What to Do...

"How much do we have to show the people we love?"
-Allie Condie (Crossed)

The world turns out of our hands. Essentially, there is nothing we can do to stop that. Circumstances occur out of our realm of influence, and yet we are expected to carry on with this thing call life.

So what can we do?

Many things in my world have begun to change lately. Realities that have remained constant throughout my eighteen years thus far are shaking and crumbling before me. Most of these changes are merely page-turners to another chapter in my life, a chapter that I’ve always known would inevitably come.

Regardless, it is hard to deal with things that I cannot control, and as a result I have been overly moody and emotional. This fact has bled over into every aspect of my life.

One struggle I have been wrestling with (emotionally and physically) has been with friends. My tendency to want to fix everything (and everyone) is oftentimes met with resistance…after all, I can’t do it. It is out of my hands. There is only one person I can change, and that is myself, but more often than not I forget that and instead focus my energy on wanting to heal the entire world. I overlook the fact that my own heart is in dire need of healing and that I need a Savior to heal me 24/7.

Last night I was talking with a friend, and we arrived at a single, unmoving question that daunted us both: what do we do now? Shockingly enough, I was at a loss for words. No ingenious solution came to mind. No divine revelation passed through my brain. For anyone who knows me well, that is not a common occurrence. Instead, I felt completely broken and useless. “I don’t know,” I said.

Almost desperately, I picked up my Bible, but then I simply stared at it in my hands. Hundreds of pages of pure wisdom and insight…where did I start looking when I had no idea what answer I was looking for? A silent prayer kept running through my head: “What do I do, God? What do I do?”

Colossians was the next book for me to tackle on my schedule that I’ve been trying to stick with for the past three years. From chapter one, a few verses stuck out to me. “…we have not stopped praying for you and asking God to fill you with the knowledge of His will through all spiritual wisdom and understanding.” My heart kind of breathed a longing sigh when I read that. Yes, that’s what I want. Maybe I can’t fix the world or foretell the future, but I can pray! The next verses explained that, “we pray this in order that you may life a life worthy of the Lord and may please Him in every way…” This is our true purpose, “to glorify God and enjoy Him forever” (a little catechism there), and when we are pleasing Him, we feel the exhilaration of carrying out the job that was charged us! This entails:

• “bearing fruit in every good work” –  being productive and seeing the results of your good work.

• “growing in the knowledge of God” – becoming wiser and more capable of handling situations set before us

• “being strengthened with all power according to His glorious might so that you may have great endurance and patience” – who doesn’t want that, right??

• “and joyfully giving thanks to the Father, who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of the saints in the kingdom of light.”

When searching for an unknown answer with an even vaguer question, I couldn’t imagine a more appropriate or inspiring response. The Creator of all things chose you and me to be a part of this incredible thing! It’s a lot to wrap your head around. He “qualified” us, meaning we couldn’t have done it on our own. It’s by His love and mercy that we can take a confusing, messed up world full of uncertainties and doubts and make it a place of beauty.

With all the graduations going on lately and so many What-do-I-do-nows clouding our judgment, Colossians 1:9-12 gives the reassurance that through prayer, everything will be alright. We have a loving Father; we have the promise of more than we can imagine. What do we do now? There is nothing we can’t do now!

Trapped Between WIndows

10 October 2013

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Trapped between windows...

Ever feel like you’re dumbying yourself down to meet other people’s “normalcy”? Like you possess all this potential, but you continuously keep it hidden so that you’ll fit in with the multitudes of your peers. Wear the right things, say the right things, go to the right places, talk with the right people. It’s all an act. Maybe it sounds rather conspiratorial, but the world is keeping teenagers under a tight rein with misconceptions of adolescence and by progressively lowering standards.

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Adolescence…what does that word really mean? Defined, it is “a period or stage of development, as of a society, preceding maturity.” Basically, it means that based upon other people’s standards, we’re not yet fully developed. We’re thrown excuses like (and I know you have heard this at least once in your life), “Your brain just isn’t fully developed.” Does that mean that I shouldn’t be held to the same expectations of a regular human being? Isn’t the purpose of so called “adolescence” to get from one place, immaturity, to the state of being mature? In the box of adolescence, this is not possible. There is no exit. There is no fire escape. All we have is a front window and a back window, and we’re stuck on the inside to decide out of which one to gaze.

Both windows are enticing, but it’s the combination of two possible lives that confuses us. Being a kid seems like fun, so we want to hold onto that aspect. On the other side of the wall, being an adult seems to accompany a host of responsibilities that our maturing brains desire.

Oh, but we’re still adolescent. So no need to worry about those...responsibilities yet.

What’s ridiculous is that some of us realize that this “normal” is not the way things should be, but we still go along with it nonetheless. Because it’s what the cool people do. It’s what those girls who have all the friends do. It’s what that guy on the football team does. Hours upon end, we converse about meaningless subjects without one ounce of authenticity. The average teen is expected (and therefore complies) to be consumed with up to three things: (1) appearance, (2) school, and (3) members of the opposite sex. Of course those things are important to a certain extent in society, but the level at which we absorb ourselves with them oftentimes amounts to, quite frankly, nothing. The verdict is predictable: We’re all ugly; we all hate school; and we all want a girl/boyfriend. What a limited scope of opportunities!

weheartit.com

After completing some neurological research on the development of the brain, Professor Frances Jenson was quoted as saying, “You think of them [teens] as these surly, rude, selfish people. Well, actually, that’s the developmental stage they’re at. They aren’t yet at that place where they’re thinking about – or capable, necessarily, of thinking about the effects of their behavior on other people. That requires insight.” Perhaps this is just me, but I find being stereotyped as "surly, rude, and selfish" insulting enough before heaping a truckload of excuses on top of it. Despite all of her education and researching, what Professor Jenson really came up with was a long, scientific excuse for the misbehavior of young people that actually limited them to the very characteristics which she criticized. And all under the banner of "mere adolescence".

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Plus, maybe this is very John Locke of me, but I don’t really like it when people tell me what I can’t do.

Additionally, I find Jenson's quote borderline humorous. My six year old cousin gets in trouble because "he knows better”. Why should teenagers be exempt from having the most basic of social skills: consideration? 

Truly, nobody is born with the ability to function flawlessly in Society, but it is essentially the responsibility of the older generations to teach the younger ones how to "rule" the world. After all, it will be ours somebody. Dr. Jay Giedd from the National Institution of Mental Health commented, “It’s sort of unfair to expect teens to have adult levels of organizational skills or decision-making before their brains are finished being built.” Besides calling for a lowering of standards for teens (which we will be ever so happy to meet, by the way), the Doctor indirectly proposes a frightening prospect. Teenagers lack the required understanding, so why bother trying to teach them? These types of excuses surmount to explain why we young adults carry big red targets on our backs every day of our lives.

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=124119468

In retrospect, it's no surprise that our expectations for ourselves have decreased dramatically as well. Typical teenagers call the kid who knows more about physics a geek, yet that kid will probably go on to become one of the nation’s leading experts in science in the next decade or two. The girl who recites the Lord of the Rings like some girls rattle off song lyrics is considered weird by teen society, but most likely she will go on to be a prominent literary scholar while they're still trying to hold a job.

In short, we have our priorities misplaced. The frustrating reality is that nobody is willing to do anything about it unless everybody does, and we all know that is never going to happen. We can harp on this subject for days upon days, but merely knowing doesn’t change anything. We have to act NOW. We have  to decide that the present circumstances are flawed and assume that we’re the only ones with the capacity to realize it. We have to be willing to go against the grain even if the world is telling us we're mess-ups. We have to challenge ourselves in the venues which God calls us towards regardless of what our peers will think or say.

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Perhaps if we genuinely devoted ourselves to doing the hard things, to taking those God-given opportunities, to not shying away from being the smart kid or the geek, then Society’s standards would begin to change, and this time for the better. Maybe together we can make a difference by getting rid of the "myth of adolescence" and by "growing-up" America. For as Martin Luther King Jr. perceptibly said, “We must learn to live together as brothers or perish together as fools.”