Words

July 23, 2010 in Prayer/Faith with 5 Comments

I’m really good with words.  I mean really good.  (or is it well? Doesn’t matter) <– see what I did there?

What I mean is, growing up, all I had were my words.  At first, it was defense.  I knew if my mom was going to hit me, if I could make her laugh, she wouldn’t.  At school, I realized that, if I could make kids laugh, they’d like me.  I quickly learned that, with my words I could diffuse any situation.  Teacher’s mad?  I’ll talk to her.  Mom’s grounding me, and not letting me go out? I’ll talk to her, I’ll go out tonight. 

It’s spilled over into my adult life. (As have 100,000 other things.) I can, when I want to, talk my way out of anything. 

So, this is how I pray a lot of time. I reason with God.  I say things like, “You know that bad thing I did, well, it was one time, and… I’m only human, but you know I love you, and you love me, so… we’re cool, right?”

Boom, like that, I try to relieve myself of all responsibility.  God and I talked about it. That’s it. It’s done.

Well, it’s not.  Maybe that’s where a lot of this anger is coming from.  Maybe that’s where a lot of my low self-esteem is coming from.  I think my ‘prayer life’ has been lacking, because of me.  I think I am on to something.  I think I’m scared of working on it.  I’m scared to press the publish button.  I’m scared to confront this.  But I have to or I’ll be right back here in 6 months. (Or still here.)

  • Desertblossom1206

    You may be the reason I begin to blog again. Your candor inspires me to be honestly vulnerable with others. I struggle with prayer and a relationship with God. I have ever since I attended seminary. I am not blaming my experience, but I am sick of being content with my discontentment. Thank you for giving me something to think about as I seek to find out what faith, relationship, and love look like post seminary.

  • http://www.crucialencounter.com Andy

    Hey! thanks for actually reading! haha. I'm glad my thoughts can provoke something. I've really been hunkerin' down and asking myself the tough questions. Partly in efforts to not be a horrible husband/father, and partly due to just feeling comlpetely distant from this guy, who went through Hell…. literally…. for me..

  • Pingback: Tweets that mention Words | crucialencounter -- Topsy.com

  • Jesse Wick

    It has bothered me for a while how much of my “prayer life” consists of me babbling on and on to God. And on and on. Often repetitively.

    How hard it is to be quiet and listen.

    Try breathing slowly and steadily. Try to focus on nothing but your breathing. Say the Jesus prayer as you breathe. Focus on nothing but breathing and the prayer. Breathe the prayer in and out. Don't think about anything else. Don't try to stop yourself from thinking, just allow the thoughts that come up to drift away and die a natural death without focusing on them. Try to be quiet. See how long you can do it. I can last about 3 minutes.

    I learned the breathing technique from a Zen Buddhist, so I'm probably a heretic. But it seems to help.

  • http://www.crucialencounter.com Andy

    Jesse,

    This is good stuff man! I seriously don't understand why you don't blog… I think often, I wonder what Jesse has to say about this. Shoot me an e-mail. I think it's time we got you setup.