So one of the things that Dave and I do is argue about is the definition of words. Most of the time the way it'll come up is that I will try to use a big word while talking to him and he'll narrow his eyes to slits and accuse me of using it incorrectly or making it up entirely. You'd think that myself being the Journalism major and he being the Mechanical Engineering major I'd win most if not all of the time. However, I would be lying if I told you that. He kicks my ass more often than not.
A while back I used the word "fastidious", and narrowing those pretty green eyes suspiciously he proclaimed that I had used it incorrectly. Affronted, I told him that I have come across it more than once in a book and the context was always used to refer to extreme cleanliness, as in "her kitchen was always fastidiously kept" referring to its extreme lack of bacteria. However, he insisted that it was a much more general term and as the argument continued we were forced to go to a dictionary to settle the matter. I dove for the book, eager to prove myself right, and when I got to the page I turned bright red and tried to quietly reshelve it, but Dave demanded to see it and gloated victoriously as staring up at us from the page it read "Fastidious: reflecting a meticulous, sensitive, or demanding attitude". Absolutely nothing to do with cleanliness, just extreme care. Dave has made certain that I have never forgotten that particular victory of his.
Switching gears to a metaphoric application, I was thinking about that incident today in conjunction (I double-checked, Dave, that is a real AND applicable big word) with my recent thoughts. I woke up this morning in this emotional low that seems to have been plaguing me for the past few days, this vague feeling of frustration with myself that I have not been able to put my finger on. I've been praying and reading more than I ever have, I am growing and maturing more consistently and healthily than I ever have before, and I've been trying to realize my weaknesses and deepen my relationships. Yet still this mist in my thoughts, this inconsistency with the way I was feeling and what I knew to be true.
So I prayed about it. Actually, i whined in an upward direction, is more what happened. And slowly my insecurities were stirred up to the surface and I started seeing my problem, something that's no surprise but that I keep forgetting to be intentional about. Just like I misconstrued the meaning of that word by taking it from a place that wasn't meant to fully define it, so I am doing to myself. That's a strange sentence I know, but bear with me. As a created being the best place to turn to for my identity, for the fullest development of who I am, is to the Creator. While the Creator can use other created beings to show me certain things about myself, after all they are his craftsmanship, I cannot depend on imperfect creatures just like me to define who I am, to see the breadth of my potential. And yet that's what I've been doing. Instead of turning to a dictionary for a straightforward and true definition I try and look in other books and hope the context I find it in will be good enough to help me figure out who I am. But I am far more complex than a word and can be used with so much more variety that if I settle for one part of the definition alone and ignore the other 5 or 5 thousand I lose the wholeness of the word. If I let one or a few people, imperfect people like me, define me I will never get a clear picture for what I truly am and can be. If I let other people define me I am spitting in the face of what I was created to be. I may never be perfect while I'm here, but I certainly want to become what I was designed to be.
After I was reawakened to this Truth, I felt my steps lighten and my body unclench. I felt energy and the excitement of purpose spread from my heart and out to my fingertips, eager to share my freedom. I have yet to be unamazed at how Good God is, how true it is that God is Love. This life - how do people live it without knowing This?
A while back I used the word "fastidious", and narrowing those pretty green eyes suspiciously he proclaimed that I had used it incorrectly. Affronted, I told him that I have come across it more than once in a book and the context was always used to refer to extreme cleanliness, as in "her kitchen was always fastidiously kept" referring to its extreme lack of bacteria. However, he insisted that it was a much more general term and as the argument continued we were forced to go to a dictionary to settle the matter. I dove for the book, eager to prove myself right, and when I got to the page I turned bright red and tried to quietly reshelve it, but Dave demanded to see it and gloated victoriously as staring up at us from the page it read "Fastidious: reflecting a meticulous, sensitive, or demanding attitude". Absolutely nothing to do with cleanliness, just extreme care. Dave has made certain that I have never forgotten that particular victory of his.
Switching gears to a metaphoric application, I was thinking about that incident today in conjunction (I double-checked, Dave, that is a real AND applicable big word) with my recent thoughts. I woke up this morning in this emotional low that seems to have been plaguing me for the past few days, this vague feeling of frustration with myself that I have not been able to put my finger on. I've been praying and reading more than I ever have, I am growing and maturing more consistently and healthily than I ever have before, and I've been trying to realize my weaknesses and deepen my relationships. Yet still this mist in my thoughts, this inconsistency with the way I was feeling and what I knew to be true.
So I prayed about it. Actually, i whined in an upward direction, is more what happened. And slowly my insecurities were stirred up to the surface and I started seeing my problem, something that's no surprise but that I keep forgetting to be intentional about. Just like I misconstrued the meaning of that word by taking it from a place that wasn't meant to fully define it, so I am doing to myself. That's a strange sentence I know, but bear with me. As a created being the best place to turn to for my identity, for the fullest development of who I am, is to the Creator. While the Creator can use other created beings to show me certain things about myself, after all they are his craftsmanship, I cannot depend on imperfect creatures just like me to define who I am, to see the breadth of my potential. And yet that's what I've been doing. Instead of turning to a dictionary for a straightforward and true definition I try and look in other books and hope the context I find it in will be good enough to help me figure out who I am. But I am far more complex than a word and can be used with so much more variety that if I settle for one part of the definition alone and ignore the other 5 or 5 thousand I lose the wholeness of the word. If I let one or a few people, imperfect people like me, define me I will never get a clear picture for what I truly am and can be. If I let other people define me I am spitting in the face of what I was created to be. I may never be perfect while I'm here, but I certainly want to become what I was designed to be.
After I was reawakened to this Truth, I felt my steps lighten and my body unclench. I felt energy and the excitement of purpose spread from my heart and out to my fingertips, eager to share my freedom. I have yet to be unamazed at how Good God is, how true it is that God is Love. This life - how do people live it without knowing This?
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