Series on Fear

I started chronicling the various fears I have in different areas in my life, and countering that with the promises of God which I know to be true instead.

Its so much noise and clutter in the background - the fear. If you sit to look at your fears, you see that its all lies. I am speaking to mine: writing them down and reflecting on them. I see that they are just misconstructions to make me forget who I am in Him. And I'm praying about them, for God to re-ignite His love in me as he continually teaches me to die to my sins of my old-self everyday... Its hard, and painful. And yet, i've never felt any lighter :D

Here is an excerpt on one of my series.

"I am scared at my Jealousy because it makes me see my inadequacy. I don’t have anyone here. It makes me fear she will move on and I will be left hanging and without...

But then again, I’ve never been one to flow with the pack. I’ve never been one to measure according to everyone else’s coat. I’ve always been ‘different’ like Mummy said.

And the Lord my God has already said to me...


"For I know the plans I have for you," declares the LORD, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future."

"So this soul of mine that He has already told to sit and be still... why are you still wavering? Why do you still grope around as one that has not yet been owned?"

Speak to that fear of yours, whatever it is. It is just a distraction to weigh you down from seeing that God is mightier than your circumstance.

...'The only time i ever saw Him run'

An Open Letter

I’m sitting here realizing that I’m in a conundrum of conflicting feelings and knowing that the one thing I need to do is get down to my knees and pray. Pray for the confusion to stop. Pray for the guilt to wash away. Pray for your love to flow through. Pray for my eyes to be focused on only you… and its hard. It is hard because I unashamedly want to keep worrying. I want to keep running. I want to not stop and appreciate. I’m in this dereliction of self-absorbedness where I’m considering me… me… and of course… me again!

Not me… should be the answer. Not me should be the focus. Not me should be the restitution.

I need to remain in you and you have of course promised that you will remain in me…

So why am I playing with this fire… this inward desire to keep wallowing here staring at me in the mirror?

I should be looking to you instead…

And in the moments that we take to suddenly stop and ignore? No – Look beyond our reflections in the mirror to see your image – love itself staring back… that is the moments that we see grace. The Grace – beautiful, abounding and abundant – able to provide anchors of strength, strength that makes us see that it is not about us. It was never about us – you as an individual. It was always about him, about her and about them. The outward gaze, the outward reflection, despite how hard and unnatural it is, is the supplemental richness that grace affords.

I’m still wobbling and bruising as I learn to deflect from the inner to the outward day-by-day. 

“But [Mwajim] where are you running to?”

“Somewhere in the middle you’ll find me” ~ Casting Crowns

         No one tells you to stop and smell the roses. Neither do they tell you to wait and watch the rain as it pours gently on a mid-summer afternoon. They forget to tell you that you fall and bruise and that it is okay. They also forget to tell you their own stories so that when you are faced with conundrums of what the giants before you went through, you can boldly look up and realize that you were never alone.

         If you think about it, society makes it seem like it is all about the race. A dash to graduate, a dash to get in a relationship or get married, a dash to get that job, a dash to get the promotion, a dash to have a baby, a move on to the next state. We are always looking forward to that next big thing – the next breakthrough. There is nothing wrong with that, wanting to forge ahead. But the thing is, once at that next level we are ready to jump to the next higher level.

         That has been my state for the past… let’s just say forever. I realized that I’ve always been in a state where I’m yearning for more. I’ve never stopped to smell the roses, or appreciate the beauty of where I am standing. From my vantage point, I’ve always been unsatisfied. I’ve wanted better…  everything to be better. As a result, I’ve been too quick to jump into the future. I’m left spending countless hours thinking of the ultimate façade of satisfaction that will be met once I just do this or do that…

         “But [Mwajim] where are you running to?” I seemed to hear my Mother’s anxious question that I had relegated to the background for a very long time. She would always ask me this when I told her my adult version of my future plans when I was a teenager. In her eyes, I saw the fear that I was running faster than my shadow, wishing upon myself things that should only come at a regular pace. I never understood then. I wished she had spelt it out in less ambiguous terms.

         In wanting that next phase of my life to come so bad, I realized that I’ve been in a perpetual state of “waiting”… I mean yes, we are all waiting aren’t we? For that special/big breakthrough?... where we wish to attain? However, I feel like I’ve been even holding my breath in the process… so do I really think that that breakthrough will be it and that I’d never want anymore?

         Yes, I’ve never sat down and been appreciative of what God has so graciously given me. I’ve never sat down and reflected that since I’ve come this far, I should be rest assured that ofcourse “He whose eyes are on the sparrow” is definitely going to keep watch over me. I’ve never sat down to breathe in the after-rain air and be glad from my vantage point. I’ve been flexed to get to the next point only out of fear. I’ve never sat down to realize that wow, since God has brought me this far, I ought to be excited for what he’ll bring my way and even more, I ought to be excited about right where I am. I ought to be more grateful from this vantage point.

         So… I’m going to sit back and enjoy tea in the scorching east coast sun and dip in ice-cream sandwiches as I learn to be more grateful from my vantage point and anticipate in joy and faith rather than in fear and anxiety and speed at what He brings next.

         Care to join me?

         

YAY for Free Stuff!!!

… like the laughter of  that someone that makes you feel comfortable.

… like the jokes you share with your mother over tea after a hard day of life.

… like the warm smile you share with your friend over the phone about absolutely nothing.

… like the clean oxygen you breathe.

… like the sweet sleep you get after a wet day in the rain.

… like the comfortable bliss you get from being absolutely yourself in the comfort of your room.

… like the  way you stare at yourself in the mirror every morning and  realize you are more beautiful  and stronger than the day before.

Have yourself a beautiful weekend =D

I am a Recovering Sinner

Angry. Irritable. Vexed. I used to be. I still am.

Unfriendly. Aloof. Self-absorbed. I used to be. I still am. And I was okay… or so I thought.
In the corner of my frontal lobe, I was just too good for him, her, you… too good for all of them. Proud and narcissistic used to be some of my adjectives. You could still say they are. Uncaring and unloving masked in the shadows of shyness and low self-esteem were common attributes as well. And I thought I was okay.

I am not a bad person. I don’t lie. I don’t cheat. I don’t steal. I don’t do bad things…

Churning, slowly deep inside… the anger, the coldness, the pride slowly morphed into doubt, vanity, greed, self-loathing, depression, and loneliness… all the things someone shouldn’t feel when alone.

Why should I talk to Him? Does he even exist? Why all this pain? Why this confusion? I thought I was okay…

Idols in the form of school, friends, relationships, worries about tomorrow, technology all crept up and filled the void I wanted filled with something more intimate. And yet the void was too big… no matter the number of substitutes that were added to the list, the void still remained… more like a big wormhole…

HE can’t possibly be enough. I mean yes maybe there is something wrong with me… but can HE can’t possibly fix it all…

I had forgotten my first love… I never allowed Him to transform me in the first place…

Slowly... bark by bark, shreds of old self had to be peeled away, painfully stripped at times with tugs of war, at times with tears and wails of childish insolence and sometimes with graceful thankfulness… struggling with the indomitable God that willingly gave His life for the YOU can leave you with beautiful war scars that show for all to see…

Scars that remind you why you believe HE exists… Scars that make you say HE should bring the drought because HE saw you through the tornado…

Day by day struggles with the flesh, struggles with myself, me fighting me over who I used to be… in death and the more that I can be and all the greatness I am in Him occur within this fragile body that sometimes wants to give up and sometimes wants to fight through it all. I did let Him change my name after all. I am now a recovering angry, self-absorbed, proud person… recovering to my full health. I was those things… I fall back to being those things most times… and yet, I am letting Him spurn me onto growing into myself as noted by the new names He has given me… peaceful, joyful, loving, forgiving, content… I will continue to let Him keep adding to the list of new names He has granted me… and each new name comes with a new lesson, a new battle of which I must let Him conquer the old self.

Those Darn Flaming Neuron Cells

I love staring at neurons under the microscope - tiny, minuscule and yet so complex. They are so cooperative and yet so fragile. Why on earth do cells – these independent, minute and invisible-on-the-macroscale level things still survive once separated from the organism?

At the early stages outside the brain, the neuron cells do not look too interesting. There are a couple of sprouting synapses here and there. Their inter-communication is very low and worst of all, they look as though they will die any minute. However, given a number of days in the culture dish, proper incubation temperature and the right media to grow in… they turn out healthy, robust, mature and bubbling with energy (not literally!)... basically, you'd be staring at the most beautiful networks of communication in the universe.

It is the transformation that fascinates me. I am always nervous at the beginning days of their culture time that they look too unhealthy, or could get contaminated or worst of all, would all die (Nightmare!). And yet, that hardly ever happens as long as the protocol is being followed. Tracking the growth of the neurons kind of reminds me of watching children grow. You know you are feeding them day-by-day. You don’t fully understand how the food fed to them works, yet, you know that somehow the food is doing its job. While you are away, you trust that all is well with the children, and when you return, you see that they’ve grown an inch taller… or so. However, with dying shock, one day you wake up and realize that they are way taller than you. Of course, you had kept watch the whole time… it was you who fed them. You had expected this… yet you are still in awe of how quickly and well they sprout up… amazing isn’t it?

So here I am working on these neurons, not fully understanding the total processes behind everything I do to them, or how their intricate systems work… no one person can tell you they understand a 100% how the neuronal culture circuits work, we only know in part. And yet, we go along with the protocol trusting that it works, and we are all amazed when we get favorable results!

            It reminds me so much of the Big Man up there - God. Staring at the neurons under the microscope, and filled with fascination, I realized that: [Hey, God already understands all there is with these flaming cells right here]. He knows how their intricate systems work already. He has graciously given us the tact and wisdom to reach a point where we can see a minute peek at how He operates. We only know in part, yet, He knows it all in full. We wish to know in full… which is why we strive to constantly get the answers to our questions… funny. I long for the day that I will know in full, understand in full and appreciate His Love in full.

            So He already knows everything on the microscopic level. And, He also knows everything on the macroscopic level… makes Him worth trusting isn’t it? I think am going to bet my two cents in on that conclusion or what do you think?

Photograph: One of my many pretty flaming neurons imaged summer 2009.

Enjoy my song of the moment... just beautiful *sigh*