a Gift?

So, now you have read how my weekend is shaping up, so should I start talking about my version of stress or something else? How about I talk about what I think about schedules... na, I hate them, I'll leave it at that. When I talked to my youth pastor about not having some skills that I thought I should have to be a youth pastor, I heard that when it comes to ministry ideally you will absolutely love 70% of it and absolutely hate 30% of it. If you feel called to ministry, God will provide everything. He will use your strengths and weaknesses. Don't let something you think that you aren't good at block your way. If you feel passionately called to do something at a certain church, go there and tell them. God will make a place for you if that is what he wants you to do. So, what my strengths and weaknesses are doesn't really matter. It may help me determine where my passion is, but that is about as far as they need to be evaluated.

What else should I get into... I'm looking to hit that flow that I get when I really start expressing what is my deepest thoughts at the moment. Where something profound comes out. I like it when I get there. I feel like the day's thinking has been productive then. Sometimes I feel like life forces me to be unnatural. Here is the dilemma in my life. I love hanging with people and chatting with people, but I don't often initiate it. I guess at heart I am still really shy. I also probably over-analyze things a little too much like I hear many girls do. So, I often wonder, do I annoy this person by always being the first person to initiate communication. Would this person still be my friend if I didn't. The truth is that you probably wouldn't. So, the problem is: Is it worth it then? Why do I care about these people who I wouldn't still be friends with if it wasn't for me always initiating? How important is this friendship to that person? The real dilemma that happens for me though is that I am shy. So, why does God have me in a place where I keep needing to step out of my comfort zone? Why has God gone and gifted me with people when deep down there is fear of people and how they can hurt me and rejection? The logical answer and the true answer is that God makes our weaknesses His strength. That is kind of nice to know.

So I have realized that this blog thing comes off really selfish. When I continually express my thoughts and my opinions, it seems like I don't care about others' opinions. The truth is that I do. I would actually prefer to hear other people's opinions and help them through life. I prefer to neglect my own opinions and stress, stay true to my values, and help others through life. I was informed today that that isn't healthy. So, if it isn't healthy to consider my problems and insecurities as insignificant, that means that they are significant. Which means that most of the stuff that I express on this site matters. But to who? Should it matter to me? What am I going to do with it? Who knows yet? I know that it actually helps me vocalize things that I have never vocalized before or even thought I thought about before. For the most part though, I think it turns out to be completely useless. It doesn't matter to me. Is that the unhealthy me, or does it not really matter? How would I know if it did actually matter? How would I know that anything that I struggle with, or find insecurities in, or care about really matter? Would it matter if I died today rather than in a month, or would the things I struggle with in between now and then matter. My heart tells me that it would, but I don't really see it making a heck of a lot of difference. From what I know, there is only a couple of circumstances that I really impacted and since, those have been forgotten about. I actually feel pretty insignificant. I bet most people do. We are all so selfish that we think unless we hear from someone that we had an impact on them, we don't matter. Wouldn't it be truly sad if that was true? What if it is? What if we all really don't matter to someone else? What a piece of crap life we would be living. So, where does that leave me? I need to let people know when they impact me positively. Where does that leave my thoughts about myself? Well, I guess I need to leave it up to God to help me know that my life is worth living.

Sometimes I think there is a curse to being an encourager. You build a lot of people up, and often aren't built up in return. A lot of the time you end end up feeling like crap. You end up really having to search to find something to encourage someone about. One of the crappiest feelings in my life was when someone asked me in a small group to encourage others in the group about their leadersihp abilities, and I had nothing to say, and actually I got encouraged by a couple of people. I felt like I threw my ability to encourage to the pigs. I'm a nut! It is such a paradox... cause a person can have their head inflate pretty quickly, yet you know how important encouragement is to you and so you know how important it is to encourage others. What a gong-show world. I think I need God to help me figure that out. Okay, I've said enough for now... I will get back to some more writing some other time.