Do you know that I love you?

"You cannot produce trust, just as you cannot “do” humility. It either is or is not. Trust is the fruit of a relationship in which you know you are loved. Because you do not know that I love you, you cannot trust me."

~ The Shack, by WM. Paul Young.

The Only Way Out is In

To study God--to really study God or spend time with him--is to study one's self.

I have seen a counsellor for years. I'll often bring up my complaints of God with my counsellor and she never lets the conversation stay there. She always brings it back to me, my life now and my childhood. Through this I've learned countless things, things that--if I look at them closely--reveal my belief or lack thereof in God. The choices I make each day, the panic I feel, the anger I harbour at life and people: all of it points to God.

It is odd--and maddening--for me to hear Christians criticize or look down upon Psychology. How can you criticize the practice of something that is so undeniably connected to who God is? He created us, our minds, our hearts and our emotions. So why would the self-study of us be a bad thing?

Because it's painful.

Finding out what you really believe can be awful. Uncovering who you really are is worse. But, as someone I know always says, "the only way out is in."

Nothing else in my life has come close to revealing more about God than psychology has. Seeing a counsellor, investigating the pain deep down, seeing life-experiences for what they really are--these things point me to God.

Now I'll be honest: they also point me away from Him. But, after running fast and long away and feeling worse and worse, I am forced to run back.

Now this takes much more than me...thinking. It takes others. There are a handful of people in my life that keep me 'in' - fighting for more. They keep me running and ask me questions I couldn't dream of posing on my own. Sure - they make me want to take boxing lessons too, but it's for my own good and ultimately for my world's own good. But just like the only way out, I also have to let them in.

I used to be jealous of people that don't seem to need any deep help. You know who they are. They don't have big questions and have no need for big answers.

But now I know that they are actually missing out.

Where You Are

If you can be unhappy anywhere, can you be happy anywhere?

My Insides Are Awake

Your vision will become clear only when you look into your heart. Who looks outside, dreams. Who looks inside, awakens.

- Carl Jung

Why So Ironic?

I read an article in Relevant Magazine recently on the nature of our generation being uncharacteristically sarcastic and culturally ironic:

"There are reasons for our embrace of irony.  We grew up in a world where earnestness failed us.  Cold Wars were waged very sincerely, ideologies were bandied about with the best of intentions.  Our parents married and divorced in all earnestness, and wide swaths of American homes were devastated by the sort of domestic disharmony that shattered any pretension of white-picket-fence-perfection.  Meanwhile, we grew up in a constant flux of advertising and brand messaging.  The conglomerates cornered the markets, the ad agencies figured us out and MTV sucked our souls dry.  But we also became savvy, and with the Internet and all the wiki-democratization it offered, it became easier to see through the charades of various culture industries and power-wielding hegemonies.  Flaws were exposed, seedy schemes revealed amid the formerly shrouded machinations of "the man."  Nothing was sacred anymore, and all was ridiculous." - by Brett McCracken, The Rise of the Ironic Class, Relevant Magazine, May-June 2009

Waiting 'til it hurts

I've been having problems with my back for the past two years.  Initiated by years of computer work and stress, the pain can often get to the point where I am nauseous and have a headache that simply won't go away.

The funny thing is that I know the solution: do my stretches regularly and exercise to strengthen my core.  

But I wait.  I don't do my stretches or strengthen my core.  I live counting on the fact that I feel good now, so I'll feel good later.  When the pain comes, I then get frustrated and angry, wondering why I am 'chosen' the be the one in so much pain.   

I'd like to say that my back pain is the only case of this controlled ignorant invincibility.  It isn't.

I've realized lately that, in so many things, I change only when it hurts.  I get up in the morning, make my coffee, and then choose to watch TV during breakfast over reading my bible because 'I'm okay today'.  I then work all day, never stopping to pray or rest to hear God because today is a good day and I 'don't need him' or am 'okay on my own.'

Then I break.  It's been building the whole time--pangs of fear, pride, anger or whatever, that show up throughout each hour. And it wasn't painful, so I didn't notice it, never mind talk to God about it.  

I'm realizing that that there are prompts in my day that I ignore: prompts that say "all is not well in this moment."  I need to listen to those prompts because that is God in me saying, "hey, you need me now....not just later."  

It's time to do those stretches now, to strengthen my core when it doesn't hurt, no matter how inconvenient it feels at the time.  Sure, that doesn't mean I can avoid pain altogether.  But it does mean that God is in everything, trying to give me what I need in every instance, even when I ignore him.

I know this is a lesson I'll spend the rest of my life trying to learn.

Branding Alberta

This must've been a fun, but hard, branding project:

I think it is spot on.  The orange colour reminds me of the golden wheat fields and somehow fits Alberta's western flair.  The script is active, yet not too feminine for such a stereotypically masculine province.  And the tagline is so true to the spirit of Albertan life.  In classic "go big or go home" gusto, the provincial government is spending $25 million dollars for the project.  

As a former Calgarian, I just might salute the initiative and go put on my cowboy hat.