Matt says that the post below is “in the realm of confusing…but in this case it’s very okay.”
I decided that I tend to spend a great deal of time in that realm, and it makes life much better if I invite you to join me in it every now and then, so I hope you will enter and enjoy your time spent there 
Or at least laugh a little at my insanity Peace out. That is all.
I have been thinking many many things today, and I attempted to make sense of them earlier, but this was all that came out. So, my apologies, but here it is:
I think that I crave complexity. By that I do not mean that I crave drama. Real, deep, thoughtful complexity is a bit dramatic I suppose, but there is so much more to it than that. I think. Do I just crave the drama? I am not very good at making simplicity authentic. I feel like simplicity is often based in assumptions, and when I let myself live in assumptions I am not real. On the other hand, sometimes just stepping back from the chaos and seeing the simplicity and vastness of a God who is in control brings healing and depth that is unlike anything complex. Its simplicity is actually rather complex in itself. I think this has been my problem with being so critical of churches lately. It seems so simple. Sometimes it almost seems monotonous to me. Is it okay that I just said that? I hope that doesn’t sound like I think I am better than everyone else. There can be great depth in simplicity, and I don’t want to demote the authenticity of the people for whom “church” (whatever that means) is authentic and deep. It can be deep for me too, but it still seems to just touch the surface of life and truth sometimes, and I don’t know how to get past that.
But, then what is complexity? What does it look like? If I crave it, how do I get it? Sometimes life seems so full of the useless, overdramatic complexity that gets us nowhere, so how do we find real, authentic, deep complexity? I think there is danger in labeling it too. I don’t want to search for complexity and then find things and say “Look! This is complex, this is what I need!” That would be ridiculous. That would lose the purpose of my searching for complexity. Then what am I searching for? Is it truth again? Is truth naturally complex and therefore that is why I crave complexity? Is it because I crave truth?
Maybe I need simplicity. Maybe I crave complexity, but what I really need to do is return to the roots of what I believe and find challenge and transformation there. Maybe I think I need the complexity for growth, but in trying to find the complexity I have merely taken the simplicity (which is, in fact, rather complex in itself) for granted.
So, I don’t know if that makes sense or not, but I promised Chelsea I would post it, so there it is
What is satisfaction? Is it being happy? Having joy? Is it having peace? Are we supposed to be satisfied? Part of me thinks that I need to learn to be more content and present where I am, but on the other hand I don’t want to always be content and satisfied. Most often I am not. Is that good or bad? I suppose it partly depends on what I do with it. Does my dissatisfaction drive me to pursue something better, or does it stifle me into stagnant disparity? Except, if satisfaction will lead me to be complacent, and therefore I do not want to be satisfied, then in my pursuit of something better I am searching for something that I don’t want. What is the something better I am searching for? Why do I always think that what I don’t have is what I want? Why is the thing that I don’t have, that I want, not the thing that I need? Why is the thing that I need so much harder to find?
I’ve been living out of sanity
I’ve been splitting hairs and blurring lines
I am a house that is divided
In my heart and in my mind
*I use one hand to pull you closer
The other to push you away
If I had two hands doing the same thing
Lifted high, lifted high*
I have a broken disposition
I’m a liar who thirsts for the truth
And while I ache for faith to hold me
I need to feel the scars and see the proof
*I use one hand to pull you closer
The other to push you away
If I had two hands doing the same thing
Lifted high, lifted high*
And if we just keep digging we can reach the foundation
Of our souls
And if we just keep cutting all the chains from our hearts
We’ll lose control
And it feels like giving in
It feels like starting over
It feels like waking up, and you know it’s coming
It feels like a brand new day
Open your eyes
(Chorus)
Lifted high,
Lifted high.
~ “Two Hands” – Jars of Clay
Maybe life is like a sandwich. Meaning and purpose are the meat. The substance. This substance is essential, because with out it, all you have are two pieces of bread. The bread. What is the bread? Maybe the bread is the distractions we have. The things that take our attention off of the thing that really makes the sandwich a sandwich; the things that give it meaning. Except the sandwich wouldn’t be a sandwich without the bread either. Life wouldn’t be life without the distractions. Maybe the distractions create part of our meaning. Eating the bread and the meat together is what makes eating a sandwich enjoyable.
Wait. There’s a problem. I like to eat bread by itself. It is actually my favorite part of the sandwich. Sometimes I don’t even want the meat. It grosses me out a little.
Interesting.
Sorry that was so weird. It’s part of this whole distraction problem.
Today is odd. I find myself wanting to write, but immersed in so many thoughts that conglomerate into interconnected mass confusion that I do not know where to start. That happens a lot. It is frustrating. I am terrible at poetry, but this is kinda what keeps trying to come out I think.
I am struck by how easily I get distracted; by how easily my brain becomes consumed with a passion for things of this world and so easily discards a passion for truth and faith.Where is your passion?
I am struck by the mystery of power. How it is exchanged in our daily interactions, and how I so easily let others have it over me.Who has the power?
I am stuck by the implications of my distractions; how they are centered on my thoughts, my needs, my desires, my life.Where is your focus?
I am struck by this inward focus that can bring me so far away from who I am and what is true. What is true?
I hate that I complain so much. Why is it that sometimes it seems as though I am trying to find something wrong or something to complain about? Do I crave the attention? The drama? I hate that it seems more natural for me to find the bad in a situation than the good.
I find myself stuck in this place of wanting to be honest with people, but not wanting to be so self-centered and (often) over dramatic about my life. It has always seemed awkward to me when you ask someone how they are and they simply reply, “good,” leaving you with that weird silence in which you are not sure what to ask next. It feels impersonal and unauthentic. It always feels like there should be more to it than that. I think that because of that I’ve always tried to fill that “good” with something else, and consequently it makes me search for something to complain about. Why is that? Why do I naturally search for something negative to say instead of something positive? What if the person really and truly is “good,” and that is all they wanted to say?
When I am having a bad day I try and honestly tell people that when they ask me how I am, but then I feel guilty for complaining. I complain too much. I make a big deal out of things that really aren’t that monumental. Part of me wants to say, well that’s just how I am; a little over dramatic sometimes, but oh well. This is where I am in life, so I should just be who I am. Another part of me wants to say that is ridiculous because I want to be growing and being transformed. I want to be passionate about something bigger than myself. I want to find the good in people and the good in life, not the bad. I want to have the joy that is in Christ Jesus, yet still be honest and realistic about the fact that life is not perfect. Although joy is not just about never being unhappy… and now my mind is going in a million different directions, so I should probably stop.
A lot of things in this world seem insufficient to me.
I started thinking about this while I was searching for a name for this blog. At first I had a series of similar, but differently worded, ideas,but something about each of them was inadequate for some reason. They were insufficient. Then I thought of one that seemed perfect, but the more I thought about it and analyzed what it meant, I realized that it too was insufficient. It was incomplete, imperfect; there were many more perspectives and angles to the idea that the specific title I had chosen did not encompass.Then I realized that this is part of the beauty of contradictions and imperfection.
This led me to the, perhaps overly dramatic, title you see now. Insufficiencies. I realized that there are so many things in life that are insufficient. There are many things that are incomplete. We are incomplete, our perspectives are incomplete, our goals are incomplete, our societies and cultures as a whole are incomplete, our perception of ourselves and our world is incomplete. Quite often I feel as though I come to a conclusion about something and then, like my titles for this blog, the more I analyze it the more insufficient an explanation it becomes. I cannot help but think that, right now, my explanation of this blog is somehow lacking and inadequate. It probably is. Even the title I am trying to explain is well…insufficient (ha). Regardless, there are voids and flaws in the way we see things. There is always another way to look at something and, it seems, especially lately, there is always a new viewpoint to consider, or another person that brings up another good point that you had never thought of before. There are things that seem contradictory, and yet equally logical.
This may seem rather hopeless, and to me it does indeed at some times, but here is the beauty of it: God is complete. He is both whole and Holy. He is sufficient, and He is truth. In our search for what is true and good and whole, we will always find Him at the center. I will be honest and say that, a lot of the time, I am not sure exactly what that looks like, but that is what I am trying to figure out. I am confident that if I follow Him, the way, the truth, and the life, He will lead me towards a (perhaps often changing) more accurate depiction of what is true and good and whole. He is true and good and whole. This requires a great amount of trust and humility that I do not often possess, but learning is a process, and you don’t learn new things if you always stay satisfied with the old things.
So, this is, partially, what this blog will be about a lot of the time. I hope you don’t think that I think there is no absolute truth. After all, if our perception can change our perspective and few things are ever complete, how can we trust that what we believe is really true? To be honest, I am not sure what the answer to that is, but I do believe that there is a very powerful God in Heaven who is loving and kind and full of what is true. I do believe that I am saved through faith, by His grace, given by the blood of Jesus Christ. I do believe that I want my life to be for His glory, and I want to pursue what it means to know Him and know who He is with everything in me.
I tend to think in questions, so I’m sorry if sometimes that is all that comes out. I will probably ask some pretty absurd ones at times, and I would appreciate it if you would tell me that and give me your opinions and insights.I will admit to you that I am a bit nervous about you reading this (if people actually do, haha), because I am afraid that I will be wrong, or crazy, or a bad writer, or something else, but I think it will be kind of fun at the same time and I hope you can at least get a good laugh out of my insanity
I need to stop rambling on now (and sleeep). I will probably do that a lot too. And I just wrote about eighteen million things in one post and left out about another thirty million that I wanted to say…So, until next time. Thanks for reading
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