Before Midterm Checklist...

Study for religion midterm #1 an hour.

Take break, check e-mail, check Facebook, check Blogger.

Persuade myself to go study for World Geography another hour.

Do a bad job of persuasion.

While procrastinating, decide to write blog post about procrastination.

Get iPod and listen to classical music to improve my brain.

Study for religion midterm #2 briefly (just writing the first 14 verses of John from memory, so fairly easy).

Wish friend would text me back about looking at her paper.

Actually get iPod and turn it on . . .

Study geography for 45 minutes or so.

Check e-mail, check Facebook, check Blogger.

Still don't get reply from friend.  Figure she will text me about an hour before suggested appointment to look at paper.

Lose all motivation for homework.

Go fishing for motivation in the depths of said inspiring blog post . . .

Can't See It

Picture by my brother. At the horse barn in TN.

Today for my Environmental Ed. class we spent a few hours (about four in all) on the ropes/challenge course here at my college.  It was a lot of fun and I even got to climb on top of a 30' telephone pole and jump off!  That took a bit of doing. . . but I did do it! Yay me. :)

Anyway part of what we did was a trust walk.  I've done that before, but being outside made it 100x harder.  Plus we couldn't touch our guide unless we absolutely had to.  And I got paired with a lady I had never met before in my life and barely knew her name.  Lol!  She was very nice but still! 

We started off and fortunately my guide was fantastic and by carefully visualizing what I was doing, I managed to do all right. We walked for a while and she told me to stop.  Then "take a big step up, onto this in front of you."  I stepped up and felt with my foot a bit--not high enough--still not high enough--finally I found the top of it and it was round, like a log or something! With a bit of help I climbed on top of it and then she told me to step across onto something else.  I stepped...into thin air.  Didn't feel a thing.  She told me to step further.  Apparently you don't step very far when you can't see where you're going!  I stretched--and stretched--and finally found something and made it across, then down.  Turns out we went over top of two great big logs laid side to side!  Well then...! 

After a while we switched places and I got to lead my guide (not over the logs, however).  "You're like the Holy Spirit!" she told me part way through (apparently I did okay!).  Made me think though.  It's easier to trust someone--at least for me--if you can at least feel them. 

But what if you can't?  What if you can't see or feel them?  What if we can't see or touch God?  Do we still trust then?  Maybe somebody would say, then that's foolish.  Well but it would be foolish for me to quit trusting my guide on the walk if I couldn't take off my blindfold.

And we are blind.  In this world we are blind, and we can't just rip off a bit of fabric and fix it.  Better to trust, I think.  Not saying it's easy.  But better. 

Not Good Enough

Black swallowtail butterfly on tiger lily, North Carolina

I've written several posts so far, and they sit in the drafts folder.

There are words inside, but they won't come out. 

I'm not good enough for this. 

Not good enough to write, not good enough to put myself out there as having even a slight idea of what should be.  Not good enough to teach.  Not good enough to be entrusted with introducing kids to Jesus, for sure.  Maybe not even good enough to reach out to my beloved "half-Christian" friends--though I really can't help that--even my not-good-enough-ness is better than nothing in that case, right?

 I want to be better than this.

But I struggle with self-motivation, yet I don't do well with the pressure of being part of a group.  I can't improve myself, yet I'm too independent (proud, maybe?) to ask for help from someone else.  I want to be better, I want to improve, but I'm scared of failure and I pull back and decide not to go there after all. 

So the lines stay unwritten, the words stay unspoken, the blessings that could be given and received drift away like dandelion fluff. 

This needs to change.  And I think I know how it changes, in fact.

Because He is good enough.  He is GOOD, period. It doesn't matter how not-good-enough I am, if I will just take His hand and take His power and take His ability to...BE.