semicolons and commas

the problem with writing a journal entry after a long hiatus (vocab word for my students this week) is that there's an expectation (from whom i'm not sure) that it will be a compilation of reflections from the last entry until now. something of the substantial sort perhaps. it is and it is not. it is in that this moment contains all moments prior i suppose (and in some sense all following as well if you take it in a c.s. lewis style).

but nevertheless, it is here, and i have no clue what it will be.

tho the only wisdom this entry can endeavor to touch upon is that i'm so far from good (more suprise than i'd ever think) and very much in want.

of the following:
peace from God
comfort
acceptance
ability

and that there is much else i don't have mastery over. not even 80% (tfa joke, unfortunately).

myself
responsibility
love
kindness
selflessness
joy

and everything else that makes up the fruit of the spirit.

especially self-control. strange that when i feel like i have no control, self-control quickly dissolves as well. tho this is not how it's supposed to be. supposedly i'm to be able to have self-control because i have hope and find stability in something greater. perhaps it's not enough faith that i won't drown while i walk in this new storm. that's something else i just realized. jesus walks on water during a storm. so thus peter does too. maybe he would have been learned to trust jesus with the sea. maybe he was at that point where he has enough faith in the ability for God to use him during calm waters. but now there's the storm factor...(it's only a new factor because it is only now that i realize it was there, thus it's new to me...maybe this is not that that significant, but for some reason, i believe it is because a new layer of blindness has just been stripped in my memory of the story i've been obsessed with for the past few months, and will probably continue to be for a while). and he gets scared.

so the lack of self-control manifests itself in a lack of actions: i miss people but i don't contact them. people reach out to me but i don't always respond. and i'm insecure so i watch tv. when i'm supposed to be lesson planning, writing emails, being...responsible for those i've committed to, at least in my most idealistic moments, to be committed to. according to that darn personality test, i'm supposedly a crusader. but i'm also paralyzed a lot of the time in ...what is it? fear? hopelessness? stress?

i don't like teaching. there i said it. i know it's a great privilege, and some side of me likes that i'm here...but i don't like playing the bad guy. and i hate seeing my weaknesses directly affecting people i'm supposed to be serving positively -are these weaknesses (selfishness, inexperience, being unorganized, etc.) a deep injustice i'm committing against my students? ... and i haven't been able to tap into the juices of goodness and meaning creativity for those God-filled lessons i dreamed about - helping my students discover the world as it is meant to be, to understand eden - instead i'm being sucked into to the realization of my nakedness, some bitterness that even my students have noticed (miss, why are you so morbid all the time?) we're reading lord of the flies, which i'm a little nervous about because what if all i do is focus on evil and forget to keep my heart grounded upwards towards good?

is what i'm doing exuding Jesus? probably not because i miss Him. I miss Him in friends, in church, in the godpod i adored last year. and i miss Him in prayers. i miss Him in community and individually. not even "in anything" - i miss Him. yes, He's here, and yes, I have moments when i realize it's all Him - but i have yet to see myself change into a better teacher because of Him - and maybe that's it. maybe i need to see my identity fully in Him rather than as a teacher or friend, or whatever - of course that's always been the case - that's always been the answer. but i still have yet to understand a)what that means and b) what else that does not explain. so maybe that's it, but it's not all of it. maybe once i seek to just be His, everything else will reflect Him as well - in the meantime, tho, i still feel guilt for not doing what i'm supposed to be doing according to what i - and everyone else - believe i should be doing - which is committing fully to children.

do we all suffer with illusions of greatness in the future?

i can't even handle myself - at this moment i never want to handle anyone else. i have to give hugs and kisses and love without any responsibility. of course it's pretty much the opposite right now. and so at this time, it's mostly desert desert desert.

(random mind wandering mm dessert.

rita's water ice has great pumpkin-flavored italian ice. not everything is symbolic or great. some things just are.

maybe. mirages. mirages of desserts. that's pretty hellish. like those cooking shows. i'd imagine hell to be a place where they show you delicious food without giving you any.)

anticlimactic. because i'm about to end here. but maybe it should be anticlimactic because that's what i feel at the moment, even tho there have been some wonderful moments with love from friends and family and the realization that my students are wonderfully loved by God as well (though i have yet to fully grasp that in my heart so that i can realize this all the time). still at this moment, i feel like i ought to hide behind this bastion (another vocab word for the week) of hope/hopelessness? that separates saturday from sunday (the last layer of security for the weekend) and maybe myself from others.

which leads me to a recent thought that i haven't quite mapped out (maybe instead of settling with anticlimactic, i'll just push on forward blindly - which is also what i feel like i'm doin)- if the church is one body what exactly does it mean for us to have an identity? is alice 1) me, my identity that He created for me and 2) the lens thru which i'm supposed to develop an understanding of humanity/ our relationships/ and our brokeness? if i am not my own, then does that make this "me - mind, thoughts, body" somehow (not irrelevant but) no longer the center of my world, and simply a temporary being for me - a soul- to reside and grow into something greater than just itself?

ok trippy. maybe also completely wrong. in fact dino says it is wrong to say individual identities don't matter because names are important. and dying to ourselves isn't dying to our identities - but rather dying to our desires. somehow i'm not really clear about how that works anymore.


nevertheless, i only wonder about this because i am beginning to see more of the fall of humanity thru an understanding of how i act and react to new obstacles. if i ever thought myself wise and kind/good - almost beautiful because i (thought i) loved people - i am now realizing how superficial this goodness was - not to deny power to any lessons i learned and character i gaiend before, but i think the genuine good was, after a while, glossed over with a veneer of goodaliceness that covered also the bad - and i guess just recently, some deep scraping away of such has been occuring - and maybe it's a good thing - i just wish that will be the last, and that this isn't something that will happen throughout my life (this = learning a lesson and growing painfully, then peace until i realize the peace is only temporary and is covering up some more darkness that must be uprooted in a difficult process) - tho i'm almost certain it will. yes for my own good. ("my"? what's that again?) but misery! where's the joy?


of course, i know just because i can see the world's fall in my heart doesn't mean that's the only purpose for me to have an identity that is alice. maybe it's just one "perk" and one way God works.

so i know i can't separate myself off, but i know i'm not indiscriminantly mixed with other people, so and i know that i can't go the other way around which also cuts me off in a sense - and claim that my identity does not exist... but at the same time, i also hate feeling a bit diluted. teacheralice is never completely away. work never ends abruptly, tho it may roll into rest. same with this whole growth and peace business.

and knowing the importance of others makes it that much harder knowing that i don't have a stable church body here in philly because i'm too scared and/or exhausted to commit to one - in spite of knowing it's so important - is that what it feels like to decide to go into rehab?

so the line between then and now and forevermore does not quite exist, because this moment contains all moments and every decision i make is just a compilation of all other decisions...and if i say i'm connected to everyone else, am i going to enter the boundaries of a major eastern religion? but we already established that identity matters. and what about forgiveness? where's forgiveness and how do we settle that with consequences? are we the sum of our actions? i don't think so...tho now i'm getting a little more confused...

well so sleep and wake - here i go enter into sleep - sorta - i'll probably still dream about the things i fret over while i'm awake.

of course i want some things to be destroyed/purged forever. die to myself. so that i can be part of something/someone greater. so that i don't have to feel like i'm choosing this or that so and so versus so and so, but that i can be "forever friends" (a la elizabeth and sunday school) with you even if at this moment i feel disconnected from you.

And death shall be no more; Death, thou shalt die. (a la donne and w;t if you've ever seen/read the play)

i think i'm at some state of spiritual confusion.