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Releasing my identity.

3 May

This post has been in the works for the past month. I’m sure I’ll discover more in the future that could be added to it.

It all started the day I was pondering why changing jobs made me feel like a completely different person. I was obviously still me – I’ll be me for all of eternity. But I felt different. I identified myself as a different person. Before, I worked in an office doing marketing for a nonprofit ministry. Now I worked at home coordinating volunteers and vendors for a nonprofit racing company.

I realized how much of our identities are dependent on and relative to external factors. When a person does engineering, they say “I am an engineer.” When a woman has a baby, she says “I am a mother.” When two people get married, they say “We are married.” In the Spanish language, there are 2 forms of the verb “to be” – there is the permanent, definitive form “ser” and there is the temporary, transient form “estar.” All of the sentences I wrote above would use the permanent form. “I am [these things]”, which is just another way of saying “These things are me.”

We define ourselves by external things, whether we want to or not. Even making the objection “I don’t define myself by external things” is defining yourself – you are identifying yourself as a person who does not identify themselves.

This is made even more evident when trying to ponder what you think makes up your identity. How do you identify yourself? Some people would say “I’m a friend, a brother, a boyfriend.” Relationships to other people. Other people would say “I’m smart, energetic, playful, and funny.” But without examples of stupidity, laziness, seriousness, and boring in other people or situations, we would have nothing on which to gauge our individual attributes. Still other people would revert to their careers, (“I’m a lawyer”), their hobbies (“I’m a golfer”), their possessions (“I’m a millionaire”), their prestige (“I’m a Harvard grad”), or their success (“I’m the youngest CEO in this company’s history.”) Notice how all of those statements are relative to something external.

Try to think of something you could say about yourself that isn’t related to something outside of yourself. Even statements about emotions you embody, like “I am compassionate,” can only be true as they find expression outside of yourself. You can say you’re compassionate – but it is not proven until you are compassionate toward someone else.

When D and I were in Salt Lake City 2 weekends ago, we got lost driving from our hotel to the race site. I usually know which direction is north, but I had gotten totally turned around. What I thought was north actually was south. D suggested we just follow the directions I had written down instead of trying to figure out which direction was which. I got really offended and even at the time, I knew it was a silly thing to be mad over. Looking back on it later, I realized that being good with directions (not just ones from Google but the compass directions) was part of my identity. I had been subconsciously thinking of myself “I am good with directions and can find my way around easily.” When that identity was questioned or threatened, I got defensive and angry.

Since that trip, numerous other situations have revealed facets of my so-called identity – facets I didn’t even know about, facets that only reveal themselves when challenged, threatened or belittled.

I have become increasingly aware of the reason why the Bible commands us to find our identity in Christ. God knows that we, as humans, naturally find our identities outside of ourselves. We use the world around to us to figure it out. Even as Christians, God doesn’t expect us to figure out who we are by ourselves, by looking inside of us. Instead, He tells us who we are. He shows us whose we are. And He tells us to find our identities in Christ.

What does that mean – to find our identity in Christ? It’s one of those phrases that is thrown around a lot and I wonder how many people pause long to think about the meaning of what they’re saying. I think finding your identity in Christ means to let every other definition of yourself die, so that the only one remaining is that of a sinner saved by grace. If indeed that was the only definition you were clinging to, there would be nothing in this world that could shake you, disturb you, frustrate you, or disappoint you.

My struggle with feeling like I should be doing more than I am doing and my resulting feelings of guilt, I think, come from wanting to identify myself as a person who makes a difference. I am trying to make my identity be something other than Christ and of course, am encountering emotional turmoil. That is the sure result of ever trying to identify ourselves with something other than Christ.

Right now, I am re-reading Desiring God by John Piper and then I am going to re-read We Would See Jesus. Two amazing books full of the exact truths that I need to hear right now. Here is one of the life-changing passages from We Would See Jesus, that especially applies to my feeling of needing to serve:

“At first sight it seems heroic to fling our lives away in the service of God and of our fellows. We feel it is bound to mean more to Him than our experience of Him. Service seems so unselfish, whereas concentrating on our walk with God seems selfish and self-centered. But it is the very reverse. The things that God is most concerned about are our coldness of heart towards Himself and our proud, unbroken natures…

“This does not mean that God does not want us engaged actively in His service. He does; but His purpose is often far different from what we think. Our service, in His mind, is to be far more the potter’s wheel on which He can mold us than the achieving of those spectacular objectives on which we set our hearts.”

Piper echoes this sentiment – that we exist to glorify God and we glorify God by enjoying Him. “God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in Him.” When we are satisfied in Christ being our only identity. When we have to hold onto nothing of this world to validate who we are. We don’t have to have the right job, the right clothes, car, body, hair, face, talent, personality, friends, hobbies, or service.

This is most liberating thought in the world to me. I can enjoy movies, flowers, thunderstorms, ice cream, good books, warm blankets, lazy Sundays, and my wonderful husband because they all reveal God to me. He is present in everything. I am here to know God and to enjoy Him. And only one thing is sufficient for defining myself: I am a sinner, saved by grace alone through Christ alone.

I still want to serve the needy somehow. But the feeling of guilt is gone. I am not just here to make this world a better place – I am here to know God and can do that in many different ways. I am a treasure to God, regardless of what I do for His kingdom. He just wants me to know and love Him about everything else. And when that is my focus, everything else feels manageable. He alone is my reward and my prize.

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Exhaustion and chaos.

19 Apr

I just got back last night from my first weeklong trip to a race. This race was one we put on so instead of just doing the timing (which is an in-and-out job), we had to set the whole thing up, coordinate all the volunteers and staff, clean up, provide food and water to all the athletes, all of that.

Overall, the trip was a good time. We got to Vegas Monday night and checked into our hotel. It was a dump. It was near the race site but it was only $20 a night.

Tuesday, we met up with the old race director, Brogg, and went to buy consumables, like duct tape, zip ties, bricks and rope for the buoys, and air horns. I somehow convinced the director of sales at Hampton Inn and Suites to comp us a room for the whole week because we would direct athletes to their hotel. So after buying that stuff, D and I moved to the Hampton Inn – SO much better!!

Wednesday, we just spent at the hotel, which now had free WiFi, free breakfast, as well as a light dinner and freshly baked cookies every night. We checked emails, confirmed vendors, and finalized packets for packet pickup. Travis flew in around 7:30 that night so I went and picked him up from the airport (which I will never do again, because I always end up pissed off for the rest of the night due to the airport roads being so asinine…long story). We went back to the hotel to check in and pretty much went straight to bed.

Thursday, we went down to the race site (Travis stayed at the hotel to work on school work and relax after his 10-day levee inspection) to stage the bike and run course aid stations by filling up trash cans with water, sorting course marking signs, and loading the trucks that would take the materials out on the course the next day. I didn’t enjoy that day because I spent a lot of time just standing around the race site watching other people work because I didn’t know much about what they were doing. I communicated to my boss and friend, D, that next time, I need a job. Just give me a job to do and I”ll be fine. When we got back to the hotel, Travis and I ate at In-N-Out Burger (first time! and it was good) and then went to bed.

Friday, everyone else headed down to the race site again to put the buoys out in the water, set up the barricades and fencing around the transition area, set up the finish line scaffolding arch and tents, and set up the bike and run courses. I did not do that – I was back in the hotel room getting ready for packet pickup. I had to print final rosters, mark the last packets from online registrations, load all of the packets into the car, then Travis and I drove to the packet pickup venue and set it all up. Overall, packet pickup went really well. I learned a few things that will make packet pickup go more smoothly in the future – like have more volunteers at the front table checking IDs and taking new registrations – but I think the setup was pretty good. Travis was a great help – it was really fun having him there. After packet pickup, Travis and I got subs from this great sub shop, ate, and went to bed around 11:00.

Saturday morning was D day. My alarm was set for 2:15 AM but somehow, I didn’t hear it go off (or it didn’t go off) but luckily, I woke up at 2:45 and realized what time it was. We left for the race site by 3:30 AM and got there by 4. Wow, that was early. I set about setting up all the timing equipment with Travis, while D went and worked on the registration data and other stuff. After getting all the timing equipment set up in probably a little over an hour, all hell broke loose.

It was absolute chaos for the next 2 hours. I had coordinated volunteers before the race and had expected to be off the hook on race day, so that I could concentrate on timing. But D radioed and asked if I could go up to the volunteer check-in site around 5:30. So I did. Only 2 volunteers showed up. After standing there for about 5 minutes doing nothing but wishing I could just run and hide far away from the pressure, I found out that more volunteers could be used at the transition area for body marking, so I directed them down there. After that, Brent (my boss who was helping me time, since this was my first time doing it on my own) asked what time I would be ready to time. Right then, I said screw it to the volunteer stuff and went and did timing. After that, for me at least, the day went MUCH better.

The chaos was caused mostly by 1) not having enough volunteers (a group of 30 canceled on us the day before the race) and 2) not having the volunteers there early enough. Two more things I learned that should make things go better in the future.

Timing went REALLY well. Pretty much as well as I could have hoped. It went worlds better than any of the other 3 timing events I’ve been at. So that was a definite blessing from God.

Overall, we had a great turnout (about 750 athletes), the athletes had a good time, got their times and awards, food and water, and the race happened. We couldn’t really ask for more for our first go-around at one. (Brogg had put this race on for several years but sold his company and we are now directing the races – he’s just available as contract labor for the year, to help us learn how to pull this type of event off).

Then yesterday, dog tired, D and I got to drive back to Denver! Yay for us! After getting to bed around 11 again, I got up at 5:00 to get my crap together in time to leave at 6:00. If we had had any more stuff to fit in the Sequoia we drove, it would not have fit. The entire SUV was full. There was no seeing out the back. After returning the radios, we got on the road.

When we stopped to get gas for the first time, D took over driving and after another 30 minutes or so, D said that she felt we should have turned onto I-70 by now. So I whipped out my phone and went on Google maps. Sure that we were still coming up on it, I scrolled to the north of where we were. Nope… that was Salt Lake City. I scrolled to the south… and scrolled… and scrolled. Oh. I-70 was about 70 miles ago. How did that happen?!?!

Luckily, there was a road we could take to cut over to I-70 and not have to completely backtrack. My idiocy cost us about an hour and 20 minutes. D’oh! But when I realized how offtrack we were, I just had to laugh. I don’t know exactly how it happened but I’m sure that it had something to do with being exhausted, concentrating on staying awake, and the exit to I-70 being poorly signed. D had almost missed it herself the last time we were driving back from Vegas. D was really nice about my stupid mistake and hey, now we have a story. Road trips are nothing without adventures like that!

Finally, I got home at 9 PM. I had planned to sleep in as late as possible today but woke up at 7 AM Denver time (6 AM Vegas time!) and was wide awake. So I got up, made some coffee, and am now watching the news and typing this blog. What a whirlwind of a weekend!! And we get to do it all again in a month. Not only that, D and I leave again this Thursday morning for a timing event near Salt Lake City.

My parents are coming out the first weekend of May, then I have a weekend to relax, then it’s another racing planning whirlwind in St. George. But we have a crap ton of stuff to get done between then and now!

So after this experience, I would say that I am enjoying this job. It doesn’t really feel like a job because it’s so different than sitting in an office but HOLY CRAP is it a lot of work!!

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Grateful.

3 Apr

Travis and I just finished watching Julie & Julia. That’s a cute movie. And I love the movies that make me feel good about my own life when I’m done watching them.

While I don’t fancy ever boning a duck or cooking a whole chicken, the movie made me appreciate my husband and the partnership of marriage. Travis and I are coming up on our 3rd wedding anniversary in less than 2 months and I feel like we are just beginning to function as a team and I am really beginning to appreciate who Travis is. So far in our marriage, things have been pretty easy – we have had almost exactly the same schedule, same time off, same lifestyle. We didn’t have to put any effort into spending time with one another because we were very often home at the same time. That meant we didn’t put any effort into spending time with one another – I mean, not NO effort but very minimal. Some nights, we’d eat dinner together, but in front of the TV. Other nights, we’d go to the Rec together, but exercise separately. Or I would watch TV while Travis did homework in the office.

None of which is bad, necessarily. It just made it very easy for me to take Travis for granted (I won’t speak for how it affected him). Like Julia says in the movie, “Who has time to be married?” I feel like that has been my attitude a lot, which sounds horrible when presented like that. Why does my husband take back seat to other things – any thing? He should be my #1 priority here on earth. He is the love of my life, my partner, my support. He is always there for me when I need him. He takes thought for me, what I think, what I enjoy. And also like Julia said, “I don’t deserve him.” I really don’t.

But that’s the beauty of love – it’s undeserved. “Love conquers all.” “Love covers a multitude of sins.” “Love bears all things; believes all things; hopes all things; endures all things.” “Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends.” “In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.”

The epitome of love is shown on the Cross – what a glorious thing to remember at Easter time. Christ endured the cross because He loved us. He loved me. Even when I don’t deserve anything good. Especially when I don’t deserve anything good. He died for me despite my not deserving it. He died so that by putting on His robe of righteousness, I don’t have to deserve it.

How often I get distracted from the true point of life. Not only in regards to eternal things, like salvation and sanctification, but also in regards to earthly things, like my husband. I’m so consumed with doing that I forget about being. I do the dishes instead of spending time with my husband. I rush out the door to some meeting instead of linger in prayer. I push Travis away when he comes to bed because cuddling will rob me of 15 minutes of sleep.

It wasn’t just the movie that made me realize all of this. It’s also the change in lifestyle/schedule with my new job and the upcoming month. Travis leaves Monday morning for 10 days in Little Rock. Then he’ll spend 4 days with me in Vegas (while I’m working a race), then he’ll head back to Little Rock for another 10 days. The anticipated separation has prompted me to take time to appreciate Travis – to kiss him, to say good morning, to hug him, to talk to him, ask him how his day was. Not that I didn’t do those things before, but I didn’t savor them like I do now. Then, I was often doing it to feel like a good wife and not a heartless person. I wasn’t taking time to love my husband, to remind myself of why I love him, to do the things I love to do with him, to tell him I loved him. I was taking him for granted. And we both lose in that situation.

But by the grace of God, I am seeing now where I have been going wrong AND I have the motivation and desire to fix it. I want my husband to feel appreciated. I want to support him, from the big things, like his getting a new job (after finding out that he’s being cut to 20 hours/week) to the small things, like helping him rake the yard (a task which I hate).

So right now, tonight, I am grateful. Grateful that I have a husband who loves me, even when I swing from being a cluster of emotions to feeling nothing. Grateful that I have a God who is faithful to show me the truth, whether hard or easy to accept, whether hard or easy to show. I am loved. And that is all that matters.

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Defeated.

29 Mar

I apologize ahead of time for the jumbled mess I expect this post to be. I have a lot going through my mind.

Travis is frustrated with my job. It makes me feel like he’s frustrated with me, since I’m the one with the job that is frustrating him.

I don’t handle his frustration well. To me, the things he is frustrated over aren’t that big of a deal. So we have to add a shelf to the garage to store my equipment. So we can’t park the Pathfinder in the garage for 2 days because I need the Sequoia in there, to keep the $50K worth of equipment safe. So what?

The ways we’re different usually complement each other – he’s good at things I’m not good at and vice versa and it works out well for both of us. This is one of those instances, though, that the ways we’re different divide us and cause misunderstandings like there’s no tomorrow. I am not a question asker. Some people are just naturally inquisitive – they look at the sky and instead of saying “The sky is blue,” they ask “Why is the sky blue?” I am the person who states; Travis is the person who asks.

So when circumstances in my job have been different than what we expected – say, having to store equipment at our house or my having to be gone for an entire week for our races or my receiving $3K less than I had originally heard from D – I accept them as fact. I need to have the equipment at our house because I’ll be using it every weekend. I have to be gone for an entire week because they need me on site for race coordination. It’s ok to be paid a little less because money isn’t my priority and I will have a job I like.

I suspect that all of the unexpected things are making the expected things even harder for Travis to bear – things like my being gone most weekends during the summer, my having to work more than 40 hours a week, and my having to be available 24/7. He’s been making little comments here and there since I took this job and I didn’t realize how much or why they were upsetting me until today. He passes them off as jokes or “stating the facts” – but I know him well enough to know that they are neither. He is voicing his frustration indirectly. And because his frustration is caused by my job, I feel like I am the source of his frustration.

Travis told me tonight that he feels like this job is asking for a lot of sacrifices from me and not giving anything back. Just a few minutes ago, he walked into the bedroom and asked if I was working, since he saw me on my laptop. When I don’t exercise one day, it’s because this job is taking over my life. When I don’t cook dinner, it’s because of the job. When I answer the phone at 7 AM, I’m working too hard. When I check email on a Saturday morning, I’m becoming obsessed. When I can’t run an errand one day during normal work hours, the job is too demanding. When I am still working when Travis gets home from class, the job is asking too much. When I have to park the work car in the garage and the Pathfinder has to go on the street, it’s absolutely ridiculous what my job asks of me.

I agree that this job has come with a lot more sacrifices than my previous one. But we knew that before I took the job and I feel like my hands are tied on a lot of this. I guess that is precisely the mentality that is causing this distress between us. I view these changes as necessary to the job – this is what the job is calling for, and therefore, what I have to do. If I want the job, I have to do it this way. Duty calls, so to speak. So when changes come up, I accept them as fact, before consulting Travis – because in my view, these aren’t negotiable. They are what they are. If there is equipment to store in my garage, I will store the equipment in my garage.

Travis, on the other hand, views these changes as negotiable. Everything is negotiable to him. Well, maybe they are when you think to ask questions and dive into specifics on the spot, right at the time the decision is being made. But when you’re like me, and you’ve already agreed to things without asking questions, it’s a little harder to put your foot down. To sum it up, I commit without asking and Travis gets mad.

I can understand why he’s mad, in some ways. He is the man of the household and as much as my feminist girlpower independent rebel wants to come out and say “Screw him, he can get over it, I can make my own freakin’ decisions,” I want to be a godly woman in this situation. I want to submit to my husband and to respect his emotions, because they are real. I can see that my not consulting Travis could feel, to him, like I am disrespecting him and not caring what he thinks about anything. That is totally not my intention. I do care what he thinks – I just haven’t consulted him because I didn’t think there was anything to discuss.

I feel defeated by Travis, by my job, by life. “Ok, you got me to feel like crap. Happy?” I feel like Travis isholding everything he’s frustrated by against me – that he is no longer frustrated by my job – he is frustrated by ME. That when he looks at me, he sees the source of his frustration. That everything I do proves his point. I asked him tonight if he wants me to quit. He hesitated and then said “No” in a tone that said “Of course not, how could you possibly think that?” But I don’t buy it. I think that was a lie.

Which makes me wonder many questions. What is so different about this job than any other? Why does Travis care so much? Is he worried about our marriage? Did he not want me to take the job in the first place? Is he jealous for some reason? Does he not like me traveling? Why are these such big sacrifices for him? Is he scared that I’ll end up working and doing nothing else? Does he not trust me? Is he mad at me for something I don’t know about? Is he bitter at me for accepting the job without talking about it with him again? Why can’t he forgive me for that? What can I do to make things better? Am I unknowingly making things worse?

I do know one thing though – if things in our marriage don’t improve, I will seriously consider quitting this job. I am committed to my husband and he has to be my number 1 priority. Even if I really like this job and think that Travis is being unreasonable, if this causes too much strain on our marriage, the job isn’t worth it.

I also know that without Travis’ support behind me (which I don’t feel like I have right now), being gone and having such weird hours is going to be really hard – perhaps unbearable. I don’t want our marriage to suffer because of this – if I had thought it would when I was offered the job, I would not have accepted it. I thought that a little time apart would be good for me and Travis, since we’ve had oodles of time together since we’ve been married. But if Travis isn’t supportive of this job, it isn’t going to be good for our marriage.

All of this uncertainty, stress and struggle also makes me wonder, if this is the way things are going to be, why did God lead me down this path if this is what was in store for us? Why let me change jobs if this was going to be the result all along? Why this?

To which I know God replies, “Trust Me.”

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The pull of this life

22 Mar

It’s been a LONG time since I updated my blog, an unfortunate side effect of my new job. It’s kept me really busy and I’m enjoying it so far.

But…

It’s kind of bittersweet. Not that leaving Dare 2 Share makes me sad (although it was the day I left), but I’m not as ecstatic about the job as I thought I would be. Deep down, my soul feels wary and disturbed. It feels like I’m living a different life – this wasn’t just switching a job, it’s switching a lifestyle. And I knew that going into this. But I didn’t know it would make me feel so… weird.

Maybe I don’t feel totally pumped about this job because it’s still a job, after all, and not a ticket to paradise.

Part of it also is that I am now salaried and I work from home – 2 factors which make working everyday not only a possibility, but also something that is encouraged (my boss D works 60-70 hours a week). I’ve been averaging something like 45-50 for the 2 weeks I’ve been with YCS. This situation, however, produces guilt in me whenever I am not working, which sucks. I’m sure it’ll get at least a little better as I get settled into this new role and it feels more comfortable. But I was not prepared for that aspect.

The past week or so, I have been good about making time with God and exercise a priority – those are 2 things that I NEED daily or I seriously think I would cease to feel like myself ever. I also need to make time to cook, go on walks, read, and relax – things I really enjoy. If I don’t make time for those things, I think I will end up hating my life and that was most definitely NOT the point of taking this new job.

All that aside, however, my biggest fear is that I will drift away from God. It would be easy to do, with being busy all the time, and thinking about work constantly (something else that needs to stop for the sake of my sanity). And even though I am getting in the Word regularly, and went to Women’s Group and church this past week, I still feel far from God. Part of it is that I haven’t been praying as often as I had been while still at D2S. But the other part I attribute to my job. It’s very similar to my last post about vacation. My whole life now feels like a vacation – unfortunately, not in the aspect that it feels like I’m lying on the beach 24/7, but in the aspect that nothing feels familiar. Everything changed. I live in the same house with the same husband but honestly, that feels like pretty  much the only things that are the same.

As I try to reclaim my identity in the midst of this new job threatening to consume my life, I think about this song by Shawn McDonald:

The ways of this world are grabbing a hold
Won’t let me go, won’t let me fly by
It’s taking it’s toll down on my soul
‘Cause I know what I need in my life
Don’t let me lose my sight of You
Don’t let me lose my sight

Chorus:
I don’t want to fall away from You
Gravity is pulling me on down
I don’t want to fall away from You
Gravity is pulling me to the ground

This world keeps making me cry
But I’m going to try, going to try to fly, GOTTA FLY HIGH
Don’t want to give into the sin, want to stay IN YOU ‘til the end
Don’t want to lose my sight of You
Don’t want to lose my sight

Chorus

I want to fly
Into the sky
Turn my back on this WHOLE world AND
Leave it all behind
This place is not my home
It’s got nothing for me
Only leaves me with emptiness
And tears in my eyes

God is powerful and can – nay, WILL – sustain my spirit in the midst of this. I cling to that truth.

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Thinking about prayer

27 Feb

I’m sitting here in a coffee shop called Raw Bean in Salt Lake City, looking at the snow-covered mountains surrounding the city. It’s really beautiful. Whereas in Denver, the mountains are off in the distance, in this city they are right there.

Our little getaway has been really enjoyable so far – I’ll give the details in a future post, when we get back home. But I felt the need to blog this morning because it helps me think through what I’m learning about God. For some reason, on vacation when I have more time to spend with God than in my daily life, I end up spending less time with Him, thinking, praying, and reading. Part of it is my lack of resolution to do so – I either give in to my laziness or allow myself to go along with what other people are doing, to the detriment of my God-time.

Case in point: yesterday, Travis and I got up around 8:30 to go eat breakfast at our hotel. Then we came back to our room and while Travis did homework, I could have gotten in the Word – but instead I watched TV and attempted a crossword puzzle. While relaxation is good and I do think I need it spiritually and physically, I feel closer to God, more joyful and more relaxed when I spend time with Him. So this morning, I suggested to Travis that we spend time at a coffee shop, reading the Bible. I’m glad we’re here.

But it’s weird… God has given me the desire to pray so much lately that right now, I feel like my quiet time is incomplete because I haven’t prayed (I have a hard time praying in my head – I usually have to pray out loud for it to be coherent). Prayer really makes me feel close to God – something I have come to crave, need, depend on. Other the past several weeks, I have gone to God with a lot of things – far more than I ever used to go to Him for. So while I am still struggling with finding time for the Lord on vacation, I am excited to see how much He has grown my prayer life – almost in spite of myself. It’s awesome to see how God can take a tiny flickering flame – one that would go out if someone just walked past it – and fan it into a steady flame. He took my indifference and turned it into passion.

Now I just need to keep that passion while on vacation. 🙂

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Whirlwind.

24 Feb

Wow, things are busy. Today at work was just crazy, then after work, I ran to Target to buy ice cream sandwiches for care group, raced home to cook a box of pasta, drove to care group (which was relaxing), then hurried home to pack for leaving for our Salt Lake City trip tomorrow afternoon. I know that tomorrow will be another extremely busy day at work (albeit a short one since I’ll be leaving at 2:30) so I want to get to bed soon.

I am really looking forward to our little getaway trip. The forecast for Salt Lake City is rain/snow on Saturday and cloudy on Sunday but I’m not that bummed because I’m mostly just looking forward to some relaxation. Reading the Bible and books, doing crosswords, watching TV while cuddling, talking. I’m also excited to explore the city – but at a very relaxed, got-nowhere-to-be pace.

I’m not usually a very busy person. It’s not really my style. I can handle it well in work settings but in my personal life, I don’t handle it well at all. I had numerous emotional breakdowns in college from feeling overwhelmed and too busy. I need down time. I need alone time. I need time to read, write and think.

So when I do get busy in my personal life, I don’t really have anything in place to keep me from overdoing things. Take triathlon training last April/May/June. It consumed my life. I was dedicated to my training, which is good, but it was at the expense of other things, like spending time with my husband, relaxing, cooking, and enjoying life.

This week, busyness has eaten up my time with God. Completely. I think about it every morning but because I need to get to work by 8 (instead of moseying in around 8:15 or 8:30) to get my hours in, I have been sacrificing my quiet time. Now that I have a job with more flexibility, I will have more opportunity for getting time in the Word – but because the job will be so demanding and busy over the next several months, I will have to guard my time with God jealously.

That is something I am making an even more heartfelt commitment to as I enter into a new season with this new job: fellowship. I don’t want to “neglect meeting together, as is the habit of some.” I want to continue going to care group, to women’s group, to the women’s book group, to church as often as possible. I want to continue getting in the Word daily, listening to sermons, and pondering spiritual truths and how they apply to my life. I don’t want to let my spiritual life slide just because I no longer work at a ministry or because I no longer have a typical 9 to 5.

So that’s really what this whole post is about: not wanting to let the most important things slide due to busyness. It’s not worth it.

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Surreal reality.

22 Feb

So I had the interview with Your Cause Sports today. I was REALLY nervous. Every time I thought about it during the day, I got a rush of nervous excitement. I had thought about what I was going to say a lot, despite my desire to leave it all in God’s hands, and I was still really nervous during the interview. They asked me why I thought they should hire me over a guy who had lots of race timing experience (what I’ll primarily be doing) and I told them that I brought more to the table than that with all of my marketing experience.

Well, they evidently agreed since I GOT THE JOB!!

It’s very surreal. I have been waiting and hoping for this moment for several days now, especially today, and it’s finally here. I am really going to give notice tomorrow that I’m leaving. My last day at D2S will be March 5th. I will be working part-time with YCS at night to learn the timing equipment and then starting full-time there on March 8th. It didn’t work out for me to have much of a break and it’s head-on into race season now but I’m up for the challenge!

Anyway, I just had to let this out. I can’t believe it! It probably won’t start really sinking in until tomorrow when I give notice and fully sink in until I walk out of D2S for good.

Excitement aside, God was very gracious to me through this whole process. He gave me the grace to believe His promises to me – that whether I got the job or not, He was being good to me. That He had already predetermined whether or not I got the job, based on the best situation for me. He is in charge and He has opened the door. I am very grateful for this opportunity and I feel like I am moving forward in faith.

Woohoo!!

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A choice

16 Feb

I just found out tonight that the job with the triathlon company I had wanted (and thought I had) back in January (that I didn’t get) might be back on the table. They are potentially getting 2 new contracts, which would bring in enough money (and enough work) for them to hire another person full-time. They were going to hire a guy with 5 years race director experience but when they called to offer him the job, he turned it down, saying he didn’t want to travel so much.

The contracts are still legally pending – meaning the race people have given their word but not faxed a signed contract. So this job is still not a for sure in itself, let alone for me.

The owner of this nonprofit also wants to meet me. So I’m going up there on Monday morning.

But here’s the thing…

I’m not entirely sure I want the job. I mean, I do.

But I don’t.

Why the ambivalence? This isn’t your typical job. It’s with a triathlon company…

Pros:

Work from home

Get lots of vacation during the off-season

Flexible-ish hours during the on-season

Get paid more

Work outside

A new, exciting experience in a fun environment

Lots of travel

More interaction with people

More authority and control over my workload (I would be in charge of timing events)

Work with non-Christians, have chances to share the gospel

Chance to broaden my marketing and design skills

Get involved with a start-up company

Cons:

Long hours during the on-season

Lots of travel

I’d be away from Travis a lot

Summer weekends would be tied up working instead of hiking and camping

I’d miss church a lot

Time off during the week, when Travis is working

Possibly not able to participate in any races during on-season

Besides D, it’s all guys who work there (and they sound like they’re frustrating at times)

Sometimes I like working in an office

I wouldn’t have a reason to dress up anymore (sweats and tees would be my “uniform”)

There are things I think I could do to minimize the damage… I could find a church that has Wednesday night services or recreate my own church services at home on my days off. I could bring Travis with me to some races. I don’t think every weekend will be tied up so we’ll have to be intentional about planning things like hiking and camping for those times. The other things are petty (like, liking to dress up… I think I can get over that).

This door isn’t for sure open yet, so I don’t want to get ahead of myself. But if the door does open, I could start as early as March 1st so I do want to consider it enough to know what my answer would/will be if/when they offer me the job.

After reviewing the list above, I feel like the Pros outweigh the Cons. It’s a little scary… leaving the known for the unknown. But just the other day, I was thinking about Crystal Renn, the plus-size model who wrote Hungry. When she had been discovered by the modeling scout and had finally lost enough weight to start modeling, she moved from rural Mississippi to New York. Her grandma (who was really like her mom growing up) moved with her, giving up her own house to go live in a tiny flat with a bunch of models. Crystal wrote that she still can’t fathom the sacrifice her “mom” made for her. But it is because her mom was willing to sacrifice for Crystal that she is changing the face of modeling today.

The Winter Olympics brought this thought up as well, as I watched a 16-year-old figure skater from the U.S. compete last night. That girl is forgoing a typical high schooler’s life, time with her friends and family, time with boys, time being a teenage girl, to achieve something great. She is following her dream. She is stepping out on the ledge and going for it.

There have been a few things in my life that I’ve had to make choices about. In the past, I’ve decided against them when they would cause me to give up something important to me. I decided to not take ballet lessons because they were on Wednesday nights, during our care group time. Travis and I decided to not lead a care group at church because we were just getting to be good friends in the group we were attending and didn’t want to leave those behind.

But maybe this is a decision that I have to be bold about. Maybe I have to sacrifice some things to achieve something great. Maybe God is calling me to take a risk, to take a chance on Him.

I don’t feel like I’ve ever really taken a risk on anything. Probably the biggest one was moving out to Colorado without jobs but that decision, we felt, was clearly God’s will.

So I want that kind of certainty with this decision. I’m leaning toward yes (if the job is offered, but that’s a big IF) but I don’t want that to be an automatic yes. I want it to actually be a decision, weighing the reality of the situation. Back in January, I wanted out of my current job so badly that I couldn’t see straight. But now, God has brought me to a point of rationality. I do like my job and I would be happy to stay there for the foreseeable future, until God moved me elsewhere. Maybe God is moving me now though?

God seems to have a way of bringing me to a point of contentment with a situation and then giving me what I’ve wanted all along. When I was finally content without a boyfriend after becoming a Christian, God brought Travis into my life. When I had finally made peace about the uncertainty of whether Travis and I would get married (and I say finally because it took me over a year!), Travis proposed. So maybe now that I am finally at peace with what happens with my job, God will give me the triathlon job. I don’t presume to know, though. He is full of surprises – all full of grace and blessing, might I add.

I really want this decision to be bathed in prayer, as they say, so I am going to try to pray a lot over the next several days about this. My life is in God’s hands and I am at peace when I rest completely in His love for me. So I am going to fight to rest, as John Piper would say.

Stay tuned for more…

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Free to love God in all circumstances.

10 Feb

After being reminded of truth last weekend, my time at work has been much better. When tempted to get annoyed or frustrated, I remind myself of truth – that I can glorify God regardless of circumstance and that being gracious and patient is glorifying to Him.

I have been reading Waking the Dead by John Eldredge and his whole book is based around the quote by St. Iphnaeus, “The glory of God is man fully alive.” For several months, I have struggled with an Ecclesiastes perspective on life: everything is vain and a striving after the wind. Why eat? Why make the bed? Why buy clothes? Why enjoy music? Why exercise? It’s all seemed so pointless and such a waste of time.

But John Eldredge says that it is through the heart reawakened by the Spirit of Christ that we truly connect with God. Living life fully is doing what you love, seeing those things as gifts from God and revelations of Him. I have wanted to believe that for so long but it seemed to good to be true.

Tonight at care group, the worship leader, Cathy, thanked God for revealing Himself to us through sunrises, songs, and Scripture. I recalled reading in The Sacred Romance (another John Eldredge book) a long time ago about God wooing us, about Him speaking to our hearts through specific, tangible things. Again, this seems to good to be true.

But then again, it’s God. Nothing with Him is too good to be true because things more amazing than I can imagine are true with Him. He proved that with the gospel. “He who did not spare His own Son, but gave Him up for us all, how will He not also with Him graciously give us all things?” Including love notes throughout the day. Including pleasurable moments, little things that we enjoy.

John Eldredge writes in Waking the Dead, “Everything you love is what makes a life worth living… A life filled with loving is a life most like the one that God lives, which is life as it was meant to be.” This makes sense to me, because if God’s glory is shone in a man (or woman) fully alive, then their heart is engaging with the things of this world around them.

Just as Travis and I were driving home from care group tonight, I was telling him how freeing it was to know that enjoying things in this world is good because they reveal God. I am free to enjoy things because of what they represent – they are the shadow but the substance is to come.

More than that, God has created me specifically to like certain things. There is a reason why I like sunrises, spring mornings, summer nights, grapenuts with bananas, honey and yogurt. He designed me to love reading, writing, and to have deep thoughts (sometimes deeper than I’d like). He created me to be more of a one-on-one person than a crowd person. He created me to be better at thinking through writing than speaking. He decided that I would prefer individual sports like running and triathlons over team sports. He gave me my love for funny movie lines, cute animals, and my wonderful husband (who cooked soup for tonight’s care group!).

The enemy wants to keep my heart indifferent or apathetic. He wants me to drift along in this life, skirting the fringe, finding no meaning or value in anything. He doesn’t want me to engage, doesn’t want my heart to feel. I will close with these quotes from The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis:

“Never forget that when we are dealing with any pleasure in its healthy and normal and satisfying form, we are, in a sense, on the Enemy’s ground. I know we have won many a soul through pleasure. All the same, it is His invention, not ours. He made all the pleasures: all our research so far has not enabled us to produce one. All we can do is to encourage the humans to take pleasures which our Enemy has produced, at times, or in ways, or in degrees, which He has forbidden. Hence we always try to work away from the natural condition of any pleasure to that in which it is least natural, least redolent of its Maker, and least pleasurable.”

“The deepest likings and impulses of any man are the raw material, the starting-point, with which the Enemy has furnished him. To get him away from those is therefore always a point gained; even in things indifferent it is always desirable to substitute the standards of the World, or convention, or fashion, for a human’s own real likings and dislikings.”

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