{Be}

I've spent a lot of time recently thinking about my future. Mostly because my future is approaching faster than I would like it to, but otherwise I think about what I don't have planned out. I think a lot about what comes after 10:00 am on May 2nd. Quite honestly, I have no idea what I'm doing or what's going on. When people ask what I want to do with my life, I wouldn't be surprised if I stayed & waited tables in small town Nebraska for the next 100 years. In a way, my future is exciting, but in another way, it is terrifying. I'm scared of not having a plan. I'm scared of being alone in the adult world. I've been thinking about who I will be, what I will be, where I will be, & what I will be doing. The word "be" scares me.

My whole life, especially in the past several years, that word has been the name that has defined me, it has held a sort of premise of a nickname in my life. But now, I come across an identity crisis with being 'Bee.' I thought my life would be on this set plan; a perfectly timed out & detailed scale & schedule. I thought that I'd be older & that, somehow, I'd be wise beyond my years. That I'd have some sort of sense of what it really means to be an adult. Well I'm young, poor, under-experienced in the "life" department, & a little clueless of how to manage myself in a big world full of opportunities. Opportunities to make choices & to make mistakes. But what I didn't expect was to not even have a Plan B when my story tale Plan A didn't follow through like I would have liked it to. Now I'm forced with this struggle of being something that I have absolutely no idea how to be.

It's funny, you know, how a simple word, with only two letters, can scare you more than almost any other word scripted from the remaining twenty-four letters in our English alphabet. See, I thought I had it all planned out, drawn out, & worked out, but now I don't want to get out. I'm faced every single day with the ominous question of: now what do you want to be? The possibilities of being something are endless, most often rewarding, but I'm too scared to take a leap of faith & dive into something that may be wrong. I say I don't want to continue with school, because let's be honest, I hate it. & though I am more than thankful for my education, I think it's time for me to turn in my last assignment. If only extra-curricular activities track was an actual degree plan, but I guess communications is pretty close in the running with them. There's thoughts raging through my mind like: Maybe I picked the wrong school from the start. Maybe I decided on the wrong major. Maybe I just wasted thousands of dollars to just want to start all over. All of these 'maybes' are freaking me out.

My main struggle is thinking that my non-existent Plan B isn't going to work out.

Most kids graduate college in their early twenties. They may claim to live an adult-like life, but still resemble a child in more ways than they would an adult. Some still may be lacking in the area of good decisions. Some may have never had the chance to be their own adult because their parents have been feeding them like baby birds their whole lives. Most of the time, a college graduate is sent out into the world still resembling a child, but fitting into an adult-sized body. They think they can take on a full adult life load; a family, a career, bills, a home, the works. But the truth is, we don't even know what we're doing out here! We plaster a smile on our faces & grind our teeth at night. Call our best friends crying & then turn around to tell our parents that we are doing just fine. It's a class act that we have learned to master. Some of us, grow up & out of it, while others wallow & grieve while digging themselves into a miserable hole.

The struggle & issue with the 'be' in being is that we don't understand it's full meaning. We don't quite understand the full potential those two letters can carry. The true definition is doing, not being. Yes, you may be a human being, but it is your human doings that will take you places. That will accomplish tasks, & that will help your life to move forward. Your human doing will be the result of your being.

So while I fret & while I worry, I'm wasting time. No, I don't have a Plan B or a Plan C, or a plan for any of the rest of the alphabet, in any language. Sitting around, pulling my hair out, & stressing over things that won't be so important in the long run, won't result in me getting things done.

"Come to me, all you who are weary & burdened, & I will give you rest." - Matthew 11:28

Peace & love.
B.

{Listening}

I believe in the power of prayer. I believe that there is someone, some creative power out in this world that hears me, that loves me, that watches over me. Sometimes, though I wonder if my words are really being transported & translated in the way that I intended them to be. I know we can all relate to being deep in a thought of prayer, then ramble off something, & immediately wanting to suck in our words, or get embarrassed because we said something in the wrong way. I sometimes convince myself that there is a sonic gap, or a massive layover time between when the words formed on my lips evaporate into the air, until they land on precious ears.

Faith is a weird thing to me. How can I be so in love with an unseen, unknown force? The idea of God, the Creator of the universe, knowing & hearing my every word, my every thought, seeing my every action, & who already knows my outcome, just boggles my mind. How can I, a farm girl with big city dreams, be so important in the grand scheme of things? How is it that He hears not only my prayers, but the prayers of billions of people. How does He translate my messages & give me the answers that I am searching for? Why on earth is my story so important, & why do I matter? In human eyes, we are all just another human, placed into different groups due to status, culture, income, race, & gender. But in the eyes of the Father, we are individuals. We are precious souls. There is no comparison for me to you, or him to her. That's what blows my mind! It is unfathomable to think of another human as a completely separate for everyone & everything. My not being judged by someone or compared & contrasted to another being seriously is the most bizarre thing. & that's just the crazy thing about God. He just does. He is.

I can recall times where I literally am so consumed with pain, so overwhelmed with life, so incandescently unavailable in my own world that all I can do is mutter letters that don't form specific words. Where my tears of pain turn into tears of sorrow. When my heart is broken out on my sleeve & I need someone to sew it back together. But then feel the comfort of something greater than me when my soul is beaten down. I often recall the story of Hannah as she begs & pleads with God to give her a son, just one little baby boy. When Samuel sees her, he thinks she is drunk, but once he listens to her, he feels her pain & offers what he can as a priest in the Temple to help her find peace in her pain & sorrow. I often feel God holding me through other peoples' arms. I hear the comfort of His voice through other peoples' words. When my broken body is repaired by someone else's gentle, dirty hands, I feel the healing of my Father.

I've had so many great opportunities in the past few months to begin the re-development of new prayer life & verbal relationship with God. I started to really focus on my prayers when I began to feel lost, when I began to wonder where God was in my life. When I was alone & disappointed, I grab the thing I was most comfortable holding; a pen. I began to write. As I wrote, I prayed. Writing my every thought on pages after pages of my prayer journal. My writings began to be my readings, my prayers. The words I wrote began to be the words I spoke out loud. There have been many times when I've spend day after day saying the same prayer over & over until it sounded so much like a drone that even I began to think that my methods were wrong. I have really struggled to continue to find new values in individual prayers & praises. We're taught as young Christians to build a relationship with God through prayer, but I have really struggled to remain genuine in my thoughts & words to God throughout my faith walk. I have to constantly remind myself, & stop myself to think of how the Lord as truly, genuinely blessed me, & how I will try to honor & thank Him for the beauty in my life.

What I've realized recently, is that prayer doesn't have to be one sided. It is a conversation. It is verses, & songs, cadences, repetitive lines of praise, of thanks, & hopes. Prayer to me is refreshing. Have you ever sat down in a dark room, no noise, no distractions, just the sound of your breath bouncing off walls? That's my favorite place to pray. Where I can lament to God in a way that He will only see me. Where I let Him fill the dark room with light. I'm not trying to make up a mystical setting, or for you to all think that I sit alone in dark rooms often, but sometimes that is the therapy we just need. Where we can be removed from the world & its noise & chaos. Where we are focused on breathing & listening for God to move about us.

God uses people in different ways; He speaks in many forms, takes on many shapes & faces. But in the end, He is always listening. From our first cry to our last breath & then everywhere far & in between, He has his ear turned to us. To comfort us when we whimper & moan. To hug us when we're lost & to give us comfort when we grieve. Though we can't see Him, I know that through people, God is always around me. Always using other's to show me Himself. I don't ever know when God is using me, but I hope he does. I hope my my soul is a shining light to those around me.

I believe in the power of prayer, because I believe in the power of God.

Peace & love.
B.