life-long learning

i walked up to her office door on the third floor of frost, clutching the computer where i had just typed quotes that shook me, and the book (whose quotes i had typed furiously) sitting on top. i walked into her office and i just started to talk -- i don't ever seem to have hesitancy in that arena. when i'm that invested in something words just seem to pour out.

"dr. george, i don't know what to think about this. this is changing the way i think! the way i think about singleness and marriage and femininity and masculinity and my value as a woman and who i am and what society thinks of me and, and, and ..." the words bubble over.

and she looked at me in her chair and said words to me in her beautiful British accent. she nodded and told me stories and lessons about culture and society and this thing called paradigm shifts.

i'm scared of losing the love for books, for ideas that make me stay up late at night, for conversations that make me smile wide.

but i guess i shouldn't be fearing that. you see, i found that book (the one i took up to my professor's office) at a small bookstore in boston. my friend and i were purusing the book shelves and i stumbled upon it, flipped through a few pages and was fascinated by the author's frank discussion about weddings and bachelorette parties and what being a bride and groom signifies. so i bought it and read it and haven't stopped talking about it since.

i'm not a college student anymore, but i hope to always be a student in some capacity. and maybe one day, i can be a teacher too. i can have a bedroom or office where people come to me bursting with confusion and eagerness about books and ideas. and we can be confused and eager together. i can look in their eyes and smile and say "me too! i'm excited too!" and we can drink coffee or tea and share stories and ideas and lessons.

i hope to always discover things - the big and small. i hope to always leave crazy voice mail messages on my friends' phones that go like this "LISA THIS BOOK IS BLOWING MY MIND! YOU HAVE TO READ THIS! IT'S SO INCREDIBLY GOOD!" and i hope to always sit at the dinner table with my dad and talk about the newspaper and those articles he clipped out and places in his basket next to the computer.

i'm hoping school is closer than it feels. and i'm hoping to always be a life-long learner, no matter if i'm taking 16 credits or zero.

when "thank you" is too small

i have been learning this year that the word "thank you" is insufficient. it's too short, it's too small, it doesn't convey what i want it to -- and it never will.

i wrote in my journal, in the midst of saying good byes in latin america last april, how i didn't know how to express my thanks. i wrote: "God, what has this region done to my heart? When I first came I was terrified and homesick, and now I don't know how to say good bye and thank you. I don't know how to write what I feel...It is frustrating how I can't adequately say thank you.."

that's part of why i try to blog - i desperately want to articulate - to show in words, actions, expressions what i am feeling, thinking, wrestling with. but isn't it frustrating when the things you want to express just don't seem to come? when you feel tongue-tied and rambly and just incoherent?

but i think the realization that a thank you isn't enough is a gift -- because it's realizing that what you have is bigger than words and actions. it's touched your heart and moved you in ways you can't express. and i am learning that that is okay - actually it's more than okay, it's the best place to be.

i stumble over words when i try to tell people how much i love my major - how much joy i feel as i walk up the stairs of frost to talk to my professors about discussions inside or outside of class, how even after endless hours of writing papers and reading books, there's still this sense of wonder and excitement as i write about the communist manifesto, about capitalism, about things that truly matter and i see their relevancy in everyday life. i can't express my thanks to those professors - those people i saw this week sitting with me at a debate about free enterprise (is it moral?) -- still living and teaching and learning what it means to be faithful and to care about the things God cares about.

i stumble over the words to express my gratitude for relationships - for the people who care for me..the people who chat over warm cups of coffee or baked goods or walks in the woods or laughing on the floor. the people who have walked alongside me for so many years or the people who just recently entered my life, always willing and eager to encourage and support no matter where i am.

so i say "thanks" or "thank you" and part of me feels a little frustrated, a little anxious that i can't make the word bigger...maybe i'll say it with tears or with chocolate or a gift or a card, but it's still inadequate, still less than what i want it to be.

Isaiah 58:21 "And this is my covenant with them, says the Lord. My Spirit will not leave them, and neither will these words I have given you. They will be on your lips and on the lips of your children and your children's children forever. I, the Lord, have spoken!"

His Spirit never leaves me
His promises and truth and love will be on our lips

this is why i am thankful - because it's in these moments, living life with these people, hearing their words, telling my own story and receiving their hugs that i see and hear truth and love. i see and experience this truth like a little candle in the window of a new england cottage. it is dark outside, it's winter and i see too little of the sun, but there's these little candles glimmering amidst the darkness - giving me hope, giving me courage, and giving me truth.

i can't say thank you adequately to a God who shines hope in darkness - and chooses to do so through people and places and studies. but perhaps what He wants me to do right now is to dwell in his presence and to reflect on these moments of truth, the flickering candle in the cottage window.

Emmanuel, God with us. i want to dwell in that blessing of light.

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a post of scattered thoughts

Life is not like linear algebra: that’s a known fact, but as I was talking to a friend this morning, I was realizing how very true that is – especially in this season of life where I came back from an intense experience abroad and am preparing for my final year of college and then …?? Where am I going? What am I supposed to DO with these new perspectives I’m trying to process? Where is it taking me? I want to figure it out: now. Unfortunately, I’m learning that you can’t figure it out all at once.

Last semester I walked into my professor’s office on a Friday afternoon and proceeded to talk to him for an hour about life after graduation and grad school. He is one of the reasons I miss Gordon so much right now – I miss those conversations with professors who not only teach me, but also listen to me and care about me as a student and person. They provide advice that continues to be helpful, even hours, days, and months after the conversation ends. After giving some practical advice about grad school, he said: “Alyssa, God has plans for your life. Vocation is real” and he told me how as he looks back on his life, he sees how God has led him to where he is today, even though it didn’t necessarily make sense as he was taking those steps.

I walked away from that conversation encouraged and hopeful. Yet I think that the implications of what he said are much bigger. Life isn’t necessarily a straight path and sometimes I really wish it were. I wish that my semester would lead me immediately to point B and from there I would continue on to point C and then D. But it isn’t like that. While I was in Costa Rica a friend of mine emailed me and encouraged me to be patient with myself and said that you don’t know how these experiences are going to influence you in the months and years to come. That was a freeing statement for me – freedom for me to let God do the work in my life, for him to use the experiences and conversations to change and shape the way I think and see the world. Yet for me, this requires a lot of patience and a lot of waiting and confusion because that process often doesn’t make sense. But I hope to be a person where at the end of my life, I can look back and see how God used and placed people, relationships, conversations, and experiences to lead me to wherever he wants me to be and however I think and react to situations around me.

“God has plans for your life.” I am honestly not sure how to respond to this. A few months ago that statement excited me, but now it makes me a little fearful and I am trying to understand what my commitment is to a God who will lead me in and through the uncertainties and confusions of life. He might lead me to the right and left, up and down, east and west, and while I know that these plans are good, I feel the tug in another direction because of my own fear and a desire to follow an easy path of doing what I believe makes sense as is "part of the equation" (you know – y=mx +b).

So where is my semester and my experiences taking me and changing me? I don’t know yet. I know it’s caused me to question a lot of things and to really seek understanding of who Jesus is and what his message means to me and to people around the world. It’s given me new family and friends and a host of conversation topics. But I also need to wait. I need to listen and learn and explore and jump into life and wait expectantly for God to use and teach me things …and to let him use Nicaragua and Cuba and Costa Rica as part of the picture and lessons that are continuing to unfold. There is still so much to be learned from my time in Latin America and the years before it and weeks so far after it, and I can’t do it all at once. It will probably be a lot of zig-zaggy lessons leading me here and then there…but I need to be patient, willing, and ready for wherever they take me.