Where is the Love?

"..All you need is love.."

So I am noticing a great big trend in society as I roam this great big earth...people are just not happy!!!

I am not really sure I understand at all, and yet I at the same time I understand completely. I was at the bookstore today and I was going to check out in line. There was a woman that seemed to be in front of me and since there were multiple cashiers i could not be sure. Well so i asked her if she was in line and she said umm...yes i am, and when the cashier said next person in line I said, oh well it is you, pointing to the woman, and then the cashier said, oh no it is you, looking at me. Then i said, no i think this woman was before me and the cashier stated again, no ma'am it is you.

So as I went to the register and was checking out the other woman, whom I was not really sure was in line or not passed behind me. I smiled to myself thinking, yeah know, I think that lady just may leave some parting words for the woman behind the register. Well as I smiled to myself she was at the exit door, turned around and said and I quote, "smile all you want, but I was next in line." What? What was that? I looked at the lady at the register and just said, ummm, i am not sure what just happened. She explained to me that I was really next etc. Then I said, wow, some people have to comment on everything. She responded by saying, well some people are just miserable and unhappy.

This made me sad. Sad to think that millions and millions of people are walking around this great big earth completely miserable. There is so much amazingness and beauty in this life. There is so many joys to be had. So why are people so miserable? BECAUSE THEY CHOOSE TO BE. Now maybe that is a bold statement to make because essentially i don't know where people are coming from and what people have been through, but i do know where i have come from and what I have been through and what I have come to find is that if I live in the problem I remain a victim. If I live in solution I can live in the freedom of God's will for me and my life in the present moment, where grace can only be found.

People manufacture there own misery all day and night. Now I am not speaking of those who have serious psychological problems. I am speaking of people who feel the need to make everyone else's life miserable because there life is not going as they PLANNED it would. Oh ok, so now we see the real misery of life, unmet expectations!

I have heard it said that an expectation is a premeditated resentment. Simply put, i think. So when someone does not meet my needs the way I think they should then they are officially not a good friend, they have wronged me, they have treated me unfairly etc. Is it that they wronged me, or that I expected something out of them that they could never meet in the first place. Gosh I use to do that so much. Expect the world from everyone and everything, and then play the victim when my world fell apart and they fell short of what I expected from them.

It's interesting to see today in life that, this life is not forever nor is it meant to be for myself. This life is meant to be a means to get to our true home, heaven. The cool part is that God is so awesome that He wants us to help each other get there as well. We must love each other to heaven. How do we do that? We simply love. We can't do a lot of that when we remain miserable. We need to look at our stuff, the stuff that weighs us down (our brokenness, hurts, pains etc.) and start walking through it. This is the stuff that builds stamina in each and every one us. God did not give us this stuff so that we can remain in it, and be miserable. He gave us this stuff so that we can run to him and ask him to use it to transform us into whatever He longs for us to be. He needs to burn all the impurities off through the fire of His love so that we can become vessels of His love and channels of His grace. If we do not allow ourselves to be emptied of this stuff, there can be no room for God, who is LOVE HIMSELF.

It's awesome because once we have experienced God's love through the trial we have been given to face, God then allows us the opportunity to love others afflicted with the same pain. And the more we give out what we have been given, we in turn get to keep. So essentially, we are truly called to love each other so as to heal each other and draw each other closer to Christ.

And so we wait...

It's about progress, not perfection...
What a profound statement. All I have ever wanted to be in perfect. Why? Because my heavenly Father is? Nope because I wanted to be right. There is a statement that I learned a short while ago and that is, do I want to be right or do I want to be happy? The answer for me today is both! Just kidding. No really the answer for me today is I want to be happy. Which sometimes means, I am not right at all. That is a hard pill to swallow for a person like myself. I like being right. It gives me a sense of satisfaction. It makes me feel good about me.

So, what if i am not right at all? About anything, a situation, person, place or thing. Yeah know actually it bothers me. It bothers me because I feel like at that point, how do I trust myself? Especially, if I really thought something was and well, now it isn't. How does that make any sort of sense? I think, why does God allow me to go somewhere that He knows I do not need to go? Why is it necessary for me to experience something that He knows may just hurt? Because he loves me!!!
Yeah I know, you thought the just kidding was gonna kick in. Nope not at all...because He loves me! God knows what I need and I do not. he knows what is best for me, and I do not. Why is it so important that I step into something that will cause me pain, for my growth. The growth of becoming exactly who God is forming me to be.

It is so difficult to accept that fact of life, that something painful is for my growth. God's wisdom though, is beyond my understanding. I say that a lot these days. I am in such a holding point in my life. I call it the waiting room. All I seem to be doing is waiting. Waiting for what, you may ask? For anything!!! I am an extremely active person. I am ready and willing whenever the Lord calls me to move...literally and figuratively. Being in this place that I am in is harsh. Doors open and then they shut, nothing lasts and there is a sense of sorrow that takes over. Why is this happening, I ask? Why can't there be more than what there is? I know that I was made for more. I have the gifts and talents to prove that...but why must I wait? Wait for what. The answer is simple, the Lord.

I have learned that God's timing is perfect. That when "the thing" finally shows up, it was never at a better time. I think I am anxious because I know that I know that I know that this too shall pass and that even if I think that this is wasted time, its all preparation for "the thing" that is to come.

So its so interesting, when they say progress, not perfection. That one statement makes me realize that, I have to fall and rise constantly and live in humility. I have to learn from my mistakes as well as my achievements and I have to look at it all and believe that God has a plan just for me, and that none of this time is wasted time. Years from now, when I look back, i think that what I will see is that life was moving forward, even though I felt the stillness. It was all progressing, so that I can be perfected by God's love and be brought further down the path towards His perfect will for my life.

We are Hungry...

"Prayer is the encounter of God's thirst with ours."

I am hungry! A lot of people probably hear that a lot from me...hee hee..i like to eat, what can I say! I like food and good food at that. I found that in my experience a good meal can carry you and give you the energy you need to get there. How is this any different with our encounter with God? How is that different then when our Lord invites us to share in his banquet meal of the Eucharist? It is not different at all. That meal provides strength for the journey in a way that nothing else can. This food is his life given over to us so that we may become him to others in this world.
My spiritual journey did not just begin with a notion of God, but a hunger in my soul that this world could not feed me.
In fact my journey began with me about to leave my faith and pursue the world and all its glamour! I remember just being done with believing in something that I could not see and really something that I felt forced to believe. All I wanted to do was just bask in what all my friends were doing. God had other plans for me and brought into my life a person that gave me Christ himself. As I fed off of the life of Christ, nothing else was good enough anymore. I began to be fed and my life changed. My whole world changed. I wanted to serve God alone. As scripture has so beautifully put it, sometimes all we need to love is merely the to eat the scraps at the banquet table. One touch of his love and nothing else can satisfy.
I am still hungry. I am hungry for more and more or that Love! That is the gift, that His love keeps you coming back for more and always provides enough. Where do I go and what do i do to get more? Well I think that has been the biggest challenge for me in my life today. I have a prayer life and a relationship with God that is beyond my wildest dreams and yet I find that when it comes to sharing that with others around me, I am at a loss. Why you may ask? Because even though I find people to hang out with and share with, it is hard to find people who are right there with you, who, as I like to put it, "GET IT!"
It is very annoying when you meet a billion people a day and feel like the odd man out. The funny thing is i know that in my heart it does not have to be that way. That God longs for us to live in community with one another. That as he sent his apostles out two by two because he longs for us to be able to share our experiences with each other. This sharing not only confirms our faith, but provides strength for the journey as we move forward.

I feel like alot of people I have met seem to be putting a stopper on there spiritual progress. Like all of a sudden they are like ummm...no I don't know what you are talking about and honestly i'm not too interested in knowing. Or wherever they have made progress to, well they feel happy just staying there and not moving anymore. As I thought about it more today I realized that there is fear in both of those statement. Fear of knowing who we are in light of Christ and fear of what God may call us to if we give him everything. Fear of what God may show us and what God may call us to stop doing so as to draw closer to him.

So in a lot of ways when we stop our growth, we tell God to stop moving in our lives. Well that is some self-will for ya! Yeesh...it all comes down to a fear of suffering! Its gonna hurt! If I give my life over to God and surrender, it will hurt. If I let God show me who I really am, it will hurt. If I stop doing the things that I love that keep me away from him, its gonna hurt. I don't want to suffer and so I don't want to progress. I remain hungry, and begin to feed off whatever I can get my hands on. This is the life that I see so many people falling into today! We compromise because of our hunger for true love. A love that only one can give. A love that when experienced just once can fill you more deeply and fully then we can ever imagine. How do we receive that Love? We need only ask for it. God will reveal himself to you in any and every way possible! As our Lord said on the Cross "I thirst." What does he thirst for, souls! He longs for you to long for Him.

Hope

"Hope is a good thing, maybe the best of things, and no good thing ever dies." --Shawshank Redemption.
Anyone who knows me knows that I am a half-full kind of girl. I have tried in my life to be the half-empty girl, but it never worked for me..it was never a part of my makeup. I love hope! Hope reminds me that that nothing is impossible...especially when I am living a life in accordance with God and his will for my life. What does that really mean? It means I have a relationship with God and try my best to feed that relationship through prayer and in the sacraments. That trying right there is hope. There is hope when there is a desire for more then what we have settled for in this life. I have seen so many people fall into that lie. The compromise that, if I want what I want I must succomb to what the world wants. The world, from my experience, is exciting, glamorous, pleasurable, fun, and always has instant payback. The reality behind that world is that, it is short-lived and essentially if I do not continue to live in that fashion I will be left hopeless. Why hopeless? Because all those things, the excitement, the pleasure, etc are all so fleeting and as much as there is good within them, it is not worth the compromise. The compromise of the loss of self and hope for there being something better.
I will say right now there is always hope. It is the hardest thing in the world to me to hear when people say that they have given up on one thing or person in there life. I believe too much in God's mercy and love that i cannot fathom that as far gone a person or situation has gone, there is still so much possibility for the whole thing to turn around. I believe in my heart that that is sometimes what God wants to see, our confidence in His saving power...true HOPE!
I feel that i need to say that there will people who read this and think, there are some things that are impossible and sometimes there is no hope. I have to say that yes sometimes things do not turn around and people will choose to continue to live the way that want to live or people will pass on from this life and they were not given more time on this earth. But behind that sorrow is always hope! Why? Because God never ever leaves us hanging. God's wisdom is beyond our understanding. Why he allows certain things to happen and certain things not to happen in beyond me, but what I do know is that with all the disappointments i have faced in my life, i was better off without it. Or God gave me an even greater gift behind the pain. The pain was necessary to prepare me, to strengthen me for the greater gift.
The place to understand that is acceptance. This is hard place to find yourself. I find that I want, what I want, when I want it...no ifs, ands, or buts. So when I do not get it or when something does not work out I go into the next tangible place: despair and hopelessness. Why...because it is easier to live there then to go into a scary place called surrender. Surrender is another way of saying, "yes Lord I do not mind walking around this unfamiliar dark room with no light switches...and yes Lord i will wait for you to turn the lights on in your time." Despair and hopelessness sounds so much better when you put it that way.
Although what is cool about surrender is that there is so much hope in it. There is hope because the door did not close, there is just a new leader and it is not you! Its God, and that means there is hope! Even greater hope then we can ever imagine because we are limited in what we can accomplish, He is not! He can do anything and everything and will do it if we only let Him do so. Hope does not disappoint!