It occurred to me that the post I just wrote (the one below this one, you should probably read it before this one) was supposed to address something other than what it did. I guess it doesn't really matter since this is kind of a bunch of random thoughts in one group. But what concerned me about my previously mentioned friend was that being happy was one of her main goals/priorities in life.
Naturally, whenever I speak of others and their opinions, only uplifting things are stated and eventually I may finally venture forth to bring up some small issue that I have with their said opinion. That being said, her opinion sucks. You can't strive for happiness as a goal. It's too broad. Happiness (to me at least) is best achieved when you are pursuing something and are enjoying yourself in the process. To pursue happiness itself seems dangerous, especially since she didn't even mention God in her priorities...God is a mere dominant strategy for her. She believes in case that saves her but as for actually changing her actions, please, let's not be superstitious here.
And you know what I dislike the most about this whole priority question episode? I wonder how many people would actually read that question and stop to think compared to the masses that are no doubting just continuing the reading (instant gratification?). Anyway, I don't like that I believe those are her priorities...her life reflects them clearly. Drinking, sex, and having a lot of shallow silly friends (possibly I fall under this...), yep she's looking for happiness. And I wonder if it's such a high priority because she's having little luck finding it. Reasoning: If someone is usually happy and at least generally content with their life, would being happy be one of their top three priorities in life? I'd answer no, only those who aren't happy truly understand what a blessing it is.
So she's dying of thirst. What would you do for a cup of water in the middle of a desert after a day or two? She needs the happiness but doesn't realize that pursuing it directly is like chasing a mirage in the desert, it's so close...you can almost taste it and then it retreats back into the distance and you're left broken. Hopeless. I don't want this for her. She can be so much better, the potential is ridiculously amazing compared to her now (though, she is a good person now, just not really a happy/devout person). At least she's a humanitarian...I guess that's nice...
Ugh, do I do this a lot? Yesterday someone mentioned that they felt like they were a project in my eyes. The paragraph above doesn't give a much different story...is this a reoccurring theme in my friendships? I feel like sometimes I'm drawn to "projects" though I honestly don't view either of the previously mentioned people as projects. I wonder if it's so I can learn how to fix my sister...but I'm not God...I am an instrument of His though. What if He's using me to improve people? And by being with them, I introspectively improve myself, everyone wins.
Friendships are actually something I've been thinking a lot about recently. Why do I have them? Do I pick people that I think I'd be useful to or people that I think would be useful to me? Or is this the wrong way to view people in general...am I their tool or are they mine? If God's using us to improve each other, what's intrinsically valuable?
God is intrinsically valuable. This can be my given. So whatever God values is valuable for His opinion is the only one that matters, this is how we can all be instrumentally valuable. However, if God wills us to even throw our lives away, we should, yeah? For pleasing Him is the only thing that matters. So if He wishes us to fix people and in the process be purified and refined ourselves, then we should? And if God wants us to live lives that don't particularly make us happy, we should for God wills it? Of course, I've always seen happiness as an attitude thing. I could be happy leading people to their lethal injection if I had the right attitude about it. Though I don't suggest adopting such intense attitudes...ugh, I have a headache and as I close my eyes I can hear distinctly my sub conscience scream "Shut up!"
Thursday, September 23, 2010
This is the world we live in.
What are your priorities? This is a question a friend and I asked each other. The results were interesting and religion may have had a hand in where we differed.
She said her top three priorities (ascending order): being in shape, pursuing happiness, and helping the very few people in this world she cares about.
Mine were a little muddled...I found that I had the text book answers to the question but whenever I thought about what I think about I thought that I think (sorry for that, I think that thought line is thoughtfully entertaining) more about secular things than about God...but it's confusing because a lot of the things I care about or at least the ways I go about them still incorporate God. But He's not what I'm thinking about.
But I'm just dodging the question, yeah? Well don't worry, I'll answer it. Though I'll be doing my top five because I know all of you just salivate over your laptops until my next post to know more about me. In ascending order: taking care of my body, being more intelligent than those who surround me, taking care of my friends, (these next two were when I had serious trouble) finding someone to marry that fits my qualifications (not going into those since that would take its own post...), and pursuing God until I collapse.
But the big problem I had was that a lot of these intertwine...I am taking care of a temple of God when I exercise, I strive to know more than others only to give them a hand up, I take care of my friends because I care about them and think that's how God would want me to treat His children, and my future wife would have to have a serious Christian foundation. So as an aggregate, pursuing God does come first, but for the most part I rarely explicitly think about it...
But maybe I'm just making an excuse? Maybe the cold truth is God isn't number one in my life. In theory I know He matters so much more than me but something gets lost in translation from the sketch paper to real life. And here is where we sin, I suppose. We all know what we "should" do but alas that's not for us.
In fact I remember in my teenage years I thought of myself as God's twisted angel, willing to help others through questionable means. I would do whatever I thought yielded the best results for God, no matter the personal cost. Ha, I was (and still am) quite dramatic in my thoughts. I imagined being at the gates of heaven, seeing all the people God saved through using my as He did and having St. Peter say I couldn't enter the gates because I hadn't lived a good life though I had good intentions. To me this was beautiful, to be condemned for having the strength and conviction to do what no one else was willing to do, the right thing. Lies and deception? Psst! Mere venial sins, what are they compared to being an instrument of God. His dark knight.
Then as I became more introspective, I realized that this may not be God's thought process but my own pride mixed with Satan. It was a lack of faith essentially. I wasn't willing to trust that not sinning, I could serve God efficiently. I had to live by my own code, I threw God's out...not the best plan. So now I've stepped away from this thinking a little (though not completely). God made me strong enough to accomplish whatever He set out for me to do. I need to trust in that...and trust in Him...
She said her top three priorities (ascending order): being in shape, pursuing happiness, and helping the very few people in this world she cares about.
Mine were a little muddled...I found that I had the text book answers to the question but whenever I thought about what I think about I thought that I think (sorry for that, I think that thought line is thoughtfully entertaining) more about secular things than about God...but it's confusing because a lot of the things I care about or at least the ways I go about them still incorporate God. But He's not what I'm thinking about.
But I'm just dodging the question, yeah? Well don't worry, I'll answer it. Though I'll be doing my top five because I know all of you just salivate over your laptops until my next post to know more about me. In ascending order: taking care of my body, being more intelligent than those who surround me, taking care of my friends, (these next two were when I had serious trouble) finding someone to marry that fits my qualifications (not going into those since that would take its own post...), and pursuing God until I collapse.
But the big problem I had was that a lot of these intertwine...I am taking care of a temple of God when I exercise, I strive to know more than others only to give them a hand up, I take care of my friends because I care about them and think that's how God would want me to treat His children, and my future wife would have to have a serious Christian foundation. So as an aggregate, pursuing God does come first, but for the most part I rarely explicitly think about it...
But maybe I'm just making an excuse? Maybe the cold truth is God isn't number one in my life. In theory I know He matters so much more than me but something gets lost in translation from the sketch paper to real life. And here is where we sin, I suppose. We all know what we "should" do but alas that's not for us.
In fact I remember in my teenage years I thought of myself as God's twisted angel, willing to help others through questionable means. I would do whatever I thought yielded the best results for God, no matter the personal cost. Ha, I was (and still am) quite dramatic in my thoughts. I imagined being at the gates of heaven, seeing all the people God saved through using my as He did and having St. Peter say I couldn't enter the gates because I hadn't lived a good life though I had good intentions. To me this was beautiful, to be condemned for having the strength and conviction to do what no one else was willing to do, the right thing. Lies and deception? Psst! Mere venial sins, what are they compared to being an instrument of God. His dark knight.
Then as I became more introspective, I realized that this may not be God's thought process but my own pride mixed with Satan. It was a lack of faith essentially. I wasn't willing to trust that not sinning, I could serve God efficiently. I had to live by my own code, I threw God's out...not the best plan. So now I've stepped away from this thinking a little (though not completely). God made me strong enough to accomplish whatever He set out for me to do. I need to trust in that...and trust in Him...
Wednesday, September 15, 2010
How Things Are Going...
I feel like the only time I write is when I'm struggling with something so as a result my posts are morbid or unfeeling. However, I don't feel that way today. Today, I can feel my heart beat, strong and steady and willing to beat until God says stop.
Religiously I've grown (I believe) in the last couple of weeks. I was struggling with putting God before school and relationships but I believe (that hopefully) I've fixed that for now. It's ridiculous just how easy it is to forget about your relationship to God when more tangible issues face you. And then what are we to do if the issues are mixed with God? I suppose "pray" would be the textbook answer here (textbook being the Bible).
I've been dealing with something recently that is connected to God and I have prayed on but still are unsure as to how I should proceed...of course, because I lack imagination in my daily life, my problem is about a woman.
Unfortunately, I am completely oblivious to the crushing of my own heart when I am with her. I have been friends with her for a year though I always have wanted to be more. She however, feels differently but really values me as a friend. And I don't think I'm just saying that to at least ease my pain a little, I honestly think I am one of her best friends though I could be ridiculously mistaken (a man can be logical in all things except where his heart is, there I believe logic fails drastically and we must all look to God as our only compass towards joy). Anyway, she's gone through some troubled times and I really feel like I need to be with her to help her talk it out and I love spending time with her (even if I'm stuck as a "friend") but it's killing me slowly because I can't move on. Whenever I've been rejected in the past, I would just isolate myself from the person and time would heal the wound as I moved on. Now however, I feel like I need to be there for her and I want to be around her but I know she doesn't want me and it hurts like hell.
But I'm not one to just sit there taking it without action. I decided to pray to God, see if the big guy could give me any words to go by. All I got was this though: "You're not going to get her, but you can save her." I don't know what to make of it to a degree because I'm fairly sure she's a better Christian than me, how could I save her? But then again, I don't matter. I can't save anyone, only God can. So whether I think I'm useful or not, if God wants me to be with her and talk about our lives, shouldn't I? Plus, if I actually care for her, won't I just do that which I believe will make her the happiest?...even if it destroys me?
So this post wasn't too much about God but since no one reads this anyway I feel like I have not let my readers down. Adios.
Religiously I've grown (I believe) in the last couple of weeks. I was struggling with putting God before school and relationships but I believe (that hopefully) I've fixed that for now. It's ridiculous just how easy it is to forget about your relationship to God when more tangible issues face you. And then what are we to do if the issues are mixed with God? I suppose "pray" would be the textbook answer here (textbook being the Bible).
I've been dealing with something recently that is connected to God and I have prayed on but still are unsure as to how I should proceed...of course, because I lack imagination in my daily life, my problem is about a woman.
Unfortunately, I am completely oblivious to the crushing of my own heart when I am with her. I have been friends with her for a year though I always have wanted to be more. She however, feels differently but really values me as a friend. And I don't think I'm just saying that to at least ease my pain a little, I honestly think I am one of her best friends though I could be ridiculously mistaken (a man can be logical in all things except where his heart is, there I believe logic fails drastically and we must all look to God as our only compass towards joy). Anyway, she's gone through some troubled times and I really feel like I need to be with her to help her talk it out and I love spending time with her (even if I'm stuck as a "friend") but it's killing me slowly because I can't move on. Whenever I've been rejected in the past, I would just isolate myself from the person and time would heal the wound as I moved on. Now however, I feel like I need to be there for her and I want to be around her but I know she doesn't want me and it hurts like hell.
But I'm not one to just sit there taking it without action. I decided to pray to God, see if the big guy could give me any words to go by. All I got was this though: "You're not going to get her, but you can save her." I don't know what to make of it to a degree because I'm fairly sure she's a better Christian than me, how could I save her? But then again, I don't matter. I can't save anyone, only God can. So whether I think I'm useful or not, if God wants me to be with her and talk about our lives, shouldn't I? Plus, if I actually care for her, won't I just do that which I believe will make her the happiest?...even if it destroys me?
So this post wasn't too much about God but since no one reads this anyway I feel like I have not let my readers down. Adios.
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