letter

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haven't blogged very often because i feel like i sound stupid. journal entries are scant and few. i also find social media increasingly undesirable and can reflexively hear my tone of voice become more dry and biting with every blog post i write.

dear future me,

hi. it's been six months since i graduated, five months since moving back, five months since working at sender one, two months since i started doing counseling, and one month since i've been rabidly searching for another job and a place to live. someone yesterday who is one year younger than me mentioned that she only has one more semester until she graduated. i feel like i am pushing through dense unforgiving pudding - time moves three times as slowly when i'm not being hurtled through the quarter system.

here are some nonconsequential things this past month: watched star wars vii, it was fun but also anticlimactic. i came home at 1:30am once, it felt nice. my iphone battery is jenky and so is my laptop. have been binge watching jessica jones. i have a new appreciation for functioning, warm jackets, fish tacos, and poke; still not particularly fond of onions though.

here are some more consequential things: i've changed in some ways that i didn't foresee and so have my friendships. i'm learning this is okay, but it feels kind of like peeling off old comfortable clothes and standing naked in the cold. in two years three of my friendship have taken dramatic turns. it is also an everyday struggle to choose joy and choose god; i usually blame it on the shitty toxic environment i live in and have little energy or desire to take responsibility for it. i just want to move out. dating is good, we're going on 2.4 years and looking forward to engagement because it feels like the next natural stage that we're eager to step into. engagement also sometimes feels like an expensive vase in my 22 year old clumsy fat fingers; we are grateful for community in san diego that figuratively/literally ushers us to fellowship/new life experiences with welcome arms. i still project my own timeline onto others though, it's dumb and i need to stop doing it. i usually do it anyways. career-wise, idk wtf i'm doing lol. that's okay too. i'm okay with the uncertainty in this area for some reason; other areas, not so much.

sidenotes;

postgrad slowpoke

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i can say no. i have the ability to say no. it is my prerogative to say no. i am allowed to say no. i have choices and options. nobody can corner or trap or pressure me into anything unless i let them. if someone throws a tantrum when i say no it is not my fault, it is on them. i am allowed to take care of myself. i do not have to bend over to defer to someone unconditionally. i can step back and turn around and go elsewhere, go wherever i want. all these things are hard to learn and i'm the slowest slowpoke when it comes to learning these things. time moves strangely after graduating

sidenotes;

what do you have for me in january?

greedy

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i want a job where i can work with youth, preferably at a nonprofit serving disadvantaged communities. i also want to move out to a place where i can have a private room and live with girls in the same life stage who aren't disgusting dirty and aren't loud. also somewhere that i can actually afford. what the heck is childlike faith. where is god in this idk i'm greedy and feel desperate and have baggy eyes

sidenotes;

bought la sportiva pythons bc my scarpa helix's rubber has holes. also ordered bridesmaid dress. and doing counseling and need/want a new laptop. wallet is sad ;_;

dreams pt iv

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i haven't done this in a very long time, and since the last time i did it, i have been burnt out, discouraged, and eventually became hopeless. it's interesting to see that some of my past dreams did come to fruition: namely the nationwide revival (more like nationwide awareness of racial injustice), seeing several SAMI branches being started, doing the campus wide social justice cafe night, and watching the ethnic studies now! coalition advocating for ethnic studies classes throughout california. i did not end up going back for berkeley for that internship i applied for, nor did i meet the activists i wanted to meet. instead i got an internship in san diego and met different people who eventually were the same people to write emails to congratulate me for graduating and to welcome the new sami leadership. i can now climb v5's and 5.11a-d's, and i did get a road bike that i named cariño. i did not run a half marathon yet.

i decided against starting a stationery business because i prefer using my art to bless people individually and not to earn money off of it. i'm not currently writing any novels, but i am writing an article for inheritance magazine. i didn't get a new camera, but i did get the chance to take photos for inheritance.

i still dream of rescuing two dogs. i also look forward to seeing younger girls become admirable and driven women of god who will in turn invest in other ladies. i dream of getting married. i also dream of teaching ethnic studies in a community college setting, and perhaps getting acquainted with the ethnic studies requirement that is being rolled out in lausd. i wonder why i do not feel like i have the emotional scope or willingness to dream on such a large scale anymore. i don't know what else to dream for. i dream to see my friend a.m. follow jesus.

november 2013 part iv
april 2012 part iii
nov 2011 part ii
feb 2011 part i

sidenotes;

meander

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since moving back, i've started around four or five different blog posts only to abandon it after a few meandering sentences. i have felt very un-myself lately, which means that i am likely changing and don't know how to process through it all. here are some things lately in my post grad life that i've noticed:

1) i never wished harder in my life than now for financial independence and autonomy. what is it about freedom that has made it become so valuable to me to the point that i effectively pine away for it?
2) there is a lot of anger in my heart. i see it when i cuss randomly during traffic or in my own reflection when disgust splashes across my face when i see certain peoples' posts on social media.
3) trust, hope, and joy have for most part become vague aftertastes of memories that both belong to me because they were mine and don't belong to me because they are so far away. i'm generally okay though, because i don't let myself sit in the emptiness for too long.
4) my heart seems to have atrophied, i don't suffer gracefully at all.

san diego

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things i miss from san diego:

1) the girls

2) dates with e in sd

3) double dates with gy & jc!

4) vh community

5) the weather

6) running at the beach

7) my apartment porch quiet times

8) the breakfast/brunch places

9) my ethnic studies friends

10) lexi!

11) pnick's messages

things i appreciate this summer:

1) short distance dating

2) short distance friendships

3) my clean room

4) time with e2 and j3

5) a part time job

6) biking around irvine

7) my car

8) not paying rent

9) trip to dc

10) sleeping in my bed

unglamorous

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postgrad life is as unglamorous as i expected it to be. it is like perpetual summertime, when i am undisciplined because i am unfettered from the guard rails of structure, schedules, demands and deadlines. moving back home is one of the hardest things i've had to do and it's hard to fight for joy and hope. when i look in the mirror i don't see a young woman who just graduated college and is okay with the uncertain future because she knows she is held safely in the hands of her heavenly father. instead i see a helpless and directionless adolescent who has no strength to hold onto the disciplines of the faith and little trust that it's okay to be hopeful for fear that it'll be taken away. life is hard to size up and it's harder to reflect on now. i also find that i have little fortitude and i realize that resilience comes at a high price 

sidenotes;

meh?? vat am I doing even???

blog list

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chinspirations.com/mhsourcepage

multiculturalfamily.co

grievingbygrace.wordpress.com

samlouie.wordpress.com/category/asian-shame

christianitydaily.com/articles/5261/20150803/honor-thy-father-mother.htm

sidenotes;

learning and stuff

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-learning the ropes of my new jobs

-learning how to love e short distance

-learning how to love mom

-learning how to grieve the loss of old friendships

-learning how to transition from short to long distance friendships

-want to relearn how to trust god's intricate work in the minutiae of my life

-learning how to budget

-learning how to make friends not my way lols

sidenotes;

yay for new candle with chri, purge cleaning and redecorating with joshua, making kimbap with family, spending time with e, sleeping with three pillows, biking around irvine, doing pullups, and stuff ya lol

reflections

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Trust in the Lord with all your heart

and lean not on your own understanding;

in all your ways submit to him,

and he will make your paths straight.

Proverbs 3:5-6

i'm a weird, limbo-like mix of past, present, and future. i only have a few days in san diego before i move back home and life has been so busy that i haven't prioritized reflecting on my life up to this point. the different threads of my life are messy and confusing.

it's strange that when i think about the formative events of my growth, pain and grief are probably the loudest voices. my freshman and sophomore years were largely characterized by the messiness of loss as i dealt with the fallout of an abruptly severed friendship. i leaned heavily upon the steadfast presence of the lord who spoke tenderly to me and washed away names that were graffitied onto my heart: "stumbling block, unwanted." as i transitioned into sophomore year the lord led me deeper into his heart of justice as i developed a critical understanding of the world as it has been marred by sin. i was on fire, i burned bright and latched onto the word "pioneer." i heard the voice of the lord so clearly as he called me beloved after my seasons of loss and commissioned me to call out the belovedness of others whom he loves so dearly. my life never felt so lucid and directed and safe.

and then in the midst of the work, fresh and bright-eyed from my sojourn out to tenderloin, i was called back from the pain of others into deeper spirals of my own pain. i began my journey with my loving gentle-man who held my hand through months of discouragement, burnout, and heartache. i blundered through my justice work and cried for relief from the compounded hopelessness from broken relationships. from junior year to senior year i did not wait upon the lord. i pounded my fists and searched feverishly for release until i was lost in my own mess. self-examen did not save me, relationships did not save me, rest did not save me. i didn't wait upon the lord, but he waited for me. he brought healing not in grandeur but in the image of a small budding flower in dead dirt and in the face of jesus as he died and rose for me. and all of a sudden it was may, and i was fumbling through the last stretch of my undergraduate career. then june came around and there was great joy and also great, debilitating fear. there is no safety outside of my father's arms.

i am the most uncooperative patient under the doctor's care; i lie about my symptoms and run from the operating table and fight with the hand that means to heal me. i go to great lengths to give voice to my pain and protest change; i am grateful that he is also my father and holds me to his chest. i am of little faith and great fear but my creator calls me to joy and fearlessness. thank you jesus, you are worthy of my praise.

sidenotes;
shizz

creator calls forth belonging

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Come, let us bow down in worship,

    let us kneel before the Lord our Maker;

for he is our God

    and we are the people of his pasture,

    the flock under his care.

Psalm 95:6-7

This is what the Lord says—

    he who made you, who formed you in the womb,

    and who will help you:

Do not be afraid, Jacob, my servant,

    Jeshurun,whom I have chosen.

Some will say, ‘I belong to the Lord’;

    others will call themselves by the name of Jacob;

still others will write on their hand, ‘The Lord’s,’

    and will take the name Israel.

Isaiah 44:2, 5

"there is a peculiar presence of grace and glory into which men should never come without the profoundest reverence. We may make bold to come before the immediate presence of the Lord—for the voice of the Holy Ghost in this psalm invites us, and when we do draw near to him we should remember his great goodness to us and cheerfully confess it. Our worship should have reference to the past as well as to the future...

He is ours, and our God; ours, therefore will we love him; our God, therefore will we worship him. Happy is that man who can sincerely believe that this sentence is true in reference to himself. And we are the people of his pasture, and the sheep of his hand. As he belongs to us, so do we belong to him. 'My Beloved is mine, and I am his.' And we are his as the people whom he daily feeds and protects. Our pastures are not ours, but his; we draw all our supplies from his stores. We are his, even as sheep belong to the shepherd, and his hand is our rule, our guidance, our government, our succour, our source of supply." -Charles Spurgeon

as creator he is worthy of my reverence and worship. his fundamental identity as the creator entails that he is my place of most profound belonging. i am to be wholly his and in his presence all fear must wash away.

let it be

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"The path of the righteous is level; you make level the way of the righteous. In the path of your judgments, O Lord, we wait for you; your name and remembrance are the desire of our soul. My soul yeanrs for you in the night; my spirit within me earnestly seeks you. for when your judgments are in the earth, the inhabitants of the world learn righteousness." Isaiah 26:7-9

The way of the just is evenness, a steady course of obedience and holy conversation. And it is their happiness that God makes their way plain and easy. It is our duty, and will be our comfort, to wait for God, to keep up holy desires toward him in the darkest and most discouraging times. Our troubles must never turn us from God; and in the darkest, longest night of affliction, with our souls must we desire him; and this we must wait and pray to him for...The intention of afflictions is to teach righteousness: blessed is the man whom the Lord thus teaches. -Matthew Henry

recently i visited a friend who has a two year old toddler; as we talked i asked my friend if her child was showing any personality traits and she shared about how her child would make noises of discovery and point out new things to her parents. these discoveries ranged anywhere from a spider on the wall to the sound of the ac being turned on to an unfamiliar water bottle.

i remember not so long ago that i felt a different kind of energy about life; my inner thoughts were intense, curious, always churning and so hungry for more and i was eager to unabashedly share about these things. i leaned forward in seats when i was in conversation, greedy for opportunities to pick at others' brains and to bear my soul to others. my desire for intimacy in relationships was un-bound: i was raw and vulnerable and i think i thrived in it. but now the thought of returning to that intensity like sandpaper, or like the thought of a messy room that i have no desire to clean. i find that i have somehow begun to erect parameters in my heart for these conversations. i no longer look for them with nearly the same amount of intensity and in fact, somehow along the way i have begun to value privacy so much so that conversation has become increasingly taxing. i wonder if it's because i feel both burned and weary from relationships that i err on the side of caution, it seems like as i have implicitly experienced what feels safe and unsafe, my heart began to unconsciously build boundaries. it now feels relieving to detach myself from expectant desires and take a back seat to let things be, to let people be.

dwelling

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i am learning as i interact in dissonance with different people than myself that i am a deep dweller. i dwell in my thoughts, i dwell on my situation, i dwell on things i care about. i dwindle and dilly dally and am convinced that by the practice of self-examen i will somehow gain something.

i'm not sure what the connection is between the acting of "dwelling" and the "dwelling-place" where we dwell, but it makes me think of the concept of being home. home is a place of profound but uncomplicated safety, welcome, warmth, protection, shelter, rest, communion, and play. home is where pretenses are shed and burdens are set aside to carve out a sacred space of communing. if i tease apart the word "commune," i think of the act of "coming together" - it is an active coming "towards" and is warm with the potential hope of embrace and connection. it paints a stark picture when compared with the act of turning away, of rejection, exclusion, and isolation. and so with the former image in mind, jesus is to be my home. when i am homeless, cast out by friends and family, rejected or scorned, i am to find my home in the wounds and life of jesus even as he finds a home in my heart. he is to be my dwelling place; just as he has created me to be a "dwelling thinker" and to be someone who places great value in healthy and thriving friendships (as evidenced by my frenzied agitation when denied this), i can be certain that i can also use these characteristics to both dwell on jesus and to invest in a relationship with him characterized by great depth.

blessed are the peacemakers

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You have heard that it was said, "Love your neighbor and hate your enemy." But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be children of your Father in heaven. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. Matthew 5:43-45

Hope deferred makes the heart sick, but a longing fulfilled is a tree of life. Proverbs 13:12

Remain in me, as I also remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me. John 15:4

the past month has been so strange and painful and also sprinkled with vignettes of God's attentiveness towards me. i have a difficult time recalling what my spiritual walk has looked like for the past year; i remember being distraught one time in february 2014 as i hurt from a conversation on the phone, struggling to get through my ethnic studies thesis in the spring, grappling with my draining internship over the summer, feeling uplifted by the students i led at a summer camp, feeling rest-less going into fall quarter, drowning in grief from september through december as i sought counseling and sat in the midst of a dead relationships, and feeling hopeless, ashamed, and self-condemned all of january. why is it that i desired reconciliation and healing and life so much for the past year and a half? why is it that out of my own strength and efforts i felt as if i was repeatedly ramming my head into a concrete wall? as the pain of unfulfilled hopes and desires sat in the chambers of my withering  and writhing heart, i had begun to give increasing attention to that pain until i was feverish with obsession and until all that was inside was the sticky darkness of hopelessness. reconciliation and life was out of my reach and it was all that i desired. i made every effort to avoid going to fellowship and every prayer i could muster started with "i don't know how to commune with you anymore."

this particular arch of my life has been threaded into the greater story of God's work in my heart in such a methodically hidden way that all i feel is the pain of the sanctification. it came to a point in january when e asked me, "do you feel like jesus loves you right now?" and "do you love jesus?" to which i responded "no" and "i don't know." i didn't realize it was possible to reorient my identity around a conditional "i am worthy only if i can successfully pursue reconciliation." and because i failed, and i failed so hard, i naturally and logically became unworthy and unloved.

i cried out to God that week and in the following month, things have happened at a pace faster than i was used to. these vignettes come in the form of an email i've been anticipating for almost six months; a twelve minute facetime and several phone calls home; a painful situation that has caused me to feel homeless and has forced me to my knees in desperate prayer and dependence upon jesus; the sweetness of walking with e and seeing how god has used each others' prayers to draw us back to jesus; the sweetness of my friendships with a handful of sisters who love me well and lift me and carry me in prayer.

things i have been learning:
1) my desire for reconciliation and peace and life-giving relationships is such that it tears me apart when i cannot have it; i do not know what this says about me, but it seems to me that at the very least it says that God, as a peace-making God, has placed this within me and calls me to lean on him as he is the sole active outworker of this peace
2) blessed are the peacemakers, blessed are those who mourn. i am not happy when i mourn or when there is discord but jesus sees me and turns towards me.

lead me

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From the ends of the earth I call to you,

I call as my heart grows faint;

lead me to the rock that is higher than I. Psalm 61:2

Along the iron bound coast of our northern shores, lives are lost because the rocks are inaccessible to the shipwrecked mariner. A clergyman of one of the coast villages has with immense labour cut steps up from the beach to a large chamber, which he has excavated in the chalk cliffs; here many mariners have been saved; they have climbed the rock, which had else been too high for them, and they have escaped. We have heard of late, however, that the steps have been worn away by the storms, and that poor sailors have perished miserably within sight of the refuge which they could not reach, for it was too high for them: it is therefore proposed to drive in iron stanchions, and to hang up chain ladders that shipwrecked mariners may reach the chambers in the rock. The illustration is self interpreting.

Our experience leads us to understand this verse right well, for the time was with us when we were in such amazement of soul be reason of sin, that although we knew the Lord Jesus to be a sure salvation for sinners, yet we could not come at him, by reason of our many doubts and forebodings. A Saviour would have been of no use to us if the Holy Spirit had not gently led us to him, and enabled us to rest upon him. To this day we often feel that we not only want a rock, but to be led to it. With this in view we treat very leniently the half unbelieving prayers of awakened souls; for in their bewildered state we cannot expect from them all at once a fully believing cry. A seeking soul should at once believe in Jesus, but it is legitimate for a man to ask to be led to Jesus; the Holy Spirit is able to effect such a leading, and he can do it even though the heart be on the borders of despair. How infinitely higher that we are is the salvation of God. We are low and grovelling, but it towers like some tall cliff far above us. This is its glory, and is our delight when we have once climbed into the rock, and claimed an interest in it; but while we are as yet trembling seekers, the glory and sublimity of salvation appal us, and we feel that we are too unworthy ever to be partakers of it; hence we are led to cry for grace upon grace, and to see how dependent we are for everything, not only for the Saviour, but for the power to believe on him. -Spurgeon


No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord. Romans 8:37-39

The devil cannot dye a soul so scarlet in sin but what the blood of Christ can make it white as snow. Satan cannot drive a chosen sheep of Christ so far on the mountains of vanity, or into the deserts of sin, but what the great Shepherd of the sheep can find that sheep, and bring it back again. There is hope for the mart sunken. There is hope for those that grovel, and that sink in the mire The infinite compassion of God can reach them, and the eternal power of God can lift them up. Spurgeon
sidenotes;

reconciliation

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i don't know how to start my train of thoughts! it's like jumping onto a circular train track that's going too fast for me to accurately judge the most appropriate time to jump. the past few months i've been reading "exclusion and embrace" by miroslav volf and "the cross of christ" by john stott on and off. i've also attended four sessions of therapy, and i've had to work through ten years' worth of conflict and hurt. i've most recently undergone a handful of conflict resolution with people who are very precious to me, and i've had to re-evaluate the armful of emotional investment i've previously committed to while feeling increasing fatigue and increasing bitterness and regret for the pain that accompanies love. in this context of emotional weight lifting, a few thing stand out to me at the end of this year:

1) i'm tired 2) i've experienced many miracles 3) i've only just begun.

i'm tired because i carry relationships in my heart and on my shoulders. they lift me up but also bring me much pain, and even as i wonder if it is worth it i find myself reaching out once more or offering myself once more or seeking to care once more. i realize over and over again that i am so very frustratingly human and that friendships require grace upon grace that i cannot possibly conjure up on my own.

i've experienced many miracles because within these relationships, i realize that reconciliation is a fundamentally un-human, divine act - and in that nature it is therefore a miracle. there is no logical reason to justify me desiring to willingly and actively forego judgment upon someone who has done me harm. reconciliation entails not only foregoing judgment but sacrificially extending a hand to the offender as a gesture of invitation to pursue a future relation-ship. there is engagement, activity, and work involved. everything in me resists the notion of suspending judgment upon injustice; there is a deep aching within me that tells me forgiveness and reconciliation are fundamentally wrong. in some senses i suppose they are: god's grace is the gravest injustice in the history of mankind and yet it is by this grace that my life was/is intended to be shaped by. 

i'm only twenty one and everything ahead of me is kind of incredibly terrifying. please be gentle with me, i'm filled with apprehensions and i'm twenty one.

sidenotes;

why do we all want to be saviors of the world because lol

despair

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if this is what despair feels like then it's bitter and sharp and brutally indifferent. i want to punch things and in the morning i want see purple and yellow shapes on my knuckles as an outward manifestation of what's inside. i don't care to pray, i've never felt so lucid and cold and dead inside. and i feel alone because no one can step in and feel these things and know with certainty that i'm not crazy. i hate explaining. i can barely validate myself, let alone legitimate myself before the many hands outstretched in a helpless gesture. i can only give you stale morsels because i myself am starving

i'm only fucking twenty one

sidenotes;

in a really not good place

complicated grief

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mine is a story of loss
and it is unfinished
of grieving things i did not know i lost
of future subjunctives and future unrealities that haunt
and shape the contours of my insides as i
wrestle emotional amnesia and concussion

sidenotes;
had first counseling session, secured a bomb winter qtr schedule, attended prison divestment conference, had two bouts of food poisoning (?) in two weekends, spent time with favorite people, came back to a clean and rearranged apt (!!), got professor's approval for research, researching postgrad options, hair is long enough to put in bun without hair tie, moopity moop everything is so weird and scary

apparently for half of my life i have exhibited most of the signs of situational depression. lol. always thought it was relatively normal to be sad about things often. guess not ???

reflections

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this quarter/year is off to a really interesting start.

1) i feel as if the most prominent responsibility characteristic of adulthood for me is to understand my emotions -- to reign them in, to live with them, to give them necessary space, to own them, to befriend them. i am reminded of a quotation by joshua harris that says, "if we want to feel deeply, we must think deeply... true emotion- emotion that is reliable and does not lead us astray- is always a response to reality, to truth."

2) something about foreign words/concepts is very attractive lol, two of my favorite words right now are conscientização (friere) & cariño (duncan-andrade).

3) today self care involves feeding myself pesto pasta with sauteed asparagus & sweet peas + roasted tomatoes & mushrooms, drinking citrus sparkling water, going rock climbing, going running, blogging, and updating my ipod.

4) pain is an interesting thing... it "becomes a strange friend...but even in hours spent examining it and learning from it and even befriending it, it is ultimately from an external source and until that source relinquishes its power, the pain remains." -dr. charlene jin from isaac's 6th symposium

5) commonsensical practices/habits that i learn in a romantic relationship are for some reason not so commonsensical in my platonic friendships and i wonder why that is. i want to develop a more substantive understanding of platonic relationships and how they in fact may be the greatest of all loves... but even as i do so, how do i reconcile this heart-changing information with the isolating potential of implementing it in friendships where we are no longer on the same page? this is a rhetorical question. i realize that the goal is not to be right but to understand and submit and meet in the middle to move on.

6) everything that i assumed i knew about committing to a fellowship is being shaken as i find myself in a reality in which i desire to withdraw for my well-being. and even in saying this i feel myself subject to the condemnatory judgment of my brothers and sisters...

7) i need to be conscious of my expectations of others and keep them in check. unfortunately i don't generally become aware of my expectations until they are violated/unmet.

8) i really freaking need to say no to things. because i'm hecka dumb and say yes to commitments and then regret it.

sidenotes;
nrk

31st

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today is the 31st. i give myself permission to cry randomly over stupid things like opening the fridge and not wanting to cook, or buying a cold pressed juice that turns out tasting gross, or when people miss my calls. today i give myself permission to post depressing melodramatic vague things on social media as a reckless and desperate vie for attention. i will avoid contact with people just because i feel like it and i will ignore the nagging need to explain myself. today i will indulge in angry unreasonable thoughts and let myself be irritated at all the halloween festivities. today i will also practice self care and exercise and cook even if i don’t feel like it. i will also try to tell at least two people about my dad. and cry about stupid dad jokes. i also hope it rains today because then it’ll be a rainy friday. and i will eat ice cream and watch tv or something. i might splurge on some new shoes. and i won’t sleep until midnight because this is the one day i’ll let myself do these things

sidenotes;
lol herp

wordsmith

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words are a tool. it is my heart that yields this tool and that can either be reassuring and life giving or terrifying and awful. sin is not sourced in my right eye to be plucked out or my right hand to be cut off, but rather sourced in my heart from which all things flow. maybe when words are difficult to come by it is to humble me and strip me of power

sidenotes;

so ya idk

rage

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rage feels like expletives tearing out of my gut and up my throat and past my biting teeth. it feels like thick hot fast blood shooting through my veins and it feels like recklessness trembling in my limbs and my clenched fists. rage feels like the cold amusement of remembering that my knuckles are made of soft skin and bones instead of steel. soft, ripped skin. rage is a violent and powerful substance that fills me from my gut to my throat, destroying my stomach, puncturing my lungs, freezing my heart, twisting my esophagus.

this week i have felt these things. today i did push ups until i couldn't and said fuck a lot and punched the mattress because i didn't want to destroy my knuckles.

sidenotes;

why do we react in anger to hurt? why do i scratch my eczema when i'm distressed? why do i have random thin scratches on the left side of the bridge of my nose?

life is moving at a very uncomfortable pace right now
emotional left fielders hecka messing with my sleep schedule and my study life

throwback

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lately i have forgotten the sweetness of being confident in God's love for me. he feels distant, unsympathetic, impatient, contemptuous. i feel like i'm drowning in my anger and that there's no way a holy God would dare reach through the layers of sticky and thick hatred to save me. i am beyond saving and left for dead. i have forgotten the crux of the gospel that embodied God's love and grace in the life, death, and resurrection of jesus who willingly died by the hammers and nails of our sin. i've forgotten the sound of jesus crying out that "it is done," and that guilt and shame and chains are no more. i don't know how to speak truth to myself but apparently my nineteen year old self can. today i finally filled the last page of my fifth journal and can move on to my sixth (?) journal and when i grabbed my fourth journal from freshman/sophomore year of college and randomly flipped to a page, here is what it said:

"there is something off when i pray, 'lord, i just want to please you.' when i am burdened with some kind of heavy desire to please god, what i don't realize is that i already am the purposed object of his concentrated love and pursuance...he sees me in the future, right now, as his perfect bride, ready for eternal fellowship with him. no pain, no tears, no sorrow. he sees me right now, at the spot he intentionally placed me in, after guiding me here and refining me thus far. he sees every tear and heartache and does not look at me in contempt. he sees my every weakness and my past, present, future sins--but in dying on the cross, he declared conclusively...that not only has my lifetime of sin been acknowledged in its full ugliness, but it has also been thoroughly eclipsed and overcome (not merely excused as to diminish its offense before God) by the lashes on jesus' back, the thorns upon his head, the blood in his lungs." -december 23, 2012

thanks, nineteen year old eunice

sidenotes;

is there something significant in the last entry of my fifth journal being about this particular phonecall idk

friendships

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“In friendship...we think we have chosen our peers. In reality a few years' difference in the dates of our births, a few more miles between certain houses, the choice of one university instead of another...the accident of a topic being raised or not raised at a first meeting--any of these chances might have kept us apart. But, for a Christian, there are, strictly speaking no chances. A secret master of ceremonies has been at work. Christ, who said to the disciples, 'Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you,' can truly say to every group of Christian friends, 'Ye have not chosen one another but I have chosen you for one another.' The friendship is not a reward for our discriminating and good taste in finding one another out. It is the instrument by which God reveals to each of us the beauties of others.” 

― C.S. Lewis, The Four Loves

i recently bought a new bike (i am in love with her!) and i also bought headlights because i have evening classes; unfortunately i do not have a screwdriver so i wasn't able to install it, so when i came home a few nights ago, an old man came up to me and chided me: "if i may offer a suggestion: you really ought to have headlights and backlights, you are much too young to throw your life away with a mistake like that..." i admit that i am not often ecstatic and receptive when random people give me unsolicited advice, and that i am very capable of misdirecting the conversation and/or verbally assuring the person that i appreciate their input even if inside i am seething in self-righteousness. i use this caveat to introduce the topic at hand: correction and friendships.

while that old man was a stranger and i will likely never see him again, i wonder if i would have reacted differently if a close friend told that to me. lately i have been blessed (a word i use intentionally albeit with a weary sigh) with many opportunities for conflict resolution, some of which are still in medias res. sitting in the tension of conflict makes me fear for the friendship as it feels like the foundations are being tested; it particularly grieves me when the depth and growth of friendships is stunted because of the unwillingness of one party to be seen and corrected. in my search for guidance and direction, i searched "spiritual friendships" or "christian friendships" online only to find relatively few things in relation to "christian relationships." i wonder whether we have so glamorized romantic relationships that we have placed it on a pedestal, and i wonder if the potential of spiritual platonic relationships have inadvertently been overshadowed and dismissed.

do we understand the implications of desiring a "Christian friend?" when we ask God for a Christian friend, do we understand that we are not just asking for a buddy to bear our emotional pains with and to rejoice in victories together. we are also asking for someone who is likewise under the authority of scripture that commands us to "love one another," to "bear one another's burdens," to speak truth to one another to the purpose of sanctification.

i once heard "intimacy" described as this moniker: "into me i let you see." as a friendship grows in intimacy, you begin to see the messiness and ugliness in his/her life just as he/she begins to see into your life. at every point both parties have the choice to opt out and to hide areas of their lives from each other, but i'm beginning to think that there is great potential for friendships to be used of god and the holy spirit as a means of gracious sanctification, and that it would be foolish of me to idiomatically "toss the baby out with the bathwater" by throwing up guards and denying my sisters and brothers the space to see into my life and exhort me towards holiness.

with these guiding principles in mind however, what follows is the very messy and scary execution. i notice that while we may theoretically welcome correction, it doesn't necessarily mean that the friends around us know that we do unless we verbally create a space for them to do so. i also notice that i have a tendency to err towards the side of acceptance and encouragement and justify it as an act of grace and mercy. what i fail to remember in doing so is that to correct someone is equally if not even more so an act of grace (unmerited favor) - who do i love enough to dare to venture into a potentially contentious and destructive space with the purpose of pointing out sin, and who loves me enough to do the same for me? doesn't the gospel say we are simultaneously more sinful than we know and more loved than we can imagine? is the full message of the gospel manifested in our friendships if we omit the reality that all have fallen short and are in need the grace of God manifested in our friends' willingness to correct us?

some questions to ask myself:
-who do i allow to speak correctional truth into my life?
-who do i allow to rebuke me?
-why those people and not others?
-in what ways do i resist correction/rebuke?
-how do i move forward as i grieve the implications of friendships that may be damaged through correction/rebuke?
-how can i encourage certain friends to be bold in correcting/rebuking me?
-how can i correct/rebuke certain friends in a way that is translated as an act of love?

Verses on Correcting
The "one another" commands
Relevant Magazine's "How We Misunderstand 'Love the Sinner, Hate the Sin'"

sidenotes;
someone sat next to me at whole foods when there are plenty of seats elsewhere, so uncomfortable lol. he has broken social norms uhhhhhhhhhh
my brain and heart definitely have a lot more to chew on and engage with during the school year... when i'm idle i feel like a dead thing

leslie

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on my first day of class god sent leslie to me. i had just finished eating my pad thai, fried rice, and shrimp roll and was walking to chat with my ethnic studies classmate whom i haven't seen all summer when i saw her across the room. she was an older white woman with unruly gray hair sitting conspicuously by the window, the single unmoving figure in the midst of just under a hundred asian students (mostly freshmen) who were conversing with thai teas in hand while waiting for the APSA board to call out raffle numbers.

distracted, i asked my friend, "does she come often?"
"yeah." my friend nodded.

"does anyone talk to her?"
"no but it's not like we can kick her out."

i didn't respond to that but told him that i'm going to go meet her. when i knelt next to her and asked if i could sit with her, she gave me a huge beaming smile and quickly moved aside her empty plate that seemed to signal to people that the space next to her was unopen. i sometimes do that to discourage strangers from sitting next to me, especially in the morning at class when i'm not awake yet. her body language was closed - she was hugging her knees and her face was empty and guarded, but the moment i asked her how her day was she brightened up and shared at a breakneck speed about how she spends her time, about her awe of the opportunities presented to us on campus, about her love of learning. i remembered that she had bright blue eyes just like melissa's. i noted that she didn't smell homeless. and when she told me about rape and murder and lies and attempted murders, her tone was distanced and impassive, as if it wasn't her story. she could've been telling me about someone else's nightmare from last night for all i knew. i was distinctly aware of the curious eyes of the students in the foreground. let them stare, i thought. the holy spirit is here, do you feel him?

it was as if God was welcoming me back to san diego and telling me that he has people for me to love on. here am i, use me.

sidenotes;

i am itchy like a monkey