trodden in spirit
Right now if He told me something though I'm not sure I'd hear it
I feel so distant from my Creator, though I pray every day
Just for strength to get through the day, there must be a way
He does answer that prayer on the way to school I must admit
For the day passes quickly enough, without me wanting to quit
Pull me up from this pit, to the Lord I cry out
And I know that He hears me, even if I can't shout
This too will pass, it always has in the past
I can't wait to be stable, finally, I will say, at last
Then I will be back to my old self, with a new lease on life
After a long time of waiting, and dealing with strife
My life will feel new, I must remind myself of that promise
For if I don't, I lose hope and feel like llamas
So that last line was pretty forced, which means it's time to stop writing
Besides I'm meeting someone for dinner, where I will do some biting
I hope you enjoyed my little play with prose
It has been too long since I tried I suppose
Thursday, February 16, 2012
Sunday, February 12, 2012
Reflections on couchsurfing
As mentioned in my previous post, I hosted a pair of couchsurfers this past weekend. They left a couple of hours ago and I'm now going to take the time to reflect on their stay here. First off, I had a blast! I loved showing them around Sarasota, we went to Siesta Key Beach (only for a little though since it was so darn cold), we went to Marina Jack's. We also went to St. Armand's Circle last night and enjoyed that too. It was cool seeing those places with new eyes again. Also, I really enjoyed cooking for them. The only bad part was that I'm so used to not buying hardly any groceries that I actually had to dip into my food budget quite a bit to feed all three of us. Now I know how my friends must feel when they feed me, lol. It's such a joy to share a meal with people. Call me desperate or whatever, but I often eat alone at dinner so having people to cook for was a great way to shake things up for me. A lot of people complain about having to cook dinner every night but I guess it's just the novelty of it that attracts me to it still at this point. If I had to do it every night I'm sure it would get old but for right now I can't get enough of it, especially when I'm cooking for others.
They also went to my church today so that was pretty cool. Today was my day for working with the elementary kids so I wasn't able to sit with them but they said they enjoyed the service and both of them commented on how young our pastor is. Back where they're from apparently that's an exception to the rule, most pastors are older like in their 60's or even older than that. We had some really interesting talks about Christianity and its role in philosophy as the guy who stayed here was studying philosophy in university. He said he has got one more year to get his master's but wanted to take some time off in between, which I can certainly appreciate. When they first got here, I shared how a gap year isn't really a popular thing here in the US and when I first heard about it I felt like I had gotten ripped off so I ended up taking one after several years in a career. Anyways, we talked about Augustine of Hippo, Thomas Akempis (sp?) and Soren Kierkegaard and their various contributions to the field of philosophy. He's taking his degree at a Catholic university so they look at philosophy through a Catholic lens. He also said they study a lot of different people's interpretations of the Bible but don't actually study the Bible itself, which I found to be sad.
Couchsurfing is a great opportunity to display Christian hospitality. This is an area where I feel the Church has often fallen short in the US at least. That's why when we go to different countries we are often humbled by their generous hospitality. They want to make sure you're at ease and feel welcome in their abode, whether that be a hut or whatever. I'm finding that I love making people feel welcome in my house and taking care of others. There are so many passages in the Bible that deal with hospitality if you think about it. In particular love your neighbor as yourself sticks out to me. What better way to show people God's love for them than to open your house to them? Obviously, I don't shove my religion down people's throats but it's such a central part of my life that it's bound to come up in conversation I'm finding. Whether it's with coworkers or random couchsurfers, I can't help but talk about my faith and relationship with Christ if we talk for long enough.
Well, to all of you who thought I was going to get killed this weekend, I'm still alive and kicking. And I simply cannot recommend couchsurfing enough. Go to couchsurfing.org and set up a profile page; you won't be disappointed :)
They also went to my church today so that was pretty cool. Today was my day for working with the elementary kids so I wasn't able to sit with them but they said they enjoyed the service and both of them commented on how young our pastor is. Back where they're from apparently that's an exception to the rule, most pastors are older like in their 60's or even older than that. We had some really interesting talks about Christianity and its role in philosophy as the guy who stayed here was studying philosophy in university. He said he has got one more year to get his master's but wanted to take some time off in between, which I can certainly appreciate. When they first got here, I shared how a gap year isn't really a popular thing here in the US and when I first heard about it I felt like I had gotten ripped off so I ended up taking one after several years in a career. Anyways, we talked about Augustine of Hippo, Thomas Akempis (sp?) and Soren Kierkegaard and their various contributions to the field of philosophy. He's taking his degree at a Catholic university so they look at philosophy through a Catholic lens. He also said they study a lot of different people's interpretations of the Bible but don't actually study the Bible itself, which I found to be sad.
Couchsurfing is a great opportunity to display Christian hospitality. This is an area where I feel the Church has often fallen short in the US at least. That's why when we go to different countries we are often humbled by their generous hospitality. They want to make sure you're at ease and feel welcome in their abode, whether that be a hut or whatever. I'm finding that I love making people feel welcome in my house and taking care of others. There are so many passages in the Bible that deal with hospitality if you think about it. In particular love your neighbor as yourself sticks out to me. What better way to show people God's love for them than to open your house to them? Obviously, I don't shove my religion down people's throats but it's such a central part of my life that it's bound to come up in conversation I'm finding. Whether it's with coworkers or random couchsurfers, I can't help but talk about my faith and relationship with Christ if we talk for long enough.
Well, to all of you who thought I was going to get killed this weekend, I'm still alive and kicking. And I simply cannot recommend couchsurfing enough. Go to couchsurfing.org and set up a profile page; you won't be disappointed :)
Saturday, February 11, 2012
Couchsurfing again finally, only hosting this time around
I got a couchsurfing request yesterday from a Belgium guy who's 24 and his traveling companion, an Austrian girl who's 20. They wanted to surf my couch that same night. Thankfully, I was wide open that night and was super excited about hosting them. So much so that I was just about as excited as when I get to travel myself to somewhere new. We've had a great weekend so far and I've had fun showing them around and feeding them, being the hungry travelers that they are. We went to the Amish market today, something I've been meaning to do anyways, and we had to laugh at a man who was wearing suspenders and yet was on a cell phone. It just seemed out of place to us. We also went to the "Old Salty Dog" a local place out on Siesta that serves up some great fish usually. Then we went to the beach but only momentarily as it was getting rather cold with a cold front moving in at that point. They only wanted to stay one night but I talked them into staying for two so I hope they enjoy themselves here. They say they want to make it to California by way of Texas and I said those two places are about as different as could be. Well, I should probably get back to hosting so I'm going to get off here for now.
Thursday, February 9, 2012
I have a girlfriend now, huh? When did that happen?
Yesterday, I started a book called the Tangible Kingdom Primer. It's a book to go through with a small group or missional community or whatever you want to call it. The whole missional thing is a real buzz word in the church world today, and as such I think has lost a lot of its real meaning. This primer is helping discuss what it means to be missional, basically it means you are sent to live among a people proclaiming the gospel with your life and with your deeds. So in that sense it's different than just a small group I guess. A small group is more of a once a week meeting where you study the Bible or some book like it. A missional community is supposed to be more intentional about hanging out with each other more during the week as well as encouraging one another to be intentional about your lives the rest of your working day or evenings with your family. Right now, though, I don't feel very intentional about anything, really. Kind of just surviving the days to be honest. I hate when I get like this. I get in a rut and then am just going through the motions instead of actually feeling like I'm doing any real living. Anyone else have times like those? My mom said everyone has those times so I'm hoping I'm not alone there.
A couple weeks ago, I joined a running club that is basically a couch to 5k program. We meet on Tuesday nights and Saturday mornings at Fleet Feet and go for a little run/walk. Our first night we did a mile, which I was intimidated by, but I made it just fine because our intervals were 2 minutes of running followed by 2 minutes of walking. So far, I'm really enjoying this new endeavor as it makes me more accountable to work out on a more consistent basis since I paid for it. Plus, I'm meeting new people which I always can appreciate as I'm a fairly social person most of the time. In the midst of this running club, I'm happy to say I've lost about 5 pounds, some days it's more than that and some days it's less than that but I average about a 5 pound weight loss from where I was at the beginning of the year. Losing 5 pounds was one of my new year's resolutions so I'm really happy that I accomplished that. Now I just need to keep going and shed some more pounds so I can fit a little better in my size Large shirts again. I've had to move up to XL this past year and as such about three quarters of my wardrobe is a little snug for my liking. Ideally if I can lose about 10-20 more pounds they'll start fitting correctly again. Now I have to set a new goal for weight loss since I achieved my first one so quickly. Maybe I'll try to lose another 5 pounds by April? I don't know, I'll have to think about that one for a little bit.
School is going well for the most part. They did give me 20 students though and it seems like when they're all there it adds to the energy of the room quite a bit. We were using counters and ten-frames for math today and they got a little out of hand to say the least. I love doing hands on stuff like that because I think they really need the manipulatives when they're first learning math in particular but they get overly excited about doing stuff with their hands. Which is how it should be, probably, but I need to find a way to contain it at least somewhat so I can get my points across that I'm trying to teach on. I also have all these Kagan books for K-2 that I haven't even really cracked open that I'd like to take a look at if I could ever remember to. Kagan is one of those things that I know I should do but it's just so hard to implement it seems like, particularly with kindergarten. Although I will have to admit I had a tough time with it even in 5th grade too.
I booked a flight to Honduras for spring break a couple weeks ago, so I'm pretty happy about the possibilities with that. I haven't been out of the country in almost a full year so I'm way past due in my book. There's just something about traveling that is so good for my soul somehow. I don't really know how to explain that. Going somewhere new and forgetting about all your worries momentarily is a great exercise to cultivate if you have the means and the opportunity.
Oh, and I got a girlfriend recently, which is weird. My views on relationships changed kind of out of the blue and then all of a sudden I had a girlfriend pretty much like the next day, crazy, huh? She's in Japan teaching English. She's everything I look for in a girl plus she likes traveling, which isn't on my list of stuff I look for but is a definite plus. So we'll see how this goes. Hope it works out but if history is a teacher than it's probably not going to end well with me. I shouldn't say that though because she's a different girl and the relationships I'm referring to were way back in college when everything is more dramatic anyways before you settle into a career. Now I've grown up a bit and feel like I can handle a relationship now. All that time of singleness was well worth it though, I drew a lot closer to Christ than I ever could have imagined. And all the girls who I was interested in were looking for something much more serious than what I could offer them. So I figured it was best to not lead any of them on since I couldn't commit to anything serious for a really long time. I told this girl I can't promise a lifetime commitment or anything like that at this point, but that I could promise I'd give us a shot at least. She's supposed to get back to the states in either April or June, depending on if she gets a 10 week position after her first job is finished. If she gets back in June, that would really be kind of funny because I hope to be in Turkey by about the second week in June or so. If we're ever in the same place that would be kind of nice. We'll see though. Long distance is kind of nice at this point. I think if I were to go from nothing straight into spending every waking second with another person I'd just go crazy. This is kind of a nice way to just ease into it.
A couple weeks ago, I joined a running club that is basically a couch to 5k program. We meet on Tuesday nights and Saturday mornings at Fleet Feet and go for a little run/walk. Our first night we did a mile, which I was intimidated by, but I made it just fine because our intervals were 2 minutes of running followed by 2 minutes of walking. So far, I'm really enjoying this new endeavor as it makes me more accountable to work out on a more consistent basis since I paid for it. Plus, I'm meeting new people which I always can appreciate as I'm a fairly social person most of the time. In the midst of this running club, I'm happy to say I've lost about 5 pounds, some days it's more than that and some days it's less than that but I average about a 5 pound weight loss from where I was at the beginning of the year. Losing 5 pounds was one of my new year's resolutions so I'm really happy that I accomplished that. Now I just need to keep going and shed some more pounds so I can fit a little better in my size Large shirts again. I've had to move up to XL this past year and as such about three quarters of my wardrobe is a little snug for my liking. Ideally if I can lose about 10-20 more pounds they'll start fitting correctly again. Now I have to set a new goal for weight loss since I achieved my first one so quickly. Maybe I'll try to lose another 5 pounds by April? I don't know, I'll have to think about that one for a little bit.
School is going well for the most part. They did give me 20 students though and it seems like when they're all there it adds to the energy of the room quite a bit. We were using counters and ten-frames for math today and they got a little out of hand to say the least. I love doing hands on stuff like that because I think they really need the manipulatives when they're first learning math in particular but they get overly excited about doing stuff with their hands. Which is how it should be, probably, but I need to find a way to contain it at least somewhat so I can get my points across that I'm trying to teach on. I also have all these Kagan books for K-2 that I haven't even really cracked open that I'd like to take a look at if I could ever remember to. Kagan is one of those things that I know I should do but it's just so hard to implement it seems like, particularly with kindergarten. Although I will have to admit I had a tough time with it even in 5th grade too.
I booked a flight to Honduras for spring break a couple weeks ago, so I'm pretty happy about the possibilities with that. I haven't been out of the country in almost a full year so I'm way past due in my book. There's just something about traveling that is so good for my soul somehow. I don't really know how to explain that. Going somewhere new and forgetting about all your worries momentarily is a great exercise to cultivate if you have the means and the opportunity.
Oh, and I got a girlfriend recently, which is weird. My views on relationships changed kind of out of the blue and then all of a sudden I had a girlfriend pretty much like the next day, crazy, huh? She's in Japan teaching English. She's everything I look for in a girl plus she likes traveling, which isn't on my list of stuff I look for but is a definite plus. So we'll see how this goes. Hope it works out but if history is a teacher than it's probably not going to end well with me. I shouldn't say that though because she's a different girl and the relationships I'm referring to were way back in college when everything is more dramatic anyways before you settle into a career. Now I've grown up a bit and feel like I can handle a relationship now. All that time of singleness was well worth it though, I drew a lot closer to Christ than I ever could have imagined. And all the girls who I was interested in were looking for something much more serious than what I could offer them. So I figured it was best to not lead any of them on since I couldn't commit to anything serious for a really long time. I told this girl I can't promise a lifetime commitment or anything like that at this point, but that I could promise I'd give us a shot at least. She's supposed to get back to the states in either April or June, depending on if she gets a 10 week position after her first job is finished. If she gets back in June, that would really be kind of funny because I hope to be in Turkey by about the second week in June or so. If we're ever in the same place that would be kind of nice. We'll see though. Long distance is kind of nice at this point. I think if I were to go from nothing straight into spending every waking second with another person I'd just go crazy. This is kind of a nice way to just ease into it.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)