A Moment to Feel Blessed

Yes, that photo to the left is the view I get to see from my window in my new apartment every morning.  It may mean nothing to most New Yorkers, as the panorama of the skyline is nothing special to us.  But for me, it means the beginning of redemption.

For the last five months back home, I've been extremely lost, and as an indirect result of that, bitter.  I felt as though I couldn't make a plan to save my life.  I had been dumped in a hole, and just couldn't climb out.

This is how I wanted life to go:

Girl finds dream job (without having to try so hard), move to said town dream job resides in, and everyone loves girl and girl's work.  Mentor at dream job recognizes girl's wonderful skills / wit (and latent charm).  Mentor encourages and hones them, which then inspires girl to go beyond the scope of the position to affect the community.  All the while, girl lives in  dream apartment that is not only cozy, but affordable and within walking distance from work.  Girl makes new friends that are awesome and somehow coincidentally interested in all the things she's interested in.  Friends recognize girl's skills / wit (and latent charm), and they encourage each other in loving words to become better people.  And that skilled, witty, charming girl in my imagination is happy, fulfilled, and feels blessed.

This.....is how things actually happened:

Girl with skills / wit (and latent charm) realizes how unskilled, un-witty, and un-charming she is at challenging job that has nothing to do with what she studied in school, and nowhere close to what she dreamed of doing.  In fact, job brings out an aggressive side of girl that she is afraid of, and stretches her (often beyond her means) as she struggles to somehow teach herself how to perform well in the position, and secretly goes home at night suspecting that she is very cold and mean at work.  Girl lives out of suitcase for five months, sleeps on mother's sofa, then is asked to leave because mother wants to sell house, finds refuge in kindness of her friend, and sleeps on friend's floor for a couple of months.  One night, girl either has swallowed a dust ball or possibly a bug while sleeping on floor and wakes up choking, then wonders how life got so sad and where God is.  Girl continually loses most expensive material goods, already feels poor, and now feels as though she can not own any nice things for herself.  Girl realizes she can't escape her past, people still think she's reckless, irresponsible, flaky, can't be trusted, and starts to feel as though she really hasn't changed much.  Girl feels like a loser, gives up on ever thinking God is going to answer her, and decides that having dreams may be a waste of time.


Sad isn't it?  But not really...as promised in the title, this is a moment to feel blessed.

Let's take a deeper look:

Scenario one is a quick way to feel as though you've come out on top in the rat race, but as William Sloane Coffin keenly observed, "the trouble with the rat race is that even if you win, you're still a rat".  On the surface, that dream scenario seems awesome, and it encompasses all the deepest needs humans have.  We want to be loved and recognized.  We want to feel encouraged, and to know our lives have meaning, that people see us and listen to us.  To feel as though we have an impact on this world beyond an inconsequential life.  We want to feel fulfilled through the works of our hands, stable, sustained and comfortable.  Deep down inside, I know these are things God wants for us too.  But this path only provides the illusion of those deepest needs fulfilled.  It is the quickest way to becoming a white-washed tomb; clean and perfect on the outside, dead on the inside.  It is the path that shows the world we've got all these things, but it's only a magic show, a sleight of hand intended to make others feel envious of what we have.  It's an accumulation of worldly success and external accolades that doesn't force someone to journey within.  It's impressive, but it's an illusion.  And sometimes impressive illusions just aren't enough.  I want something amazing.

This is what scenario two offers; the opportunity for amazement.  It's sad, and hard.  It involves struggle, unhappiness, obstacles, discouragement, and a lot of ugliness.  It can bring out the worst in someone through incredibly uncomfortable situations, but it is an accurate portrayal of what life is like for most people. And here are some amazing things I'm already seeing in the midst of it all.  As unskilled as I am at my job, people still keep me around.  Every day I recognize that its not my skill that keeps me going, but the invisible force of grace.  As mean and cold as I can be, I can see other people's graciousness  come through.  I express my unhappiness and instead of being asked to leave or find another job, they work with me to make things better.  In my bitterness, my friend's still want to be my friends.  They put up with my complaining, crying, yelling and often times hopeless rhetoric.  I may not be impressive, but they don't care, they still love me.  And we may not have the same interests, or always share loving words, but we challenge each other to become better people, inside and out.  And despite all the times I've failed my family and the times they've failed me, we're still a family, no one has been disowned yet.  Thank God the only things I've lost are material goods, and yes, it's sad, but at the end of the day it's stuff, and it can be replaced.  I've realized that the good things I want are things of permanence, lasting things.  And then there's sleeping on the floor.  Sometimes sleeping on the floor is....well.....no, it's just sleeping on the floor.  But God knows that.  So he takes you from the ground and brings you to the 11th floor of a rent stabilized dream right across the street from Central Park, five stops away from work, where every morning you get to see that view.  And you take a deep breathe in, despite the life you live that is nothing like how you'd imagined it to be, and you come to the realization that you are on the path towards something amazing.  You realize that it's the perfections of life that are the true distractions and not the obstacles.  You realize that your messy existence is in no way an indication of your short-comings, but a divine set-up for your redemption.  You decide that being a white-washed tomb is not enough, so you very reluctantly take the path of the fool since it is the only alternative, and you hang on.  You wait, you struggle, and hope there's a pay off, because the word of the Lord says that God chooses the foolish things of the world to shame the wise, and the weak things of the world to shame the strong, and you choose to believe that.