Toe in the Water
(Campus Market)
I keep waiting for something significant to happen. I know I’m not happy at where I am now, but why do I keep waiting?
I’m considering visiting the home of the “enemy”, to see what it’s like on that side. What have I got to lose?
I haven’t fallen asleep yet.
(Max Adler)
Time and time, over and over, I still get stupefyingly paralytic depression.
I can’t sleep, concentrate, or laugh. I haven’t gone to church in a week (tomorrow — er, in three hours I mean — will make two), gone to any events besides the CCF meeting, or have had the ounce of effort required to do something (laundry, homework).
What is the cause of this? I’ve placed blame on many things — sugar, milk, my mattress, stress, possible autism — but I doubt that any of those have relation to my problem. I think that deep down inside of me, I know that it’s impossible for me to truly be happy (or joyful) when my daily life is met with the constant lies and ignorance being spouted from every mouth I used to respect. I do lose respect for people quite easily, you know. (I very rarely gain respect for people, except for a few in the past year).
And the kicker here is that because I don’t have respect for many people, I trust no one enough to let them help me — or if I still even consider it help. They might ask me what’s going on, but I smile and say lies. I know exactly what to say to fend off their help; growing up in the church helped me with that. I used to think that my faith was sound; unwavering, unfaltering at times. I’d be God’s shining light in the modern day of corruption and wrongness.
But now, I can hardly tell the difference between whether I’m truly a Christian, or I’m simply at church or at meetings just because I’m looking for nice, honest friends to hang out with, because maybe, I’m actually really lonely inside. (Though, if my subconscious were trying to make friends, it would almost certainly avoid making friends with Christians).
Not only that, I’m afraid of being the leecher on the sideline. Sure, I’ve helped out on worship, shown my leadership, but being assertive has only made the real leaders to delegate my complacent peers to lead instead (hah what a letdown from the website business. I don’t even feel that I’m being used anymore). I’m thinking that now, the only reason why I help on the worship team, or strive to serve the fellowship is simply because of an unexplained phenomenon that urges me to contribute back to the community — instead of any passion or love for God.
I see some friends around me in their own strong faiths, battling their sins with the help of the more (so-called) mature Christians. They constantly struggle each day, to my admiration. But recently I can’t understand why they are doing those things anymore. I can see their reason — out of love for God — but I can’t comprehend how they can devote so much, especially since to me, “love for God” becomes “debt to God” and that becomes “obligation to God”. (“Obligation” screams unauthenticity, which you would know bugs me if you’ve read any of my other posts).
Who knows? Maybe this bout will just pass away, like the ones that did a year ago.
Lately, though, they haven’t. I stay up in bed thinking about the grim future of emptiness that I’m setting myself up for, and how helpless I really am to do anything about it.
Hot Soup
I spilled hot soup on myself today at Campus Market.
It was the cashier’s fault for having such dreamy eyes.
On love and loss, depression and trust
Love
Living, caring
Singing, talking, relaxing
Spirit elated, body depressed
Staring, thinking, contemplating
Judging, dying
Apathy
Discovering that
Even if you try your hardest,
Predestination still
Redirects you away from a joyful
Ending that you’d once undoubtedly
Surmised to be possible and likely;
Slaving away at the daily chores, without
Inspiration to guide you along your way, and
Overall, you think that there’s
No point in anything anymore.
Why can’t I find neither the courage, nor the audacity to make known to others what matters more?
Why do I feel like I’m being so narcissistic when I think about how to get help from others?
Why is it so easy for me to resist the inreach of others when they’re there to aid?
Why can I so easily judge others, quick to take note of their exact insincerity?
Why can’t I look at powerful religious figures and think they’re honest?
Why do I know You’re there, but don’t feel any comfort?
Why is it that my closest friends don’t know me at all?
Why do I feel like my whole life is a fake?
Why can’t I trust anyone?
Well I’ll Talk
But the point of this blog is for myself, so keep that in mind, person/people reading this. (I’m not going to go on a shameless self-promotion rampage and email everyone I know to check out my blog post. [Nor am I trying to "make it big" in the blogosphere world.]) Ugh.
I’m mad at people. It’s because I’m not being accounted for, by the people who are supposed to be my brothers and sisters in Christ. The past two weeks I’ve skipped small group on purpose (well, the first week was because I felt dead), and to my dismay, the first week not one person asked me why I wasn’t there, and the second week only had meager improvement (yet small enough that I still wanted to punch a wall).
At this point, I’d like to cut in my own blog post at this point to say that I don’t really care for rational solutions/advice on this (especially since the problem itself is irrational). Rationality would say that it shouldn’t matter who cares if I’m there or not, but that only pushes the idea of spiritual independence. This is my blog, so I’ll write whatever I want in it. Otherwise, the only way I’d get this off my chest would be to act passive-aggressively or speak sarcastically to try to make fun of the situation (which both deconstructive, and plus, I’d have no one to rant to about this). And back to the point:
Yet, even though hardly anyone cared that I wasn’t there at small group, it seems like a certain person still cares about my ability as a programmer to continue working on the website, despite my absence from their meetings. It’s almost as though I’m being used: the enticement of small group was the bait, and signing me up to work on the website was the switch. And now that I’ve signed off my soul to working on the website, it no longer matters to him whether I attend small group or not (that is, if he even noticed in the first place).
Not that I expect every single person in small group to be concerned if I’m missing, but it takes some audacity for him to email me asking about the website without wondering (I know I’m being unfair right now).
Even then, I wish that people just knew stuff about me, but still cared about me (regardless of some undisclosed attributes I have, but that’s besides the point). I want to be in relationships beyond the point of people asking me, “What’s wrong?” to find out (much like my sentiments regarding how my closest friends ask me, “Do you want to eat lunch together?” instead of initially asking “Where are we eating?”). I’m not myself around anyone, and I’m not myself around me.
I should find someone who’s extremely gifted with discernment to be my accountability partner, or a mentor who can tell when something’s wrong.
My gut hurts. A lot.
But no one really cares.
Could I really disappear and no one would notice?
I guess after tonight I have an answer.
I’ll try it again next week and see if, again, no one says anything.
Struggles
How do people keep each other accountable?
I look around and hardly see any accounting done where the fellowships are most tightly-knit, but I don’t see people sharing struggles with each other, or keeping each other accountable. Maybe it’s more of a personal, one-on-one thing, but if that’s true, then I’m wondering where are my one-on-one’s.
There’s no one who keeps me accountable.
Maybe it’s just because I’m quiet and “pious”, according to a Facebook quiz. I’m also thinking that it’s because since I’ve grown up in the church, people around me who know this fact think that I’m supposed to “know better”. In other words, they don’t feel they need to remind me that I’m drowning in a lifestyle of sin.
But this isn’t true; I’m sinning right in front of brothers and sisters, and they haven’t said a word.
It makes me feel horrible, but I don’t know what to do, if they, of all people, aren’t saying anything.
Productivity
I wonder if I can channel my passions into doing something productive.
A Spiritual Mentor
Or guidance of any sort. Honest guidance, not just the dull “nod and smile” type of guidance that someone who doesn’t actually care would give. I want to so much become a better Christian, but no matter how fast I try walk on the path, I’m bound to go astray.
In college, there are brothers and sisters all around me to nudge me in the right direction, to give a word of advice when I need it, to be able to make time for and spend time with me. There are older folks, who have already graduated. They stay behind at our fellowship and it appears that they’re there because they do care about the people there. If they were only going to our fellowship out of obligation, they would have bounced once they graduated. There are older students who won’t hesitate to tell me about classes and studying strategies. They aren’t afraid for their wallets to take me out to lunch, just to talk to me. If they were, they would want to split the bill. There are students my age who were freshmen, just like me. Even though they’re my age physically (well, I’m a little younger than most of them), I can’t help but look up to some of them for their spiritual lives. We can have intelligent discussions about anything, even religious matters, and I hardly feel compromised.
But here, back home, it’s as if suddenly, no one has time for anything (except Wade, who’s admirably made more than an effort to invite people to do things and fellowship). The people who do have time, on the other hand, make an effort to avoid giving me advice at all, or they give me sarcastic, nasty remarks about my issues (which has somewhat driven me to become less trustful with my personal life [if that's even possible]). I haven’t had one good “talk” (talk is in quotes because I’m of course referencing to a conversation that leaves me thinking critically) with anyone since I’ve been back from college. Arguably, I might have had a few good internet “talks,” but now I’m starting to doubt the legitimacy or earnestness of those talks. Well, I guess I’m coming on a little hard on my home people, but they definitely don’t give me much to look up to. I’d see more of their personalities if I had deeper conversations with them, but I have trouble developing that kind of a relationship.
I (internet) talked with someone a few days ago and he said that pride is what’s keeping me from sharing my burdens with the people around me, but I’m sure it’s not only that kind of pride. I think that I’ve got some kind of a mix of a superiority and inferiority complex that has made me think that I’m fine where I was. Some type of thinking that on a subconscious level, I was superior to everyone around me; that no one was a greater Christian than I, a soaring eagle above the mountain that is spirituality. Obviously, that’s extremely prideful, and pompous, and arrogant (though the way I put it is a little more blunt than how it appeared in my though processes at the time). But now, as I think about the level right below (or above) that arrogance, I see this lack of sharing any of my personal life (or personality) with anyone. I see lies that I’m spouting to those, who at the very least, feign interest in my matters, slip out of my mouth over and over again to avoid causing them extra stress or damaging my reputation. I see that I’m more horrible and sinful than I feel that anyone else could possibly be: a manipulative, lying snake who (most people would agree, if they saw who I really was) deserves to have his head crushed. A snake whose whole life is based on many huge, ongoing deceptions.
Underlying all of this, I suppose, is fear. Why am I afraid of sharing who I am with people? Many reasons: the tarnish of my image, the chip in the persona that I’ve worked so hard (unintentionally, though) to build, the excommunication and stigma thereof that comes with varying degrees of my sinful life, and the list goes on and on. What scares me about being scared is that I’m also afraid of recovering. It makes me wonder if I’m a true Christian or not, because the Holy Spirit should be guiding me away from such things, but I haven’t budged and am afraid to budge. Then again, I hate change, so maybe that’s just it. Hopefully.
Now, would a mentor help solve all my problems? I don’t think so. But it would definitely help to have someone available who’s committed to guiding me to give me a good “talk” once in a while…
Someone to trust.
Sigh
“And even when your hope is gone,
Move along, move along just to make it through.”
I wish someone’s out there who would hold me and love me, and I could love that someone back with all my heart.
But that won’t happen. Not in my lifetime, anyways.
Dying in silence.
