insomniatic ponderances
So, it's o'dark thirty. I'm on LiveJournal again. I'm pretty sure there's something wrong with me. Well aside from the hangover I mean. I've been sleeping in 45 minute increments and then awaking to enormous cranial pain. This isn't the best feeling in the world. Anywho ... my brain is going rather rapidly in a hundred different directions. I don't know how I feel about that. It kind of makes me feel like I'm psychologically flawed whenever I can't concentrate on anything in particular. At the same time, that feeling of brokenness is also present when I am over-concentrating.
Today I was working on removing some plant matter from some mesh netting. I'm pretty sure that the overall intent of the 'project' was to get the larger pieces out (leaves, vines, etc). However I was sitting on the porch, with this gigantic piece of netting in my lap, fiddling with every little tendril of planet matter that had wound itself around the netting. These things were miniscule. They were so hard to notice and yet here I was expending all my mental and physical effort to get them removed. The struggle within was killing me. On the one hand, I was almost proud to have this attention to detail as part of my personality. On the other hand, I knew that overall this was a lost cause. The netting was going to be reused for the same function. New tendrils were going to wind themselves into the netting again. I wasn't even removing all of them (my eyes would fail to notice the occasional two or three).
I didn't know if I was going this anal retentive 'cleaning' out of some sort of personal pride or out of spite against Sarah who didn't really want to due such an indepth purge. Maybe she didn't feel the need. Maybe she just didn't want to put forth the effort. Whatever the case ... the inner dichotemy was killing me. I felt a lot like Dr. Kevin Casey (Michael J. Fox) from Scrubs. I felt like I suppose a lot of people who suffer from Obsessive Compulsive Disorder feel like. I wanted to stop, but couldn't. I didn't even know if I wanted someone to come out and try to stop me. On the one hand, I felt largely like Michael J. Fox's character ... that this was a low moment and no-one was suppose to see this. Then again, I am blogging about it. On the other hand, I had this theory that if someone else were to point out the foolishness and futility of my current mode of behavior, I would accept their viewpoint as 'enlightened' and thereby quit my pursuit.
This in turn, led me into another series of inner thinking about why the viewpoints I lend credibility to, change over time. Sometimes I take the word of someone who is experiencing something, as highly valuable. Eg: I'm suffering from bankrupcy so I know the value of a dollar and can offer advice on how to help you stretch yours. On the other hand, in this case, I found myself waiting patiently for the viewpoint of someone from the outside environment to say what their viewpoint was. This viewpoint would then be taken as credible for it could account for situational ingredients and behaviorisms that could not be seen by the person (namely me) within the scenario due to whatever emotional or mental clouds had been kicked up in the situational dust. Again ... the dichotemy was killing me.
I suppose it's all indicative of something, although I'm not sure what. Lately in life, there's been this understanding amongst Sarah, myself, our friends, our family members, and others in the communal groups we share, that we're about to leave a mode of living and enter a slightly differing one. Everyone, myself included, wants to postulate on what will happen next. Have I been accepted to any graduate schools? Are you sure you want to pursue pastoral service? Where are you going to live? What is Sarah going to do? Are you going to have a job? When are kids in the picture? None of these questions realy has a certain answer, or even a certain launching point from which to begin the quest for an answer. And dammit that is frustrating.
My applications for grad. school aren't yet completed. Different institutions require different requirements. Some want one transcript. Others two. Some want one essay. Others want a customized one for their own school, suited to the questions specific to them. Some schools want 3 references. Others want 7. Some schools have no fee for an application. Others want $50. Between my varying availabilities of time and effort ... this task is much more daunting then I think others realize. Although the possibility does exist in this instance, that ... I'm just being a lazy excuse-making punk. I dunno. But without a degree of certainty regarding my final destination I can't pour my full effort into the other questions that need resolution. I haven't actually graduated yet. I'm still on my last leg of classes. I haven't gotten an answer about where we're going. Everything feels like the last few lyrics of the Smashing Pumpkins' song "Spaced" (From Pisces Iscariot if you're interested)
I was born whole
Fractured, divided, shattered into a billion fragments
A million piece puzzle
A million piece jigsaw puzzle with no this, and no that
I find myself thinking and speaking in grand sweeping statements. Everything is this. Nothing is that. I always want to do this. You never want to do that. These statements don't really help in the determination of what my larger life puzzle looks like. Nor do they help in the interpersonal dialogue between Sarah and myself or between myself and anyone else. I suppose in the psychological interpretation of a faith relationship, they don't really help in the dialogue of prayer either. I do have faith that there is some sort of way in which I can speak to the divine and in turn the divine can speak to me through these larger sweeping statements. But I have also become increasingly interested in the ways we form conceptual pictures about ourselves and our faith lives ... and in that respect this conceptual faith painting isn't going to get any clearer if I keep using a larger brush of absolutism to try and draw out a scenario.
I feel schizophrenic. I feel like I alone have an understanding of where it is I want my mind to go, my life to head, my words to speak, my faith to grow. I feel like no-one else does. I feel like there are a million different metaphors, paint brushes, colors, mediums, for me to start describing this final destination and that no-one else can formulate the picture suitably for my roadmapping needs. When I begin to compose this picture with one set of tools, my mind is simultaneously jumping to another set of tools, noticing how in a particular circumstance or point of view that other set would be better suited to the task of composition. I can't find a moment of conceptual peace. I rarely sleep. My diet isn't nourishing so much as sustaining. I feel like I am usually spiritually dry with random instances of extreme dampness, wherein I want to water the faith of others. Nothing is certain and yet there is certainty in the uncertain. This concerns us dude.
I suppose I could ramble on for quite a bit longer. I could include scriptural citations and endeavour to formulate a sermon whose 'gospel' would help me find a hand-hold to climb out of this chaotic well. I think at the moment, however, I would rather find a blanket and attempt to soothe myself back to sleep through warmth. To that I, I shall leave you ... if you for some reason are still reading ... with the lyrics to a song from Dylan's latest album. It's fantabulous. It's definetly sermoninable. Phrases stick in my head and offer brief moments of clarity. So ... here it be and there I go. PS: Italicized phrases are ones with which I can't think of a clearer or more immanent way of relating.
Bob Dylan
When The Deal Goes Down
In the still of the night, in the world's ancient light
Where wisdom grows up in strife
My bewildered brain, toils in vain
Through the darkness on the pathways of life
Each invisible prayer is like a cloud in the air
Tomorrow keeps turning around
We live and we die, we know not why
But I'll be with you when the deal goes down
We eat and we drink, we feel and we think
Far down the street we stray
I laugh and I cry and I'm haunted by
Things I never meant nor wished to say
The midnight rain follows the train
We all wear the same thorny crown
Soul to soul, our shadows roll
And I'll be with you when the deal goes down
Well, the moon gives light and it shines by night
When I scarcely feel the glow
We learn to live and then we forgive
O'r the road we're bound to go
More frailer than the flowers, these precious hours
That keep us so tightly bound
You come to my eyes like a vision from the skies
And I'll be with you when the deal goes down
Well, I picked up a rose and it poked through my clothes
I followed the winding stream
I heard the deafening noise, I felt transient joys
I know they're not what they seem
In this earthly domain, full of disappointment and pain
You'll never see me frown
I owe my heart to you, and that's sayin' it true
And I'll be with you when the deal goes down
Today I was working on removing some plant matter from some mesh netting. I'm pretty sure that the overall intent of the 'project' was to get the larger pieces out (leaves, vines, etc). However I was sitting on the porch, with this gigantic piece of netting in my lap, fiddling with every little tendril of planet matter that had wound itself around the netting. These things were miniscule. They were so hard to notice and yet here I was expending all my mental and physical effort to get them removed. The struggle within was killing me. On the one hand, I was almost proud to have this attention to detail as part of my personality. On the other hand, I knew that overall this was a lost cause. The netting was going to be reused for the same function. New tendrils were going to wind themselves into the netting again. I wasn't even removing all of them (my eyes would fail to notice the occasional two or three).
I didn't know if I was going this anal retentive 'cleaning' out of some sort of personal pride or out of spite against Sarah who didn't really want to due such an indepth purge. Maybe she didn't feel the need. Maybe she just didn't want to put forth the effort. Whatever the case ... the inner dichotemy was killing me. I felt a lot like Dr. Kevin Casey (Michael J. Fox) from Scrubs. I felt like I suppose a lot of people who suffer from Obsessive Compulsive Disorder feel like. I wanted to stop, but couldn't. I didn't even know if I wanted someone to come out and try to stop me. On the one hand, I felt largely like Michael J. Fox's character ... that this was a low moment and no-one was suppose to see this. Then again, I am blogging about it. On the other hand, I had this theory that if someone else were to point out the foolishness and futility of my current mode of behavior, I would accept their viewpoint as 'enlightened' and thereby quit my pursuit.
This in turn, led me into another series of inner thinking about why the viewpoints I lend credibility to, change over time. Sometimes I take the word of someone who is experiencing something, as highly valuable. Eg: I'm suffering from bankrupcy so I know the value of a dollar and can offer advice on how to help you stretch yours. On the other hand, in this case, I found myself waiting patiently for the viewpoint of someone from the outside environment to say what their viewpoint was. This viewpoint would then be taken as credible for it could account for situational ingredients and behaviorisms that could not be seen by the person (namely me) within the scenario due to whatever emotional or mental clouds had been kicked up in the situational dust. Again ... the dichotemy was killing me.
I suppose it's all indicative of something, although I'm not sure what. Lately in life, there's been this understanding amongst Sarah, myself, our friends, our family members, and others in the communal groups we share, that we're about to leave a mode of living and enter a slightly differing one. Everyone, myself included, wants to postulate on what will happen next. Have I been accepted to any graduate schools? Are you sure you want to pursue pastoral service? Where are you going to live? What is Sarah going to do? Are you going to have a job? When are kids in the picture? None of these questions realy has a certain answer, or even a certain launching point from which to begin the quest for an answer. And dammit that is frustrating.
My applications for grad. school aren't yet completed. Different institutions require different requirements. Some want one transcript. Others two. Some want one essay. Others want a customized one for their own school, suited to the questions specific to them. Some schools want 3 references. Others want 7. Some schools have no fee for an application. Others want $50. Between my varying availabilities of time and effort ... this task is much more daunting then I think others realize. Although the possibility does exist in this instance, that ... I'm just being a lazy excuse-making punk. I dunno. But without a degree of certainty regarding my final destination I can't pour my full effort into the other questions that need resolution. I haven't actually graduated yet. I'm still on my last leg of classes. I haven't gotten an answer about where we're going. Everything feels like the last few lyrics of the Smashing Pumpkins' song "Spaced" (From Pisces Iscariot if you're interested)
I was born whole
Fractured, divided, shattered into a billion fragments
A million piece puzzle
A million piece jigsaw puzzle with no this, and no that
I find myself thinking and speaking in grand sweeping statements. Everything is this. Nothing is that. I always want to do this. You never want to do that. These statements don't really help in the determination of what my larger life puzzle looks like. Nor do they help in the interpersonal dialogue between Sarah and myself or between myself and anyone else. I suppose in the psychological interpretation of a faith relationship, they don't really help in the dialogue of prayer either. I do have faith that there is some sort of way in which I can speak to the divine and in turn the divine can speak to me through these larger sweeping statements. But I have also become increasingly interested in the ways we form conceptual pictures about ourselves and our faith lives ... and in that respect this conceptual faith painting isn't going to get any clearer if I keep using a larger brush of absolutism to try and draw out a scenario.
I feel schizophrenic. I feel like I alone have an understanding of where it is I want my mind to go, my life to head, my words to speak, my faith to grow. I feel like no-one else does. I feel like there are a million different metaphors, paint brushes, colors, mediums, for me to start describing this final destination and that no-one else can formulate the picture suitably for my roadmapping needs. When I begin to compose this picture with one set of tools, my mind is simultaneously jumping to another set of tools, noticing how in a particular circumstance or point of view that other set would be better suited to the task of composition. I can't find a moment of conceptual peace. I rarely sleep. My diet isn't nourishing so much as sustaining. I feel like I am usually spiritually dry with random instances of extreme dampness, wherein I want to water the faith of others. Nothing is certain and yet there is certainty in the uncertain. This concerns us dude.
I suppose I could ramble on for quite a bit longer. I could include scriptural citations and endeavour to formulate a sermon whose 'gospel' would help me find a hand-hold to climb out of this chaotic well. I think at the moment, however, I would rather find a blanket and attempt to soothe myself back to sleep through warmth. To that I, I shall leave you ... if you for some reason are still reading ... with the lyrics to a song from Dylan's latest album. It's fantabulous. It's definetly sermoninable. Phrases stick in my head and offer brief moments of clarity. So ... here it be and there I go. PS: Italicized phrases are ones with which I can't think of a clearer or more immanent way of relating.
Bob Dylan
When The Deal Goes Down
In the still of the night, in the world's ancient light
Where wisdom grows up in strife
My bewildered brain, toils in vain
Through the darkness on the pathways of life
Each invisible prayer is like a cloud in the air
Tomorrow keeps turning around
We live and we die, we know not why
But I'll be with you when the deal goes down
We eat and we drink, we feel and we think
Far down the street we stray
I laugh and I cry and I'm haunted by
Things I never meant nor wished to say
The midnight rain follows the train
We all wear the same thorny crown
Soul to soul, our shadows roll
And I'll be with you when the deal goes down
Well, the moon gives light and it shines by night
When I scarcely feel the glow
We learn to live and then we forgive
O'r the road we're bound to go
More frailer than the flowers, these precious hours
That keep us so tightly bound
You come to my eyes like a vision from the skies
And I'll be with you when the deal goes down
Well, I picked up a rose and it poked through my clothes
I followed the winding stream
I heard the deafening noise, I felt transient joys
I know they're not what they seem
In this earthly domain, full of disappointment and pain
You'll never see me frown
I owe my heart to you, and that's sayin' it true
And I'll be with you when the deal goes down