Hang on tight!

Trust in Lord in all your ways and lean not on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge him and he will direct your paths.

There are many people that I trust. But I can’t say that there has ever been a specific time where I have had to trust someone with my life. I’ve never experienced one of those scenes from a movie where you both have to descend down the face of a cliff to avoid being shot by machine guns, and you have to climb onto the back of the person with the rope. You know, those scenes where the guy tells the girl to get on his back and hold on tight. She replies with “You’re crazy!!” He looks her in the eye and the gunfire pauses for dramatic effect as he says “Just trust me.”
Ya, never been there. I wonder which people I would trust with my life like that. It makes me question not only my trust of humanity outside the people I’m close to, but also my trust in my savior.
So many times I “lean on my own understanding”. I plan out the details of my life without making sure it’s what God wants me to do. I act as though I am omniscient – as if I am the one in control of the universe rather than him.
There have been moments – and they are becoming more frequent – when I feel as though God is looking me in the eye, offering me his hand, and saying “Just trust me.” A year ago I would have honestly told you that trusting God wasn’t such a difficult thing to do. I suppose I had never really been required to fully rely on Him. But now that I’m going through a more realistic part of life, I’m realizing just how hard it is to trust him. It’s not a piece of cake. I’ve finally had the revelation that the more trust I put in God, the less I have to rely on myself. In the end, relying on myself is not a good thing anyways. I consistently let myself down, and no matter how hard I try, there are always some things that I will never be able to accomplish with my own strength and determination.
As I currently sit on the airplane above the clouds, I see the red sun setting behind the mountain peaks and I wonder why I have difficulty placing my circumstances in the hands of the Creator. But despite whatever the reason may be, I’m attempting to overcome it. Not because I have any ability myself, but because I’m choosing to reach out and grab the strong hand in front of me and say “I trust you.”

play a song

The wait was as long as the line. I stood there with my piano purse hanging from the crook of my arm.
A small boy standing behind me decided that he would make the most fun out of his line-waiting experience. He started pushing on the "keys" of my purse and played me a little song. "Dooooo-dee-doo-dah". I just grinned as his dad whispered "stop it!"
It's little things like this that tend to poke me a reminder about my perspective. Waiting in line really isn't terrible. Especially if I make the most out of it. The longer the wait, the greater the song I could compose in the meantime.

Sad beans.

Embarking on this adventure called college has proved to be anything but predictable. And while I knew I wouldn’t know what to expect, there were definitely things that I didn’t expect to be unexpected.(?) In other words, I had no idea what college life would be like, but one thing I wasn’t prepared to have change was my life back at home.

Coming home during school breaks has been a source of comfort and familiarity for me. While away at school I desperately miss this place I call home. Returning once again has a calming effect on my nerves. However, that security is thrown off kilter when there are things that I don’t recognize in my own town; when I go to the church that I have attended since I was 4 years old, and half of the people I don’t even recognize. My siblings talk about friends whose names I don’t know. That genuinely bothers me. My brother has basketball practices that I can’t watch. My sister is playing in her first piano recital and I’m not going to be there. My baby brother is suddenly taller than I am. I long to be there for my siblings – my family – in times of need. And I have this ache I’ve never felt before. A feeling of being left out of my own life - of things going on as normal, without me.
Is this what everyone experiences when they first leave home? Certainly no one has ever told me about it. Honestly, I am at a loss as to how I should handle my situation. Should I leave the things of my past behind and move on to boldly embrace my future? Stop dwelling in the past? Perhaps I should attempt to be a part of both worlds: the one called college and the one called home. Or perhaps I should give up an out-of-state college so that I can live at home and be able to sustain all of my relationships. I am deeply saddened when I realize that many friends are now only acquaintances, some acquaintances have fell off the face of the planet, and the people that have replaced them are random individuals I have never seen before. I don’t know, maybe I’m just being overly dramatic. Perhaps it's hormones. Maybe that bean burrito did it.....