Counting Gumballs

Sometimes life grants you beautiful seasons of consistency and stability, like the changing of the ocean’s tide.  It will rise with as much certainty as it will subside, then repeat with the occasional tropical storm or unavoidable hurricane.  There are also those seasons when life is as consistent as a twenty-five cent gumball dispenser.  You’ll never get the color you want until you’ve spent every last quarter, if you get that orange gumball at all.  Still we are held captive by the things we want, regardless of whether or not they are truly better than what we expect.

Though a little juvenile, I think the idea of a lost child full of love and good intentions, breaking his bank to get the gumball he wants very accurately depicts my current season of life.  I started gathering my thoughts about subjects like community and justice months ago, what feels like months ago.  Yet I haven’t made the progress I wanted, I have been trying to force myself to believe things are supposed to be something they aren’t.  I’ve been trying to convince myself that community is to be understood out of my misunderstanding, or that justice should be an extension of my incredibly finite and imperfect judgment and my even more finite and less than perfect understanding of love, and Jesus.  I put boundaries, expectations, and limitations on nearly everything I have been trying to deeply understand.  I want to better understand subjects like rest, community, generosity, love, justice, God, and more…  But I don’t want to let go of what I expect to learn, or leave my anticipation at home when I walk out the door.  I’m asking God for gumballs, and when he gives me gumballs I want it in another color.  I prefer it too be more round, to roll across the table better, to keep it’s flavor for 48 hours, or to even take on unrealistic qualities like a gumball that not only offers me something sweet and satisfying to chew on but will also act like a Tylenol and take away the headache I’ve given myself.

Gumball 1:  After months without a proper vacuum, I purchased Lucy from Goodwill for $10. Best investment ever.

Sorry for the sub-perfect analogy, but I guess it’s the best I can come up with.  And it is honestly how I feel.  I feel like a twelve year old who has put in his last quarter and got just another red gumball, not that orange one I was working so hard for.  Like most twelve-year-olds, I’ll be bummed that my quarters are gone, but I still get to look down and count my gumballs and enjoy them one at time.  Maybe I’ll enjoy them all at once.  It isn’t that there are anything wrong with the red, blue, yellow, green or purple gumballs, I’ve just somehow told myself orange was the one I wanted, and therefore it must be best.  Well, it’s not. It’s just orange.

I would like to think I am a very observant person, unless I am looking for something.  A lot of people act this way, and it makes sense.  When something isn’t where we believe it should be, or where it usually can be found, it becomes more difficult to look elsewhere.  When I am looking for my keys, I go to where I usually leave them.  If they aren’t there just shoot me, I don’t know where to start.  I may lead myself to believe I am actually looking in other places but it isn’t long until I come back to the hook in my room just to make sure the keys didn’t return themselves to where they should be, like most inanimate objects with a sense of humor love to do.  Either that or show up on your face, or in your hand.

Gumball 2: My roommate Brian turned 27 this week, we celebrated with Chicken Wings, Nerf Gun Wars, Chocolate Chip Muffin Cookies, and Jurassic Park. Incredible.

The same has been true for me as I attempt to tackle difficult questions in my own life.  If I’m not looking for something in particular, I am open to learning and I feel as though I learn so much.  Yet if I focus my learning, I miss the world around me.  I miss the fact that life is giving me answers to questions I wasn’t asking, or even the answers to the questions I am looking for are right there, they just weren’t what I expected them to be.  Sometimes we have to run out of quarters before we can realize just how many gumballs we’ve gathered in the process.

It really is hard to lay down our expectations or our presuppositions, let alone our pride, biases, or everything we ever thought we knew to be true.  If we knew how life was supposed to be lived out there wouldn’t be problems, inconveniences, or hang-ups.  The world would be fine without us.  In fact, we’d have nothing to fix, nothing to struggle against, no need for a conscience or for spiritual and moral convictions.  Love wouldn’t exist because there would be no hate between people, life would be a single dimension and I assume it would nothing desirable. Life is messy, so is community, love and justice, mainly because they involve messy people. The tough questions will always bet there to wrestle with, that is why it’s important we take truth as truth and we don’t place our experiences into the tiny little boxes we’ve created for subjects like faith, God, justice, community, and love.  If we do, we’ll never actually get closer to a world full of people who actually love each other in their actions instead of “loving” through our empty words.

Gumball 3: My buddy Nate and his band Judah & The Lion released their second EP Saturday, Sweet Tennessee. So stoked for this kid, his band, and his beard. EP was released only yesterday, check it out, you won’t regret it.  Need a song suggestion for the day: “Back’s Against The Wall”

Gumballs are those things in your life you’ve been throwing quarters at and miss because you’re focused on something else.  Gumballs are as good as gold when we finally recognize them, but there as heavy as a bag of rocks when we see them as inconvenient or add them to the clutter in our life.  Some people say, “Count your blessings,” and I wonder if they are really trying to say, “Count your gumballs.”  Take notice of the things your time and efforts have produced in your life.  Don’t forget to pay attention to everything, not just things you are looking for.  Take notice of what life is trying to teach, or listen when you ask God to show up, then enjoy what you’re given and don’t focus so intently on what you don’t have.  Give out of what you have, not out of what you hope to have someday.

Good things can go unnoticed every day, some times for one’s whole life.  Don’t let the good things in your life go unnoticed any longer, especially because you are focused on things you do not have. Count your gumballs.  Enjoy them.  You won’t be sorry.

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Today I’m going to live…

I’m ready for a change of pace.  Ever since my quick, last minute trip to Colorado, I’ve been playing catch up.  Actually, I was playing catch up before I left.  Taking those few days off from work when I needed the hours while I was looking for other side jobs, didn’t get me closer to being in control of anything.  And even though it has been busy, it’s been a good month. I’ve learned a lot, witnessed countless human interactions, and have been forced to reorganize my life to address new responsibilities while fighting to carve out time for the things I feel are important.  And for the first time since beginning my trek through the Americas almost a year and a half ago, I’ve been reminded just how difficult it can be to save time to be both responsible and passionate.

Ironically, it was this same struggle that pushed me to travel.  To search for “something more” as my Swiss friend Phillipp mentioned from his hammock while we took in the cool evening air off the Panamanian coast.  Knowing there has to be time, resources, and enough common sense to blur the lines of passion and responsibility has been one of the major driving forces behind the development of the Become a Human Project.  But now that I am back in the grind of normal, everyday life in America, I am reminded at just how easy it can be to forget the things important to us, like passions and dreams, just because the burden to be responsible is so heavy.

A week ago Thursday we learned rolling Sushi brings people together and can even end in a jam session. Not to mention it is so stinking tasty.

When life gets busy, and responsibility demands our attention, it’s often easier to give power to circumstance and to those around you than it is to recognize the power, influence, and responsibility we hold over our own circumstances.  With all of the changes in the last few months between new friends, coworkers, employers and fellow dreamers there have been a few phrases that seem to keep catching my attention.  Though many of them are thrown around lightheartedly, or in jest, I believe they’ve kept me sane in the midst of craziness and chaos more than I realize.  Most of them you may have heard before, some might be new, but either way I hope you find them for the little bits of truth they hold:

“Sink or swim.”
“Adapt or die.”
“P. M. A.!” which stands for “Positive Mental Attitude.”
“It’s gonna be great… No exceptions.”
And finally, “Today I’m going to live.”

Something all these little catchphrases share is an understanding of responsibility, a conscious effort to do. The last little mantra comes from my newest position of part-time employment, a tutoring job with a high school freshman who continually places me in positions to risk my health and well-being, yet inspires me to live in the present every day.  We only get to spend a few short hours together each week, and maybe it’s because our time together is so short I forget the reason my shoulder is bothering is probably from the times I fell skateboarding with him right before studying.  But it’s also during this time we’ve started to ask each other, “Bro, did you live today?”

After hanging with this kid for only a few weeks now, I can honestly say I have lived a lot more than I intended to.  If you would have told me before this job I’d be learning to downhill long board, throw my body at the pavement in an attempt to power slide, or drop in on an 8 foot quarter pipe on a skateboard I would have told you to, “Shut up.”  Now I keep telling myself to “Shut up, and live a little.”

I’ve been thinking recently how we often let our fate rest in circumstance or in the hands of others.  People will be late, the weather will change, and sometimes the waves just aren’t that great.  Yet in that lies the beauty of our stories, we have much more control when we realize just how little control we have.  My friend’s Donnie, Kern, and Jon just started an epic adventure across country in search of valuable life experiences as they chase waves and document their journey.  I could write pages on their story, and I probably will one day.  But Donnie has always said something I love, “There’s only one option and it’s gonna be great…  No exceptions.”

One day about five months ago Donnie told me he would say this to his pals when they would go surfing and they already knew the waves weren’t coming in.  Even though they may not be catching the best surf, or any surf at all, the goal was to find the fun wherever it may be.  The goal was to give up placing our satisfaction in things outside of our control and to find satisfaction within the things we can control.  The goal was to live, regardless of the circumstances.

Our friends from “Current Sea”-Donnie, Jon, and Kern dove into their survival kit before hitting the road.  Only good things can be expected from these goons. Pictured: Jon (left) and Kern (right)

Sometimes we need to remember we always have a choice.  And I don’t wish to give the illusion that keeping a “positive mental attitude” in difficult situations is easy.  It’s not, it can be incredibly difficult, but when we realize our control does not extend much farther than ourselves (if it does at all) and we work hard to remain positive, encouraging, and loving in difficult situations, you will be amazed to see how you influence those around you.  It doesn’t usually help to think too much on things we cannot change.  Although it is important to learn from past mistakes, it is equally important to learn how to move past our mistakes.  If we spend so much time dwelling on missed opportunity, we may miss the next one.  If we spend all of our time focusing on how broken we are, we may never actually fix ourselves.  If we continue to depend on others to maintain a positive, encouraging outlook, well we may not be so lucky to find an encouraging group of people every time we need one.  If we are focused on the moments we failed to live, we may not decide to live at all.

Though I don’t feel I’ve developed this thought enough for you to quote me on it, I do think it is worth considering.  I’m reminded of what Ghandi said, “Be the change you wish to see in the world.”  I’m reminded of the example of Jesus, God as man, not telling us how to live but showing us the most satisfying way to truly live.  Maybe Jesus’ call to pick up our cross daily is not too different from waking up and making the decision to truly live, though I don’t think those statements should be used interchangeably.

I wish my questions didn’t always lead to more questions, honestly.  But I’m grateful for questions, and the places they have taken me.  Maybe this little concept of understanding the control we have over our own situations is the beginning of answering life’s big questions.  Can we address issues of global justice while injustice is being ignored on our own street?  Can we change the world, our country, or even if our city if we’ve failed to first change ourselves?

House humor, Brian and I marking our cups. I love a good beard joke.

It’s not as simple as the power of thinking positively, making ourselves believe things are better than they are.  It is about deciding to live by exercising the control we have over ourselves, in hopes to give life to those around us, especially when it’s difficult to do so.  Yet to do this alone is nearly impossible.  Actually, I’d argue it is impossible.  Which is why I am thankful for community and passionate people who can encourage me when life is difficult.  Maybe community partly exists so that we can be our best selves, become a better friend, or point us closer to the Truth or the Higher Power we struggle so much to understand.  When it comes to God, maybe community is not primarily about telling us who God is, but instead demonstrating his heart for us and others while encouraging us to do the same.  Maybe community is supposed to encourage us to love in difficult situations, to share burdens of brokenness and speak life and love into us so when life get’s tough we know what choosing to live looks like even when it’s hard.

My new boss reminded me last week that it never hurts to surround yourself with ambitious people.  I’d agree, it never hurts to surround yourself with those who encourage you to live daily, to pursue truth, and to love with everything you have.  Life’s too valuable to spend it avoiding bad things.  It has to be about finding joy and satisfaction in doing good things, especially when they are difficult.  Life is too valuable to not spend our time looking for opportunities that make us feel alive.  Life is much too valuable to not spend our time actively living, let’s not waste it, especially when it is difficult to do so.

Check out Donnie, Kern, and Jon, feel free to follow their journey and send them some encouraging words.  I know they’ll love it.  For more information check out their website, and watch the two minute video of their adventure below.

The Network 5.12 - Getting Started

Reblogged from The Network 5.12:

Everyone has God-given passions and gifts.  It is our individual purpose to use these to love others as well as to find community where we can be loved.  One of my closest friends, Cyrus Eaton, is encouraging people to live this way through a start-up called The Become a Human Project.  Through conversations with him, his organization, and so many other encouraging folks, it has become my desire to build a community around where my own gifts and passions meet: climbing, music, and loving strangers (aka.

Read more… 262 more words

Best of luck to my friend Andrew as he kicks off his own adventure with dream building. Not only is it encouraging to know he has been inspired and challenged through the Become a Human Project, he has made the commitment to actively pursue passion and responsibility together in hopes of loving others. If you have a minute, I strongly recommend you visit The Network 5.12 blog and homepage and send Andrew some encouragement and feedback a long the way. I know he'd love to hear your thoughts, and I know he'd love to connect with you personally. Give. Love.

Be Good Episode One: Meet Megan

As I mentioned in my last post about the Be Good web series, I had a friend of a friend who I had met through my cousin who connected me to Lauren, the director of the Be Good documentaries.  Megan is that friend, and was actually featured in Episode One of the Be Good series.

Below is the first episode posted by Be Good just about two weeks ago, and just below that is a reflection Megan shared with me last week.  It is simple, brilliant, and thought provoking.  I hope you find time to enjoy both.

So to those of you who do not know Megan, meet her.  She is great.

“Be Good” Episode One, Journey from Lauren Groth on Vimeo.

“When Being ‘Strong’ isn’t What You Think”

Last Thursday I started writing a short article on ‘Hope in an Age of Anxiety.’  I really hope to finish it… but the truth is, words like ‘hope’ and ‘strength’ can all too often become an empty mantra for me; a kind of sentimental replacement for actually facing the reality of my life in a true way, in a way that often makes me uncomfortable.  I don’t think any of us want to be in a ‘bad place,’ you know?  In light of that, we find our coping mechanisms, that are all too often, simple distractions from what we don’t like about our lives.  And while the ‘real’ you remains eaten up with anger or hiding away under a blanket of guilt, shame, and confusion, we simply keep handy a little cardboard cut-out, that we can wear like a shield… most people will never know the difference anyway, we tell ourselves.  So, without being self-indulgent, or maybe being really self-indulgent, I’m not sure, I would like to expose a bit of me, behind the cardboard cut-out that all too often stands in for me in daily life.

Very often, I get told that I am ‘a very strong woman.’  I’ve heard this phrase in almost every possible context, both good and bad.  Keeping in mind that the power of suggestion is absolutely a thing, I’ve always felt the need to live up to such a description.  In fact, I’ve always prided myself on being able to take a hit without flinching.  If I happen to get knocked down, no problem, I will stand right back up.  Both my temperament and my physique seem to manifest strength, so even though most of the time you could push me over with a feather, I can keep up appearances.  Being a ‘minister,’ I always assumed this kind of strength was necessary… I mean, you need broad shoulders to carry the weight of everyone’s stuff, right?  That’s what being a ‘minister’ is all about, right?  RIGHT!?!  So, time after time, day after day, I would do what was necessary to be strong… swallowing pain, training myself to be a rock… unmovable, steady… Strong.

So wrong. Yep. Just, clearly wrong.  But this is what we do.  We get stuck in the patterns, in the coping mechanisms, the distractions, and we begin to build the walls and shields around our hearts without even realizing it.  Our lives become nothing more than an unexamined series of events that are happening to us, but leaving us unaffected.  Little by little, we become so closed or angry or bitter that even the obvious beauty, the easy beauty in life is faded and unattractive.  We have gone against everything that we are… we have rebelled against our fragility, the tenderness that a person needs to be human, to live as a human, and we become hardened.  But not strong.  We replace ‘hard’ with strong because it’s easier… we can remain in control, we can maintain a posture of ‘hardness,’ but it’s a delusion.  Maybe a happy one for awhile, but a delusion nonetheless.  And because we’re human, delusions never satisfy… we always end up wanting that unexplainable and mysterious ‘more.’

Another way that people always describe me is ‘Intense.’  *InsertSarcasticRemarkHere* as you will undeniably do if you know me.  =)  So another reason for me to be Strong, was not only to keep out the bad, but to ‘restrain’ myself… to hold myself back in the fear that my Person was just to BIG for the Average Joe.  I mean, who wants to be friends with a person with so many ideas, so many feelings, so many opinions, so many… well, the list could go on and on.  So, being a minister can easily become ‘my out.’  It is necessary that I hold myself back so others may feel safe.  This is good right!?  This is selfless right!?  RIGHT!??!

Ohhhhhh gosh.  So wrong.  So, so undeniably wrong, yet again.  Here’s what happens when you decide to constantly swallow half of who you are.  You meet someone who for whatever ever reason has the capability to disarm you.  It’s so dangerous and mysterious to a person like me.  Because they don’t even know their own power… it’s what I would categorize as a Cosmic Failsafe that is somehow put into place so that I can’t Hide within the events of Reality.  You see, there is something that is true that is almost impossible to accept about ourselves. . . are you ready for it?  YOU ARE NECESSARY FOR THE WORLD… YOU ARE NECESSARY.  Ahhhh, TERRIFYING. The universe actually needs you to be who you are, so time after time, moment by moment, there is actually a Mysterious Presence completely devoted to educating you to your own humanity. . . begging you for your heart.  Listen, I know it sounds impossible and crazy.  But test me on this.  Try to deny the Fact that you want to be happy.  TRY.  Because at the end of the day there are several things on the list of life that you are just never going to want experience:  1. Nausea (the freaking worst)  2. A break-up (I’m not even going into this right now)  3.  Making a mistake that you have to apologize for  4.  A Hangover (enough said… and can probably be tied up with numbers 1, 2, and 3)  5.  Falling off a cliff  (sounds extreme, but are you okay with falling off a cliff right now?) . . .  THE LIST GOES ON.  Anyway, the point is, if you are completely honest with yourself, your happiness is important.  We will medicate, and eat, and drink, and use drugs, and become all sorts of things for the lack of it… for the desperation deep in our hearts for it.  What I’ve come to realize and accept about this phenomena?  My happiness is important because I am supposed to be, to exist, to thrive, and to offer Myself in a whole way to Everything that Is.  I need to be happy because the world Needs Me to Be Happy…  I know, you’re skeptical.  It’s cool, I’m just asking you to consider it.

It’s been almost 8 months since my grandmother passed away.  For those of you who are privy to the inner sanctum of all my crazy (which of course, I am learning to accept and appreciate about myself), you know 2012 wasn’t the most winning of years in my life.  So, in pure dead theological, druidic, Taoist, Christian fashion… the obvious question is, What did I Learn?  I think I’ve had myself convinced for several months now that I learned to be Strong… and by Strong I mean Hard.  And I did.  I learned how to swallow every bitter pill… I learned how to bounce back like a punching bag… I learned how to protect everyone around me from Myself.  And recently, I learned, that none of that, not one ounce of that is actually Strength.  And trust me, the Mystery will teach you… the hard way if it has to… by showing you just how easily that kind of strength can be washed away.  The goodness in that horrifying and terrifying and disarming experience is that the flood that comes to break you out of all your delusions teaches you the more important words, the better descriptions, of what’s important to the human person: Grace, Forgiveness, Wholeness.  These are the words that count… and these are the manifestation of everything that is Strong and good and beautiful.  These are the things that don’t MAKE you who you are, but gently (or sometimes forcefully) lift the layers of heartaches and wounds to reveal the Radiant Person underneath… no matter how buried she’s become in the brokenness of life.

And so I guess this isn’t going to end with a definition of what being Strong actually is.  In fact, I’m not sure if I even want to worry about that word so much anymore.  But, I do want to end with an invitation to hope, an invitation to opening the door to Life again, even if you’ve been on hiatus.  It’s okay, we all do that.  But maybe, just maybe, if we try and take a little step together, someday, we can understand just who we are, and why we want so much… and finally be okay with all of it.

The Invitation by Oriah

It doesn’t interest me
what you do for a living.
I want to know
what you ache for
and if you dare to dream
of meeting your heart’s longing.

It doesn’t interest me
how old you are.
I want to know
if you will risk
looking like a fool
for love
for your dream
for the adventure of being alive.

It doesn’t interest me
what planets are
squaring your moon…
I want to know
if you have touched
the centre of your own sorrow
if you have been opened
by life’s betrayals
or have become shrivelled and closed
from fear of further pain.

I want to know
if you can sit with pain
mine or your own
without moving to hide it
or fade it
or fix it.

I want to know
if you can be with joy
mine or your own
if you can dance with wildness
and let the ecstasy fill you
to the tips of your fingers and toes
without cautioning us
to be careful
to be realistic
to remember the limitations
of being human.

It doesn’t interest me
if the story you are telling me
is true.

I want to know if you can
disappoint another
to be true to yourself.
If you can bear
the accusation of betrayal
and not betray your own soul.
If you can be faithless
and therefore trustworthy.

I want to know if you can see Beauty
even when it is not pretty
every day.
And if you can source your own life
from its presence.

I want to know
if you can live with failure
yours and mine
and still stand at the edge of the lake
and shout to the silver of the full moon,
“Yes.”

It doesn’t interest me
to know where you live
or how much money you have.
I want to know if you can get up
after the night of grief and despair
weary and bruised to the bone
and do what needs to be done
to feed the children.

It doesn’t interest me
who you know
or how you came to be here.
I want to know if you will stand
in the centre of the fire
with me
and not shrink back.

It doesn’t interest me
where or what or with whom
you have studied.
I want to know
what sustains you
from the inside
when all else falls away.

I want to know
if you can be alone
with yourself
and if you truly like
the company you keep
in the empty moments.

By Oriah © Mountain Dreaming,
from the book The Invitation
published by HarperONE, San Francisco,
1999 All rights reserved

Be Good.

As many of my stories go, a friend of a friend who I’ve never met, but know in a round about way through my cousin, is doing something awesome and I want everyone to know about it.

Lauren and I were connected through our love for people and have shot a few emails back and forth regarding humanity.  One of her most recent projects is titled, Be Good, and is a documentary web series in which she has taken her love for people and her talents in film-making to make short videos of her discussions with others about what it means to be “a good person.”  The videos are both engaging and thought provoking.  If you want a teaser you can play the promo video below.  In fact, I highly insist you do.  You won’t be mad at me.  I promise.

“Be Good” Documentary Web Series Promo from Lauren Groth on Vimeo.

For more information visit begoodseries.wordpress.com, or to watch the first two episodes, click on the links below.

Episode 1 – Megan
Episode 2 – Doug

Living With

Somewhere in the middle of our four hour conversation Alex said, “Just because you don’t know where you are, doesn’t mean you can’t help somebody wherever you’re at.”  Alex and I were both flying standby from Atlanta to Nashville on Sunday night, and when our chances for actually catching a flight back to Nashville disappeared, he offered me a ride.  Grateful for the opportunity to get back in time for work, I accepted.

Alex was just another miracle stranger (A.K.A a friend I just hadn’t met yet) as well as a prime example of the continued goodness found in humanity that has kept me inspired, well rested, well fed, and on the move by providing me transport to the next “place”.  It seems as though my life depends on random acts of kindness from others, at least ever since I began this journey searching for the “heartbeat” of humanity.  I continue to find my needs being met in ways I would have never imagined.  Alex was just one of a handful of people this week who have helped meet some of my physical needs while challenging me to think deeply about love, life, and what it means to truly live.

The last ten days have been exhausting on many levels, but they were also incredibly good.  My friend Trevor’s mom, Melanie, died a few weeks ago after living with lung cancer for over six years, and getting back in time for the funeral seemed difficult and expensive.  The next few days I would be greatly encouraged by old friends, new co-workers and managers, and complete strangers like Alex who would give me a ride or buy my lunch while I spent an entire day waiting for a flight with enough available seats to get me to Colorado in time and within my budget.

Trevor was one of my travel partners for the first six weeks of my wander through Latin America. Not sure if I would have made it there without him.

Yet the most encouraging part of the whole trip was spent with friends from home, and others who knew Melanie on some level, reflecting on her life.  I know Melanie understood her love for others, but I don’t think she could have fully understood her influence and those she would continue to influence after death.  Story after story I was reminded of someone who not only loved, but someone dedicated to truly living and inviting others to fully live with her as best she knew how.

Melanie appreciated the term “living with”, especially as she shared her cancer story.  “Battling cancer, or battling anything, is just so exhausting,” she told me once while chatting briefly in the family’s kitchen.  I know she spoke specifically about living with cancer, but what if we looked at life and saw the relationship of all the good and the bad as they influence the unfolding of our personal narratives?  What if we didn’t spend our lives battling poverty, sickness, or oppression and started living with them in a new context?  It isn’t that we shouldn’t stand in opposition or pursue change against such things, but when we “live with” something, as Melanie would say, we recognize the influence it holds in our life to teach about some of life’s toughest questions.  It forces us to stop and think deeply and critically about some of life’s most important issues when otherwise we remain too comfortable, busy, or tired to see certain things of real value.

While I sat in the busy Atlanta airport all day Thursday I had a lot of time to think and people watch, two things I greatly enjoy. Recently I began reading a novel Trevor and Melanie read and recommended for me, The Forty Rules of Love.  Watching people during that long Thursday, I started to contemplate an analogy used by the author, though I plan to use it in a slightly different context.

The author relates our lives to bodies of water.  The calmer the body of water, the more shaken we can be by the smallest influence as the ripple caused by a tiny pebble will stretch across an entire lake if the water is calm enough.  In contrast, the more movement we have in our life, more is required to demand our attention.  Throwing even a large stone into a raging river will change nothing, the noise can be deafening to the point we cannot even hear our own thoughts, and the current so strong it would take mountains to move it.  Even a boulder might not be large enough to disrupt our busyness, and sometimes we fight so hard to let nothing change our current course or the dreams within arms reach which we believe so strongly to be more valuable than they really are.  We want to be the most powerful force in our lives.  Though this may not be bad, it can be a terrible distraction when it comes to experiencing life fully.

As I observed the travelers hurrying awkwardly with their luggage, and others waiting for their flight continually engaged in their phones, headphones, tablets, and computers, it appeared as though no one was looking for something small to powerfully influence their world.  It appeared as though it would take a mountain to actually disrupt anyone’s life enough to make them take notice.

But it isn’t that life is a rapid river and we simply get caught in the current.  To be in control we divert to so many other things, careers, our social lives, social medias, music, movies, anything to keeps us entertained and engaged because to be still and to take notice of the small subtle things, our lives may be drastically altered.  We may be pushed from our zone of comfort into conflict.  We may recognize how important it is to pursue a life of purpose, and to live fully.

Image taken from Chasing Vapors, Fully Love : Fully Live. Click image to view.

If there was one thing I learned from Melanie, it was to not wait for a mountain to disrupt our lives and force us to slow down and reflect on a life well lived, or not.  Let me pause and say that Melanie may have been able to see the beauty in living with cancer only because her life wasn’t moving so strongly in any direction she could see the influences every little thing had on her life, and also the big things.  In a speech she emailed me months ago she referred to a lesson she learned while living with cancer, how she had to hold herself accountable to fully live because when you have cancer it’s as though you’ve been given a “hall pass” to check out and no one will challenge you.  She refused to let herself be the victim, she didn’t want to use any hall pass, that meant yielding what was easy and comfortable to that which was purposeful and life changing to herself and those around her.

I’ve been so challenged by Melanie’s story, about living with life’s challenges rather than always battling them.  If anyone’s life held the appearance of a pristine lake with a glass-like reflection, it was Melanie’s.  And I think it is because of this she looked for the value in every relationship, every decision, and in choosing every morning to live each day to the fullest.  Sure there are some terrible things in this world, and there are so many things we cannot control.  It doesn’t mean we should give up, grab our hall passes and check out.  Learning to fully live and fully love means learning to live with the pain and brokenness in our world and to learn from them valuable lessons about ourselves.  It means our lives have to be calm enough to take notice of the little things, instead of constantly moving so fast, filled with such turbulence we can’t even recognize the importance of big things let alone the small ones.

I think Paul understood this concept and expresses his thoughts in his letter to the Romans.  He refers to “living peaceably with all,” but also notes responsibility lies for us to exercise our effort and control as best we can.  He begins his statement, “So far as it depends on you…” knowing that not all will choose to look at life and to live with everyone and everything.

“Living with” has to be about our hearts deepest desire to be fully alive and to fully love and be loved, wherever were at.  And like my new friend Alex said, we don’t even necessarily have to know where we are at to show kindness to those around us.  But we do have to make room in our life to be disrupted, and we have to be calm enough to recognize the important interruptions, disruptions, distractions, and inconveniences no matter how small or insignificant they seem.

Life is to too valuable to miss this important lesson and continue our battle with everything.  And as Melanie said, it is exhausting to battle anything.  So let’s stop, calm down, and learn to “live with”.  Let’s learn to live with everything and pursue things that really matter, like actually living and actually loving.

Melanie with her two boys, Dylan (left) and Trevor (right).

The Life Examined

Like many of my free moments, I often share coffee and good conversation with a handful of inspiring individuals who continually encourage me to live passionately and purposefully while at the same time challenging me to know why I believe what I believe.  I mean, isn’t that what everyone wants, to be fully alive, full of passion and purpose in full understanding of their beliefs and convictions?  This morning was another one of those days, sharing conversation with a few friends who, unknown to them, continue to help me understand my difficult thoughts.

Socrates said, “The unexamined life is not worth living.”  Well actually he said, “Ho de anexetastos bios ou biôtos anthrôpôi,” but I have no idea how to accurately say that and I believe the previously mentioned translation is the most agreed upon, regardless of the many other ways in which it can be said in present-day English.

It can be exhausting, the way life tries to teach us valuable lessons and present us with much needed wisdom, insight, or understanding.  Sometimes it is much easier to ignore the lessons life is trying to teach us or to think critically of difficult realities.  To live a life unexamined, as Socrates describes it, is much easier than we may realize, but it offers very little satisfaction because it requires very little from us.  Yet in contrast, it is the Life Examined that must be the only life worth living at all.

In the last few weeks alone I’ve been invited to sit and listen to others as they started examining their own lives.  It is a struggle, an ongoing wrestling match, and disconnecting is often the most comfortable thing at times.  When life gets tough, it is easy to play the victim, to put aside our responsibility and place blame on others.  It is easy to look at failure and lead ourselves to believe we are without value, because somehow we’ve been led to believe someone who has no home, lives out of the back of their car, with little to no money and has made many mistakes in life is just “a nobody”.  It is easy to look at global issues of religion, politics, social justice, ethics, consumerism, and sexuality and except them as they are, because to challenge them, to deeply understand the issue and all sides in involved, will probably be a difficult, time-consuming task that will ultimately put us in positions of discomfort and challenge our securities and everything we may have ever thought to be true.

If we do not engage the Life Examined, we risk so much more than we realize.  If we do not allow ourselves to be challenged and open our minds to truths outside our current understanding, we will never form relationships foundationally strong enough to support a cooperative movement for change of any kind.  If we cannot open our mind enough to allow our lives to be fully examined, we will never know what we are missing out on because the reality is we do not know the things we don’t know, at least not yet.

Am I crazy to believe this world could change in an instant if everyone simply learned to see themselves as valuable humans, forgive themselves for their mistakes, and love others as they love themselves?  It wouldn’t take more than five minutes.  But still, after thousands of years of “civilized humanity”, humanity that is capable of the most incredible things, we still struggle with being civil.  Why?

I wish I had an easy answer for that question which doesn’t leave one depressed, but I don’t.

Image by Liza Posar.

Chris is a friend I met who needed some food this last Sunday and was stuck physically and financially for a few days.  Over some frozen leftovers we started to wrestle with the Life Examined.  Chris has experienced life in ways I can never imagine, he has been through a lot of pain and admits he has hurt a lot of people.  He clings to a hope, that even for him, there are people out there to love him not for what he has to give them, but for who he is.  After listening to his story, I felt like I could share in his hope.  Not just in humanity and their love for broken and hurting people, but even in a God who could love through brokenness, resentment, hatred, intolerance, chaos, and not only be in control, but can restore broken humans and make them beautiful.

Last week I woke up to a phone call from a close friend whose mom passed away.  I’m so grateful to be a part of his life and honored to have known his mom and share a handful of deep and inspiring conversations with her.  When I returned from South America just before thanksgiving I was able to reconnect and be greatly encouraged by her and her story of living with Cancer for six years.  I only say “living with” because that is how she would tell her story.  It was in this truly trying time I think she really discovered what it meant to fully live, and I would say she even did everything in her power to invite everyone she touched to join her.

Maybe that’s what my friends have been helping me wrestle with as we drink too much coffee and break bread.  I think it’s what my friend’s mom discovered when faced with a difficult situation.  It isn’t that the unexamined life isn’t worth living, we may simply ask if we are even living at all?  One can exist and be present, without living.  One can go through life without really understanding life’s toughest questions any further than what Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram allow.  One can even spend a lifetime and miss out on countless opportunities to love.

As I conclude my thoughts, I think I must share a wise word offered by my friend Josh this morning.  Once we start diving into the Life Examined, we certainly need to be moved by what we find, but we must be patient to understand certain issues and aspects before running to action.  Sure there are things we can actively do when we examine our lives and exercise them immediately.  Am I patient with myself and others?  Do I explain my life by the things I choose to not do, like lie, cheat, or steal?  Or do I wish to be remembered for the things I do, like treat other justly, rejoice in radical mercy, forgiveness, and grace, and walk humbly with man and God?  Yet there are other deeper issues that require time and attention to understand them deeply before we run off and start another non-profit.  Political differences, social injustices, religion, and discrimination of any kind require much more than emotion and hard work.

To see true change we must not only learn to examine our lives, but also take the time to deeply examine the issues and understand problems from all sides and from anyone’s shoes.  It is okay that there are things we do not know, and we shouldn’t panic if thoughts are challenging and intimidating.  Learning and growing are processes, and they can even be a painful and uncomfortable at times.  Sometimes it take finding ourselves in a difficult situation before we ever see the opportunity that life offers to reflect, learn, and grow.  It means we choose not to play the victim card and seize opportunity to live each and everyday as if it were our last.  It means we begin a journey towards waking our dreams, fully loving, and fully living.  It means we engage the Life Examined.