Nostalgia

In the back of your mind linger memories, of places and people and things you once knew so well. A rose-tinted memory reel of the best of times, but you've changed since then, and so have they. Recapturing that feeling, reliving the past... It's as impossible as changing it. You never thought you'd feel so close and so far away at the same time. At the very least, it's growth you're after.

To give so much of your heart away, and get so little of it back...

Pray for my soul
at the gates of Heaven.

我怎麼這麼傻地等著你?

She had her heart broken
And she broke one too
An eye for an eye
A tooth for a tooth
A story for one of yours
And now that everything's settled
How will this end?

Wordless

You flip aimlessly through poems 
Journals, books,
Filled with thoughts of those
More eloquent than you
Those wondering how the world came to be
Asking God for a person someone like a person
And your own thoughts
Slowly twisting into yarns in your mind
Formless, empty
And who would have thought you could have so much to write you didn't have anything at all?
Because some things could only be felt
By a longing for more
A deep set sadness
And ache left by battle scars of battles no one remembered
Much less cared about
But you, you were the canvas onto which the stories were carved
In criss-crossing lines on the skin of your ancestors
Each mark a story of love, but also pain
And how could you ever find the words to embody that?
And maybe, you thought, maybe a different language would help
Maybe the smooth lilting or staccato tones
Of something not English
Something more right
Some language in which each sound was a story
But do those even exist?
So instead you settle for empty pages in empty books
Filled only with thoughts that have no form
Wordless, languageless,
But full of the things that matter.

Kindness is a code to be lived by.

So many people believe in you. For the days you can't do it for yourself, do it for them.

Encouragement

"The thing about a fire is that it will burn out. A storm will always pass, and a river always finds a shore. You may see nothing but the fire, but God is with you in the midst of it. You may only see the storm that's been raging indefinitely - it feels like maybe this is all there is and all there'll ever be.

But what you've forgotten is that behind the biggest cloud, the wildest storm, the darkest day is a blue sky."

The End of a Day

I don't think of it being a new day until I've woken up from sleeping some indeterminate amount of time vaguely in the middle of the night.

But today, I don't really want to sleep. I don't want tomorrow to come. I do, but at the same time I'm scared. I think that maybe if I stay awake, send a few more messages, call a few more times, I can change the future I'm afraid of. But I know I can't. And time - or our perception of it at least - marches resolutely forward regardless, and maybe I just need that same determination.

You shouldn't have to, nor can you, make someone love you.

If you stay with someone who doesn't value you, eventually your self-worth will be theirs.

Patchwork Hearts

She saw the beauty in pain,
And the growth, and the strength,
And maybe that's why she was drawn to brokenness,
To broken people,
To hastily mended souls and frayed hearts.
Maybe it was because she thought that she could help heal them.
And maybe that's why she spend her time
Her energy
Her willpower
Trying to help fill the cracks,
Peeling off little pieces of her own heart
To patch the holes left by others.
But one day she found
Maybe she tore off too much,
Her own broken heart scarred by amateur stitches
The comforter longing to be comforted,
But the world looked,
And saw a girl too broken to be repaired
Who loved too much to be loved
And there she stood
With her patchwork heart,
Torn apart by love
And left alone.

"Don't diminish your accomplishments."

Half-Asleep Ruminations

I always get my best writing ideas when I'm drifting off... And then I promptly forget what they were when I wake up, just that I had them.

Peace

And in her right mind, she realized how little she needed anyone else. And maybe, how little she wanted anyone else.

Fervor

I remember when I first found God I procrastinated on problem sets and projects and just sat for hours reading the Bible. I want that excitement again. God, renew my heart.

Focus

I came across something in my devotionals yesterday that struck me pretty hard.

"Based on what you believe God wants you to want, what discipline do you need to start doing to head toward where God wants you to go? Choose one thing. You'll be tempted to pick three, four, or even ten, but don't. Whatever you do, pick just one thing."

I thought about this and laughed, because literally the day before I had listed three things I wanted to do. I don't know if I completely agree with picking just one, but I do get that when you have divided attention, nothing gets the attention it deserves. And in a way, I see it in my life (I'm writing this post at work, for one... oops?). But there are a lot of things I want to improve, and a lot of ways they tie to each other. I've never been good at giving my full attention to one single thing for an extended period of time, but maybe I can take it day-by-day.

But regardless, every day, I choose God.

Timing

It's such human nature to insist that the timing was wrong. A missed job opportunity, a broken relationship... Even if "everything" was right, it was just the timing that was off. Especially with relationships. People, myself included, will say that the love is there, and everything seemingly lines up, but... We weren't ready for a relationship. We had unresolved issues. We needed to work on ourselves before we could work together.

Not that there's anything wrong with that. But we'll insist that because of that, the timing is wrong. We'll think longingly, "If only we had met in the future..." (Or, sometimes, in the past.) But it's not true. The timing wasn't off. It was just God's timing, and not yours. We would have chosen it such that the relationship would work, such that we would get the job or the internship or the vacation. But God chooses the timing such that we grow. He chose the timing so we would realize maybe this career path isn't what we want to do after all. He chose the timing so we would realize all of the ways this relationship was broken, or maybe more specifically, all of the ways we are broken. He chose the timing not for our hopes and plans to fail, but for His to succeed.

We tell ourselves the timing is wrong because that implies that maybe sometime in the future, the timing will be right. But it always is right. "Sometime in the future" means different situations, different people, different perspectives. We're not the same now as we were before, and the timing never had anything to do with that. He just had different plans. We think of timing being wrong when relationships don't work out because we see it as a failure - somehow we weren't good enough, we didn't try hard enough. Why else would two people who love each other not be able to be together? But the truth is, God places people in our lives to help us grow, and to support us in that growth. And that's all a relationship ever is, ever will be, and ever should be. Growth in faith, and growth as an individual. And sometimes, even with all the love and support and wanting to make it work... Sometimes our partners in growth are temporary. Sometimes God places them in our lives just to show us what there is we need to work on, to expose the darkness in us. Sometimes the people we love aren't meant to stay with us forever, just point us in the right direction.

The timing is never wrong. It's God's plan. It's just hard sometimes.