Coming Alive

A few years ago my best friend and I wandered around the streets of London seeking adventure. At the exact moment that this story takes place, actually, I believe we were looking for the perfect tea cup to take home to her mother, but adventure seemed to await around every corner that summer. We happened upon a cobble stoned courtyard full of life and color. In the midst of the revelry we saw a paneled chalkboard with three quotes. “Treat everyone the same because everyone is different.” and “To love is to trust someone into your translucence.” were both beautiful quotes, but the one in the middle was the one that struck me as the most important. As the one that made this moment worth remembering, 

“Don’t ask yourself what the world needs. Ask yourself what makes you come alive and then go do that because what the world needs is people who have come alive.”

People who have come alive.

This concept stuck with me for years—ingrained from that moment onto my heart—continually shining its beautiful face through decisions that I’d made and people that I'd met. At times I would repress it, thinking that it went against what I’d been taught, but then I would find it again in the loveliest of places and remember who I was. I’d only ever wanted to be truly alive.

A week ago I finished reading The Fountainhead by Ayn Rand. I’d heard of the book before, but never had a true interest in reading it until it was given to me as a gift. I lost myself in that world. I found Howard Roark to be bold and absolutely wonderful. I found Ellsworth Toohey to be the scum of the earth, but what I saw most was the bold resurgence of this concept.

“Come alive.” The book screamed at me. “Why hold back? It is okay to be ‘selfish’ if your ‘selfishness’ is something that makes you true to who you are. You cannot be anyone else and that is what makes you beautiful.”

(and I heard God whispering the same into my heart, "I've been trying to tell you this for so long. I made you as you. Not as anyone else. Find peace in that truth. Who you are is enough. I'll worry about the rest.")

I learned a lot of lessons from this book. I could write reviews and analyze the different things that I saw, but the thing I continually return to is the concept that floored me in London in that little cobblestoned courtyard.

Sometimes

Sometimes all it takes to make me smile is a little bit of sunshine and to hear "Beautiful Day" by U2 at random.

There is something about that song that always makes me happy. From the first note to the last I am riveted and it feels as though nothing can bring me down.

The power of music.

"I found a place where the sheep count humans..."

"We speak our minds, but it never hurts feelings"

-Cloud Cult "After the Car Crash

I've been growing a lot lately. Actually I am a bit astounded by the person I've become versus the person that I was just a month or two ago. It's like a light switch went off in my head and I heard God say, "You do know that I made you to be you, right?" Everything changes when you meet someone who sees you and says that who you are is enough. I think I've lived much of my life thinking I needed to be "better" but never really being able to figure out what "better" meant and so falling short of the goal. I've always just gone back to being me. Never realizing that who i was, exactly as I was, was enough. In a way it makes me think of one of my favorite moments in the Old Testament. Now this may be a totally botched analysis for the story, but when Hagar runs away from Sarai (Genesis 16:1-14) and encounters God in the Wilderness she refers to him as the God of seeing and to me it always seemed like something changed in Hagar at that moment—more than just having new faith. She is an entirely new person. I imagine her as more confident in her return. Will things be different for her when she returns? Doubtful, but she goes forth anyway knowin that she can take whatever comes her way. That has always resonated with me...the idea of being truly seen. I did not know that this was what drew me so firmly to God until I saw it in another person's eyes. The beauty of it all was that where one saw and found lacking God saw and simply loved. So like he sent Hagar back into the fray with a promise to always be with her, he did the same to me. 

(Side note: when Hagar later begins to doubt Gods promises again (Genesis 21:15-20) I find that equally beautiful because I know I would do the same! She's human, but God is big enough to take care of her—doubting heart and all.)

The point of all of this was just to say in making changes and I think this blog will reflect that. I've always loved writing. It helps me to clear my mind and to process the things my heart hasn't fully understood. Even if no one ever reads my words it is the process if writing that I just truly enjoy so I promise to write more, and I will write about everything that I love. Books, music, movies...the intricacies of life and people that I do not understand. I just want to write.

I used to love the song this post was named after. I haven't heard it in ages, but there is a line in it that says, "We found the answers in the last place we were looking and in the end all we want is the beginning." Two cliches beautifully placed together in a way that strangely describes what I feel.

So stay tuned, if you like, to a new kind of blog from me.

Random insights, if you will.