A few weeks ago my friend Erin posted five of her life goals and asked readers to share some of theirs over at her blog
Going to the Sea..... I tried to comment but I had set my Besecure internet blockers so high that nothing (as in not even the administrative over-ride password with super security clearance and death-ray crashing reboot on the computer) could let me post comments on her blog.
Not that there is anything even remotely offensive on her blog. Unless you happen to hate God or people. Then it might offend you...I just had a momentary need to 'throw up the fortress walls' and set the 99.9% level over our internet usage until I could get enough margin to reconfigure my brain and figure out how and where the new gaps were in our safety net to control adult and dangerous content...
It was that....or carry the modem in my purse...which gets a little crazy and unreasonable when running a seven laptop network with ten users. :) But hey...no one ever said my life (and me for that matter -were anything but crazy.)
But I think I digressed.......
I'm right now I am writing a post......
On the internet!!!!!
Which means I have margin to.......
A. get the blasted besecure down to a level that it would let me back into blogger. (whoot!)
and
B. margin to actually stop and write something beyond appeals to denials for the same medications that has been denied HOW many times already? (but we still haven't exhausted all of the appeals to the denials....outside review board level this week now if anyone wants to pray.)
So I thought I would write down my five things........
OF course the first thoughts were strictly off the cuff.....and reactionary to life as I know it.....
1. To sit down with all 11 of my children at a meal and not have a drink go flying.
2. To go to the bathroom during daylight hours without someone talking to me.
3. To sleep through the night without someone thinking I must be dead.
4. Ha.. How about staying alive.
You get the gist...sort of reactionary to irritants. :) Human reaction sort of goals.
But with two weeks of building and compounding irritants between those first silly thoughts and this moment, my fingers are slower...my heart less raw. I'm sure the last two snowstorms pushed me over the edge and the sunshine has pulled me back.
My five life goals? The things I want to pray over....to pursue and write on my heart? They are still not as deep as I would like them to be or as strong but they are here like mustard seeds....quietly sprouting and sending out roots into my life.
My first life goal is to remember. Since seventh grade I have kept journals or notebooks or blogs to help myself remember the stories of people and places and God's seen and unseen hand at work in the world. My goal with words is to remember the things that God has done and what I have seen.
My second life goal is to care. It's easy to stop caring. Last week in India 100 girls were rescued from the sex trade because 'normal' people like us cared enough to get uncomfortable in our own lives and start working to set them free. I talk about addiction, poverty, crime, mental health and po~n all the time with our crew. As middle class American's it's too easy to not care about people who have it 'harder' than us. My life goal is to make my intentional caring now so much a part of my life fabric that it's second nature...that it wont be intentional...it will simply be who I am by the end of my life. My goal is to make caring as normal as breathing...God cares about us - that is what the whole Jesus thing was/is all about. I want to Care.
My third life goal is to move toward suffering. Human nature - my nature - is to move away from pain, suffering, hurt and ugliness. My life goal is to continue (in Gods strength) learning how to move - in love - toward my own and others suffering. I am surrounded by amazing people who are walking down roads I don't understand - usually because I am afraid to ask. My goal is to learn a new dance - one that is more comfortable leaning into suffering than leaning away from it. I don't want to be afraid of pain.
My fourth life goal is to love always. I don't want to love when things are easy or good. When I am happy or when people do things I like. I want to love at all times - understanding that love is a choice - a decision and a commitment that is fluid and has boundaries. Love says I will, I do and I am. Love is yes. I want to love the people in my live not just tolerate them.
My fifth life goal is to be real from now until I die. I don't have the time, energy, interest or honestly desire to 'act' perfect any more. Therefore.....I am officially releasing myself from the American housewife dream trap. If I gain ten pounds, never dust, bathe the children only when they smell really bad and change sheets on beds never except under extreme duress - I'm calling it good. And I am doing it publically. My new life goal is to be real....all out real. Sometimes I need coffee, sometimes I need wine and sometimes I just need to throw a huge honking temper tantrum REAL.
I guess it would have been easier to just have goals like write a book, ease a friends pain, and add beauty to the world....but shoot - how would I I have filled the last half hour of my day if I had done that? :)
What five life goals do you have? Will you share?
Blessings over your day - overwhelming and abundant joy in the journey.