Ending a Decade

This is the last year of my 20s.  Some days I still feel like I am 10-years-old again, climbing trees and daydreaming.  Other days, it feels more like I am well into my later years of life, skipping several decades with enough story and adventure and loss to fill a lifetime. Most days I wake up aware of the ticking clock of my existence, yet by the end of the day I look back on how much time was wasted on ridiculous escapes like social media and fear and wishing I was someone else or somewhere else, instead of  showing up to my own life and treating the time I've been given on this earth as sacred and something that matters greatly.  It's really quite sobering.  I wonder what it takes to be consistently intentional. I wonder if there is a mindset that is deeper than laziness that often causes me to give up or underestimate my own worth-- deep down maybe the struggle is with codependency and people pleasing, which is an exhausting battle.  I often give into my deep fear of failure, of being exposed as someone who is incredibly lacking, and instead of fighting I go and I hide.  

Yesterday I was putting on a pair of jeans that have grown tight in this new year.  In the midst of an intense move, job changes, applying for medical school, trying to sort out where I will move if Trump becomes President, I have gained weight.  All the fluctuations and how I feel out of control when it comes to my own life got me thinking about how to rightly motivate myself to want to eat well and exercise again after an intense year that has left me apathetic towards my own health.  One thing I know--wanting to be healthy in order to fit a status quo and look good externally to a world that changes its opinion like the wind changes direction is not going to get me into a good head space.  Americans seem to find so much status and worth in things that are temporary-- where we live, what car we drive, the job that consumes all of our time, the size of our pants, the clarity of our faces.  Things that we think are so secure, yet can be lost in a second. We feel superficially good when others notice and applaud our outside success. Soul sucking is the best way I can describe that grind.  The freedom comes when actions are the product of an internal place that knows its true worth, recognizing that material things should be held loosely.  Lately the loss of the last three years have had me confronting my own motivations- -the way I so often get sucked into living my life for others.   Do I want to be healthy in order to get an applause for my figure and discipline, or is my motivation more long term-- wanting energy for the kids I hope to one day have and for the mountains I want to climb and for the clinics I want to start and for all the learning I want to keep doing, which requires a healthy and clear thought life.  Do I want to become a doctor so that the people who have spread rumors about my family will see that I (we) are actually somewhat functional-- or is it because I feel called to be a healer, moved by the realities of medical care inequalities, heartbroken but hopeful for the future of medical breakthroughs and the care of the vulnerable and forgotten?  

  There are a few things on my list of "what I want to do before I'm 30".  Some are adventurous, others practical: take the MCAT, start medical school, go hang gliding, start writing a fiction book (something I've always been scared of), but the biggest thing I want to confront is my own heart motivations.  I want to walk into a new decade with a sense that my life is not defined by how the world measures success, and I want to end this decade that's been so full already with an overarching theme of these 10 years teaching me so much about the need to prioritize caring for my own heart and keeping that space uncluttered and free. 

New Keys

Dedicated to the lovely Lily Chi, who always encourages me to keep writing.

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No man, no land, no task for my hand ever soothes
I stay restless for you
All I am was made for you and no other will do
So I stay restless for you. 
-My Epic

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I’m typing from an almost empty room in the home where I grew up, staring out into our backyard as the family dog, who we all believe is practically human, chomps away at a bone.  He’s in his happy place and I am glad.  That backyard has been his paradise and the only existence he’s known-- he’s been the king of its white fenced borders, making sure in his sweet Golden Retriever way that all who enter know who is in charge.  

This is one of his last nights to roam this particular plot of land.  It’s my whole family’s last night to walk through the halls and up and down the steps that lead to the rooms that we’ve all grown to know so well-- the weird light switches whose quirks we know without even thinking, the layout that we could walk through with eyes closed, the secret hiding spots we carved out as kids playing hide and seek.  We moved in on my 10th birthday, all six of us curled up in sleeping bags and warmed by the fireplace, settling into a beautiful new part of the story. My mom loved the gas stoves that worked even in the worst storm.  My dad loved the pool.  I loved all the trees I could climb, where I could make believe and read and dream.  It was this home that I returned to after my first trip to Nicaragua.  It was where I journaled about all the love I felt for the people I met and this country that somehow felt like home, even after just one visit.  It was in my room in this house where I first started experiencing the presence of God and where my heart started to feel a deep desire to be of some use in the world, bringing at least a little light and laughter into darkness.  

I didn’t know that my own heart would first have to experience darkness and a sense of homelessness--losing the things I'd grown to know so well over the years. 

I moved away for the first time at 17, but it was still home--still the place where my friends could come to play and the church family my parents pastored could come to connect and fellowship.  These walls hold so many memories.  They contributed to the making of so many friendships...and sheltered the tears of sadness over those that didn’t last.

I didn’t know as a young child that my parents would both lose their jobs on the same day, causing the house to go into foreclosure.  I didn’t know that something in their hearts wouldn’t stick together like they planned when they started out thirty-one years ago.  I didn’t know then how addiction could change brain chemistry and personality, impacting everyone. I didn’t know how ministry, however noble, could create unhealthy and oppressive burn-out.  I didn’t know that church would become a traumatic place instead of a healing place in my heart for a time. I didn’t anticipate not being able to one day bring grandchildren to their grandparents’ home,  where I would show them all the secret spaces in the place where I grew up while telling them about all the grand adventures of my childhood. 

My reality is so different than what I imagined at 10, yet I believe that in the midst of the loss, the unnecessary is slowly getting stripped away.  One thing I don’t want to lose is my child-like wonder.  Depression has a way of grinding away at awe. I don’t want to lose the hope that the earth is just waiting for majesty to be discovered and unearthed, like a treasure hunter out on the beach with a metal detector, knowing that somewhere on the endless miles of sand there is something incredibly special and worth the search.  

I’m now 29 and a little more aware of loss and grief and struggle, but also of unexpected new starts with nothing left to lose. There’s a lot of courage available in that particular set of circumstances.  There’s a lot more comfort to be found now in all of my questions not always having answers and sometimes just leading to more questions, and hopefully, ultimately, a sense of peace and surrender.  

Soon the last of the items will be cleared out and the door will be closed and the locks changed.  Our keys will no longer work. Our dog will get used to a new home that has no yard, forcing his family members to explore the surrounding area. And we will embrace the new and live in awe once again, basking in the incredible faithfulness of a Father who catches every tear and is present in every hard thing, cheering us on into a new place of abundance and joy unspeakable. 

Cheers and onward march to this new chapter-- to infinite grace and kindness and deep wells that sustain.  There are hard and sad things I am still processing and that need to find their way onto paper, but I trust that the future is one of freedom.