A Switch

It has been quite the month, to say the least.

Today I got to sleep in...way in, and it was wonderful. This whole past week I have been dead tired, and I mentioned this to a friend who told me, "Well, Kate, you're emotionally exhausted."

Emotionally exhausted. I guess that makes sense.


If I were writing this a week ago, Jehovah only knows how riddled it would have been with emotion, pain, frustration and anger. However, like I said, I got to sleep in today.

It's always amazes me, no matter how many times I go through something and the cycle happens the same way, that I forget how I work. I mean no matter what, I seem to forget. I forget that when I am in something, I am in it: I feel it in my bones. And I forget that after I buckle down and let emotions run their course, I am the most logical person alive.

I'd like to get this tattooed on my forearm so next I am in the middle of the bone-breaking emotional shit storm (there really is no other term, sorry), I will look down and remember, "Okay. I've done this before. I've gone through this before. I'm going to be more than okay. In fact, according to this arm tattoo, I will be better and walk into more of what God has for me."

Now, I am not going to do this. I would like, despite my life pattern, a real job someday. And I think the title "Poem to Read During Emotional Shit Storm" is too long for a arm tattoo. So, I go to God:
Me: God?
G: Yes?
Me: Will you help me remember I am not a weak little flower next time something like this happens? Actually, just don't let this happen again.
G: I tell you all the time who you are and who you are not.
Me: Okay. Just tell me I'm going to be okay.
G: You're going to be more than fine, Kate.
Me: Why can't I see that right now, G? (yes, I call God 'g'. we tight)
G: Because you're too busy staring at yourself.
Me: Oh snap.
G: Yup.

The reality is, everything changes when your perspective changes. At least that's how it is for me. When I can stop looking down, focusing on the ground, and start looking up and around, I see all there is for me HERE and NOW. It's so freeing. So freeing. When I ask God to show me truth (enter logical Katie here) and commit to believing His truth, it's like the weight and even pain of my situation is lifted.

The reality is, 90% of my life is perspective. Right now, for the first time in 24 years, my future is sealed off. All I have is right now and the people around me. God is growing in me an intolerance for broken integrity, a desire for contentment and the ability to live in the Kingdom of God right here and now. Now, that's all a work in progress...especially living in the Kingdom each moment.

The truth: no one is perfect, but we can love the Perfect One. This, in my eyes, frees us from hypocrisy. Life is good and life is hard, a butterfly garden and a shit storm. We get to choose how it shapes us and what me make of it.


Here's to switching our perspectives,

K
...reading The Sermon on the Mount.