Cooking

I really like to cook.

Last night I cooked my first "home by myself for 5 weeks" meal. Up until now I've mostly been eating leftovers and frozen things (and lots of cereal). I made spaghetti, which looked like this at one point:
The funny thing is, I've intended to cook something every night for the last week, but I always ended up pulling something out of the freezer, even though I knew whatever I made would taste better. But I realized as I was cutting vegetables that I've been more than just lazy. I realized that I've actually been avoiding it.

Cooking by yourself is lonely.

My ex-girlfriend Jackie and I used to cook together a lot. We'd try new recipes and experiment with them, it was always fun.

I think it's the little, everyday things that can feel the most powerfully lonely. For the first time in my life I can truthfully say that I am settled and content with the circumstances of my life, singleness, wilderness, and all. But I really wish I had someone to cook with last night.

Easy or Meaningful?

Do you want your life to be easy, or do you want it to be meaningful?

As I was eating breakfast this morning it struck me that this is one of the most fundamentally important questions I think any person can answer. I think a lot of people go through life trying to avoid pain, trying to be happy, and trying to stay out of trouble. It makes sense when you put it that way, right? What's wrong with that?

I don't think there's anything wrong with those things in and of themselves, but I think that they suck as life goals. The problem is, you can chase happiness for years, try your hardest to avoid pain, but you won't be able to, and in the meantime you'll have missed out on a lot of wonderful things at best. At worst, you'll have made some very bad mistakes.

Anything worthwhile is difficult. Relationships take work. Big dreams require risk, and sometimes risk leads to "failure". But the funny thing is, if you determine once and for all that you're ok with pain, disappointment, and difficulty in pursuit of the meaningful and beautiful, you start to realize that the difficulties that go along with it aren't really so terrible. It's like taking a shot, it hurts a lot less of you accept that it's going to hurt and relax about it.

Some conversations are hard to have. Some decisions are hard to make. I'm not trying to make light of that. But hiding from those things, or trying to distract yourself from them, won't magically make them fade away. And while you're trying your hardest to avoid them, you hurt people, and you hurt yourself.

I want my life to mean something, and I'm willing to take some bruises if that's what it costs. What about you?

Hero Time

"Gaming in whatever form is my chance to right some wrongs about reality. I think I should have been a gruff ex-cop who smokes too much and wears a bandage over his knuckles, or a bestial bandit king who sacrifices himself to save the last druid, or an eccentric spymaster with too many secrets, or a terse Paladin who can’t admit he is painfully lonely or many more. What other pastime allows you this?

It was a revelation when I realized all these characters over the years were just facets of me wanting a little hero time. It makes me wonder how some people can stand to live their whole lives without being - just once- the guy (or the girl! justin) who saves the day."

Jay Watamaniuk

I read this quote in a developer blog recently and loved it. I feel like he managed to say something I've tried to get at before but never expressed quite this clearly. Stories are more than just entertainment. They are healthy. They feed us and keep us sane. They remind us that life will always be bigger than whatever we are experiencing in the moment. And while games offer the most obvious participation in a story, anyone who's ever stayed up till 3am reading a novel knows that you don't have to play a story to become a part of it.

I'm more aware of this than ever these days. I think that stories, my own and others, are keeping me sane these days, and I'm grateful.

Under the Snow

I've wanted to blog for a while, but I haven't had anything I really wanted to say. Life has been slow and quiet, which I've learned to appreciate more than I ever thought possible. I'd say the most significant and interesting thing I've observed in myself lately is that I'm not angry about the pace of my life anymore. I'm not grumbling about it, although I'm still fairly confused. It's funny when God works change in us, sometimes looking back it can seem like almost nothing has changed, aside from the disposition of our hearts...which is a wonderful reminder of what He really cares about.

But what has finally prompted me to start blogging again is the wonderful snowstorm we had here two days ago. I've found myself staring out of the window for long stretches of time lately, until the sunlight reflecting back into my eyes leaves me blurry eyed and happy. Here in the mountains we don't get gray snows, the clouds always lift and for days on end you can watch the slow accumulation of animal tracks across the lawn, and watch icicles melt one drop at a time.

Nature restores me. The night of the storm I set my alarm for 7:15am so I would be the first one to go out in the new snow (that was about as early as I could manage without being grumpy). It was frigid, my hands went completely numb from holding a camera into the wind, but I couldn't help it. Everything looks different under the snow.

Then I realized as I was walking that my backyard had become a good parallel for my life these days. It's quiet, and beautiful, and really very fragile. In the middle of winter it can seem endless and you want it to be spring so badly you can hardly breath. But snow melts quickly, and there will never be another snowfall like this one again, ever.



Right now, my life is like this, and I've fallen in love with it:

Amplifiers

My crazy week of feverish preparation for the Prayer Breakfast ended a few days ago, and after two lovely days of relaxing (and catching up on sleep) I'm feeling human again. The event came off quite well I think (at least the parts I was responsible for didn't have any issues) and it was incredibly rewarding and meaningful for me to be able to be a part of helping it happen. I might follow up with an entry or two on the event itself, but the biggest "take away" of the weekend had more to do with the people I spent time with. Specifically, I've been struck lately by how incredibly important the people we surround ourselves with are to what we ultimately make of our lives.

In the past when I've heard people talk about the importance of who you surround yourself with, they've usually focused on avoiding "the wrong people". But now more than ever I'm convinced that its far more important to focus on actively surrounding yourself with people who redefine "normal" for you in positive ways.

I think the people around us act like amplifiers. They pick up and magnify whatever spiritual frequency they're attuned to themselves. If it's negative, they amplify the negative voices/energy/whatever-you-want-to-call it that is being directed at you already, making it louder and more substantial. It gets harder to believe in yourself, in your dreams, in the possibility of progress. It gets harder to make good choices. I used to think that the important thing was to make sure you weren't surrounding yourself with those kinds of amplifiers.

But what I've learned from a long year and more of isolation and growth is that it isn't enough to not have negative reinforcement in our lives. We absolutely need people around us who stretch and challenge us if we want to reach for something more in our lives. This past weekend has shown me just how much I've quietly allowed myself to relax my expectations for my life, to become focused on the achievable at the expense of the truly worthwhile, and to allow myself to be intimidated out of some bigger dreams that scare me just as much as they excite me.

It's so incredibly easy to fall prey to the all too reasonable voices of doubt, caution, cynicism, and fear when we try to stand against them on our own. I think we need to see present examples of other people accomplishing large things, so that in the moments when we doubt ourselves we can draw some inspiration from what they're doing. I think we need to see other people succeeding at impossible things so that when we're tempted to settle for "good enough", we can push ourselves to believe for more.

So let me say "thank you" to all those who have amplified the voice of God in my life lately, whether you were aware of it or not (and most of you aren't). I hope I return the favor to you along the way.

If you've got Tedrepil's, I've got Rewansur's

Things have been too serious lately, and no one has posted any comments. So today is crazy day.

The last two security challenge words I had to type in to comment on other blogs have been "rewansur" and "tedrepil". So, your mission (I don't really care if you choose to accept it or not, damn it), is to respond to this post with your suggested definition for these two words, which I've decided to adopt. I'll pick my favorite and start using it obsessively, so you really want to get in on this.

Ok, go!

Also, this was me today:

Books Worth Dying For

Is a book worth dying for?

Perhaps a better question might be, “what makes a book worth dying for?”, since a long list of men and women throughout history, both famous and obscure, have died for a book. Looked at in a certain light, it seems profoundly irrational, or at least profoundly un-Darwinian, which is what makes it such an interesting question for me. For a long time I've been fascinated by certain uniquely human passions that are as difficult to describe scientifically as they are undeniably compelling. What is it about music that stirs us so powerfully? Why do we inhabit imagined worlds in stories and film so eagerly? And, getting back to my initial question, what makes a book worth dying for?

It seems to me there are two things that make people willing to die defending or disseminating a book: either the ideas it contains or a commitment to the universal right of other people to read it. The first is more obvious. People have often proven willing to die in defense of a compelling idea that gives their life meaning. But if you boil it down the book itself is really just the vessel for the idea. In most cases any vessel would suffice, as long as it preserved and spread that idea efficiently. The second is more elusive. Some few individuals who have died in defense of books seems to have been doing so more in defense of what access to that book represents than what it specifically says. Namely, freedom. Not just the freedom of the author to say what he or she will, but the freedom of every person to bring themselves face to face with challenging ideas on their own terms, to wrestle with them, to accept or reject them as they will, regardless of whether or not that process is convenient to those in power.

Taking it out of the philosophical realm:

I believe that 12 year olds in Quattar should be able to read cartoons and comics from America.

I believe high school students in Boise, Idaho should be able to read blogs and diaries written by their peers in Syria.

I believe that citizens in Myanmar should be able to read CNN and BBC, even if those networks are reporting unfavorably on the abuses their government keeps inflicting on them.

I believe that farmers in the Chinese heartland should be free to carry on an email dialog with their counterparts in France without fear of the government punishing them for the tone of their questions.

On October 6th in 1536, William Tyndale was publicly strangled and then burned at the stake for insisting that every man, woman, and child in England had the right to read the bible in their own language, even as King Henry VIII was fighting viciously to consolidate religious control in his own hands. In high school I was taught that Tyndale was a martyr because he died in defense of the bible. That is certainly true. But I believe Tyndale would deserve that title if he had died defending the people's right to read a one act comedic play. When it becomes a question of the freedom of information and expression, either every book becomes one worth dying for, or none of them are.

The Next 100 Days

President To Face Down Monster Attack, Own Demons In Action-Packed Schedule

I think it's really cool of the White House to finally give us a more detailed look at what President Obama will be tackling within the next 100 days. It's comforting to know that when disaster strikes, he'll be ready.

Vision

It's been a very full and intense week. I've grown a lot.

It's always strange to look back and realize how inherently selfish one's perspective had become. I've been realizing over the past few days that most of my sense of disorientation, lack of purpose, even panic lately is due largely to the fact that my vision had imperceptibly narrowed. Everything I was focusing on related to my own life. It was all important and significant stuff (it always is), but it wasn't enough.

I'm dreaming bigger dreams at the moment. I've been pushing out a frighteningly big idea for a non-profit digital publishing enterprise. I don't want to talk specifics yet because it's such a fresh idea, but it's single-handedly pulled me out of my recent funk.

I'm excited and nervous like I haven't been in months. I'm feeling a compelling sense of urgency again, like every minute of each day is important and meaningful. I'm scared again, in a good way. I've decided that life isn't worth living unless you're pursuing something so big that it scares you a little, but so important that the thought of not pursuing it is much more frightening.

So - once again - here's to the future, whatever it holds. At the very least it should be a very wild ride =).

Lonely

I thought I understood loneliness.

I thought it was the feeling of being by yourself when the people you wish you were with are miles away. I thought loneliness was the overwhelming awareness of distance, but it isn't.

Loneliness is the overwhelming awareness of the irrelevance of distance. It isn't missing someone, it's not having anyone to miss.

Even if I could go anywhere on earth right this minute, I would still be lonely. That's a strange thought. It isn't that I don't have great friends, I have some of the best friends in the world. But sometimes being with people makes this feeling worse, and I don't know why...

Sorry, I know this is melodramatic, especially since I haven't posted in a few weeks. My holidays were great. Now I'm coming home to a home that suddenly doesn't feel like one anymore. Everything has shifted, and I have nothing tangible to center myself on. I've felt this way since last monday when I got back to Virginia. Most of the time this feeling of disorientation feels almost fun. I can appreciate the freedom, the closeness with God as we drift together in this. But sometimes it just feels scary and endless, like right now. And when it does, I think of calling someone, just to hear their voice. But there isn't anyone to call.

That is lonely.