Thursday, May 29, 2008

Connections

I’ve written about this many times, the subject of worry.   I’ve written about how I worryied about so many silly things as a young boy.  I made straight A’s in grade school, but still I didn’t understand that at the end of the year when we got our report card, I was worried that even though I made all good grades the place on the report card would say I had to stay in the same grade and repeat it again.    I would spend the whole night worrying the day before report cards would come out.  Why did I have this sense of failure even though I had made good grades throughout the schoolyear.   Christmas Eve, I would worry that I would wake up and Santa hadn’t come to see me.   I worried about all the bad things I had done throughout the year and wondered if any of them were bad enough that I would end up giftless.   Even to this day when my pastor begins to talk about worry in a sermon.  I sense that she is staring at me and making sure I am paying attention.   I hate to admit it but oh I do worry.   About my family when they are going through a hard time, about my friends when they are hurting and I don’t know how to reach out to them.  And about myself, still silly things as I did in grade school.   Jesus said not to worry somewhere in the bible.  Am I getting any better than I used too be.   I want to believe that I am.  I am very grateful for the way that God has cared for me in the past.   Sometimes it is so hard for me to just depend on God instead of myself.   So many times I try to control situations that are not mine to control.    Lately I’ve been filling my every waking moment with something.   Work, come home edit pictures for my photography, chorus practice, my concert is this weekends.   Spending some time with my friends, this weekend camping was wonderful spending it with them and nature, and just soaking up the beauty of the Earth and all of God’s wonderful creations.  I feel like I’m still not being still enough!  I’m passing through so many days.  Am I making a difference?  Am I doing what I was put here to do?  It’s like we are on a search for joy.  With me it seems I go in so many directions, dream vacation/ yes I’m leaving for the Bahamas in 8 days.  I’ve been finding food and friends to be part of joyful living.  This is all wonderful and great, but still I know in my heart there is something more I’m supposed to be getting out of life.   The greatest gift is my relationship with God and His son Jesus.  I still feel I’m learning to pray.   I’m forty years old, and still learning to pray.    I’m still trying to find balance in my life, and it is hard.   I spend much time on unproductive things too.   I feel a little back in forth in my feelings in this entry.   There are parts of my life I’m proud of and there are parts of my life that I would love to change.   It’s like I know we are all a part of each other, everything is connected.   For good or bad we touch each life we come in contact with.   I just hope my good outweigh’s the bad.   I worry sometimes about that.  How’s that saying go?   To be anxious about nothing, pray about everything.