Blessings

Good lesson from one of my favorite co-workers today...

"Some people just don't know how to look at the blessings."

She was describing a situation a friend of hers was struggling with in which she had a NYE party she really wanted to go to that was out of town, but couldn't find a babysitter for her child. The friend explained that there was another party in the apartment community right where she lived, but that she just really wanted to go to this other party and was extremely disappointed that she wouldn't be able to. The friend said she was so upset that she hadn't heard back from the babysitter that she was crying the night before.

My wise co-worker got off the phone with her friend, described the conversation to me and then sighed, "Some people just don't know how to look at the blessings."

Her friend had a family-friendly party option right in her own backyard, but was too busy pouting to be thankful for it.

How often am I so focused on what I want, that I refuse to be grateful for what God has provided? I want the far-away thing. The glamorous option. And I'm so caught up in stomping my feet and throwing a fit because I can't attain it, that I can't see my proverbial forest for the trees.

Maybe it's time to stop straining to see what's over the horizon and check out the beauty I'm sitting in right now.

Thankful.

It's Thanksgiving weekend and my parents just left. I feel a little like the wind was taken out of my sails. I miss them already. It was so good to see family and just hang out for a few days. I don't think I realized how homesick I was.

Home being a people, not a place.

And I feel thankful. Definitely thankful.

Right now, our car has a blown head gasket and freeze plugs, work is really tough, we're still broke, and I'm working through some personal issues which make me feel raw and tired and vulnerable a lot of the time.

In the midst of each of these fires, I feel so grateful. Grateful for the trials. Grateful that I serve a God who loves me so much that He's willing to place me in his refiner's fire until all these impurities melt away.

To illustrate...
A couple of weeks ago, John asked how I was doing before church. I said something to the effect of feeling like I was being burned in the refiner's fire. After church, we were talking to our friends Rome and Aubrey. Rome started explaining - out of nowhere - how refining silver works. The refiner puts his silver into the flames and must watch it very closely because the metal has to reach just the right temperature to purify it. It has to stay in the flames long enough to melt away the impurities, but if it's left in the fire for too long, it will be destroyed. How does the refiner know when it hits that just-right spot? As he's carefully watching it, the moment he can see his own reflection in the metal, it's time to take it out of the fire. Rome looked into my eyes, right through to my soul and told me in no uncertain terms that my Refiner was watching me very closely and wouldn't let me stay in the heat a second later than was necessary.

(I hope you've experienced a conversation like that - one that is so obviously divinely appointed that you can't help but be overwhelmed by the experience.)

So see? How can I be anything but thankful? Our God loves each of us so much that He's willing to refine our character to reflect His own. He knows I can stand the heat because he created me and the furnace I stand in. He's watching to make sure I'm not overwhelmed by the flames. He's guiding and protecting me just like a good Father does. He doesn't allow me to walk around this earth in such bad shape that I become a poor example of His astounding love for all of us. He disciplines and forms me with great care, ensuring that while I may feel warm, I never get burned.

And in the end, I'll come out much more beautiful and useful than I went in.

Bad Day

Today I had to pay $50 to get my car off of a tow truck. Said tow truck jostled around my car just enough that the slow water leak is now a very fast water leak.

We don't have money to fix this.

I'm trying to stay in a peaceful state of mind in which I remember how blessed I am. I have a car. I have a job that will allow me to work from home for the afternoon (and by "work", I mean "blog"). We have an amazing friend who's willing to try and help us fix the car for the cost of parts. It's just a car. It's just money. We're in the hands of a God who always provides.

And still, I want to sit and cry about having a bad day.

Okay, time to blog

As indicated earlier by my wife, the ball has started to roll on the music front. This is good, beyond good; it's why we moved down to Long Beach in the first place. It's been a crazy but wonderful adventure thus far, but has seemed incomplete without progress in that area.

I guess it really started with hearing a number of friends and family telling me that I should be getting out more [musically speaking], but I had the easy excuse that I had 'already tried.' When I moved down here (2006), I tried everything I knew to do to get out there. It was conspicuously unfruitful. I managed to get a couple of students, which was great, but I lost those when the world economy crashed. So I had this classical training, great experience and skill, and ended up feeling 'all dressed up with nowhere to go.' It's a tough place to move from there. It may sound sort of silly, but the oppression of the dead end felt inescapable. I would make an occasional contact, but would fail to pursue it well because I believed the lie that it wouldn't happen, it couldn't happen, I wasn't good enough for it to happen.

Anyhow, just in the last six weeks or so, things have been changing greatly. I got picked up by an agent though a friend of mine. That necessitated recordings and head shots, a considerable expense. However, the head shots were completely taken care of by a professional photographer friend. I had a few old recordings from my conservatory recitals, which at least prove I have chops. I wanted to record some new stuff to demonstrate my versatility in various genres, as well as the misc. instruments I play (flute, Native American flute, penny whistle, etc.). So I search for a USB mic that will be appropriate enough to do some instrumental recording with. I go to a home recording web forum and poke around. They all slam USB mics, which I expect (latency and quality issues), but I find a couple that look like they'll do. For shiggles, I post this old clarinet I have that I haven't been able to sell. I don't expect anything to come of it. However, a fellow on there wants it for his studio, and is feeling generous and wants to help me. We do a trade for a very nice mic, and an interface to plug it into the computer (which can also do mixing & add other mics, guitars/basses/drums etc.). It's so much more than I was originally looking for. I got a mic stand and cable from a guy on Craigslist that lives about 5 blocks away. We meet and hit it off. He's been an audio engineer for years, a fun Christian dude, and I give him my card. He listened to my recordings (old conservatory stuff) and can't wait to work together. I was also invited to sit in with a band that does corporate gigs in and around LA (which is definitely 'nice work if you can get it'). Everything is aligning.

What really amazes me is the fact that all of this has come out of nothing. On the heels of my former business partner defrauding our company, it feels like I've had less to work with now more than ever. However, just taking the time to listen to God's call has pushed out the lies I've been listening to for years. Everything is coming together, and it's wonderful. The adventure continues on a new footing, and it couldn't be greater.

Need (Warning: this might be TMI)

Life is exciting. John's music career is moving forward in huge ways, but I'll let him tell you about that. I'll just fill you in on my share of our world...

I feel that this season (so Christian-ese) of my life can be characterized by "need" - my undeniable need for my sweet Jesus. I have been struggling with some serious burn out. I didn't realize the full extent of what people meant by "burn out", specifically in my line of work, until now. I thought it was just kind of getting sick of the job. But boy howdy, is it so much bigger than that! It feels awful. REALLY awful.

I've had a few moments in the past couple of months in which I've completely broken down - prolonged ugly cries paired with an overwhelming feeling of a total lack of control. I've had SEVERAL days spent just completely exhausted trying to put one foot in front of the other. I now know what anxiety feels like. Real anxiety, not the "I've got a test tomorrow" easy stuff. And in the midst of this, I've noticed a shift in how I react to feeling bad - I get to this point where all these thoughts are racing through my head, but it's really hard to vocalize any of it. I sit there screaming in my head that I need help, but I don't know how to communicate that I want it or even what "help" would mean. Poor John is doing his best to be a support to me, but it's a tough job, particularly because our learned ways of communicating are so different.

I think this moment of crisis is largely fueled by my job along with a few home-life factors. In the last week at work, I was punched for the first time (don't worry, just grazed in the shoulder as I was trying - unsuccessfully - to break up a fight) and watched a drug addict hit what I hope is rock bottom. Not to mention the usual calls about my kids' personal crisis ranging from "I don't know how I'm gonna pay this light bill" to "I think I might want to kill myself". It's intense. Lots of people in my life have said that I have a gift for social work. They ask me how I do it and confess that they don't think they ever could. The truth is, I don't know if I can do it, either. I just feel this deep-rooted compassion for others. I see what I see in my line of work and my heart breaks and I have to do SOMETHING. It's also ruined me for other fields. I mean, how can I think about doing something like marketing or retail when I compare that to the sense of meaning I get from doing what I do? Then again, I see how jolly the people who work at Trader Joe's are and a career change doesn't seem like such a bad idea!

And here's why I started this post saying that I'm excited about life right now. Burn out is hard. HARD. HARD. HARD. But I've got a friend named Jesus whose name breaks chains called burn out and anxiety and stress. I'm recognizing through this how much I NEED my sweet and strong Jesus everyday. I'm still not good at that, but I've recognized the need in a very real way. I've also been blessed with many things in this season, like a job where self-care is encouraged, an insurance policy that covers unlimited therapy, a Christian therapist booked through a very secular organization, and a husband that is willing to stumble through the task of supporting his wife. Not to mention the fact that I've got space in my life to try and figure this out - I've got a bed to rest on, a roof to protect my head and an absence of things like kids that might completely overwhelm me. This has given me the opportunity to address issues that I probably wouldn't have otherwise which will make me a stronger and much more effective servant of God.

And in small moments, I'm able to rejoice in this trial because it means I'm growing. I know this isn't the hardest thing I'll ever have to deal with and I'm grateful to go through it now to make me more well-equipped to deal with the bigger stumbling blocks further down the road. My tools for ministry are being sharpened and it hurts so good. :-)

Reflections

If we're not spending every ounce of our energy trying to catch a glimpse of our Creator and then reflect that image back to Him the best way we know how, then really - what's the point?

The Next Move

We've been sharing a house with a family for about 5 months now and it turns out it's time to move. They're moving for good and would like to rent out the whole house now for a bit more than we can afford. So off to a new adventure!

We found an awesome apartment that we're really excited about in Long Beach's gayborhood. It's 2 blocks from the beach with awesome boutiques, restaurants and cafes within walking distance. My commute to work will be all of 2.5 minutes.

Sharing a place with a family has been a struggle in trying to communicate and define our own space. When you're living with parents, it's hard to feel like grown-ups - even if the parents aren't yours. But this place has been a great stepping stone to this new place. Had we not jumped on the chance to live in this house, I think we still would have been in the ghetto. We wouldn't have felt like we could move, but we now know that's a lie. We don't have to be stuck anywhere.

I think one of the most exciting parts of this new place is that it's not too dangerous or awkward to have people over. Both of us LOVE to have people over, but we haven't really been in a position to since we've been married. So come on over, everyone! We'll have a chat and I'll make you some food.

Yay. :-)

I can't sleep. Oh and it's John.

I can't sleep. It's ridiculous. Almost as ridiculous as Brittany, the 9 year old my landlord sired, handling the cats in this house.

I know, I know, what the heck, right? Well, cats can take it, so calm down. Anyway, Brittany likes to tell me everything about the cats: what they're thinking, what they like and dislike, what their meows translate to, etc. So I was putting away groceries and notice Sophie (the tuxedo cat) sitting on the dining room table. She scares easy and I thought it would be fun to mess with her, so I go over and start petting her. Brittany is at the other end of the table. She sees me petting Sophie and gets jealous, so she starts calling the cat over. Sophie, assumably afraid of something like the picture above, leans into me a bit and starts meowing. Brittany tells me Sophie hates plastic bags and is likely freaking out on the inside that I'm holding one. I wad the bag into a ball and throw it hard onto the table in front of the cat. Both cat and girl flip

out. It was glorious. Brittany lunges over, grabs the cat [see above] and starts "comforting" her. She's stroking the cat rather forcefully saying, "It's okay Sophie, it's okay, I'm here, it's okay, that was a fake bag, don't worry, that was a fake bag..." Oh man, LOL to that.

Normally I try to blog when I have some sort of spiritual or life epiphany, as few in this world want to hear my discussions on what I ate for dinner or what child/animal I most recently messed with. Sadly, no profound moment has hit me in the face recently, which probably means I'm due for one, which sucks because those are often borne from life's rough spots. So I guess I'll share some mini-piphanies and musings from my head recently.

Common misconceptions about Christ and spirituality:

1. Touch is really, really important. Jesus spent His life healing people through touch, in doing so He broke down walls of community castigation and social rejection. He commanded his disciples to lay their hands on the sick. He didn't tell them to meet with them and pray. The direct command was to literally lay hands. A friend of mine recently witnessed a healing that was borne through prayer. This fellow was suffering from advanced cancer, and had people all over praying for him, but my friend administered prayer by laying his hands on the sick man and it changed everything. The cancer went into complete remission immediately. An amazing story, yes, but an amazing lesson as well. We need to be a lot more generous and liberal with touching. Kids are always touching, hugging, and holding hands. Maybe this is a small part of what Christ meant when He told us to come as little children. An innocent child isn't afraid to express love.

2. Jesus hated organized religion. Hated it. His ministry basically consisted of teaching people about God, healing the sick, and lambasting the religious elders. Jesus basically came down and told the Hebrews "you're doing it wrong!" He denounced the religious institutions, showed compassion and love to women, offered forgiveness and transformation to sinners, all in a culture that was rabidly religions, hyper-punitive, and sexist. I really like that. He didn't work with the religious institution, He worked in spite of it.

In conclusion, I guess my goal for 2010 should be to be more aligned with these mini-piphanies. If Jesus were to come speak to us today, would He be happy with how one's faith is generally determined by which building you go, which book you read, and how often? Would He be happy with us hiding behind comfort zones and meaningless sociological constructs of "personal space?" I think not. My faith needs to be lived outside of the church, where I can literally touch the lives of others.

Oh yeah, and we're moving! Another adventure awaits in LA. We're looking at a couple different places, and they're both places where I could meet more people just by milling about. Since I work from home, it can be a bit tough to meet new people, so this will be a nice change. I'm sure that can work in concert with these scary realizations I'm having.

One more thing, it's really storming. Look at this low-quality cell phone picture, you can see the sidewalk is completely under water!