The art of listening.

Listening is something everyone thinks they know how to do, but most people don't have a clue.

I've noticed people do one of a couple different things when they talk:

1. They talk to themselves at other people...meaning, they spout out some vaguely on-topic anecdote that is really only designed to posture themselves as not fitting their own insecurities.
2. They just talk about themselves because there are ears around, regardless of whether anyone else in the room might actually have something important to share
3. Get something off their chest, invited or uninvited
4. Interrupt people to be funny/loud/share a good idea first
5. Ask questions, invite discussion, clarify the thoughts of other people, respond to other people, progress the discussion

That 5th point is, I think, what is very, very rare in conversation these days.

I have found that I enjoy and participate in group discussions less and less these days. I think it is simply because I am more aware of how much of those first four are really done, due to my training and experience in counseling. It's aggravating, and I wish to go back to the time when I was blissfully unaware of how much of what people say is only posturing, ego fluffing, and just plain rude.

I suppose some may believe it would be a lot better use of my time to point out to people what's going wrong, but I don't think so. I don't think it would do any good at all. It'd be like trying to kill a hive of bees with a flyswatter. Sure, I might get some people to change, but the sting of making people uncomfortable about a behavior they probably aren't even equipped anymore to change, and then watching them shrink away from making conversation with me because of it would be worse. That alone isn't enough for me to decide not to say anything, but it's knowing I wouldn't even get the whole hive that puts the lid on the coffin. Our culture is the queen bee. We don't teach communication skills as a culture, and we don't learn them. We just get worse. Except me. Except a few other people I've met in life. That's it.

So, when I get frustrated with it all, I stop having anything to say. And when I don't have anything to say, I don't talk. That sets me apart from others. Makes me weird. I'm OK with it.

There was a dream that I dreamed, a dream for good communication.

The new journey.

I find my lack of faith disturbing.

Of course, I always knew I would find I was wrong about the whole transition away from college but I never really felt it in my heart. All I knew was that I was moving away from everyone and everything I ever loved and that I was broken over it.

However, I think I'm finally sane again.

I think being in my beloved college home made me crazy in some ways. I really do. To no wonder! Think of all I put up with during college: saying goodbye to dear, dear friends every year; watching people fall in love, get engaged, get married, move on; trying and failing to gain that for myself; watching friends come and go out of my life constantly. Of course I went insane!

These days, I have already made significant strides in becoming a capable adult. Only occasionally now do I feel an overwhelming urge to call someone on the phone crying, whereas while I was up north it was daily, even if I rarely followed through. I am not nearly as lazy as I used to be, and I feel like I think clearly and with much more confidence. Overwhelming confidence! Not the norm for me.

The best part is I am much less interested in dating than I used to be. Not a day went by that I didn't think about how nice it would be to share my life with someone. Nowadays, I still have that a lot, but I also think about how good and right it is to be single right now. It just makes sense and feels like a good fit. Being single for most of college was hard! I had to watch so many lovely relationships blossom while I spent my nights alone. That was a bitter pill to swallow, especially when it was someone who I wanted for myself!

God's plan pulled through and makes sense, as it always does. I am with good people now - the people I work with, I mean. It's a good fit, plain and simple. They are my kind of people. I also have new opportunities to make lasting friendships, even though it is a much slower process...yuck! I'm building a future full of financial security, much more than I could have hoped for. If I ever have a family, that's going to be a necessity, and why not start now? My whole "I'll live in a box if it means I don't have to leave all my friends" idea...maybe wasn't so smart.

Speaking of friends, the church group seems like a dream come true. It has the seriousness and solemnity I grew to love at the beginning of college, and all the unity of purpose and emphasis on social events that I found later on. I can finally grow in my faith again, something I've felt has been lacking during the past couple years.

This is a good new journey.

There was a dream that I dreamed, a dream to have faith in something new.

Over the bridge.

I wish I felt like I had a little more control over my own life.

Nevertheless, I am resigned to this path that seems chosen for me. It makes me feel a little awkward when people congratulate me on "my" success. My career and education are like a a body slide. If I try to slide off to the left or the right, I'm going to slip back into the middle and keep sliding down. So when people congratulate me on my new job and upcoming graduation, I feel like they're congratulating me for staying in the middle of the slide. It's not like they're doing anything wrong - quite the opposite, I appreciate the sentiment - it's just awkward for me, because I don't feel like I really worked for it at all. I've fought this path and lost. I put most of my effort into things that didn't work out. You won't hear anyone congratulating me on that!

Now I am coming to a bridge, much like the one I crossed six years ago. Back then I was a naive 18-year-old, scared to leave home but more scared not to, lonely and ignorant. Now I'm 24, confident and capable, anxious but unafraid. It feels a lot different than the last bridge. The last bridge's crossing felt like an escape, and though I didn't know what was coming, I knew it had to be better than what I came from. This bridge feels like the end of a long movie...a movie that I really, really enjoyed. Although I don't want the movie to end, I know it's over. There's no more plot, nowhere else for the movie to progress...it's over. The sequel looks promising, but I really don't know much about it at all...there's no promises that it will be better than this movie, or even that it will be as good. Life in this town was the movie. Life where I'm going is the sequel. This is the bridge I'm crossing.

I don't have any choice, so I'm going for it.

There was a dream that I dreamed, a dream to put all bridges behind.

Railroaded.

"Maybe it's time to change...And leave it all behind! I've never been one to walk alone, I've always been scared to try. So why does it feel so wrong, to reach for something more...to wanna live a better life? What am I waiting for? 'Cause nothing stays the same. Maybe it's time to change."

I feel like many of the changes and choices I've made in the past year and a half were not my own. My career has never been my primary concern in life (perhaps a fault) but yet, in the past year and a half I've completely changed my career path, and made it a reality...almost effortlessly. I applied to a competitive program late and got in...two years later, I'm going to graduate. I passed both my major exams to become a counselor, with barely any effort. I've been getting congratulated on passing them, but honestly...I barely studied. How did I succeed?

Yet, the things I've put the most effort into the last six years have been mostly unsuccessful. The things I chose for myself, the things I wanted most were always out of reach. My career was always something off in the corner...a necessary burden. But yet, I've succeeded in that effortlessly.

It feels like a path has been chosen for me. Sometimes I wonder how I ended up where I am. It seems like just yesterday, I planned to ask my girlfriend to marry me within months, find a job in English, and keep in touch with all my friends...two and a half years later, I don't have any plans at all, but it looks like somehow I'm going to go off alone to a distant city to be a counselor with no plans to date anyone ever again. I could have never planned this. In fact, I didn't. This wasn't the plan at all, and I have done barely anything at all to push it this way. Quite the opposite. I've fought it every step of the way, laying down my own plans...good plans. I was very methodical, very intentional in everything I did. Yet here I am.

I accept this, now. I don't like it, but I accept it. My good friends tell me I should like it. I agree, I wish I could. I wish I could want what God apparently wants to give to me. But I don't. I don't yet understand or know how to want something that I don't really want. I'm just not there.

There was a dream that I dreamed, a dream to unrail.

Inside my madness; and other tales.

I am a firm believer in common insanity.

Everyone has their own little weirdness, their own quirks and little insanities. If you follow my blog, you know something of my insanity...I'm quite sure the last three posts or so have been the product of my own special insanity. If you're not sure what I mean, allow me to explain.

If I'm not careful, I can get into some pretty sick thinking.

Observe:



This is a "normal" view of time. The past is permanent, immutable, fixed. Existing only in memory. The future is full of two or more possible directions at any one time.

This is my view of time when I devolve into sick thinking. I count every time I've gone "off the mark" of what I perceived to be the "good path" of my life (marked with blue) into the "bad path" of my life (marked with red). Imagine thinking about every instance of your life where things were inevitably and irrevocably turned in a direction that impacted the rest of your life - and disliking the result. It's not a nice burden to place on oneself.

This is the kind of thinking that has influenced the past few months of blog posts. I'm sorry if it's been repetitive or depressing. I don't apologize for writing it. It was good for me.

Things are better now, because I have relearned (with some help, no doubt) a few gems of wisdom that I feel are important for me to try to keep in mind next time I start this thinking again (and believe me, it will happen). It's sad to think that I've learned all these things before and simply forgotten, only to learn again by making myself miserable. Do you hear me sigh? Here goes.

Knowing the result of everything I try to do is unimportant compared to knowing whether or not what I am doing is good. If I believe in the power of the good, I should trust in the good to take care of the rest. If I truly believe that God exists (which I do) and that he is a good God, the power of good is virtually unlimited. It "echoes in eternity." If my soul is to last for eternity, it must be tied up to the good. If I am striving for that, everything else is nothing.

Knowing who I am means knowing what I can and cannot do. I can invite someone to coffee after only barely knowing them, because I'm kinda curious about who they are, and I'm bold enough to violate any social norm to do what I want, dammit. I can't change the past because it's over and I'm not a time traveller. It means knowing my boundaries. Being assertive. No means no, no matter how many times I'm asked. It means saying what I mean and what I feel, regardless of how others may negatively perceive me.

Finally, I must accept whatever comes my way. There are two different ways to take on life: fighting to make things happen, and surrendering to whatever fate God brings me. What one needs to be happy is to do both...my problem is that I was only doing the former. A fruitless battle guaranteed to make me miserable...because if something is not meant to happen, it will not happen. There is no shame in saying "Very well then. What will be will be." I did not understand this - it felt like cowardice. No more.

This is what I've learned - take what you will.

There was a dream that I dreamed, a dream for sanity.

Just the facts.

School has begun, and it's been much as I expected.

I really don't have a lot of time anymore, and pretty much as soon as I have homework and work starts, I will have no time at all. For much of anything. It's only a matter of time before people will wonder where I have gone - some out of genuine concern, most out of detached curiosity. Mostly I will wonder why no one saw this coming when I made it practically my mission in life to be with these people as much as possible while I still could...before I left.

I don't know if people consider the life-span of their relationships much when they decide how they will conduct them, but I know in my case no one has...yet. I'll be gone in less than a year, and already I might as well be gone now because I no longer have time for what I would consider a meaningful relationship. I still entertain the idea of entering a romantic relationship as well, but I heavily doubt my own capability in making a proper decision regarding women since every other time I've made one it's ended in a disaster much further beyond what would be considered the normal or usual pains of entering/attempting a relationship. This is kind of new to me - usually when faced with even the possibility of romance I am excited - and apparently too excited to actually make a good discernment decision. Now, however, I feel merely apprehensive and doubtful, and I think I have good reason to do so. It's difficult enough to explain in person, so I won't even try to elaborate here.

It's no longer up for debate whether or not I am happy - I have definitely not been happy for quite a long time and have no one to blame for it, really. It's hard to complain when you know that the problem lies either with you or no one at all. I am generally incompetent in at least one component of anything I try to accomplish, whether it be the paperwork part of counseling, the motivation aspect of earning a living, or the discernment part of a relationship, and whenever I am reminded of that, I usually end up not wanting to do anything except what I have to do.

I know no one ever really seems to believe a word I say regarding my feelings, self-concept, general state in life, etc. but at least when I write things out here on the Internet, I can get a sense that I have explained myself as best as I can. I don't really hope for much besides a chance to explain myself, and I better get used to it, too, because that will likely be the last thing I do before entering heaven (or hell): explaining myself. I suppose if I can get that right nothing else will really have mattered.

That's it, just the facts. Thanks for reading, whoever you may be.

There was a dream that I dreamed, a dream that's a fact.

Last of the old, first of the new.

Have you ever seen the movie Groundhog Day?

The basic premise of the movie is that the worst day of the main character's life occurs on Groundhog Day. Somehow, though, every time he goes to sleep, he wakes up the next morning and it's the same Groundhog Day. He is stuck in an infinite loop. Eventually he turns that worst day into the best day, and finally is free of the loop and has a new outlook on life.

For a long time now I've been really down. My spiritual life has been the pits, I wasn't happy about the future, I was not content with pretty much everything in my life. I couldn't tell what was wrong with me. It was like I wasn't directing my own life anymore. The thoughts going through my head all the time, some of the things I said or did...it's been a hard time.

I really think I've just been depressed. The Groundhog Day idea is really appealing as it relates to the past four years. Do it all over again, and do it RIGHT this time. I don't want to move, to change, to go away. I would rather just fade away...like dust in the wind.

I'm not really sure if it's over but I feel better. I've been accepted to grad school where I've been going to college for the past four years and things are looking up. My future might be in counseling after all...so long as I really get this graduate degree.

I feel as though I am the last bastion of the old STM crowd and the first of the new. I've actually thought that for a long time. See, I was here when Creed was in its final years...and then I was here to see the new group arise. I disappeared here and there, it's true, but something's changed. Something's different. Ask anyone who has been here as long as I have...it's an entirely different flavor. Not good or bad, just different.

The last of the old. It feels like forever ago...a faded memory, that I came here to college, friendless, hopeless, and with little virtue. I remember what it was like coming here. I cried after a week because I felt so alone. That first year was a fluke. A total fluke that I ended up hanging around Creed...simply because someone invited me that I randomly met over the summer and I felt too guilty not to go...

The first of the new. I had disappeared and intended not to return...and then, I had no choice because there was nothing left for me. But it was too late to get back the time I had lost. I made the last year and a half the best of what it could be. But there will be no second chance, no Groundhog Day of repeating circumstance. It is what it is.

But now, I do have another chance. I have come back, at the turn of the tide. There is a bright tomorrow, new faces, lit for Christ. And I will be there to gain back the time I lost.

There was a dream that I dreamed, a dream that is the first and the last.