'Nothing goes as planned. Everything will break. People say goodbye, in their own special way. All that you can rely on, and all that you could fake, will leave you in the morning.'
I sat down with a guidance counsellor right before starting school my senior year. I proceeded to tell her that I didn't really need, nor want her guidance - I had my entire life planned out. After graduation, I was going to attend Baylor, just like everyone else in my family had been doing for generations. My freshmen year, I was going to rush Chi Omega, another family tradition. My major would be journalism, with a minor in communications. I would graduate from Baylor, marry, and live in the suburbs of a city with a major magazine that I could work for.
She looked at me, smiling, and asked if I had a backup plan. The notion was ridiculous to me at the time. What could I possibly need a backup plan for? I hadn't been raised to have fall through plans. Needless to say, not a single thing on my five year plan came true. God spent the next year breaking my pride, and shattering everything I loved more than Him. And during this twisting, stretching process of such incredible pain - I found God, and myself, in ways I didn't know possible. He led me to ORU, and a major in International Community Development.
I sometimes wonder if that year was necessary though. Could I have gotten to this point without having to be so broken, and having to lose so much? If I hadn't have been so stubborn, and had resisted holding onto my own dreams so tightly, would things be entirely different?
'You’re in my veins, and I cannot get you out. You’re all I taste, at night inside of my mouth. You run away, cause I am not what you found. You’re in my veins, and I cannot get you out. '
I understand the concept of feeling something in your veins, more so than most people. If you don't enjoy reading somewhat gross details, skip this next paragraph. My sophomore and junior year of high school, I was hospitalized multiple times for a plethora of diseases. My doctors began running I.V. treatments every three hours, for an hour. I had never really thought of feeling anything in my veins until this - they were just there. But this medication was like cold fire, a contradiction of two pains, as it burned and froze at the same time. It was without a doubt the most excruciating thing I've ever had to do. My veins eventually started knotting themselves, in an attempt to stop the medication.
What's it like to feel a situation in life so deeply, that you can feel it in your veins? I don't think it to be the kind of experience one would forget easily. In the same way the veins began to knot themselves against helpful, but painful medication, we emotionally tie ourselves off. The memory of former pain is a great motivator - sometimes so great that we end up not letting in the very things we need the most, and will bring us the greatest happiness.
It boils down to trust - do we have the ability to do it?
'Everything will change. Nothing stays the same. Nobody is perfect, oh, but everyone is to blame.'
Where did this darkness come from? Humanities hatefulness, its cruelty? How did it find us? Did it steal into our lives, or did we seek it out, and embrace it with open arms. What has happened to mankind - we now send our children into the world, like soldiers off to war, hoping for their safe return, but knowing that some will be lost along the way. We lost our way when we allowed the shadows to swallow us, somehow morphing the darknesses name into our own.
'Everything is dark, it’s more than you could take. But you catch a glimpse of sunlight shining down on your face. You're in my veins, and I cannot get you out.'
Light always stands out the most in utter darkness. This made it easy for me to find God, in so many real, tangible ways, for such a long time. When life is falling apart, it's easy to grab onto Jesus, and feel His presence consuming your life, healing and restoring broken parts of you.
But what about now? For the past year, my life has been filled with so much life, light, laughter, joy, fun, and hope. I'm beyond obsessed with how incredible it is to live my life - I can't get over how blessed I am, or how undeserving I am of it. If someone had told me two years ago that I would end up here, in a place of unparalleled peace and contentment, I would have laughed at them.
Maybe that's why it has been so hard lately to feel God. I am fully aware that my relationship, or love for Him, is not based off of what I'm feeling, but a deep commitment to His greatness. But I have missed knowing His touch, and His voice. I'm learning though - I'm learning to find Him in times of extreme happiness, as well as incredible pain.
It's a lesson, and a life, that I wouldn't trade for anything.
