Sometimes I like to think that I have it all figured out. I feel so much more secure thinking that I have already thought through all of the crappy stuff life can throw at me, enabling me to go through "crisis" when it's most convenient. So I start my job and think "Wow, having a job is hard. I am sad I am not a college student. Life sure does move fast-there, made it through that change-of-life crisis." (you should probably imagine that last part said in a robotic monotone to get the full effect). Well guess what I learned this past week? You don't get to go through a crisis or work through hard stuff when it's convenient. Sometimes you can have a break down when your boss is giving you really difficult work and when you have a project due and when you are starting to get sick because no one in corporate America actually takes sick days, they just come to work and share their germs.
So here is my crisis: taking my own advise is really hard. Learning to live in the moment and love where you are is hard when you feel stupid, or insufficient, or chubby, or lonely. It's almost like wishing for another time (past or future) is the only way to survive. Moments like that are unavoidable in life, they will happen. I don't think I will ever learn to love them, and I don't think I should.
This is my current struggle. How can I define my self worth? It seems simple, I have worth because the Creator, the Good, the Beautiful, loves me and sacrificed His son for me. That's the answer, but some how it doesn't cut it at 11 o'clock when I am crying over my lap top because the homework is just too hard. It's really hard for me not to view my self worth from a lens of what is happening at that very moment. For example, when I make a mistake at work, I must be ALWAYS be stupid and clumsy. Or when I eat too many cake balls I must ALWAYS me flabby and unattractive. And while our self worth as human beings isn't dependent on intelligence or beauty, it is hard for me to look past my temporary insufficiencies.
I don't really have an answer or a solution, just a reminder to myself that I am more than this moment. So while loving and appreciating this moment is a lofty and good goal, I ALSO have to remember that this moment is not the definition of me. The definition of me is no single moment, or combination of moments, and it's not even the sum of all the moments I have lived and will live. The definition of me is something only the one who made me knows-and as I give myself completely to Him I discover more and more of my own definition.
