Whew! Trying to keep up with a fast moving train of thought...

So, I cannot sleep. This means that I want to either eat (there is a canister of vinegar Pringles calling my name), watch a movie, read, or play on the computer. I chose to start by getting on the computer. This led to a series of thoughts that I am still trying to process, so I am going to write them down. Feel free to try and follow along, but my advice is to RUN LIKE THE WIND!!

Okay, so I get on the computer and I check the blogs that I follow and I see that my friend Terry has posted something new. I check it out. Terry makes me feel so inadequate, she is funny and FILLED with moxie and she is so REAL. She just returned from Nicaragua, where she used her skills as a nurse to bring comfort, medical attention and aid to those in need. And in her day to day life, she is an in home care nurse who deals regularly with the terminally ill. She and I only see each other during baseball season, but I am better for having known her and I love that I recently found her blog.

So, I am sitting here reading her blog and feeling like a lowlife for not charging forward and changing the world like Terry does. Then, I see that I have messages on Facebook and email and so I turn over to them. These messages are from young people whose lives I have been lucky enough to be a part of, for a short time. They are messages of thanks and humor and they make me smile and then tear up. I am so not worthy of these thanks. I am, in so many ways, a fraud and a hypocrite. This line of thinking makes me frustrated and agitated so I walked away from the computer, said a prayer, an admittedly angry prayer, and headed to my bookshelves. I pulled down the book that I am reading right now, for the third time, Brooding by Andy Williamson (great book, I recommend it VERY highly). I start reading where I left off, reluctantly, because I am a place in the story when something hard to take is about to happen and I know it is coming. But then I read the following line, "Tyler also knew - despite his own anger and bitterness at the Lord - that he had just been used by Him to help this lost girl find her way. This fact greatly humbled Tyler and shook him to the center of his being." Oh...yeah...

As I sat there considering this sentence, I was suddenly reminded of something that ugly little dude that so often pops into my head said, yep, Socrates. I pull down Plato off the shelf and start searching for what is niggling at the back of my mind and I finally locate it in "Apology". The quote is as follows, "The greatest way to live with honor in this world is to be what we pretend to be."

Oh, okay...I get it, God. I need to find the humility to realize that as broken and twisted and screwed up as I often am, I can still be an instrument for You. I can find honor in being what I pretend to be and what I want to be, even if I am not perfect at it. And in so doing, I can do some good and I can be an instrument.

I offered words, along the lines of that previous paragraph in a much less angry prayer and felt that familiar tug of the spirit to return to the book I was reading. I started flipping through the pages and came across a passage that I had marked that lit up like a neon sign. These are the words that God offers to the heart of one of the characters in the book. "Do not confuse your perception of yourself with how I perceive you. Don't confuse my love for you with your fickle love for Me. I love you as you are - not as you should be. Accept the fact that you are accepted. You are my beloved child. I delight in you. Trust me."

Whoa...now there are real tears, the good kind...I love these kinds of processes where I can see connections and move from anger and agitation to feeling loved and of worth. Of late, feeling that kind of worth has been difficult for me and so I appreciate, with all of my heart, the peace that is mine, at this moment. Now...I think I can sleep...