Having a real hard time. I'm hitting struggles, starting to truly realize how much real life seems to suck and knowing it shouldn't be this way. We weren't meant to live with hurt or pain, in conflict or selfishness. We were meant to communicate effectively and know how to respond instantly in love and grace. But so much of this is not the fallen, broken world we live in. There's conflicts and misunderstandings. We were raised differently, showing how words mean different things depending on your background. My promises mean nothing, because in your life, they were always broken. Your apologies mean nothing, until the actions follow behind.
I'm tired of always being the odd person out, of always being different. It's so hard to find a place where I feel like I belong, where I can flourish and have the support of those around me, backing me whenever adversity comes my way. It seems I've yet to find the work environment like this, or the school environment like this. As much as I try to bare my heart. To not be the one causing conflict. To be sympathetic and listening... it gets taken the wrong way. My questions are seen as assumptions. My misunderstandings are arguments. My confidence is intimidating. Instantly, without a reason I know, what I say is taken in the most mean, disrespectful way. I try to find the pattern, try to change the words I say, the phrases I use. But what works in one setting isn't consistent to another. What one person appreciates another despises.
Ignorance and mediocrity seem so bliss. I wish I could quit now, and be content working a job outside of my capabilities, without a passion or purpose. I wish I didn't understand the inflection in the tone or the judgement on a face, so I can continue lying myself into belief that I am liked by those who don't care. I wish I didn't learn so fast, work so quick, so my success wasn't a reminder of your faults. So my good work wasn't seen as showing off, but respect of a job well done.
I keep hoping someday will be better. The next level of schooling, the next place of work... There, maybe, I'll find the spot made for me. Yet repeatedly, I run into the same wall of misunderstanding because of my confidence. Of arrogance due to my intelligence. Of intimidation because I will stand for my beliefs. Just when I thought I learned my lesson, the same lesson needs learned again, albeit in a different context. I know it's me - I don't pretend to consistently believe it is everyone else's problem. I'm the common factor between my schools and places of work.. I know I'm the problem. But I don't know how to solve it. I don't know what to fix about me. I don't know where to go, what to learn, I don't know what's wrong with me.
I just want to know why I don't belong.
Wednesday, February 21, 2018
Sunday, November 26, 2017
One Step at a Time
So many things I need to get done.
Grad school applications are due Friday. I still need to finish editing my personal statements and make sure my references turn in their statements.
I start a huge psychology experiment. The survey has to get sent out tomorrow, so it can be open for a week, and then I'll still have a week to run data analysis and write the paper so the rest of my group can make a presentation. Oh, and this experiment will also be presented at a conference in the spring.
In addition, I have my normal course load, with the chapter readings and projects to complete.
Honestly, it isn't that much. The change in scenery, coming back to school, has me slightly unsettled. I still need to clean and put stuff away before I'll feel like I can relax. Part of me knows I'm just overestimating the amount of time, and importance, of various things. Honestly, the best I can do is just take things as they come. I'll find time... plenty of time. and My teachers are understanding if I need an extension or two.
I'm trying to learn how to use my time efficiently and focus. Not just my thoughts, although that's a big part of it, but my actions. Sitting here stressing, making the lists and plans and calendars ultimately doesn't get the job done. At some point, I just need to start. To see the steps that make up the whole and just begin. Currently? That's picking up one thing at a time from my luggage and putting it where it goes. Tomorrow, it'll be one assignment at a time. Each of those start with opening the right document and doing what needs to be done.
The list may be long. The time feels short. But there is so much more time, actual, workable time in a day than I credit myself. I underestimate my abilities to complete the task quickly, consistently overestimating how long something will actually take once I get started, especially when it comes to personal work. Of course, I have the projects that end up taking longer than I really would have liked them to... but everything will get done in its time, and it'll work out the best I can make it.
It'll all be okay.
Grad school applications are due Friday. I still need to finish editing my personal statements and make sure my references turn in their statements.
I start a huge psychology experiment. The survey has to get sent out tomorrow, so it can be open for a week, and then I'll still have a week to run data analysis and write the paper so the rest of my group can make a presentation. Oh, and this experiment will also be presented at a conference in the spring.
In addition, I have my normal course load, with the chapter readings and projects to complete.
Honestly, it isn't that much. The change in scenery, coming back to school, has me slightly unsettled. I still need to clean and put stuff away before I'll feel like I can relax. Part of me knows I'm just overestimating the amount of time, and importance, of various things. Honestly, the best I can do is just take things as they come. I'll find time... plenty of time. and My teachers are understanding if I need an extension or two.
I'm trying to learn how to use my time efficiently and focus. Not just my thoughts, although that's a big part of it, but my actions. Sitting here stressing, making the lists and plans and calendars ultimately doesn't get the job done. At some point, I just need to start. To see the steps that make up the whole and just begin. Currently? That's picking up one thing at a time from my luggage and putting it where it goes. Tomorrow, it'll be one assignment at a time. Each of those start with opening the right document and doing what needs to be done.
The list may be long. The time feels short. But there is so much more time, actual, workable time in a day than I credit myself. I underestimate my abilities to complete the task quickly, consistently overestimating how long something will actually take once I get started, especially when it comes to personal work. Of course, I have the projects that end up taking longer than I really would have liked them to... but everything will get done in its time, and it'll work out the best I can make it.
It'll all be okay.
Saturday, November 25, 2017
To Wonder or Wander
Wander: walk or move in an aimless way
Wonder: feeling of surprise and admiration, caused by something beautiful and unexpected
I never cognitively realized wonder and wander as two different words... in my journey, so often wandering has led to wonder. What currently feels like a pointless, hopeless, never-ending journey has sparks of beauty and hope along the way, reminding me the purpose and love behind my choices and life. The wanderings continue to show me wonder.
Tonight, my mind wanders and I have yet to find the wonder. But its coming, I know it is. Somewhere in my anxious mind, beauty is seeking a way out. it wants me to let go and let it shine, but I'm so afraid of the judgement and loss that may come. I don't want to hear the criticism of the beauty, the love showing me the way to living. I am afraid of the pain before the emerging, the anxiety and shakiness, confusion and unsettling. Its the deep down, when I have nothing left to fight, that beauty can come out. When I find myself, stripped of my own defenses, relying on Him who was there the whole time.
Don't get me wrong. Coping skills are good. I firmly believe God gave me tools to be able to take care of myself at times, to take responsibility in my wandering. Yet it cannot replace Him or gave them to me... Just as the gift is not meant to replace the giver, God's wisdom is not meant to replace Him who gave it to me. Yet I let my coping skills replace the love and wonder of Christ, to rely on them instead of relying on Him. These gifts I'm given are meant to point back to the giver, to remind me of Him and his love.
Before writing, I'd tried eating and sleeping. I'd taken my medicine and cleaned, did some homework and took a shower. Yet nothing removed the wandering in my heart. I was scared... my repertoire was nearly empty, my arrows spent... but I was still wandering into darkness. My mind wouldn't settle. My skin itchy, my body moving... to sit and settle felt like defeat. My stubborn heart was avoiding Him... yet I took a step. Pandora, with Bethel Music Arts, would be a reminder my spirit could follow. And then this blog was born...
I have a previous blog, Zephaniah 3:17. I haven't written in a year, almost to the date. I guess I had lost the motivation to write, and my musings seem worthless. Its definitely a different purpose... my wanders there more hopeful, based on my missionary events and the wonders God was showing me. I hoped to cause others to think, I actively pursued hope by showing my questions and revealing the answers I was given.
But I don't have answers anymore.
This is for me. If you stubble across it, enjoy the wanders and wonders of an anxious mind trying to make sense of herself and the world. But this isn't for you. Or an audience. It's a place to write, to type, to get my thoughts out... but provide a way for God to use my wandering for good, too. Because you may feel alone, and in my thoughts, find someone who struggles. Who reminds you you aren't crazy and you aren't alone.
It's definitely less pressure on me. I'm not stressing over the formatting, my sentence structure, or the flow of my thoughts... I can just write. Whatever comes to mind, it doesn't have to make sense and I don't have to stay on topic. Eventually, the thoughts crashing and wrecking havoc and confusion in my brain will be put into sentences, to make sense... and out of my head.
Tonight's stressor deals with a different type of wandering... the academic world of having multiple homes, as I travel between my dad's and college. Trying to make a home in two places, always longing one over the other, but having to spend time in both. I've been at dad's a week... I still consider it my true home. My people are here... the one's I can hang out all night with, where I don't have to strategically consider my every move and the interpretation of others. Yet home was a stress... there wasn't enough time to see everyone I wanted to see, to spend time with my dad and my best friend as much as I wanted to... even now, I'm trying to figure out how to spend the last few hours I have at home, because I want to spend time with everyone in those last moments. I'm hurt and frustrated because I had people who told me they wanted to hang out, so I said to let me know when they were free... but they never got a hold of me. I shouldn't be hurt.. life gets busy, people get forgotten, especially when I've been gone. But I acknowledge the hurt, as silly as it may be... because that's how it gets the treatment it needs. When we ignore the problem, we don't seek to solve it, to fix it... to treat it. So I acknowledge it, and in this, can seek a way to move past it and not let the circumstances sway how I view myself... as much as I want to tell myself how worthless and unloved I am, because of how it seems to be, I can overcome with the truth.
Through worship, the coping skills, time, and journaling... I think this anxious mind has settled for the night. Settling upon the wonder of the written word and the even better healer of sleep, the wanderer has found a pillow for the night. Thanks for the ramblings... and remember to love your beautiful self.
Wonder: feeling of surprise and admiration, caused by something beautiful and unexpected
I never cognitively realized wonder and wander as two different words... in my journey, so often wandering has led to wonder. What currently feels like a pointless, hopeless, never-ending journey has sparks of beauty and hope along the way, reminding me the purpose and love behind my choices and life. The wanderings continue to show me wonder.
Tonight, my mind wanders and I have yet to find the wonder. But its coming, I know it is. Somewhere in my anxious mind, beauty is seeking a way out. it wants me to let go and let it shine, but I'm so afraid of the judgement and loss that may come. I don't want to hear the criticism of the beauty, the love showing me the way to living. I am afraid of the pain before the emerging, the anxiety and shakiness, confusion and unsettling. Its the deep down, when I have nothing left to fight, that beauty can come out. When I find myself, stripped of my own defenses, relying on Him who was there the whole time.
Don't get me wrong. Coping skills are good. I firmly believe God gave me tools to be able to take care of myself at times, to take responsibility in my wandering. Yet it cannot replace Him or gave them to me... Just as the gift is not meant to replace the giver, God's wisdom is not meant to replace Him who gave it to me. Yet I let my coping skills replace the love and wonder of Christ, to rely on them instead of relying on Him. These gifts I'm given are meant to point back to the giver, to remind me of Him and his love.
Before writing, I'd tried eating and sleeping. I'd taken my medicine and cleaned, did some homework and took a shower. Yet nothing removed the wandering in my heart. I was scared... my repertoire was nearly empty, my arrows spent... but I was still wandering into darkness. My mind wouldn't settle. My skin itchy, my body moving... to sit and settle felt like defeat. My stubborn heart was avoiding Him... yet I took a step. Pandora, with Bethel Music Arts, would be a reminder my spirit could follow. And then this blog was born...
I have a previous blog, Zephaniah 3:17. I haven't written in a year, almost to the date. I guess I had lost the motivation to write, and my musings seem worthless. Its definitely a different purpose... my wanders there more hopeful, based on my missionary events and the wonders God was showing me. I hoped to cause others to think, I actively pursued hope by showing my questions and revealing the answers I was given.
But I don't have answers anymore.
This is for me. If you stubble across it, enjoy the wanders and wonders of an anxious mind trying to make sense of herself and the world. But this isn't for you. Or an audience. It's a place to write, to type, to get my thoughts out... but provide a way for God to use my wandering for good, too. Because you may feel alone, and in my thoughts, find someone who struggles. Who reminds you you aren't crazy and you aren't alone.
It's definitely less pressure on me. I'm not stressing over the formatting, my sentence structure, or the flow of my thoughts... I can just write. Whatever comes to mind, it doesn't have to make sense and I don't have to stay on topic. Eventually, the thoughts crashing and wrecking havoc and confusion in my brain will be put into sentences, to make sense... and out of my head.
Tonight's stressor deals with a different type of wandering... the academic world of having multiple homes, as I travel between my dad's and college. Trying to make a home in two places, always longing one over the other, but having to spend time in both. I've been at dad's a week... I still consider it my true home. My people are here... the one's I can hang out all night with, where I don't have to strategically consider my every move and the interpretation of others. Yet home was a stress... there wasn't enough time to see everyone I wanted to see, to spend time with my dad and my best friend as much as I wanted to... even now, I'm trying to figure out how to spend the last few hours I have at home, because I want to spend time with everyone in those last moments. I'm hurt and frustrated because I had people who told me they wanted to hang out, so I said to let me know when they were free... but they never got a hold of me. I shouldn't be hurt.. life gets busy, people get forgotten, especially when I've been gone. But I acknowledge the hurt, as silly as it may be... because that's how it gets the treatment it needs. When we ignore the problem, we don't seek to solve it, to fix it... to treat it. So I acknowledge it, and in this, can seek a way to move past it and not let the circumstances sway how I view myself... as much as I want to tell myself how worthless and unloved I am, because of how it seems to be, I can overcome with the truth.
Through worship, the coping skills, time, and journaling... I think this anxious mind has settled for the night. Settling upon the wonder of the written word and the even better healer of sleep, the wanderer has found a pillow for the night. Thanks for the ramblings... and remember to love your beautiful self.
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