4.30.14

Breakfast - 2 blueberry poptarts
Lunch - cheezits
Dinner - chickfila


Dreams

You can't eat and you can't sleep. Your focus is sharp but selective. Remembering and recalling every little detail is a side effect, as is the anxiety that comes from the uncertainty and waiting.

Music sounds different. You can listen to a song you've heard a thousand times before, but some how it's like you're hearing it for the first time all over again. The lyrics speak to you differently. 

The last time you felt this way was when you were an irrationally emotional teenager. It's cool to finally feel it all again because it reminds you that you're alive and it lets you know there's something in this universe much greater than yourself. Something beyond your control and almost unobtainable.

I mean it sucks because it will take your legs out from under you. When you spend years in the confidence of who you are and of your place in this world, you kind of start to believe you're invincible. I am far too confident for this. Too sure of myself and of the process by which the world interacts to be as shaken and unsteady as I am right now. I don't like it. I don't like it one bit... But yet, I do. I do like it.

This thing comes along and you realize the control it has over you. Very humbling and bittersweet. It reaffirms the beauty of the world. Reaffirms that there are things you are unaware of. It makes you a student again. You thought you knew but you have no clue. 

And that's the beauty of it all, there are still things to be discovered. 

But the worst part is that you can't trust it. It's autonomous. And it comes and goes so quickly. As much as you want it to be dependent on something that you can identify, it isn't so you can't. The temptation to associate it with a source becomes your point of vulnerability, and since you can't truly identify the source you can't trust it.

Truth is life's easier without it. 

But it's not as full.

4.23.14

Breakfast - 2 blueberry poptarts
Lunch - turkey and cheese bagel
Dinner - probably Chickfila


When doing becomes done

My last blog post was kind of forced. I ended up going back a couple times and editing it even after I posted it to Twitter. Even now I still feel that I didn't write exactly what I was trying to convey. But I knew I wanted to post something that day. I knew there was something I was trying to process and that's what came out.

Now that I've been consistently doing this blogging thing for a couple of months I'm learning more about writing and thought processing. It's challenging. Sometimes I'm in the zone and I can knock out like 4 blog posts in one sitting. And sometimes I'll go two weeks without being in the mood to write. I guess that's what the pros call "writers block."

One thing I've learned through this whole blogging thing is how the act of "doing" looks. I've always been a doer, but this blog has helped me document, contemplate and evaluate the action side of it all. Despite being prone to doing, I still find reasons and excuses to remain stagnant; to be lazy, honestly.

I'm not in the mood. Everything I write is just boring anyway. There's something good on TV. The only people who read this are Icelandic people trying to steal my identity... I can literally think of 100 reasons to not write a post.

But there is always one reason to write that trumps all of the reasons not to write. Ready for it? Drum roll please…

Because I can!

Any good doer knows that the reason we do stuff is because we can. Doer's like to maximize their potential. They also like to take advantage of opportunities. For me, writing a blog is a bit of both. It doesn't matter what I write, it only matters that it gets written; that I take advantage of my ability to make this thing happen. That's enough for me. Once one idea has been written and is posted, I get to cross it off the list and move on to the next idea. Just get it done.

Let me tell you a story.

Almost 4 years ago I was given a book called "The Next 5 Years." It was sort of a self-help guide to planning the next 5 years of your life. On page 4 it wanted me to write a mission statement for my life. Kidding me? A mission statement? "I'm in my mid twenties and clueless, how the heck am I supposed to write a mission statement when I can't even decide on what scented body wash I want?!" It took me almost 3 years to crack that book open again.

But when I finally did I had a pencil in hand, not a pen, and I just wrote some surface-level philosophical statement about purpose and stuffs. I figured I could always come back and change it if need be. Then I flipped the page…

“90 percent perfect and shared with the world always changes more lives than 100 percent perfect and stuck in your head.” - Jon Acuff

There is no better feeling than when doing becomes done. And sometimes you gotta suck it up and push on through the blah to get to the done. Because once you're done with page 4 you get to do page 5, and I promise you, page 5 was a really stinking good page.

4.20.14

Breakfast : donuts, bacon, French toast, orange juice, potatoes and quiche. "Real men eat quiche." - my Grandfather circa 2001.

fEaster

Today is a very special day. Not just for those who are religious but for everyone. Whether you celebrate Easter by going to church or not, I can almost guarantee that you at least celebrate by feasting. Feasting with family, friends or strangers. Today is a day for food.  

My church encouraged it's members to attend Saturday services this year in order to make room for newcomers on which was assuredly a hectic, overcrowded, traffic-filled morning. Still wanting to celebrate on Sunday, my small group decided to get together for a Sunday brunch. A brunch to end all brunches. And I was on bacon duty (heyo!)

After brunch I came to where I am currently sitting now, a park. For the past couple weeks I've been spending my post-church Sundays at a park reading a book by Tim Keller called The Prodigal God. Today I finished it.

This book has been great, easily the "deepest" book I've read since my New Years Resolution kick. (Yes, it's April and I'm still keeping up my resolution: read more, talk less. And yes, as always, struggling on the latter half.) This entire book delved into the parable of the prodigal son. Thoroughly insightful and flipped the whole thing on its head, giving a lot more attention to the moral conformity of the elder brother.

The last chapter that I read today focused, conveniently enough, on salvation. Salvation is experiential, salvation is material, salvation is individual and salvation is communal. This last one, the communal one, boy was it good.

Keller talks about the parable and how it ends with a feast, a celebration for the community (the exact kind of feast that was the last supper and the exact kind that we are all taking part in today to celebrate Easter). There is a lot of feasting in the bible and Keller acknowledges how this is intentional; how feasts play a very specific role in unifying people. He immediately points out the contrast of how feasting is communal by nature but that modern day society is becoming increasingly independent, as more and more people are distancing themselves from communal institutions (a.k.a the church). How many times have you heard a friend say "No religion, just relationship" or "I love Jesus, but not Christianity"? I meet people all the time that church hop every three months with the excuse, "I just wasn't getting fed there." (So ironic that they use the metaphor of being "fed", right?).

The illustration Keller gives to facilitate this thought of salvation being communal is a story of three old friends. When one of the three unexpectedly dies the other two are distraught. Yes, they are struck with sadness and mourning, but equal to the loss of their friend they realize that they have now lost a piece of each other. They will never laugh in the way that only their deceased friend could make them laugh. The point here is that it took a community to know an individual.

Today is a day for fEasting. Today is a day for community. In your fEasting and in your community I want to challenge you to dive in head first. Commit. Belong. Because as Keller helped me realize today, it takes a community to know an individual. And if I am to live every day in desperate pursuit of knowing Jesus Christ more and more, than I am going to need a community to help me do so.

Everyone brought something for my small group's brunch today. It was like a brunch potluck. Me? I brought Krispy Kreme donuts cause I'm smart like that. But also cause I was worried I wasn't going to like what everyone else brought to the table. I was worried I wasn't going to be "fed." But did that fear keep me from showing up altogether? Heck no. And did my Krispy Kreme donuts make someone else's day? You bet they did! Probably in the same way that someone else's bacon made my day.

I think what Keller was getting at is that Jesus and church isn't just a big feast where you can show up and expect to be fed all the time. It's a potluck. And if you're worried you're not going to be fed then bring something to the table that you know you will like. Commit to the community. Commit to the feast. Because you can't get to know Jesus without them and they can't get to know him without you.

Happy fEaster!

4.17.14

Breakfast - two blueberry poptarts
Lunch - turkey and cheese sandwich (and some Keeblers chocolate chip peanut butter cookies)
Dinner - Baked potato soup


Why you should delete Tinder.

Yes, I'm guilty, once upon a time I Tindered. It was unfortunately back in summer of 2013 before it got legit. Back then the talent was pretty slim (or not), if ya know what I mean. But the novelty of it all was still cool and fun. Heck, it was almost like a game. How many matches can I get? How many terrible pickup lines can I try? If I immediately call a girl "Sugar Bear" will she like it, or will she block me? Yes, I enjoyed it for a couple of weeks.

But then I realized something. People suck.

You would think Tinder would be an extrovert's dream. Here's this amazing thing where you can meet and connect with as many people as you want. Just swipe left or swipe right. But once you start matching with girls and talking with them, you realize that communication is a lost art form. Nobody knows how to get to know each other anymore. Like, ask me a stinking question or something. Anything. What's my favorite color? Do I sing in the shower? Am I still afraid of the dark? Anything but a one-sided conversation. Technology has just ruined it all. This self-serving, instantly-gratifying reality we've created has consequently destroyed our ability to invest in real, tangible relationships. Don't like this person and what they have going on? Just swipe left.

We've created a cyber reality where people can hide behind profiles, instagram photos and tweets. And this anonymity gives us power that we wouldn't normally have. Power to choose what we allow into our reality and what we erase from it. Hide the bad, keep the good.

"Show me your perfect life" - my tongue-in-cheek mindset anytime I log into social media.

But what happens when our cyber reality collides with reality reality?

This is why I deleted Tinder. I remember the first time I unintentionally ran into a Tinder match in public. It was like that scene in Mean Girls where the high schoolers are playing the roles of zoo animals in the mall. We never even officially acknowledged each other's presence, but we traded long awkward stares from across the room for a couple hours. So uncomfortable. No. Just no. I deleted the app right then.

I love this town. I someday plan on owning it here. And every morning that I wake up is a new opportunity to take a step closer in that direction. On my path, on my journey to owning it, the last thing I want to be doing is trading uncomfortable stares from across the room with a random person whose first impression of me came from a hot or not app. No way am I letting something like that get in my way of maximizing my potential; of owning this town.

I want to control my own first impression. And you should too. Delete your Tinder.

4.9.14

Breakfast: 2 Frosted Blueberry Poptarts
Lunch: Maniacs Fried Chicken and Fries
Dinner: Publix Chocolate Milk

Atheism in Relationships

Last night at church pastor Alex Seeley shared an interesting story of how her friend once called her an atheist.

I don't know pastor Alex very well but from the few times I've heard her speak I can confidently say she's one of the most radical and passionate Christian's I've met in awhile. She's from Australia and she's an "in your face and I'm not going to apologize about it" kind of Christian. Which is awesome. And which also makes me wonder that if she's being called an atheist, what the heck am I?!

So pastor Alex went on to explain more about the situation. She shared how there was an area of her life that she had struggled with for over 30 years. A simple bad habit. And her friend called her out saying that if she truly believed in God and his unfathomable power, then there would be no more excuses to continue practicing this bad habit. Her friend said that allowing this bad habit to rule her for 30 years was no different than atheism, because it undermined God's power over her life. 

If you don't believe God is big enough to fix everything, then you don't believe in God.

Today I had lunch with some of my bestest Nashville bros. These two bachelors are both in their 30's working cush jobs, making bank, and they absolutely fall into the "Nice Guy" category. They both shared stories of recent situations where they were in relationships with girls who eventually went a little crazy and broke things off. The reason they both got from these girls was, "I'm not good enough for you. I don't deserve this."

When I heard these guys share their stories my mind immediately went back to the message Alex shared last night. The girls they had been dating were atheists. Not actual atheists of course, but they were putting God in a box. At one point they may have told themselves that they had received grace from God but they didn't allow that to diffuse into the other areas of their lives. They didn't accept the fact that God is everything and he not only fixes people but he fixes our place in this world as well, our place in relationships. What was once unworthy does not receive grace and stay unworthy. Living with that mindset is basically like slapping God in the face.

I think one of the reasons we experience broken relationships in life is because, despite already receiving grace, we allow this idea of "unworthiness" to creep in; we allow it to make us atheists. It's what happens when we let the world influence our attitudes towards one another, rather than reflecting God and who He is. So for me, this whole situation serves as a reminder to be the person in the relationship who reflects God's grace and to allow that grace to influence the relationship, rather than the world. When someone tells you they're undeserving don't just remind them of all the reasons they matter to you, remind them of all the reasons He is who He says He is, and that He says they are worthy.

Cause you either believe it or you don't. 

4.2.14

Breakfast - two Blueberry Poptarts
Lunch - half a can of Pringles and Mountain Dew
Dinner- Ritz Crackers & Cheese and a quart of Publix Chocolate Milk

Make yourself available

That's where everything starts. Before anything can get done someone has to be there to do it. Someone has to be available.

Doers sometimes overlook this. Thinkers sometimes think too much about this.

As a doer and someone with a passion for service, I often overlook making myself available and instead just ask people what I can do for them. This is good and bad. Good in that I get to help people. Bad in that I sometimes fall into people-pleaser mode where serving others becomes more of an agenda than a pleasure or joy. And if you look for it and listen for it, you can tell that people know the difference between when they're an item on your list and when they're a pleasure or joy for you to serve. They can tell when they're being valued vs itemized.

For me, the times when I do my best work, serve the most people and build the strongest relationships have all started with making myself available. Committing and saying, "I'm in. I'm here. Whatever you need, I'm your guy."

You don't have to have a game plan, you just have to be there.

I think the biggest challenge with making ourselves available these days is accessibility. The internet and cell phones create the facade that we are "available" when we are in fact just accessible. And this inescapable accessibility actually takes away from our availability. It distracts us, distorts our focus and redirects our attention.

But this means there is a huge opportunity at hand. With so many people trading availability for accessibility, the value of being someone who is available rises. Simple supply and demand economics.

So be someone who is available. Be someone who says, "I'm in. I'm here. Whatever you need, I'm your guy." Because being available is valuable. Being available is where everything starts.