Today is Thursday meaning today I should be posting a blog entry about ::5 Ways:: the church gets it wrong. Don't worry I have the posting and it will be posted, just not today. Today I present a message I should have said a long time ago.
I have noticed, well through some close friends have noticed, that I need to recalibrate my life. Tonight I had the breakdown that was a long time in the making. Tonight I admitted I have no control, the future is not in my hands, I have nothing but faith and love and I have so little of both of those.
For the last few years, well for the last 11 years to be exact I have been attempting to become something I am not. Lately I have been attempting to befriend those who I can use to better my own message through a number of ways. This blog being one of them. This must end.
I dream constantly about becoming famous, have a major influence on not only the local church and political scene, but truthfully the international scene. As a child I felt called to one day lead on a scale few have dreamed leading from, but I know this is nothing more than a childhood fantasy and is by no means Christian. This must end.
For as long as I can remember I have chosen my friends, my church family, where I shop, where I eat, where I go and what I watch all based what it can get me and how it can work into MY master plan. This must all end.
I now understand why I was never chosen for the leadership positions I dreamed of having. I know understand why I was never asked to go to the places others went. I have for too long used and then forgotten about my friends, even my family. Every decision of my life has been controlled, I am the most manipulative person I know, I watch Ben Linus and see myself. I attempt to be the controller of my own destiny but I know I am not that controller and that is too much for me. I must give it to the one who is and faith. I have lived a life of little faith, controlling, manipulating and analyzing each and every move of my life. My life has been the last few years nothing more than a giant game of chess. Again, This must end.
My blog and the Internet as a whole consume my life to a point of having completely sleepless nights and caused me even having a strained relationship with my fiancee. I am more concerned about my blog ranking than my credit ranking. This must end.
I also have been without a full time job for 8 months now. My father purchased the mobile home I own this past November. Since moving in here I have not been able to fix any of the issues I had with it (such as new crown modeling or putting new siding on the outside) because I have not had the money.
I have headaches daily, psoriasis outbreaks, and now a twitching eye all due to stress. Within the last 8 months I have quit a perfectly good job because I disagreed with some moral issues that were at the place of employment (I do not regret this decision, I do wish I had a job lined up before I quit). I moved into a house I actually own and must take care of. I graduated college. I got engaged. I've gone through 2 roommates, finally reuniting with my original roommates. All through this my blog has kept me going.
My blog kept me going through both of my grandparents passing, through my multiple suicide attempts and the counseling that followed, through the coming out of my sexual molestation and the telling of it to my parents. It has been there for the dreams I shared and for the heartbreaks I dealt with. Through all this my blog has truly been my "Therapy."
Lately though my blog has taken on its own life, controlling mine. Instead of it helping me, instead of it being place of open discussion and conversation, it has become a source of popularity (how little it may be) for me. I am now taking action to help keep the blog to its original purpose. That purpose is for it to be a place for me to share my thoughts and dreams creating conversation for myself and others.
I never regret the past, but I do learn from it. I do seek friends, I do seek having an influence of positive change. I do not seek reality show like fame. I do seek true friends and I know I have them all around me. I do not seek control of my life anymore. I do seek faith that is able to trust in God to control my life.
We all have names for it. For the next ______ I am going to be detoxing from the overload of media and technology I have filled my life with. I will be pausing all future posts, I will not work on any posts. That means little twittering, no brightkite, no blogging, no Myspace, no Facebook, no YouTube, no plurk. That also means a time for me to reconnecting with the God of the Bible, a reconnecting with friends outside of twitter blurbs, a reconnecting of nature with more than a webcam in a national park, a reconnecting of me with my city, my surroundings, my actual life. I will twitter some, more for myself as a way to keep my thoughts on this journey. Expect very little twittering, if any. I feel that it would be to share this journey, both for myself and others, but I also want this to be a personal journey, so I will be cautious of what I share and what I think is twitter worthy.
I know one neighbor by name, even though I have lived here since November. I know 2 bus routes even though I say I support local mass transit (I can better navigate the mass transit in Paris, London, Chicago, and Cologne than I can in my own town!). I know of few churches, I know few people, I know very little about the city and county I actually live in. I will be for the next _______ trying to understand, connect, grow in my faith, my city, my county, my neighborhood, and my relationships.
I have been blogging at least once a week for over four years now (AOL journals, then Xanga, now here on Blogger), my life since 2004 has been completely open for all to see. A life that's anything else is almost foreign to me now, but I must do this.
I know this sounds fake, I know I will lose many readers, I know I will lose contact with some of those who are my online friends. I will still have access to email if you need to contact me for some reason. I will still have my phone, though I am turning off most of the twitter people I follow, and turning off the myspace, facebook, plurk and brightkite updates for now. Why not just call me, lets have an actual conversation. Some of you have never heard my fake British accent thats actually a speech impediment. Please don't misunderstand me. I love and support technology and how it provides new ways for us to connect to each other. This time though, for this part of my journey, I must detox from this technology and recalibrate my thoughts and my actions with little influence from this technology.
This is not the end of my blog and don't worry its defiantly not the end of my life. This is the cocoon that the new blog, the new me, will emerge from. My blog is a part of me and I am on my blog. I think, I dream, I live with my blog. I will not end it, but I will change it. I hope you understand and support me in this.
bis neueres Willkommen zum Wormhole
2 comments:
I go on electronic fasts and they have helped with this. You will see a difference.
A long time ago, I was bent on being famous in fiber art. Most of my extra teim was for this purpose. And for a bit, I've reaped in the efforts of all that energy.
But then God moved into my life from the garage where I'd safely put him/her and showed me other ways to look at life. Now that life, those goals are dead to me. What I do now is nothing of what my life was like even 5 years ago. And even in the past year, this has shifted to a more intense focus on areas of concern to God...poverty, justice of the oppressed and mercy. This is so different than me from the past 'famous artist' stage.
People have asked if I am 'getting back to the studio' and honestly, I have no desire. Perhaps I won't. Right now, I have other things to do for the Kingdom.
The journey has been transformational and has lead me back to writing and communicating what I learn. I used to write a lot before the artist thing. Now I am back at it, one of my orginal loves. If only a few people read it, fine. But writing is truly how I process thoughts. And in turn, I read other friends' and family blogs. It is the way of today, more like letters sometimes than 'published' work, but a valuable form of communication.
I enjoy learning from your blogs and will look forward to when you return. I found your blog on Xanga by accident and have followed you ever since.
A good friend of mine (and band member) Ryan a.k.a Angus Simmons says, "What we must all do is learn moderation in all things except love."
My prayer for you, Ken, is understanding that balance.
Kenny, I'm here for you brother! Not that you'll read this anytime soon but I know some good restaurants in Seffner/Dover you, maggie, beth, will, and I should all meet up for dinner sometime.
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