It’s been a “nope” week. The kind where you just put your head down and barrel through the responsibilities and deadlines and doubts and tiredness and inwardly flip everybody off because “nope, I just can’t take one more thing right now.” I play that line back to myself until it becomes the tune of my life. Soon every little inconvenience or slight injustice becomes—in my mind—part of an elaborate, orchestrated attempt to ruin my day. What’s so frustrating is that I’ve had several “Ah-Hah!” moments throughout the week too, when I am all-too aware that my perspective is frighteningly narrow and my attitude, well, frankly atrocious. But these moments are so fleeting, and even though I know that I need to shape up I just don’t. Why? Why and how can I know something to be true (that I am being winey, selfish, bitter, etc. and that I have good reason not to be) and still refuse to let that truth manifest itself in my life? I actually think that word manifest is important here. It’s cliché to say that knowing something in your head doesn’t matter if you don’t live it out. Yeah, yeah, we all know that. But even though we talk about it a lot, it’s not something we usually remain aware of as we live life. And I think it’s the same with truth. We don’t hold on to it unless it is translated into ritual, physical practice in our life. In one of his many letters to readers, C.S. Lewis penned advice along the lines of “fake it till you make it.” On the face of it, that seems like bad advice, but what I think he is getting at is that living a good life requires practice. We have to exert a lot of effort to shape the kinds of rituals that will help us live well. Being thankful takes work. Thinking about other people takes work. Caring about someone else’s problems in a real way takes work. Humility takes work. Consistency, responsibility, endurance—it all requires dedicated effort moment by moment. We don’t ever become good. We are always about to be good or bad. The fact that we are on the continual cusp of a choice towards either holiness or sin is why the rituals in our lives are so essential. Rituals are anything that is a habit. Rituals can be physical. Does my strict 10:30 bedtime preclude other goods? Like exercise or quality time with people dear to me? Is that weekly Thursday morning Starbucks actually essential? Or does it drain a monthly $20 bucks that could be put to better use? Rituals are also in the mind. What is my thought life leading me to believe? This week I have let my thoughts run wild, pulling me into a negative ever-downward spiral. It only takes one “Of course, that lady would grab the last seat on the train. Rude.” to start chipping away at my reserve of patience. Other thoughts flood in. “Thanks for that mister—I just loveeee getting soaked with muddy ditch water because you don’t care about pedestrians.” “Oh, no, really, babe, it’s fine--don’t pick up the pile of clothes that’s been laying on the floor for a week. I’ll do it.” “I can’t afford anything nice.” “It’s so unfair that I have to do _____” (you name it). It’s so ridiculous when you write it down. Did I really think that? Am I that petty and naive? Yep, I am. Nope, it doesn’t have to last. It’s been a week of ritualized bad attitude, but I am writing thankful now for two things in particular. One, a husband who leaned over in church this morning and whispered, “Don’t hold yourself captive.” He knew. He knew that I was a prisoner to my own thoughts and that I would continue as such until I intentionally loosened my grip on my self-inflicted bad attitude. And I am thankful for writing, a ritual in its own, that allows you to actually look at the craziness of your thought life. It brings clarity—an “Ah-Hah” moment that lasts because it’s on the page—and you can look and laugh and repent and start fresh. As we head into the week of Thanksgiving, I pray for just that. A heart full of thanksgiving, that appreciates the good (like the amazing sunset tonight!) despite the bad.
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Sometimes you just have to stop and smell the roses, or, in my case...the kimchi fried rice balls. See, the 33rd St. PATH train that connects New Jersey to New York lets out at Herald Square. The same Herald Square you see on TV every Thanksgiving, the little tuft of open space between Macys and Victoria's Secret, where Santa stops to wave to the throngs of parade-watchers in the bitter cold. I have been all over the five boroughs of New York and have lived here almost five years and can honestly say that this patch of street—from 33rd to 35th along 5th avenue—is the most awful place in the entire city. Awful for the sole fact that it is so mind-bogglingly congested. It does not matter what time of day or how bad the weather—every single tourist that has ever been or ever will be seems to flock to these sacred streets. The problem is that there is more to New York than just tourists. Hello! I am trying to get to work. Take your selfie stick elsewhere please. I spent last Winter and Spring thinking: okay, at least this is as bad as it can get. Piles of snow and slush? Check. Thousands of people blocking my path? Check. Biting winds, 20 MTA buses, and constant sirens? We got this. And then the summer came and someone in the Urban Beautification, Revitalization, and Development Department decided that what the Square really needed was a little TLC. In the form of a food stall village, smack in the middle of the sidewalk. Now, I am the first person to love a good food stall, especially ones that have to meet the extremely high expectations of New York's foodie-hearted populous. But in my day-to-day life, I care more about efficiency than cool factor. I just want to walk to work without needing to strategically plan every step. So, I spent a few months inwardly grumbling, wondering when the food stalls would leave and begrudging the extra crowds they attracted. Now on top of tourists, my daily grind included 1) weaving in and out of lines of people trying to decide what to eat and 2) resisting the temptation to buy alluring snacks at 5:35 when I'm starving at the end of the day. But this past Wednesday, for some reason, I stopped, letting others rush past me on the race to the train. It was already dark, another thing I had hated ever since September. But I guess my newly darkened homeward commute painted a new picture for me. The literal shifted perspective made me notice the twinkling cafe lights hanging from the trees, the smoke curling up from the roofs of the stands, and most of all the smell of the kimchi fried rice balls. Pausing for two seconds to take it all in, I became a tourist in my own city all over again. It’s really beautiful isn’t it? New York is a world of extremes. Sometimes it’s the best place on earth. It’s New York, the gateway to the world, and you cannot believe you have the privilege to be living here. Other times, it’s the most inconvenient, crowded, expensive, strange place you’ve ever been and you can’t believe you were insane enough to think you could live here. I think a true New Yorker is the person who can honestly say “I love it and I hate it.” The key is just to make sure you keep falling in love with it every so often.
Do you know what awful thought I had one day the other week? "Tomorrow is Saturday, so I can do real devotions." Hot coffee, candles, morning light, and, you know, the Bible. The thought stopped me in my tracks on my way to work. Since when does reading the Word and seeking the Lord depend on how picturesque my set up is? I was struck by the absolute certainty of my thoughts. I was assuming that my circumstances affected my worship, that prayer could only happen with the smells of fresh baked banana bread filling my kitchen. Sometimes I call it the "Instagram Effect." I don’t know about the rest of you, but Instagram sure makes me feel like my friends live perfect lives. My own page tells a different shade of story than my actual life would. So as every perfectly styled, golden-lit picture flits past my eyes and splashes onto my mind's portrait of "normal," I slowly, subconsciously, begin to believe in a world that only exists through i-Phone cameras: perfect symmetry, steamy hot beverages, blindingly blue skies. My innate love of all things beautiful and cozy goes into overdrive, seeking constant satisfaction and comfort in aesthetics. I begin to assume that this is just how life should be. Right? I become ungrateful, winey, discontent, and hard. I begin to demand the beautiful rather than appreciate it, and in the meantime lose any ability to take joy in simple pleasures for the very fact that I am concentrating too much on obtaining them. I am reminded of Jesus's words to his disciples in the book of Matthew: "If anyone wishes to come after Me, he must deny himself, and take up his cross and follow Me. For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it; but whoever loses his life for My sake will find it" (Matthew 16: 24-25). His is the backwards Kingdom, running counter to our deepest instincts. He has been teaching me that I must love in measure, that I must find joy in him before I find joy in others or other things. Otherwise I spiral; I judge the world by Instagram standards and ravenously chase The Beautiful without any reference to The Maker. I've started to do devotions on my 45-minute train trip to work. It's so unglamorous, squished between 5000 other New Jersey commuters on the 7:56 to 33rd street. Sometimes I feel self-conscious because I think everyone is reading over my shoulder. Do I look silly? Where is my morning joe and the dewy light? It has been a good practice. As some of you know, this has been a difficult season in life. My husband and I are incredibly busy, stretched, and often discouraged. We don't see each other as much as we'd like. It is easy for me to turn the small comforts into ultimate ones, to think that a good homemade soup or fuzzy socks will fix loneliness or fatigue. But God, the ever-faithful teacher, reminds me every Sunday night--as I mentally prepare for work the next morning--that only he will bring a new song in the morning. (PS: incidentally, I am writing this while curled up in a blanket, sipping coffee, listening to night sounds. I'm very cozy. And content.) |
Authorwife to a med student and mama to three under three, seeking the joyful and learning to live by faith. Find me on Instagram and Pinterest or shoot me an email. I'd love to hear from you!
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