Superhero

I lean back in my chair, head cocked to the side, confident and full of myself; pretending I am a superhero. I lift one eye brow with a slight grin. 'I can do anything' I whisper to myself. 'Because I'm a freekin' superhero! And superheros have super powers.' I grin widely.

But then I glance back at the computer area in front of me; papers scattered about, bits of old projects left unfinished on top of the printer and left on and around stacks of CDs. Around my feet lay wires tangled with themselves from old and broken parts of who-really-knows-whats. I'm not really smiling anymore.

Among the heaps of junk and potentially useful items is a College catalog with course listings. I let out a sigh and sit back in my chair normally, snatching the book out from under a pile of old art work. I flip it open to some papers stuffed into the pages. Enrollment papers for the coming semester. 'I want to go to school', I tell myself, in a less than convincing voice. Barely audible. I stare at the book for a bit but then I toss it back onto the pile, and set to work on getting rid of some of the mess.

I shuffle through some papers lying on the desk. I look back at the computer screen, and see a face smiling out at me. It's the face of a baby. Amy. She's only a month old. Her little face smiles out of the computer screen, the rest of her body wrapped up warmly in the embrace of her father. His face smiling along side hers. I put down the papers and look at the picture on the screen. 'Hi Amy.' I say. My heart begins to ache a bit. It must be so comfortable there, in her father's arms. He's got a hold of her snug and tight. You can tell he's not going to let go of his little girl any time soon. How peaceful it looks to be a part of that picture. 'I want to be a mother', I begin to say, less audible than before.

I bookmark the page, and close the window. Why was that painful to look at? I decide to change rooms and I go get the papers I left with my church books. I begin leafing through and find the notes from church I took earlier this morning. Notes about being kinder to people, and about what faith really is, and about what separates hope from belief. There on the corner of one piece of paper is the scribbled words 'Note to self: Go on a mission'. There's so much that intrigues me about the gospel. I believe it. I want to share it with people. 'I want to go on a mission', I say. But am I too scared, I wonder?

I continue working on recording the notes in other places so that I can throw out all the bits of paper that have been collecting over a period of much-too-long. But I don't know how to throw some of them out. Some of them are pieces of art work, swirls and lines, shaded pictures mixed in with my notes. How do I throw those out? They aren't exactly masterpieces, but they aren't exactly transferable to some other place, and I still want to keep them. After a while, I stop. I go back to the computer chair by the window. I'm not interested in sorting papers anymore. I'll leave that for some other time. When I care more. Maybe I'm bored. Maybe I'm ADD. Then again, maybe I don't care if I'm ADD.

But, what do I care about? I wonder to myself. What do I want to do? I've got a job. I work at a daycare. I could keep working there. But for what? But I don't really want to work there anymore. Working there isn't what I want to be doing in a few months. Maybe it's because I am not dedicated, and I just don't want to do something I'm not enjoying, or maybe it's because having worked there has made me dislike children, and I think that is wrong. So I ask myself again, 'what do I want to do?'

'I want to start a business', I say, half wishing someone was listening so they could give me some sort of motivation. It would be amazing to change the world in some way through a business I created. The truth is, I want to begin changing the world through my efforts to help people. I want to help people all over the world. 'And I want to travel too'. I hear the words come out, but by the time they are out, my mind has already moved on. I want to travel, but what about all the other stuff I want to do? Do I have the guts? Do I know what's coming? Can I do any one of these things and not miss out on the rest?

I sigh. I lean back in my chair, and cock my head, looking out the window. 'I want to be a superhero', I say. This time I can barely muster up the words. 'Maybe then I'd have the guts to try something. Anything. Even if it was just finishing clearing up this messy room. I'd do something exciting. After all, I'd have super powers.'

But nothing changes. The leaves aren't even rustling in the wind. It's all the same. Same as when I looked out the window the first time. And I'm not a superhero. I don't have super powers. And I can't bend the rules.

I sigh again. I wish someone would push me in some direction. Then I wouldn't have to choose and come up with my own motivation. I'd just have to keep the momentum.

I get out of the chair, and begin cleaning the papers off the desk. Frustrated, and weary I trudge on, hoping somewhere in the mix and confusion of it all, someone will save me from the fate of the unfortunate soul, born as a regular. Not a superhero... Not even a sidekick... Not super at all.

Change

Change is always inside of us, no matter how much we desperately want to curse, blame or give credit to our surroundings or environment.

A little while back I had a moment of different feelings that I have never felt before. It was so distinct. The feelings were simple. “There is such a change coming your way that you will take leaps where you took baby steps before.” And I didn’t know what to do because I was driving a vehicle at the time, and when something that direct and that blunt hits you that strongly, the first impulse is to stop, stare blankly, mouth agape and just sit in shock, but I can’t exactly do that while driving a car. Instead, I pressed the gas harder and stared wide-eyed ahead, a smile forming on my lips and no words to express. It was such a huge feeling of excitement that washed over me that I sped my vehicle WAY over the limit for quite a distance before I came to again and realized how much over the limit I was going.

And for a while I held the thought in the back of my head, and said nothing to anyone. I didn’t want to ruin the moment. Because maybe I had just dreamed it, maybe it was just the sunshine, maybe it was just my imagination. But here I am and over and over I am finding myself staring at a ladder that is leaning against the very walls that not long ago I stared at and saw as obstacles.

The change is in me. I am what’s changing. The ladder has always been there, but I have never seen it before. Now I see the ladder and I see a way over the walls and as it becomes clearer that it is this opportunity to climb the ladder over the wall that I am supposed to take. It is this change, in these future moments. I battle the fear inside and take a step closer to the ladder, and as I do, I feel such joy!

It’s so exciting to see the path laid out ahead of me like this. For so long it’s been a path that has lead to a wall. But now I see that there is a way over the wall and my journey is opening up. The path is leading to the ladder, not the wall, and I couldn’t see that before. The wall is fear, and the ladder is courage. The other side of the wall holds so many frightening experiences… exciting experiences. To hold back would be stupid. The opportunities are endless once I cross this wall. This is what I believe it is like to fly. This is what it’s like to have change.

Becoming Identical vs. Becoming Unified

Please read Ryan's orriginal blog, which others of you can read here, because then I think this will make more sense... I figured I should write my thoughts here, instead of in the comment under his blog.

Ok. I bet you already knew this, Ryan, but I had the thought, so I wrote it down. :)

Just by presenting this question, about individualism vs. unity, I believe you are being an individual. Simply by offering this question out to us (the readers), you are being an individual, thinking and expressing your thoughts. And by posing the question, you inspire others to think about and consider answers. Without your 'individualism' in this instance, methinks we wouldn't have this common ground to work our thoughts off of to better understand one another. Without 'individualism', there would be no reason to try to understand one another, no reason for developing 'people skills', no reason for these simple basic life skills, that are obviously needed to cope in life.

Without individualism, there would be no need for understanding different perspectives which we can obviously tell, that there is a need for. If God wanted us to have no differing of perspectives, in order to be 'unified', He would have needed to take away every thing that gives us any differing characteristics. We would need to be the same in skin color, gender, size, and be identical in every way (which I think is the real issue here, the confusion between becoming identical and becoming unified). In order to be 'unified', he would need to allow us no human contact due to the differing of perspectives, simply by our different visual perceptions. Yet this is not the case.

Individualism provides us an opportunity for understanding, and therefore of unity. If our thoughts are understood by each other, then we can grow and develop towards being edified, and therefore, unified. It is through being edified that we find truths, and correct principles, which are anchors in life that once understood, begin to unify us.

We have our individuality, our own personalities, our own flares, but still we can have a common understanding which brings us out of the slums of mockery, slandering, and other attitudes which further us from each other. This common understanding is greater than we are. It's not just understanding one perspective out of the thousands, but God's greater perspective which sheds light on how everything works, and why people are the way they are, and how to interact and live by correct principles. But this does not mean it steals our tastes, goals, tendencies, talents, passions, love or individuality to become unified through understanding.

I suggest that it is this 'individualism' which spawns the ability to attain 'unity'. I believe that it is due to, and because of our individuality that we are able to be unified.

The rewards of labor

I thought this diagram was pretty cool. I saw it when I was... well a lot younger. The colors were very impressive to me at the time, since it wasn't very often I saw a rainbow in a grown-up's book. So I sat looking at the picture for quite a while before I asked my mom what it meant. At that point in time, I was simply drawn to the pretty rainbow, and so of course, when presented with the choice of which one I thought I should choose, I wanted the rainbow one.

I've since come to realize that there is so much more to the diagram, with much more depth than just a pretty hour-glass shaped object vs. the brownish icky (I swear it looked worse in the book) diamond shaped object. The principle of the comparison is actually quite spectacular. The main principle of this diagram is that what you do now, will affect you later. Whether we choose to do something positive and uplifting (sharing our lollipop with the next kid over), or something negative and depressing (hiding out lollipops from everyone else), we can not avoid the fact that there are consequences to every choice we make. "There -- are -- ALWAYS -- consequences!" As would that guy off of that movie (Jumper) say.

It gets harder and harder as we strive to do good, to keep doing good. But if we endure, if we stick it out and keep on, eventually it will turn around and we will find it becomes easier because the rewards outweigh the challenge. An example of that would be lifting weights. As we lift them, we could realize that it hurts, it's hard and we don't like it. But the more we do it, the stronger we become, and the easier it is. And for some reason people get happy because they can lift big weights. And happiness is the ultimate reward for our actions. We have to keep in mind the long-term happiness though, not the short-term surface-type happiness that can be stolen away in an instant once our environment changes.

True happiness is not dependent on any outside influence.

This means that the happiness we feel in any given situation where 'something made us happy' can be stolen away from us if the situation had been opposite what it was. For example, if someone says "I think you look very attractive today", that might make you happy. If it does make you happy, then the opposite would also stand. If they said "I think you look ugly today", then that would make you feel unhappy. The goal though is to be happy even if someone says something that can be taken offensively. The goal is to stay focused on the big picture and realize that even if the world around you is a mosh pit of chaos, or a battle field of arrows aimed at you, or a jail cell of injustice... You can still be happy. Or at least at peace with yourself.

One way to do that, is to be grateful all the time, and looking on the bright side of things. If someone says "I think you look ugly today", you could be grateful that the implication is that the rest of the days, you look beautiful. Or you could be grateful that they pointed it out before you walked out the door so you could do something about it. Or you could be grateful that you don't care if they think you look ugly. Or you could be grateful that you have some duct tape in the drawer. See? All these bright, happy... happy thoughts.

It's the point of this life. "Everlasting Happiness"

One Thousand Shells and a Million Ocean Waves

I've been to the ocean twice in my life, once when I was too little to remember and once this last summer. When I was too little to remember (about 5 or 6), we went to the ocean to collect the final clue at the end of a treasure hunt for real buried treasure that my aunt had hidden in a box beneath the sand. I think she created all the little golden trinkets within the box, and I wonder now where they have gotten to, because in our family, we never throw things out.

I don't remember very much about the ocean other than the a snippet of the crazily sharp cliff rocks, a glimpse of the expansive ocean, and a large dead crab that convinced my 6 year old self that I never wanted to set foot in that monster-ridden water. About four years ago, I decided I wanted to go back, mostly because I'd forgotten what it was like, and had heard it was fabulous. 'Going to the Ocean' was something I put on my 'to do list'. The one most of us write at some point in our lives listing the things we want to accomplish before we die, unless we only have one thing on that list which is: to write that aforementioned list.

There are about 35 things I've written on that list, and some have been able to be crossed off. It's one of the most exciting experiences to go over that list and pre-live those experiences, and cross off others. But I find that the more I go over my list, the more I add to it, as though each thing I've done previously adds two items to the list, and at the rate I'm at... well, I will never finish. I've acquired a driver's license, but now I've added to the list that I want to go on a spontaneous road trip, and that I want to travel to Egypt. I've gone skiing, but now I want to go snowboarding, and skydiving. I've been accross Canada, but now I want to go to Peru and to Austrailia. And more than dreaming, I hope these goals will come true. Interesting though isn't it, how the more we do in life, the more we want to do. Like going to the Ocean.

Although I can now officially cross it off of my 'to do' list, I feel the need to put 'Going to the Ocean' on the 'Things I should do again sometime' list. Last summer at the ocean was spectacular. When we first got to the beach, I noticed a shell on the ground and thought 'This is beautiful! Unique! I should keep this!' As we continued down the path to the beach, more and more of these little shells lay scattered about our feet. I eagerly picked up shell after shell. Once my feet touched the sand though, reality stole me from my 'lucky me' mindset as my eyes rested on the thousands of little black shells that littered the beach like unwanted waste. I dropped my thoughtful collection and only picked up the most significant, unique and precious ones to take back with me as tokens of remembrance... including a couple sand dollars, random bubble seaweed, and of course, some small dead crabs. Apparently I couldn't get around that lovely... dead... smelly... piece of the experience, so I decided to take some home with me.

The waves, the starfish; the driftwood, the sand... Another expereince to check off my list. And now I've added to my list again. To travel to more beaches around the world, and to dance on the beach as the sun goes down. My list will never stop growing, for as each chapter of life's adventure draws to a close, somewhere two more chapters have just begun.