Inadequate Words

I'm sitting in my dorm room in Iowa, tired, sore and sweating. With the help of my father and several friends, my stuff has all made it into Hildenbrand Hall and I start Resident Advisor training tomorrow. It's crazy to realize that four days ago I was in another country, continent, and hemisphere. Everything that's happened since landing in America has been a blur. I feel disconnected, like a brainless robot performing tasks but unable to truly think or feel.

One of my family members asked me the other day if Swaziland had been an unbelievable experience. The truth is that it wasn't unbelievable, not at all. I have never felt anything so incredibly real as I did during the few weeks I spent in Swaziland, I have never felt so alive. The experience that's unbelievable is returning to America, returning to a place that I once called home and realizing that my heart is still in the rolling hills and mountains of a country far away. What's unbelievable is waking up each morning ready to spend the day at a carepoint with smiling, wonderful children and realizing that it will be at least another year until I can be in their presence again. What's unbelievable is spending my time away from my loving and fantastically supportive teammates who, in a matter of hours, became my family. What's unbelievable is coming into a world where we complain about five extra minutes in traffic, a broken air conditioner, hair in the sink, too much grease on food and a million other minute details. Swaziland was real. The shock of America is what's unbelievable.

As I adjust to existing again in my native land I feel, as my friend and teammate Sierra would say, like I'm on "The Struggle Bus." Friends and family members alike have been asking me countless questions about my experience in Swaziland and as I recount story after story to them I realize how incredibly inadequate my words are. I can describe my horror and pain witnessing the children's ward of the hospital we visited, I can describe the landscape and how many children came to the carepoint barefoot, some traveling three or four miles on roads of dust and rocks. I can describe the crumbling huts made out of branches and mud that many children come home to with no dinner on the table or parents waiting to care for their needs. I can describe so much of the pain and suffering I witnessed and experienced alongside the people of Swaziland but it's inadequate to just tell these stories without being able to describe the unspeakable joy and peace that permeated the entire country and its people.

I don't know how to describe in words the source of the light that shone out of the children of Ludlati Carepoint. I don't know how to explain their gratitude and contentment despite the grave odds they face. I don't know how to explain their resilience, their kindness, their bravery, loyalty, or beauty. I don't know how to convey to people how inexplicably happy these children are, how blessed they are to be able to survive on God's grace alone and be constantly thankful for even the smallest blessings. I can't explain how much peace I felt holding little Danele against my chest, or the excitement of a chat with the animated Colile or how my heart shattered into a million pieces as sweet Kholiwe called out to me, "I will pray for you all year!" as I walked towards the van on our last day.

My words are inadequate and that's hard. I want so badly to tell everyone the stories of my trip but nothing I describe can truly bring that place justice. I am on The Struggle Bus and don't know if I will ever be getting off. I can only take peace in the fact that while my words are inadequate, God's love for these children is not. I rejoice in the fact that while so much about the lives of these kids is broken, their spirit remains strong. They are an indescribable blessing that I can only make feeble attempts to put into words.

Tomorrow Came Way Too Fast

I am flying to Swaziland tomorrow and I'll admit it, I'm slightly terrified. I've been playing it cool all this time thinking, "I've done long flights and a foreign country before. This is no big deal!"Honestly, I think that the only reason I felt that way was because I couldn't believe that I was actually going to Swaziland. Getting to go on this trip was such a crazy blur of events that were so incredible I couldn't even grasp it all. I kept saying, "I'm going to Africa this summer!" But, it was just talk, just a concept, too amazing to be a reality. It feels like forever ago when I was riding home from Iowa for spring break and got a text from one of my friends who saw on Facebook that my sister had won a t-shirt contest. That moment of pure joy and gratitude put me into a kind of blissful shock and today I woke up and realized that this crazy "leaving tomorrow" thing came way too fast.

I feel unprepared even though I've checked and double checked that I had everything I needed for this trip. I've crossed everything off my list but no matter how much I reassure myself that I've got everything down, I can't help but be completely positive that I don't have anything down at all.

But when I stop and really think about that, I realize that it's going to be okay to be unprepared. Yes, I undoubtedly will forget something, maybe even something important, but it's okay because it's going to work out for the best. The beautiful and terrifying thing about all of this is that I don't know what "for the best" is. I don't know what to expect and that's mortifying but spectacular too. I used to say that this was no big deal, but it is. Going on a mission trip to Swaziland is a big deal, but it's also the right deal. It's a deal that I suddenly found my heart fully committed to before I ever knew that there was a crazy t-shirt contest in store for me. This is what I am supposed to be doing. Yes, I cant shake the feelings of nervousness, terror, feeling unprepared, and a thousand other things that are haunting me right now, but I also can't shake the overwhelming knowledge that this is beautifully and inexplicably right.

Tomorrow is happening. It's going to be here before I can blink an eye and I'm not ready, not at all. But  even with all the time in the world to spend thinking and preparing, I still never would be. All I can keep telling myself is that the fear, the nerves, and everything else is okay. I've never been in this alone.

What Do I Absolutely Need?

Today is Saturday and I just finished cramming most of what I need to survive in a third-world country for nearly two weeks in a backpack. It's a large backpack, but still, a backpack. I am leaving for Swaziland on Tuesday morning. Well, sort of. First my team has to get all of our bags loaded in a van, then drive to Chicago, then fly to Atlanta, then catch tremendously long flight to Johannesburg, South Africa and then, finally, drive the five hours to Swaziland.

I've never thought of myself as a particularly heavy packer. I know girls who go through three outfits a day. I only need one, thank you very much! I don't straighten, curl, or even blow dry my hair. I wear a minimal amount of makeup if I wear any at all. I always try to pack just what I absolutely need. But, as it turned out this time, what I absolutely needed wasn't able to be zipped closed in my bag. I tried rearranging again and again to no avail. I simply had too much stuff.

I was in a predicament. Most of this stuff was just what our team leader had instructed us to pack. But, clearly, something had to go!

"Okay," I thought, "What do I get rid of when I have everything I am supposed to have?"

I stared down into the chaotic tumble of travel items. The first thing that caught my attention was the mini pillow and blanket. These were not huge items. It wasn't like I was bringing a full sized pillow and a comforter, but did I really need both for the plane? No. The blanket could be folded to make a pillow if I needed it and I already had two sweatshirts with me. So, just like that, a surprisingly large chunk of space appeared.

Next came the shoes. Did I really need a pair for the carepoint, church, and the plane? No. The shoes I wore on the plane could very easily double as church shoes, so I chucked the shoes I had carefully matched with my dress for church into a pile in the corner.

I got rid of some skirts, t-shirts, pairs of socks, bras, and limited myself to one pair of jeans (sorry if that horrifies anyone). Eventually, the bag zipped and honestly, I am pretty sure that I am still over-prepared in the wipe, tissue, snack, medication, hand sanitizer, toothpaste, and soap department.

It's funny how much I still have even after stripping away nearly a quarter of what I was sure I needed. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised at all if I got rid of a few more things before I leave on Tuesday!

Grieving to Gratitude: How Thankfulness Changed My Life

            In my lifetime, I’ve heard more than a few rumors about myself. People have spread falsehoods about my family life, my friendships, my romantic relationships and more. I thought these rumors would end after high school but they are just as prevalent now, in college, as ever before. The most recent rumor I heard about myself is that I’m always happy. Apparently, I never stop smiling, am always in a good mood, and practically radiate positivity. Although this rumor is flattering, nothing could be farther from the truth. I am not always smiling and am most definitely not in some kind of eternally good mood. I get angry, sad, and feel pain far more often than most people seem to realize. I have my bad days just like everyone else. I’m human, not a Barbie doll with a smile plastered on its face.

            “You’re so lucky to have such a positive disposition. You can always find the good in every situation,” one of my friends informed me a few weeks ago. Yes, I try to find the good in every situation and yes, I tend to have a positive disposition but it’s not luck that made me this way. Life didn’t just coincidently grant me with a positive attitude. I wasn’t born an infinitely happy miracle baby. As a young adult, I do feel blessed to have a positive spirit but I was not always this way, I was not always able to find good in my life. No, I am not lucky to be positive. It was not by chance, but by choice, that I came to accept the gift of gratitude for my life.

            In the summer of 2010 I was miserable. I spent as much time as I possibly could in my bed sleeping because living was a nightmare. Every night before I fell asleep, I prayed to God that I wouldn’t wake up in the morning. I asked Him to save me from this excruciating existence and every morning I opened my eyes in despair and anger realizing that God expected me to make it through another day. I thought He was trying to torture me and I despised Him for it.

 I was lonely all the time. Even when I was around other people, I felt completely isolated in my own mind. I dreaded every breath I had to take and looked forward to nothing except sleep.

            On one particularly horrible day, within a two-hour time period, I found out that the boy I was in a relationship with at the time was going to move away because he had gotten a scholarship to a school across the country and also that my mother was moving out of the house. When I got the news about my boyfriend, I cried uncontrollably for over an hour. My stomach ached so badly it seemed like a piece of lead must have been lodged inside of it. Each beat of my heart felt like a baseball was being pitched straight at my ribcage. Just when I had pulled myself together, I got the news about my mom. This time I didn’t cry, not even a little. I went numb and stayed numb for months.

            Then, one day, about three weeks before I started college, I decided I’d write in my journal. I felt so dull that I could only manage to put one sentence down: “I’m thankful that I have food on my plate.” I recall staring down at those words for several minutes in shock. Did I really have something to be thankful for in my miserable existence?

            The next day I wrote in my journal once more. Again, only one sentence and it said, “I’m thankful for waking up feeling better than when I went to sleep.” Like the day before, I stared down at the words I had written hardly believing they were my own. I wasn’t sure why I had said that, after all I always looked forward to sleep and dreaded waking up. I was intrigued by what I was writing and so I decided to continue. Everyday I sat down with my journal, stopped thinking, and wrote a sentence. I discovered that I was thankful for friends, laughter, technology, beauty in nature, giving and receiving love, family, patience, new opportunities, and more. Writing down a sentence of gratitude became so much of a habit that even on my bad days I found something to put down. It became a game to me, and I wasn’t about to let any negative emotion keep me from winning.

            “I’m thankful for tears because they mean I have something to lose,” I wrote one day. Another day I wrote, “I’m thankful for the pain in my heart because it means I’m alive.” I even went as far as to be thankful for the people who had made me angry because without them I would have never learned how to forgive.

            For months, I wrote down one thing I was thankful for every day no matter how tiny or silly it seemed. I wrote when I was happy, sad, tired, angry, desperate, and excited. Then, one day, I looked down at my journal and discovered words that I never, even in my wildest dreams, thought could come from me. I had written, “I am so incredibly thankful for my life.”

And the amazing thing was that beyond just seeing those words on paper, I actually felt it. I felt so grateful to be living and so thankful that I had woken up all of those mornings I had begged God not to let me. I was thankful to exist, to be a walking, talking, breathing, loving, being.

Last August, I went through a break-up with the same boyfriend who had moved away the year before. I can’t lie and say it was easy or that I handled it even remotely well. I wasn’t smiling or feeling positive. In fact, I was doing quite the opposite. However, there are two journal entries during that time that stand out to me. The first one is from the day we broke up and it says, “I am thankful for love and for life and for the people who have shaped me.” The second entry is from the day I said goodbye to him because I was heading off to another semester of college and it says, “I am thankful for you.”

Those were two of the most painful days I’d had since my misery summer of 2010. I felt completely heavy and depressed. If I was smiling, it was forced.

I’ve had plenty of terrible days since then. I’ve suffered. I’ve felt sad and hurt for dozens of reasons. I’ve been so venomously angry that I’m almost ashamed to talk about it. Despite what many of my friends think, I am not always happy or positive, and I’m certainly not always smiling. But, I am always thankful.

Now, instead of opening my eyes in despair each morning, I open them in anticipation. Instead of waking up grieving over the torturous life God is making me go through, I wake up grateful to be able to live the life He has blessed me with. My circumstances don’t always provide me with an easy path to happiness. I am not lucky. I am simply thankful everyday for whatever comes my way, and that has made all the difference.

Cancer-Based Love

I am usually a pretty friendly person. I make an effort to be nice to everyone and I am mostly successful. I try to love and not judge, but sometimes, as much as I hate to admit it, there are people who just grate on my nerves.

Not long ago I met a man who, to be quite honest, drove me a little insane. I noticed him on the first day of one of my courses at school. He was an older gentleman, and by older I mean older for college. He was probably around fifty and he liked to talk, a lot. Whenever the teacher explained anything, he always had a comment to make or a story to tell that somehow, in his brain at least, related to what we were studying. Every day we heard story after story about his life, and don't get me wrong, they weren't bad stories I just didn't want to hear about them during class time. This gentleman was not in the least bit unintelligent, however, I began to feel agitated every time he opened his mouth because I knew something longwinded would come out. Even when his comments were helpful to my understanding of the subject matter, my annoyance far out-shadowed my thankfulness.

One day, I noticed my class seemed strangely quiet. I scanned the room and unsurprisingly the gentleman wasn't there. I felt a little thrill. For once, I wouldn't have to listen to those stories! The next day, the gentleman didn't return. Nor did he come on the following day or for the rest of the week. I began to feel hopeful that maybe he had dropped the class. The class discussions had changed quite a bit and I can't say I minded that he was no longer there to dominate them.

This Monday, my teacher announced to the whole class that the gentleman had officially dropped the course. I wasn't sad. I wasn't disappointed. I had secretly been hoping for this. But then, my teacher told us why.

The gentleman had cancer and would be needing treatment and operations right away.

And suddenly, I couldn't breathe. I felt like an entire elephant family had just planted itself on my chest. My whole body ached and I thought my heart might explode out of my ribcage and spray on every person in the room.

I had always considered myself a nice person. I had always thought that I tried to love everyone.

But I hadn't succeeded this time. I hadn't loved this fellow at all. Even when he was kind to me and had helpful advice, I couldn't get past my own judgement to listen to it. I had rejoiced in knowing I wouldn't have to deal with him in class anymore.

This gentleman has cancer. This gentleman that I didn't love has cancer and I was happy to have him gone. Can I still call myself a nice person?

No. I can't really say that about myself anymore. Or, more accurately, I can't call myself perfect. I can only call myself human and infinitely flawed.

The problem is that I could only see as far as my limited perception. I could only see my annoyance. I could only understand my frustration.

"If I had only known, I would have responded differently. If I had only known, I wouldn't have felt so annoyed, I would have just loved."

Those were my thoughts after initially hearing the news. Yet, I can see now how infinitely flawed those thoughts are too.

If you only love someone when you find out they are suffering, it's a weak love, a guilty love, a conditional love. That's not the kind of love God asks for and it's not the kind of love I am okay with giving anymore. God asks us to love our neighbor as ourself. He doesn't say love your neighbor if you find out your neighbor has cancer. He doesn't even ask us to love our neighbor because the neighbor might have cancer. God says to love your neighbor. That's it. No questions asked. No conditions. Just love him.

The most beautiful and terrible thing about being human is that you can't ever really know what's going on inside of someone else. You can't ever fully understand the journey that other people have traveled on to get to where they are. You can only see them as they are. And if you judge everyone by your first impression, never truly understanding the intricacy of the joy and pain that knits all of humanity together, you miss out on one of the most spectacular commandments: unconditional love.

I can't go back and change my actions or my attitude toward this gentleman. I can only pray for his life and continue on with my own having learned something of infinite value.

I know now that I can't go on loving in conditions. I can't go on judging first and loving later. I have to love first, and love unconditionally because if I do that, the judgements I would have made in my lack of love, will no longer exist.

If there's anything I want to teach the world from my unfortunate mistake this time, it's just to love your neighbor, always. And I don't mean love your neighbor because you never know if he might have cancer, I mean to love your neighbor unconditionally. Because, in the end your love for your neighbor shouldn't depend on if he has cancer or not.

What Do We Really Deserve?

Have you ever had something happen to you that you felt like you didn't deserve? Has anyone ever treated you poorly without provocation or have you ever been given something extraordinary that you didn't feel like you earned in the slightest?

The idea of deserving is interesting to me. When we do good things do we deserve to have the same amount of good repaid back to us? When we mess up do we deserve to get our own lives messed up? What we do we really deserve and who decides it?

A few weeks ago my friend made a comment about a woman who got an abortion. She said, "Well we all know where she's going. She'll be getting what she deserves."

Those words shocked me. But what shocked me even more was the certainty with which she said this. In her mind, the woman who got an abortion was, without a doubt,  going to hell. She was getting what she deserved. That's it. End of story.

But is that really it? Does that have to be the end? Would Jesus have looked at that woman who got an abortion and said, "What you did was terrible. Good thing you're going to get what you deserve!" Would Jesus have left it at that? Or, would He have lifted her up, pointed her to his Father, and forgiven her? 

The truth is, Jesus died just as much for my white lies as He did for that woman who got an abortion. What if we all got what we really deserved? What if Jesus looked down on all of us with no compassion and said, "Well I sure know where you're all going!" and walked away without looking back.

What would that mean for my life? What would that mean for yours? What if we all truly got the punishment we deserve?

I can only be grateful that the story doesn't have to go like that. It doesn't have to go like that for me or for you or for that woman who got the abortion. I can only be grateful for compassion, for forgiveness, for love. I can only be grateful that we, as humans, have been given the capability to embody these things, even if we must do it in a flawed and infinitely imperfect way.

Not a single person on this earth is entitled to life. Life is a blessing. Each minute of it is a blessing and you can spend it rejoicing in someone's iniquity, or you can show that person forgiveness, you can show that person the light of God.

Before you comment on what someone else deserves, remember what you also deserve, and remember who took the punishment for you.

The Greatest Blessing You Never Asked For

Why me?

How many times have you spoken that phrase or screamed it inside your head? I've lost count. Up until a few months ago those words were stuck in my heart by the superglue of misery. In high school, they were as much apart of me as breathing was. Every day, I found something wrong with my life and would mutter to myself, "Why me? Why is all of this happening to me?"

I said this when the boy who told me he loved me had a summer fling with another girl, I said this when I lost my best friend, I said this when my parents told me they were splitting up, I said this when I was accused of being a bully and when I got arthritis in my toes at age seventeen. I said this when I sprained my knee, when loved ones passed away, when the boyfriend I'd been in love with for years broke up with me, and pretty much any time my life wasn't going just how I wanted it to.

"Why me, why me, why me?" I'd repeat over and over in my head.

But lately I've been thinking, why not me? Why should any of this not have happened to me. Where would my life be if everything had gone exactly how I wanted it to during the time of my struggle? 

Not here. That's the answer. I wouldn't be here. I wouldn't be in the amazing place I am. I wouldn't be writing this blog or going to Africa if I still had a boyfriend to devote my time to over the summer. I wouldn't be nearly as interested in serving others if I hadn't first been accused of being a bully. I wouldn't know half as much as I do now if even one of those things hadn't happened to me. 

I asked, "Why me?" because I could only see as far as my own head. I couldn't fathom that there was a bigger plan for my life. I only knew my plan and my desires. I was looking at the world through clouded eyes, through flawed eyes, through human eyes.

But I know now, that there's a bigger picture and if I got to choose everything that happened in my life, I would never really learn or accomplish anything. I would have nothing to be thankful for because I'd feel entitled to everything. Life would not be a gift. Nothing would be a blessing.

There is something incredible about not getting what you want. There is something fantastic about understanding that you cannot control every circumstance. There is something amazing about realizing that every challenge, every struggle, every heartbreak, could be the greatest blessing you never asked for.

I always used to think that the pain I went through would destroy me. I thought it was going to break me and never realized the amazing place it could take me.

What if we all said "Why me?" for every beautiful thing that happened to us instead of every struggle? What we asked God how we could be so lucky to have so many moments of sheer happiness? What if we asked why we had too many blessings to count instead of why we had to deal with a few moments of hurt? 

I am serving in Africa this summer because of incredible circumstances, and incredible doesn't even begin to describe it. How can this be happening? How can I be so lucky? What were the odds of my sister winning a t-shirt contest? Why am I so blessed? 

Why me?