This Early Bird is Grateful for the Worm

   This morning I woke up early.  I even woke up with my mom’s voice in my head saying “Arise O Sluggard" as she used to say to us on mornings where the day’s activities (usually chores) awaited us, but nonetheless the subtle chastising from Proverbs always got us out of bed.

   

However this morning I did not grumble as I woke up, it took no chastising to get me out of bed. This morning I awoke at 4:30 to take a friend to the bus station and hurried to get her there only to find out that we were there half an hour before even the bus station opened, but what surprised me is that I was not in the least bit irritated but rather grateful for the extra little time I would get to spend with my best friend. As her bus came and I saw her off the feeling-that overwhelming gratitude- still resonated with me. Like sweet honey residue that stays on your fingers that just keeps sticking to everything til you address it.

  

 As I drove home I felt my heart welling up. Barely 6:30 in the morning and I felt so alive, so awake, and yet every highway of thought in my mind all kept coming back to that sweet aroma of gratefulness in my life.

   I decided to go to an apartment complex rooftop and it was there that the feeling seemed to flower and bloom within my heart. It seems odd that “Thanksgiving” is now done and I’m feeling this way now, but it was something about that sunrise over the newly awakened San Marcos and realizing it was December 1^st and that this year is almost over that it seemed to be my spirit that was breathing a sigh of relief.

  “Thank You Lord for silence”, I said out loud as it was through that stillness, like a silent dramatic pause in a movie, that I could soak up this revelation of gratefulness in my life.

   As I got home and started my much needed coffee the gratitude still embraced my frame. I was actually just putting some cinnamon raisin peanut butter on some gluten free crackers when I realized that both the crackers and raisin spread were given to me by dad who knows what I love. The NPR mug I was drinking my coffee out of was given to me by the dad of the very friend I had just dropped off at the bus station because he knows I love NPR.

Mostly what I felt like what hit me hardest was HOW God loves us. He knows us, knows just what we need and when we allow him to intervene in our lives he works in small ways too not just big ways.

   For example, my best friend and I love animals and both know the joy and therapy animals’ sweet spirits brings. As we were walking around my grandparents property on Thanksgiving we came upon a sweet dog who simply wanted petting and all we wanted was to hug it. Seriously a divine appointment. Then a couple minutes later as I had been telling my brother I had been desiring to pet a horse lately, a girl on a horse walks by and I bolted out of the house and got to feed and pet a horse named Pappy. God knows just what we need.

    Or as some of you know and I’ve talked about frequently, this semester I seemed to stumble upon jazz music. Specifically Vince Guaraldi who is the composer of all the Peanuts’ soundtracks. Seriously this has been something that the Lord has put in my life that I thoroughly enjoy and believe it had to have been HIM that put it there because of the rest and relaxation I get from listening to it.

I am so loved. I am so grateful that God knows us and he knows just what we need. Perhaps you’re not a sentimental sappy Sally as I am and petting animals, jazz music, cinnamon brooms, and fresh flowers don’t make you happy. That is the great thing about the Lord and that I’m realizing. He doesn’t just know me, he knows ALL, to the depths of their very existence and he knows what makes us tick.

   So I guess I’m just resonating on gratefulness today. I’m in gratitude today to God that he made a way for me to spend eternity with him and that I can spend time with him now. I’m grateful that I was given a family that loves me and appreciates me for who I am and will always and forever be my 1^st audience to entertain, and siblings that are lifelong best friends.  I’m grateful for friends who just get me’ and for NPR mugs that just seem to make coffee taste better. I’m grateful for sunrises, for the wonderful month of December and the actual joyful and almost tangible spirit of Christmas. I’m grateful for jazz music and coffee and the culmination of those two things together. And especially today I am grateful for early mornings, and the wonderful joy and stillness that comes from the dawn til noon.  

So with that: 

                                                                 Arise O Sluggard!                                                                                                                                 How long will you sleep?

And what are YOU grateful for this morning-for this is the day that the Lord has made! Rejoice and be glad in it.

Thanks and Amen.

Love, your actual Christmas elf, Shelby

I Have Run Out of Rocks

Today, I am tired. The heaviness of it resonates with me today in everything I do. The fact that the clothes I’m wearing are all fished from the dirty clothes hamper, or the fact that my hair is not done and hangs loosely untamed down my back and shoulders framing my drooping face. There is no makeup on my face to cover up my dark circles, or even to cover up the few blemishes that showed themselves this morning that I’m sure have erupted from stress. I am just simply too tired to care about those things today.

I spent the wee hours of the morning last night crying on my kitchen table. My laptop and books strewn across the table, I felt myself cracking like clay that is drying after being molded and shaped. I couldn’t hold myself together, and the effort it took to try and collect myself and then fail made me fall apart even more. As I sat laying my head against my table, the mascara staining the pages of my bible I had opened I remembered a painting I saw years ago. 

It was of a girl, lying sideways in a field looking up at a house and barn on the hill. I was simply going to google the description of it because I couldn’t remember the name but then as I pulled up google I immediately ‘remembered’ although I don’t ever remember knowing the name in the first place but nonetheless I knew the paintings name-Christina’s World. I googled it and there it popped up. My heart seemed to bubble over as I looked at this painting.

That’s it. That’s how I felt.

Weary. Worn out. Weak.

I remember reading about the initial inspiration for the painter was of a neighbor girl close by who was crippled with Polio and he saw her climbing a hill with her arms.

This painting resonated (still) with me and I can’t seem to shake the feeling of it. I feel like that girl-she is continuing on despite her struggle but the journey for her is difficult, I imagine how tired she must be.

I cannot exactly put my finger on why I feel the way I do. After all, my struggle is not quite the same as hers. I do not have polio, and I can walk and run, I am provided for, and I have people around me and yet, I know just how she feels.

I feel like her because I have felt alone in this struggle of life. Tired and in pain, she just continues but although there might be people waiting for her in the place she’s looking towards there is no one along beside her. 

Too often have I felt like this for this to be okay. And I know that my God does not desire for me to feel this way.  

I read that this painting inspired the scene in Forrest Gump when Jenny is throwing rocks at her childhood home and slips and falls and therein lies one of the most poignant quotes of the movie:

“Sometimes, I guess there just aren’t enough rocks.”

Forrest Gump is quite wise for being fictional. But to me this scene in this movie represents the weakness of our own strength. Though we may fight and ‘throw rocks’ found from our own self at those looming worriments in our life, eventually we run out of our own strength and we fall and break down. 

I realized that in this painting perhaps the girl may not be crawling towards the house but running away from it. Why would a crippled girl with polio want to leave so bad from a place that she must crawl away from it to leave?

Or perhaps that place is hope that she has wandered away from and is crawling back to it and realized that she can go no further with her own strength.

I do not know.

Perhaps that is the beauty of art and its subjectivity to each individual that views it.

Nonetheless the aspect of this painting that most resonates with me is her echoing lonesomeness in the midst of that field.

After praying about this painting and why I felt so close with this girl, I felt the Lord whispering to me that perhaps what she is doing, is waiting. Waiting for her hope. And that’s what I decided she must be doing.

I felt like the Lord showed this to me because this is the place He wants us to be at. Not that He delights in our weakness and weariness, but rather this is the place that He meets us. Broken and tired and lacking our ‘rocks’ to fight life with, this is where He comes in, scoops us up and carries us. Whether He brings us up the hill to the potential house of hope or rescues us away from the potential house of brokenness, I think that He is waiting for us to get to this point of weakness so He can come and be our hope.  

The Lord is my strength. And I have run out of rocks.

So as I find myself crawling through the hardship of life’s worries and lonesomeness, I have decided to wait, below the hill and let Lord be my hope and carry me to where I need to be.

Love, your new Andrew Wyeth enthusiast, Shelby

Peach Season

It might be barely spring break, but as the weather slowly starts to warm up summer is inevitably on the mind. But for me, one thing I'm really excited is that the impending summer means peach season.
This year has been a lot of new experiences. But moving to a different part of the state that is not desert means that crops like peaches will be more accessible and abundant and therefore I am excited.

I remember a few times when I was little a member of my family would usually make some trip to the hill country and they would always make it a point to usually pass through Fredericksburg and bring back bushels of peaches. One year though, someone brought back 3 full milk carton boxes filled with peaches. The crispers of our refrigerator were full to the brim of that orange and sun kissed glow of the tons of peaches that were inside of them. I remember I finished both drawers of peaches in probably 2 days. Everytime I'd pass the fridge I'd pop open that door and sink my teeth into one of those juicy peaches. I couldn't stop. It was insatiable; and those were (and still are) the best peaches I have ever had. When my mom noticed she was definitely upset especially because it only left one bushel to use for frozen peaches and cobbler but I actually remember not even feeling that guilty. Those peaches were worth it. The only guilt I did have was that not many members of my family got to share in that sweet peach nectar wealth I had taken part in.

Lately God has been teaching me a lot about dependency even when I don't even realize he's doing it. But it never fails that as soon as I start to tip-toe away and start to reach for the other things to satisfy me God always finds a way to humble me and it forces me to crawl back to him and let him pick me up and I can once again find my solace and comfort in him.

In my quiet time with the Lord earlier today, I felt him describe my pursuit of satisfaction as trying to build a house of cards out in the open air. It won't take long for something small like a breeze to blow through it and knock it down. And the frustration will never end- no matter how many times I try to change my WAY of building a house of cards, if the foundation isn't right, and the setting isn't right-something as fragile as our flimsy cards won't stand and will eventually topple at the first thing opposing it.

See, I've made the mistake recently that somehow God's work is finished with me. And that my point of dependency and intimacy with him that I had reached had somehow bottomed out and that was as high and deep as it could go. So I started to put my love and comfort and security in other things. People mostly.

But that house of cards  I was building in trying to find satisfaction elsewhere didn't get very far before something as subtle as breeze toppled it. Nothing drastic, but it was just enough for me to feel that familiar pang of brokenness again.

Brokenness has become familiar to me. But not only am I learning to delight in that brokenness but also that God does not allow problems without provisions. There is no problem in our lives that we shouldn't delight in-because if all problems come with provisions-that means that God is making a way for us to become more like him. In essence, the more problems we have in our lives means the more ways that God is teaching us to be more like him. If we worry, perhaps he's teaching trust. If we are angry, perhaps he's teaching us patience. If we are disparaged, perhaps he's trying to teach us joy.

There has been one time that I have clearly heard the voice of the Lord. He said to me 'Shelby. I, I, love you. Aren't I enough?' *insert sound of heart physically cracking in half.*
I think often when life is hard we look for other outlets of comfort and love to satisfy us. But in my experience what's something that's not so recognized is even when we think life is peachy keen, we often leave God on the curb to just wait a second while we go and try to walk our own road. But finding our satisfaction in God is a daily activity. It doesn't come in seasons, there's always more God has to show us.

I want my love for God and walk with the Lord to be like the peaches that were in the refrigerator. Insatiable. Memorable. Always wanting more. I want my love for God to be something that I can't just pass  up but it has to be satisfied with that sweet bite into that juicy goodness peach flesh.

See, what I'm learning is that God is satisfying. He's more satisfying than those precious, succulent Fredericksburg peaches. He is enough. He has never disappointed me with His sweetness to comfort me, teach me, even to correct me. I don't want to just find His sweetness when I'm in a season of brokenness or correction. I want to daily find my satisfaction in Him.

He's sweeter and more satisfying than Fredericksburg peaches on a hot summer day, and there's more to him than all of the crisper drawers of refrigerators around the world, combined.

Thank you God for being so sweet to me. Even when you're teaching me, correcting me. Even when I try and build my own house of cards and attempt satisfaction elsewhere. You're the only place where I find true peace, rest, love, and security. 

Love, your peach nut, Shelby

Childlike

Today I feel like a child stuck in a grown up’s body. Ironically some of you may laugh because I do not quite have the stature of a full grown adult, but nonetheless as my feet dangle from the chair while I sit here and type this, I just feel like a child that is found to be in way over their head.

Perhaps it is the weather outside that has spurned this. The weather outside reminds me of a memory I had of traveling to College Station to an A&M game with my family. It was one of the few ‘vacations’ we ever took and I remember the thought of being the age to ever attend University seemed light years away. Yet here I am, with that memory and thought still fresh in my mind, but despite the years of growing up I still have that feeling of being a child in a foreign place. Some place where I am a visitor but not quite a member.

Sometimes I think I’m too sensitive that something like weather can just consume my whole person with this blanketing nostalgia-sometimes for memories that I can’t even fully recall. However this feeling like a child I think is so heavy because it has forced me to look back on time and reflect on the fleetingness of it, and really what it reveals and roots up in me is lack of control.

Lately I have wanted to really learn about God’s holiness. I would read about the angels in Revelation and Isaiah shouting,  “Holy, Holy, Holy, is the Lord God Almighty!” and I knew that I was missing something when I began to think How could the angels do that for eternity? Repeating that over and over? Wouldn’t they get bored? Like...just a little? Recently I have been hearing many teachings and reading myself over Isaiah 6 and the biggest part that has stuck out to me about this verse is that when Isaiah comes into the presence of the Lord he says, “Woe is me!-I am ruined!-I am a man of unclean lips--and my eyes have seen the  King, the Lord Almighty!” See, when Isaiah, an esteemed prophet and ‘relatively holy’ person came into the presence of the Lord his sins were magnified! But the Lord sent an angel to cleanse him and Isaiah was so in awe that God would spare his life that when the Lord asked whom shall He send Isaiah said Here am I! Here am I!

Y’all this passage blew me away. BLEW. ME. AWAY. It has easily become one of my favorite chapters in the Bible because it not only reveals God’s holiness (and mercy) but it sets out the purpose of our life!

We are so CONSUMED with the world around us. Everything. Looks, people, money, success, etc. But the one blinding conclusion that has been poking and prodding in my head is that it DOES. NOT. MATTER. Those things will fall away. Riches will fall away. Beauty will fall away.Earthly success will not be measured. We fill our lives and minds up daily with these things that don’t matter. But what do they  matter? I mean honestly- practically and realistically what DOES matter is God because HE is the only thing that will be here at the end. Why are we putting our trust and time and effort into these fleeting things? When that same energy could be put into the kingdom?

I suppose what I’m trying to say is as a college kid that feels very often like I have no idea what I’m doing with my life- this concept of God’s holiness has put my whole life into perspective. It has humbled me in the sense that the God of the universe has called me by name and cleansed me of my sin despite my unworthiness. The second thing is that it has put purpose and drive into my life. Much like how Isaiah felt after his lips were cleansed with a coal and God spared his life, that enthusiasm and excitement and sheer gratefulness to do ANYTHING that the Lord asked of him that caused him to cry out ‘Here am I Lord! Send me!’  I understand that. I understand (atleast a little bit) how Isaiah must have felt.

God has given me this hunger that can only be satisfied by spending time with him and I have noticed that it has made things of this earth that I was once dazzled by seem like black and white television compared to the high-definition, high resolution, color television-esque joy that I get from God in comparison.

Y’all I look back on old journals, old blog posts, old facebook statuses from even this time last year and I hardly recognize myself. I wish I could fully convey the amount of things I was idolizing. Awards shows, celebrities, fashion, movies, men, approval of people…

It’s true that today I feel like a child. Partly due to this nostalgic weather, but the other part is that I realize I am just a child in the depth of my knowledge about the Lord. And ironically, the more I grow in the Lord the more I realize how little I thought I knew. It took me to this point in my life, and for many things to be stripped out of my life and hands for me to realize that God is enough for me.  

But this time in my life has been beautiful in many ways. Like a child listening to her Father’s stories that she’s heard for years-suddenly they enthrall me. I read stories from the Bible and I GET IT. I feel like so many of the children I’ve ever been around who are looking at a picture book and look back at me to ask for help and affirmation and understanding of what they’re looking at.

Oh guys, I have such a sweet father.

He’s kind to me. He’s gentle when he disciplines me. He knows the plans for my life.

I know there will be many, many times in my life when I do not understand what God is doing in my life or what I am supposed to do-all I know is that I want to be in God’s presence all the time. Learning about him. Talking to him. And like Isaiah was- I just want the Lord to send me! Use me!

Although I never would have told you this growing up, sometimes it’s good to feel like a child. To be excited like a child. Believe like a child. Comforted by our Father like a child.

It’s funny how that realization comes when we’re all grown up, huh?

Love, your child-sized grown up (sort of), Shelby

Being Shepherded as a Weary Lamb (while procrastinating for a test.)

Isn't it ironic in life how when we're supposed to be getting work done is when we least feel like it?

Right now I should be reading a book about Puritans, but I'm not and despite the fact of me writing this, the most enticing thought right now is actually a nap. The apartment is quiet, it's overcast outside, and I feel like my whole body is like the physical manifestation of having dark circles under your eyes. Tired.

So tired.

Today, maybe it was the physical aspect of being tired that pushed me into just overload. But this fatigue goes far beyond my physical body and goes far beyond even today. This weariness has reached to a spiritual level and no amount of sleep can satisfy it.

Last night after returning from a super bowl party, and hyped up on some midnight triple shot Starbucks (I think I have a problem with impulsively drinking coffee-but I digress)- I found myself alone in the apartment. This is not a new sensation for me as I have previously mentioned, and I was a little bit excited because I thought that I would use this caffeinated energy to spend some time with the Lord.

After trying to press and press into the Lord's presence waiting for me to 'encounter' Him.
 I began just praying and found myself on the floor of my apartment sobbing and crying out to the Lord and this phrase bubbled up inside me that I just couldn't stop repeating.

"I just want you to be proud of me Lord! I want to make you proud Abba! I want to make you proud!" 

Where did this come from? Moments before I had still been on my knees in prayer, yes, but this feeling, this outcry just sort of came out.
However, as the words were coming out of my mouth, the truth that rang with it seemed to make me crumple on the ground even more.

Lately, the Lord has been teaching me about physically acting on the heart he has given me. And it has been really rough. I guess a more colloquial way of saying it is the Lord has been guiding me into not just' talking the talk' but walking the walk.

My heart is to be like Jesus. That's it.
I want to tell people about the Lord's great love. I want to be bold and sensitive to the spirit and in my daily life I want to bring the Holy Spirit with me and like the disciples in Acts I want to see New Testament miracles happen in our modern age. I want to just overflow with love that strangers even feel the love of God radiating off me. I want to be used by God. I want to bring GLORY.

I want it to be easy. I want talking to people to be easy. I wish that the logistics of talking to people about Jesus was as easy to do as it is to just say nothing and sit silently at the bus stop.

I have been so transformed by this love of Jesus. How do I tell people that? How? I want so badly people to know the peace I have found. I don't want people to perish. I want them to know the joy of salvation and eternity. I want them to know! I want them to feel! I want them to be a part of my family.

But sometimes I get overwhelmed. Because for example as I'm walking through campus I think-look at all these people. Every one of these people could not know the truth and I do! How selfish am I to keep this to myself? 

Sometimes I have talked to people around me and there has been little fruit (to my knowledge), and other times I have known I was supposed to talk to someone and didn't.

There are many things that stop us from telling people about Jesus. It seems silly to know something so sincerely like the love of Jesus and yet find it so hard to share with those around us. Especially when we know the rewards of following Christ.

 But for me, it is fear of man that cripples me. Probably it is insecurity that is rooted in that. I definitely am trying to work through that obstacle in my spiritual life. But that is what stops me.
What will they think of me? What if they get angry? What if I can't give them an answer? 

So begins a cycle of me spending glorious time with Jesus-absorbing his word and spirit and then itching to share with people and trying to fight against my flesh to be bold, and worrying what people will think, sometimes obeying God and sometimes not, and then feeling the anvil of guilt fall upon my shoulders as I cycle through the feeling of thinking I disappointed God.

I was tired. I am tired. I feel so weary of the whole process. My poor flesh is just not enough to keep up.

But as I was talking to a friend the other day who had recently returned from a missions trip abroad-she made a good point and that is that God doesn't need us. He can bring people to know him without any of our help and it is a privilege that he uses us.

I will say that in no way does that let us off the hook of sharing the gospel. God calls us to go out-and make disciples however something that has been hard for me to realize as someone  who is hungry for people to know Jesus is that it is not my job to retrieve the sheep. The Lord is the greatest shepherd and he is the one who gently uses his staff to retrieve us around our woolly sheep necks and ultimately calls us close to him.

This subject is something that I'm writing about while being in the thick of it. I am surely not at the end of my journey of learning how to be like Jesus in this area of evangelism and preach like the disciples and use the new spirit-the same spirit Jesus had in him in my day to day life.

But I do know that God sustains me. I could preach to every one I meet for the rest of my life and its pretty much a guarantee that many of them will brush me off. That many of them will hate me like they hated Jesus. And many of them will reach the end of their life still filled with unsatisfaction.

If you're ready to swallow this pill of conviction about our fear of man the other day I was reading in Acts and in Acts 5:41 it says that  "They departed from the council, rejoicing that they were worthy enough to suffer shame for His name." 

Woh. Let's go over that real quick.

The apostles were REJOICING that they were even worthy enough to SUFFER (shame) for in the name of Jesus. See, the Lord is good and gracious and cares for our fragile hearts so He does indeed care how we feel, but I should be so HUMBLED by the Lord and what he did on the Cross, that I should rejoice to suffer for Jesus' name.

I think what we as Christians but ultimately as humans get caught up in is ourselves; but really- it is not about us. It. is. not. about. us. Plain and simple.

When we put on the name of Christ, our purpose in life is to serve God and follow his commandments and bring him glory. Not bring ourselves glory. My purpose in 'preaching' is not to give myself a name but to glorify Jesus' name.

The joy and assurance of our salvation as well as the promises found in the Word should be where we build our foundation and confidence on. And as for our daily sustenance we are given that by spending time with our 'Abba Father' daily and embracing the spirit of God that has been bestowed upon us as 'sons of God' (Romans 8).

Surely, surely I can promise you that as soon as my finger releases the cursor to publish this blog I will find myself with my foot in my mouth about what I am writing here.

But you know what? The Lord is gracious. And despite my inevitable disobedience that I'm sure will happen throughout my years I will continue to try my best in hearing God's voice and being the best vessel I can be for his spirit to work in this broken world.

Days like today I am tired. I feel drained physically and spiritually but the Lord sustains me, he is teaching me everyday, gently correcting me as he holds my face between his hands and lets me know when I have done wrong, and when I stray he comes and finds me and picks me up and puts me around his shoulders and carries me close to him.

I will never stop being taught by the Lord. And I hope this never stops. As I grow closer to the Lord I find myself wanting less and less of myself and more of more of him. And I hope that as I grow old I am not someone who is known for my own name, but known for bringing glory to Jesus' name.

I am tired yes, but that is because it is 2:30 in the morning. However as I pull my covers back and get into bed I can tell you that I have never felt more rested or renewed than I do now in this wee morning hour after spending time with my Abba, my Shepherd, my Comfort.

Love, your little roaming lamb, Shelby

Lessons from that Pharisee, Nicodemus.

I'm sitting here writing this while my nails dry and I stop and listen... 

Silence. 

Save for the sounds of the apartment.

A zipper clanging against the dryer during its cycle. The stomp from my neighbors with rhinoceros feet upstairs. A lonely train whistles in the distance. All just noise. But yet- all of it seems to only emphasize the silence even more. 

Silence and I have become very familiar friends you see. We've crossed each others paths a lot these past couple of months and for this extrovert it has been on many uninvited terms. 

I used to fill up my silence with noise. I'd blast the happiest music I could find. I would make the supreme showstopper of Broadway playlists and fill the noise up with singing. I'd put on a movie. Put on NPR. Sometimes without even watching or listening, just to have those voices, that noise, playing in the background to fill up the brooding silence. 

But silence, oh so patient, would always wait for those things to finish, and in the end would always be there. Silence is there when the credits end. Silence is there when my computer dies. Silence is there when the Terry Gross interview I'm listening to on Fresh Air is finished. 

However after all these meetings with Silence, I realized that it wasn't Silence that was bothering me. 

No Silence, like when we feel the sensation of pain in our body is not the actual problem, but rather a symptom of something deeper. 

Silence was, for lack of a better analogy, like the heartburn to what was actually the bigger problem of an ulcer. And my ulcer was loneliness. 

Loneliness drained me. 

The past couple of months I have experienced severe loneliness. Sometimes the loneliness has been out of circumstances that is no ones in particulars fault. Busy Schedules, Little Money, your basic college problems. But what stung worse is that sometimes the loneliness was because of circumstances that were out of my control,and some that hurt me and left me feeling all alone to nurse my wounds. 

I can't count the times that I scrolled through my contacts and called or texted everybody or anybody who would be willing to talk. 

Someone, anyone, let me know that you still care. That you're thinking about me. That you want me in your life. Someone, anyone, please. 

That became my innermost cry and desire. I so badly wanted human affirmation and companionship that 't when it didn't happen my only solution would be to sleep. Because when you sleep it passes time and you get to dream. 

I felt so weary. I would talk to the Lord, but I would talk as if I already expected not to get an answer. 

I would talk to the Lord to fill up the silence and go on and on, 'Woe is me, even the LORD won't talk to me.' 

However, it was silence that ended up speaking to me the most. Silence that pushed me to my limit of talking so that I could hear the Lord.  

 

At this moment, I remembered a few months earlier the Lord speaking to me the name "Nicodemus." 

I was really puzzled by this and did a lot of research on Nicodemus and read and re-read John 3 which is where he mainly shows up in Scripture but it wasn't until this moment that I was sitting in the silence and suddenly I remembered Nicodemus and it made sense. 

See, when Nicodemus went to Jesus he was seeking answers, his time with Jesus was very private and intimate because it took place in secret and during the night and he went because he KNEW something was different about Jesus. He was not like the other prophets. And this is one of the only times Jesus did NOT speak in parable. He gave it to Nicodemus straight, and although he was mildly confused by what being born again meant, Jesus wanted Nicodemus to understand that concept because to know the spiritual things of God we must have the spirit within us and I like to think the Lord knew that Nicodemus was worth telling this to. 

See I wasn't asking questions. I was wallowing. But until I stopped talking, (which for me is the hardest part because I love to talk), was when the Lord began speaking to me about these things. And just like Nicodemus and Jesus interaction was alone and in the secret, so was this. 

'Shelby, if you ask, I will answer.'   

I began asking the Lord like Nicodemus who HE was and what HE thought of me, and you know what? He answered. 

I entered into this period (and I think am still in it) of intimacy with the Lord that would never have happened had I not been to the point of despondent loneliness and hurt that I was in. 

His comfort and presence became an almost completely tangible feeling and I began to enjoy the times that I found myself alone in my apartment because those were the times that I could most easily enter into the Secret Place and be in fellowship with the God that will never leave me. Ever.  

*big sigh of contentment.*

There are things about me that have not changed. I still am as energized by people as ever. And there are spots I find myself in every so often of just plain old being bored and alone. However, I think sometimes we put limitations on ourselves (I could never do that, I will never be that etc) that stunt the Lord's work in us and when we find ourselves in pain and trial is when the Lord is taking matters into his own hands and pruning us so we may be the fuller, richer, and shaped people he intended us to be.  

The Lord stretched my limits by making this extreme extrovert be alone, live with an introvert, be in desk job alone, and come home alone. 

But it was through that isolation that I grew most with the Lord. It was through that loneliness, that nagging silence that I was able to hear what He thought of me rather than what people thought of me. And what was most rewarding about my extreme solitude was being able to unlock the secrets of Gods character. The 'spiritual things of God' like what Nicodemus was looking for but needed to be born again to know. 

Yes it is true I still get lonely, but instead of frantically reaching for flawed humans companionship, I try and turn first to my greatest Friend, Counselor, and Father. It has made all the difference. 

Love, your still *inhale* extrovert, Shelby

                                                                                                                                                                                          

10 Year Lesson

I was writing in my journal this morning and I wrote down the date, December 21st. I paused for a moment remembering this date and that ten years ago today my dad was lying on the bathroom floor, gray and sallow, and (unbeknownst to us), having a heart attack. I remember bringing him a cup of water out of a plastic flowered cup as he was pressing his clammy face to the cool hard tile. Our family was going over to my grandmothers and my mother, flustered with four whiney children was upset at my father for leaving her with just the children during this holiday outing. Little did we know however that by the time we would get back, my dad would not have gotten better. His eyes were sunken in and his color was an ashy hue. A doctor call, and short drive to the hospital later my dad was admitted to the hospital with chest pains and within just a few hours after some tests and a nitroglycerin patch the doctors told my mom that my father was having a heart attack and was going to need a triple bypass surgery.

2 days later my father had the surgery.

He was in ICU on Christmas Eve.

And in recovery on Christmas Day.

I remember through this span of surgery and recovery we were shown an endless amount of love and care from others. People visiting with us, praying with us, feeding us and trying to entertain us. Although I was a child, I had a much greater idea of what was going on. My 3rd grade heart was burdened and somber with the thought of what could happen to my father. The head of the household. The bear in our family den. My daddy.

Our foundations as a family were being shaken and all I remember I could do was turn to books to read. I retreated into the pages of the novels family and friends had bought for me. I read to a reclusive state. I detached. I see now that as a child, I didn't quite understand how to cast your burdens, so I bottled them up.

Eventually things got better. We opened our Christmas presents in the hospital room and the kindness and gentleness of the nurses and doctors on that floor resonated with me as a child and still resonates with me today.

I suppose this day has reminded me of how much things have changed, how much the Lord has brought me through and how he has always always had his hand on me. Being in college now, I marvel at all that has happened in the last 10 years.

Another near death experience of my father.
Lost jobs. Money troubles.
Middle School. High School.
New Friends. Lost friends.
World Travels.
New experiences.
Car wrecks.
A rebellious streak.
Heartbreak.
Disappointments.
Moving. Moving again.
And College.

I vaguely remember this time 10 years ago thinking about what life would be like when I was in 'college'. Of course it's very different now than what I had imagined, but I wouldn't have changed anything about the last 10 years.

In the heartbreak and disappointments, the Lord has drawn me closer. In my rebellion hes broken me, and humbled me. In my new experiences and travels he's given me lifelong companions and friendships.

I believe it was that day 10 years ago that the Lord started to shape me. It was that day that the Lord started to reveal himself to me. Reveal his true character. He was patient with me. Patient with my hard and scared 9 year old heart. Patient through my rebellion. Patient through my hurt. He was so patient to wait for me. He was always near, always present, always waiting and never letting me stray too far.

 I still feel like my 9 year old self sometimes. With a scared and heavy heart, I want to close up and detach, but it's taken me 10 years to find my true peace and rest within the Lord.

During the holidays, people always want to talk about what we are grateful for. Grateful for family. For friends. Grateful for the gifts we get. But truly, what I am most grateful for is the Lord.

He has been so faithful to me. So good to my family. He has brought me out of a place of darkness and crowned me with joy.

Love, your ashes that have been turned into beauty, Shelby

Seasons of 'New'ness' with special excerpt from Chuckie Finster

My hair has gotten longer.

I noticed it in the shower the other day when I was rinsing the shampoo out of my hair and letting the hot water run the suds out, I felt my hair had hit a new length down my back. I remember cutting it was only a few days after I got back from India. I had grown my hair for a really long time, like over a year, to be the length that it was, refusing to even trim the dead, fried, ends that were what was left of my bleach blonde hair I had done a few years earlier. I was really hesitant to cut it, and sort of on a whim my mom and I had gone into a salon that 'owed her a favor', as seedy as that sounds and he cut it, a lot shorter than I had hoped, but I ended up really liking it.

Not to get super corny or anything, but I think looking back my hair had represented that past year. That past year was full of hardships, and disappointments, and sin, and temptation, and just a lot of ugly things-the things that are the dead, fried, split ends of our life. Those dead ends are also the ones we hold on to, just as I had refused to cut them, believing that they were helping me or that they looked better, they were actually making my hair look worse and preventing it from being totally healthy. Without even knowing it, I think that cutting my hair was representative of leaving the old things in the past and God giving me a new life, a new spirit, a new hair-do.

I guess when I was in the shower, it caught me off guard to the length in which my hair had grown because it seemed like just yesterday I was in that salon. It kind of baffled me as to how time fast time flies, and how much things can change, literally from day to day.

In my own life, God has physically been taking me through a season of new-ness, if you will.
It seems like every aspect of my life has become changed.

I live in a new place, and am experiencing a whole different lifestyle not only one that's different from El Paso, but one that is wholly independent. I'm paying bills (that are addressed in my name), making dinner, cleaning the house, and I even make my bed every morning. I'm entering into this fresh experience of the REALITIES of adulthood that I'd never fully felt the extent of before.

There's also this new change God's doing in my heart. I have found, that sometimes, the things we say or the preconceived ideas we have about our life are not always true. I guess mostly what I'm specifically referring to is our plans for our life. I had been making the mistake of dreaming up my life and asking God to put his stamp of approval on it, rather than asking God initially what his plan was for my life. (Seems simple enough right?) But for some reason, we just can't do it, we go and go and go sometimes for years without inputting God into any of our decisions and then we hit a wall, fail miserably and ask God where he was and he still, picks us up, dusts us off and tells us that he's been there the whole time. God is SO good to us. He's been so good to me, and so patient to me in this season of my life. He's been gently correcting me on the things that I had so obstinately labeled about who I was and what my life was going to be. He's sort of taking me through a season of rebuilding. My world that I had built up for what my life was going to be was wrecked, and the Lord has sort of said to me, "Let ME tell you who you are. Let ME tell you how I see you." And you know what? It's been refreshing. To have the only confidence and security you have come from the Lord.

I was reading this morning in the November 1st devotional for My Utmost for his Highest, (Oswald Chambers is the bombdotcom y'all) and a part of what he said really spoke to me:

The first thing God does is get us grounded on strong reality and truth. He does this until our cares for ourselves individually have been brought into submission to His way for the purpose of His redemption. Why shouldn’t we experience heartbreak? Through those doorways God is opening up ways of fellowship with His Son.

Man, God knew what he was doing when he sent Jesus. He knew we would fail as humans, and he even knew that we would question the Gospel, and in this context he knew life would get hard for us stubborn little urchins. And what my man Oswald is saying here is that our heartbreak, our hurts, are what brings us closer to God. THIS is why the Good Book says to rejoice in your hardships, because hardships bring us to the point that we have no choice but to sit down at God's door like limp rags and say, "I can't do this on my own anymore. Life is just too hard." And THEN you know what God does at that point in our lives, he takes us and gives us the truth and strength of the Gospel and the truth about ourselves.

My world was getting hard this past year, and I was broken and broken and broken again. My preconceived pillars about my life and what my life would be, the things that I was putting between me and God were shattered and I became a limp rag, and I came to God's door and he picked me up like a little lamb that got left out of the barn in the rain, and he took me and he's kept me close to him. Because of my hardships, God is near to me now, and he's given me a new spirit. He's rebuilding me to be something that was totally different than what I had ever imagined for my life, but I love it. I love it because it's pure and right and from the Lord.

My new spirit is popping up like little flowers all over my life. I'm learning to listen to people more and enjoy being an observer rather than the talker. I'm learning to be sensitive to what other people want and sometimes doing what they want without even letting them know that's not what I 'wanted' to do. I'm learning to see people in a new light, strangers on the street and bus, I'm learning to see them how God sees them without making harsh judgements in my head. Another new blessing of change that may seem silly but I believe was a prompting from the Lord is my newfound love of black coffee. I used to be scared of it, but now I wouldn't have it any other way, and it has truly gotten me through some hard times, and lifted my spirits this semester.

Chuckie Finster has some good insight below:









































You know, life IS hard. It's inevitable. It's full of disappointments, and tragedy, and stresses, and pain but God is near through it all. He's sovereign. And he wants use to use those hardships to be in closer fellowship with the Son.

Lately I've learned to just have to take a big breath and say "Lord, won't you come and just be with me today?" and that has made all the difference.

So I guess, what I'm trying to say is invite the Lord into your daily life. He just wants to be close to you. He wants to be a part of our decisions. A part of our conversations. A part of our lives.

It will make all the difference.

Love, Your so fresh and so clean clean (spirit)/Oswald Chambers fan, Shelby

Rain and Robert Frost

I knew this was coming.

I did. I knew that this change, this inevitable change of growing up and moving on would be here. But what I really did not expect is the change in my heart to appear with the physical changes of my surroundings.

There's something about the rain that brings out people's inner emotions, almost like its washing away the facade of emotions and ideas we cake over ourselves. As I write this, you can probably guess that it's raining outside, and I feel like I have to write out my heart for myself to even understand it.

Change is unsettling. Especially change within ourselves.

For me, the most unsettling change in myself is my loss of inspiration. These nights, these kind of late, quiet, (especially rainy) all to myself nights I used to relish because these were the nights that my creative wheel would spin and I was full of stories and characters, emotions and dreams. And now the inspiration seems like an old friend, or a fond memory. Someone who was in my life and we used to have really great times together, and even had a future planned together but we just kind of..drifted apart.

If I could write Inspiration a letter I would ask it to come visit, but, but, I feel like Inspiration's mad at me. That feeling that once ignited me, that feeling that was able to just feel emotion and write and create and dream up stories, is gone.

I suppose I feel like a young child who has just realized the puppet show they have been watching-that the puppets are just peoples hands of normal people moving inside of a cartoon made of cloth,and not the wonderful entertainment I once thought it was.

It's like the wander has gone out of my life.

The wander that I used to look upon people's lives and stories and the world around me is gone. It's been muddled with the reality of my future, and my career, and bills, and.. decisions...

Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer's motto is Ars Gratia Artis which roughly translates to Art for Art's Sake.

I used to...understand that. I used to love that motto because I understand that Art helps make life beautiful. Art helps us outwardly express and understand what is going on within our lives.

I was born feeling like an artist and I knew that simply because I knew that I understood what art meant to the world. I understood why we have so many versions of art and entertainment. Why art? It's to help us understand what we feel, or sometimes to help us feel things we didn't think we could feel. Art whether that be painting, sculpting, writing, acting, dancing or film, tells some sort of story that takes us out of our reality and into another.

Art shouldn't have to justify itself. But it does serve a purpose, but for those that are skeptical, we say
why not? Art for Art's Sake.

This summer I went to India. And I love India, from the bottom of my heart. I truly, truly do know that I want to live there and have a life there, and be a part of the surrogate Indian family I had the privilege of being a part of while I was there.

And while in India, I started to not think about being in Hollywood. (What I'm getting at people is the decision to give up a film career or not..) But I just felt so happy, so content to be in India. I loved where I was and who I was with and when I would think about starting a career to end up in Hollywood just seemed so fleeting. It still does, when I talk about it. To think about the shallowness and fleeting 'treasures' of the glamorous lifestyle Hollywood is associated with. While in India, I started to be okay with the idea of not being famous.

But I think what was happening is that India, is so extra sensory. It is constantly filled with smells, and colors, and sights, and sounds that you don't have time to be inspired because you're so consumed with this effervescent culture.

Yet, as I've been home I still think that the treasures of  Hollywood are fleeting and shallow, but the feeling that I associated with being inspired, and making movies and telling stories, the feelings I associated with what would be my film career feel lost and... I miss them.

So basically I'm just conflicted. I know the emotions and the way I felt in India were real, I know that if I became a doctor and did medical missions that I would be happy once I'm back in India..
but at the same time, I don't know what to do with my old friend Inspiration..

That inspiration feeling is what drove my creativity, that inspiration feeling is what drove me to tell stories and to want to make movies and to be an artist for art's sake.

Why do I feel like I must choose one or the other? I cannot just ignore the aching right side of my brain and turn off my need to create and entertain the rest of my life, but at the same time my only future for those feelings had always been to end up in Hollywood and I don't know if that is a place that I could thrive spiritually and be 100% sure I was doing the work and living the life God wanted me to live.

I've been reading a lot of Robert Frost lately and I really love him a lot. He's one of few writers that makes me truly like poetry, and he's also a writer/poet that can from line to line transport you to wherever he wants to take you, put you directly in the setting and make you feel what he wants you to feel. So naturally, in my current pickle I relate to "The Road Not Taken" I see my two roads, and the yellow wood is clearly my future but unlike Mr. Frost I don't know which one to take. I wish to take the road less traveled but the road as to which is 'less traveled' is not so clear yet.

So for now, I take these things day by day, and see which emotions are fleeting and impulsive and which ones stay, because those are the ones that matter. But tonight, it's grieving. I miss my Inspiration, I miss my stories. I miss the way 'creating' a story felt.

I don't know if I will follow in Mr. Frost's path and take the road less traveled, to be honest I really just want to be on the path that God wants me to be on.

All I know is change is scary. Rain is comforting. And Writing is cathartic.

Til the next thunderstorm-when the rain can wash away and reveal more from my heart.

Your, 'one traveler', Shelby

Morning Comes in Light

I find it ironic that I'm writing this late at night. But night time is when I find myself with most free expression so I just deal.

Anyways, what is ironic is that this blog is about morning. Sweet morning. I'm not always some chipper song bird in the morning, but I don't understand people who hate the morning. I don't understand how someone can hate something so beautiful.

Morning is beautiful.

Night time, I love night time, its the time of the mysterious, the time of the thinkers, and the time of the regretful.  But the morning, I just cannot ignore it, oh the morning is just... beautiful.

Even the very idea of the morning is beautiful. God gave us light. He gave us the day time. The earth was completely dark but God gave us the day. He gave us the sun to warm our bodies, and light for us to see.
Isn't that amazing? As the saying goes that every day is a gift, truly, every day is a gift to us from God.

The concept of morning is what brings tears to the brim of my eyes. Every day I am amazed at God's omniscience in my life, in the world. God thought about every detail, and although it seems like such a broad concept, I believe he created the morning to correlate with what would one day be salvation.

The concept of morning is new-ness. Renewing. When the sun rises it is the blanket to put the night to rest and bring a new chance every day. Don't you see? Morning is the very essence of God's redemption. Night time often brings mistakes, the shadows of the dim moon are often filled with sins, with regrets, but morning is new. No day is the same as the day before. Every day is a new day. A fresh day that has never happened. Think about it, no date in history has ever or will ever be repeated.

When God gave us light, when God gave us time, when God gave us night and day, I believe he saw ahead in the future and saw our sins, he saw what had to happen, the redemption that was going to be needed, and I believe he gave us mornings as gentle reminders of his love and redemption.

Rainbows are relatively rare and coveted for the most beautiful and many people know that rainbows are a reminder from God about his love for us, but lately God has been showing me his consistent reminder of his love with mornings.

When I think about the morning my heart wells up... I mean when you really think about it..

Mornings stand for hope. New beginnings. Second chances.

Mornings stand for comfort. When nightmares terrorize our slumbers, the first sliver of morning light has relaxed us all. And we can finally sleep with the promise of day time coming. (At least that is how I have always been.)

Morning is fresh. Dew is on the grass and plants, and the sun is beginning to warm what the night made cold.

I have always felt like God loves mornings just as much as I do. Not that night time is the best, but often we are tired or upset, or processing our day. But mornings I have always felt like are special to the Lord. I imagine him sitting at the kitchen table, with the sun warming him, and just talking to me. You know? I know God is there any time, but in the mornings, in the quiet, in the still, in the freshness of the day is my favorite time to talk to God. And for me, the best time to listen as well. The world is silent but not eerie, and anticipation of the day is in the sunrise, and God, is there, in the sunrise, in the dew, in the morning coffee, waiting to sit and talk before any of the real troubles of the day start.

I once heard a speaker say that before he got up each morning. Before he got out of bed, as his mind was waking up he just rested with God. He said that although he was awake (technically) it was the most peaceful rest he had ever gotten. Before he even truly opens his eyes, he simply rested in God's presence and talked to him before his feet even hit the floor.

Isn't that lovely? To rest with God.

See that's what the morning is meant for. The morning is not meant for strife, but the morning is meant to rest, to prepare for the coming day and all the heaviness of the troubled world that the rest of the day will bring as the earth continues to turn into night.

Scarlett O'Hara truly did change my life with her philosophy on life-After all tomorrow IS another day.

See, God thought about mornings. He thought about the mistakes we would make. And he created mornings so we are reminded of another day, of our second chances that he gives us.

So savor that sunrise, rest in God's presence, take a breath and thank the Morning Star that he is forgiving and redeeming. Thank him for mornings, and for coffee and  tea, and thank him for each day that he gives us to enjoy the beautiful gift of morning.

Love, your new found early bird, Shelby

(El Paso Sunrise, I felt it appropriate to put a sunrise I actually am familiar with instead of some cheesy one.)

 (OK..I know ...it's still cheesy but in the words of Forrest Gump about desert sunrises:

 "I couldn't tell where heaven stopped and earth began." :)

Even the Darkest Night Will End and the Sun Will Rise (And no this is not a Les Miserables blog.)

What is it about death? 

Even uttering the name feels like a whisper, a secret traveling along the corridors of an old mansion. 

It is something we all recognize, and encounter, yet it is so unfamiliar to us. 

Death makes us feel vulnerable, insecure. It lurks with an all knowing presence, stripping us of our dignity of knowledge. Death is...scary. It looms over us. Sometimes we are aware of its presence, and other times it chooses to take those without a warning. One breath we are here on earth, our souls warm and conscious in our living bodies, and the next we are gone. A shell. Our souls traveling to our eternities. 

How is it that we can be so familiar with something yet know so little about it? Death is the one thing in our lives that is so common, yet it is still a tragedy. 

I think what bothers us the most about death is the finality of it. A goodbye is hardest when you know that you will never get to say hello or goodbye again. But what about those deaths that are sudden? 

Those stories are ended abruptly. It reminds me of the Sopranos cliffhanger episodes where they would end mid sentence and just go black. Except this time, there is no new episode next week. Or next year. The people are not leaving on a long visit. They are not necessarily even fatally sick (although that can be worse), but they are gone. Those deaths can be the hardest I believe. The ones that we have to cope with that 'they' are simply not coming back. 

Death has been especially common it seems lately. People always seem to go around the holidays. I think it has something to do with family usually, and being together, or lack there of. But nonetheless, the world in this month of December has seemed especially sad. First, the Newtown tragedy happened and in the same 24 hour span, one of my assistant principals passed away suddenly. What seemed more ominous was that I had seen him at a restaurant that night, and even taken a picture of him. His death especially stuck with me. I was not particularly close to him but I had seen  him and talked to him hours before he died. There was nothing I really could have done if I had been able to go back in time really, but I still think about him often. 

His death has made me wonder ABOUT death. What happens? Why we are chosen to die when we die etc? But more so about how we interact with people. How we interact with each other. I technically was close to one of his last interactions outside of his family and friends that were with him. And this was not the first time that I have had an out of the blue experience or out of the ordinary interaction with someone before they died or something happened to them. It has happened to me a couple times. This last time though has really made me aware of how I treat people. Of my general outlook on life. 

Our day is filled with constant interactions with people. Greetings, apologies, directions, fights, exclamations, love etc. And often, those interactions are muffled by our own selfishness, our own wills and our own bullheadedness to be right or get what we want. But what death has shown me recently is that those interactions could be that person's last. Even if their  74, 25, or just a mere 6 years old going to school for the day. 

Those interactions MATTER. Those things we think are mundane matters. Our words matter, our actions matter. Every little thing, chance or planned, whatever-has meaning. It has significance and purpose and is a checkpoint on our journeys into reality and mistakes. 

It sounds so cheesy to say this, but after this wave in death Ive seen recently-I find myself consciously thinking of the little things as much as I can. I don't go to bed angry, I forgive easier, I make sure to say goodbye, I make sure to tell those that I love-I love them-every chance I get- I don't let things bother me as much, or ruin my day, and I find myself soaking in my surroundings and experiences wherever I am. 

It seems silly. But these things could be our last words, or someone elses last words or memory. 

Death is final. It gives no second chances. That's why it's important to give those while we are living. 

Death is unexpected. It is often inconvenient, or spiteful. But death will come to all of us. But while we still have the chance to make our time on earth matters it's important to do so.

I guess December is always a sorrowful month. The real deaths in my life have always been in December. 

Luckily the Saviour was BORN in December. But regardless, tragedy never seems to be merciful during the woeful 31 days of the end of the year. Maybe it is an odd coincidence. But a phenomena nonetheless, that what is supposed to be such a joyous time of rejoicing and celebrating the holidays, is too often cut short by death. 

It's almost the end of December. Which means a new year, with new surprises, new celebrations and new tragedy. I just hope that this new year holds more joy than death. And if death decides to rear it's ugly head, we have no regrets with the people we love. 

Be honest. Be happy. Forgive, forget, and look forward to the future however long we may have. 

Love, your night owl, Shelby

Folly, The Election, and a Soapbox

My stomach dropped. It did. As I heard my mom exclaim in the other room, I knew. Obama won. This is not NECESSARILY a political post, honestly. Was I disappointed? Yes, but it mostly just made me think. My mind is still reeling at the millions and millions of posts about the election. Hearing what people have to say... kills me.

Division. DIVISION. DIVVVIISSSIIOON.

It literally makes me nauseous, the avid, slit your throat division going on in the country. If I can get on my soapbox for a moment I would like to say that what makes it worse is most Americans are uninformed, band-wagoners, and that goes for both sides, they have no idea what this country's structure is, much less political agenda, policy, and what that means. To go a little further, most have little respect for the other. Granted, it is hard to stay unbiased when issues affect you personally, however most Americans don't care to research, they just swallow the carefully doctored food the media feeds and takes it to argue menially. Really, Republicans and Democrats a like don't care to look up facts. Honestly, when the evidence is right there in front of them. Case in point, in 4 years the debt has increased to 16 trillion. When it 8 years in Bush terms it only increased by 4 trillion.That is something no one can argue with, it's plain truth and honestly, I hate conflict, but no political, religious or social beliefs can argue with money and how America is with no question in debt up to their eyeballs that keeps growing.

But I don't want this to be a political post. Not necessarily. It just scares me how little people care to actually research issues. Real research, not just news sites. But actual research of WHAT you believe and WHY. That is becoming my biggest issue. There is so much conflict, when I think about it, its like  hearing fingernails scratch across a chalkboard, but the problem I'm seeing is a nation divided and most don't know WHY.
They don't know why they believe what they believe, they don't know why they support the candidate they support, and they don't fully know their beliefs.

The moral compass has significantly decreased in society. America is more evident simply because we live 'first world lives' with even the poorest people usually having a television and a cellphone. However, the jokes we make, the things we talk about, the trash we fill our lives with, is showing how little reverence we have for anything. I'm not saying that we should have a Puritan status quo or anything, but have some ethical standards. SERIOUSLY. It's a lack of respect. I love that we have free speech. Other countries have had people murdered for speaking their mind, but its a lack of emptiness in our speech. Its a lack of substance in our actions. We speak and we do not know why we are saying these things. I guarantee atleast 50% of voters on both sides had no idea why they were voting for their candidate. (Speaking from a purely biased point of view, many Obama fans have no idea what they were talking about, if you don't believe me look on Twitter. But back to being fair.)

Anyways, as a Christian, my job is to trust God. I get caught up in the political hub-bub and people can argue, and name call, and slit throats, but ultimately it is God's plan. I remind myself that God loves everybody the same. He loves me, just as much as he loves a satan worshipping serial killer.
Personally, I don't want to live in a world without God. How hopeless is that? To have nothing to look forward to or lean on after living in this grief-stricken, poverty filled, conflict ridden world.
God put Obama in place. I'm not happy. But I cannot continue praying for someone, and continue hating them.

That does not mean we can stay stationary and wait for God to come back. We still can take part in our country. We can get informed, and really know why we believe the things we believe before we ignorantly absorb everything a celebrity tells us on Twitter (sometimes they get paid, guys).

Look at the facts, preferably from an unbiased source. And make your decision. And ask yourself, why do you believe what you believe? And why are you proclaiming it?

Just a thought.

I know the things I believe. I know my perspective on the issues. But it's in God's hands. C'est La Vie.

Love, your wearisome citizen, Shelby

Hollow Drawers

*Insert my depression song, Casimir Pulaski Day by Sufjan Stevens-then Read*

Loneliness kind of sucks.

I mean like I've felt lonely before. But I've never actually been alone. I mean technically, my parents are still here, but honestly, I've never felt more alone.

When I got back from Brazil, (which I will write about I swear, because there's so many wonderful things to say I have to write about it), but anyways, I felt this weird anticipation. I mean I felt the normal, 'I miss being around 21 people constantly' and 'I miss my best friends', 'I miss Brazil' and 'I miss travel' yadayada business, but I felt like I was waiting for something when I got back.

I sort of realized that it was my friends. And in my friends I include my brothers. But, I realized that mostly it was my friends I was missing.

Regret kind of flooded my thoughts as I lye on my bed one night watching IMDB trailer after IMDB trailer, a few days after I got back. I felt it when I walked into Reagan's room and a new comforter was on his bed and his drawers, once full of "Urban Outfitters" t-shirts were now empty. The hollow sound of the drawers echoed the hollowness of my heart. I regretted not spending more time with him before I left for Brazil. In my own whirlwind of preparation I completely forgot I was not going to see my best friend for a whole 6 months. I completely forgot that life was forever changing for our family and that Reagan, my best friend and confidante was growing up.

I suppose Reagan made up a huge part of my life. Way more than I realized now that he's gone. Even when he was lounging on his ipad, looking up (useless) things to buy I still appreciated his presence. It's like..at least it was waiting there for me. At least I was not alone. I mean, I really do miss Reagan for Reagan. Laughing at Spongebob, or watching Greys, or basically being the person who we tell everything to. Him being the one to laugh at my jokes, and always has been the person to do that. Being the other part of "the babies or the little kids" that my family still refers to us as. I mean I really do miss Reagan-even when he let the water run while he was brushing his teeth. But I guess I never realized how great it was to have a person there to talk to.

I mean I really love to talk.  I really needed that. And your parents, are your parents and sometimes they don't have time to talk the way you want to talk. And that's where siblings/friends come in. So when I came back from Brazil and Reagan wasn't there... It really hammered the first nail into my loneliness.

Then, me being the person that I am, has best friends that graduated and now are all gone and off to college starting a new chapter in their lives. Second blow into loneliness.

Then, El Paso, the fact that there's so little to do in this town makes going out monotonous. Monotony is boring, and boring just makes it easier to stay inside the house, which only sometimes makes me feel lonelier. Moseying around the house going from phone to reading to watching tv to talking to parents to looking in refrigerator multiple times to sometimes baking, or facetiming Hugo, or sometimes writing, or getting frustrated at writers block to ultimately, doing my most common activity nowadays, napping.

People keep asking me if I'm ready for school. Usually I tell them no. Ha! But honestly, I'm not ready for school in the sense that school can sometimes escalate loneliness. My best friends are gone from school. My brother is no longer there. And I just feel, unprepared. I'm ready for school in the sense that it will keep me occupied. (But my lazy alter ego usually shuts that thought up.)

I'm not saying I don't have friends. I do. It's just that sometimes they're not as accessible as I would like them to be. Or transportation is an issue. Or parents or school or work or whatever.

The value of friendship is just really hitting me hard in this season of my life. And it's coming at a time with a lot of other changes, and crossroads, and detours, decisions, endings and beginnings in my life and family's lives.

I really hope this doesn't just sound like I'm complaining. But hey, I don't have anyone to vent to anymore right?

Maybe if someone reads this they'll take me out and we can talk! :)

I have a feeling I'll be on this a lot more. I gotta tell you, the good part about being lonely is it leaves you with a lot of time to yourself and your thoughts. And lots of thinking leads to inspiration eventually. And inspiration usually leads to good stories. So, many more screenwriting ideas have blossomed from this time of solitude and disconsolation. I need to write more anyways. It's a good way to relieve my creative juices.

I was serious about the someone taking me out thing before though.

Until next time when I share about the wonderful Brasil... Saudades.

Love, your newfound 'recluse' Shelby



Love you weenie javelina legs!

Lying On the Flagstone

It's late. I love and hate late nights. I love them because I'm all alone and I hate them because I'm all alone. But, I use them to get a lot of thinking done. Aaaand...sometimes Facebook stalk people, but, I digress.
I have a lot of things on my mind. School is officially out. Finally. But it ended on this weird note. Like, if I had to describe the feelings its like where you feel like your about to burp, but then it just goes away.

Am I losing you? What I'm trying to say is, the year felt unfinished, flawed, cut off, and the grains of sand that represent the days of summer feel like they're already slipping. My screenplay finished. My senior year is here. My best friends are leaving. This year is past. It's done. But oddly, I'm not completely ready for this new year. Not yet. It's waiting at the door, ringing the bell and I'm yelling from across the house "HOLD ON, ONE MOMENT, I'M GETTING READY."

I think I'm really just scared.

I'm really really scared. It's not that I haven't wanted THIS YEAR for a long time, but I feel unprepared.
I'm scared.

What if my dreams don't come true?

What if I don't leave? What if I find no one? What if I settle? What if I become a nobody? What if I never go back to Ukraine? What if I'm all alone this year? What if ____?

I feel so...out of control.
I feel like I have the world at my fingertips and  yet I have no control over it.
Physically and emotionally.

I feel all of my artistic expression pent up inside me. I see it. I hear it. I imagine it. I see my future. I see my films, but yet...a part of them loses it's vibrance when the thought creeps into my mind that there's A LOT of people wanting to do what I do. Or... I'm really not that good. I need to create-but with my field of dreams, I worry if no one will care about my creations. Care enough to invest in them. I worry if they will see my vision and embrace it. I just... worry.

I fool myself. In good and bad ways. Mostly bad. I know that of course there is someone for everyone...but sometimes I worry that there's no one for me. Yes, yes, I'm 17 bla bla bla I've heard it... I'm young. I KNOW. But, well... actually that's all I'm going to say about that on a public blog. The story goes much deeper and emotional but that's way too much for this. Anyways, the point is, I worry no one's out there for me, that TRULY is what I need AND what I want. I want someone that is even the things I don't ever ask for out loud. Does that make sense? I want someone that even fit's the things I don't talk about with other people.

I'm disappointed. I'm scared. I feel uneasy. Sometimes I just want to sleep and sleep and sleep. Because even talking about my thoughts seem chaotic and uncontrollable. It's overwhelming.

There are so many problems in the world. I have a list of things I need to do. I have a list of things I want to do. I have a list of things I need help with. And I have a list of things I want to do but can't do on my own. I have a list of people to pray for. I have a list of things to pray for. I have a list of what I want to write about. I have a list of what I want in a man. I have a list of just things I need. I even have a list of just things I need to remember. Good thing I have Siri to help me with those things. Not really, she kind of sucks when it comes to anything other than setting an alarm.

I worry. I hate letting people down and so I worry about that too. Being an entertainer means being a people pleaser, and that causes me insurmountable amounts of stress. I must say, that lately that HAS subsided since the excessive amount of time spent in school caused me to think thoughts like "I just feel like giving them all the bird and walking out the FRONT DOORS. Ain't no one gonna lay a hand on me."
I got REALLLLLLYYYY lazy the past couple of weeks. But laziness, procrastination, and people pleasing are a terrible combination that combust into a careless, heap of low self worth and stress.

I joke, but in all honesty. I love to make people happy. So, on top of the things I do for myself- I worry about the things I must do for other people. I hate to disappoint.

This blog doesn't really have a point. I guess it's just me processing.

I don't even know what my summer in Brazil holds. I have absolutely no idea. I feel like I'm just going to step off the plane into the Rio airport and THEN it will hit me that I'm there. For some reason though, it is refreshing to have no sense of expectations and not have to worry. God has a plan-that's why I'm in missions, and i'm just going to follow and trust it'll all be okay.

I don't really know anything anymore. God, hope and dreams are the only things I feel like I have firmly planted beneath me. People are leaving me. Life is changing, everyone is moving on and I'm stuck in this weird gray purgatory area of transition.

To quote my mom, who I believe quoted my Nana, "Lord, save us all!"

That's exactly how I feel. Lord...save us all?

There's a lot of problems in the world, me included and lying on the cold flagstone in my kitchen only makes me feel better for a short amount of time. I don't even know what to do anymore. I have a list of things and I don't know where to start.

So Lord, save us all. Seriously.

Happy First Day of Summer right?

Love, your frazzled night owl, Shelby