Outstretching

I must confess: I've been having a bit of a hard time.

I feel really bad admitting that, as though in confessing my problems I'm causing nothing but distress to pretty much everybody, including myself.

I hadn't even been thinking clearly about the reasons why I've been feeling a bit low until I talked to my mom this afternoon. Somehow, the conversation with her was a bit of a catalyst, pointing me to what I needed to realize about myself.

I'm unhappy. I'm disappointed in myself. I feel like I've come out here expecting things to just kind of fall into my lap, unwilling to get off my bed and do the things that really need doing.

And it's not even that I haven't been trying; it's just that I haven't been trying in the right ways, I guess, or trying as hard as I should have. Because, surely, if I had been working hard enough things would have worked out by now? Maybe?

I'm anxious. I need work. I need to feel that I'm doing all I can to support myself out here. And I need to be able to not worry about money so much all the time.

But suddenly, typing this, it occurs to me that there's something to learn from this too. Maybe there's a purpose in waiting.

I don't think I'll ever know really what it's like to live in poverty. And I'm so grateful for that. But...

But isn't it important now and then to catch a glimpse of how people who are in devastating financial trouble live? To sense a little bit the kind of anxiety they experience all the time? Doesn't this just increase our compassion for them?

It makes me want to make a difference for them. And maybe, once I've figured out a way to get through the next couple of years out here and I've gotten my degree, maybe I can start with the kids in difficult circumstances, be one of the people who try to help them love learning through the books they read. Because I think that knowledge may be the only way to lift people out of circumstances like that.

Just the way serving others is the only way to lift you out of anxiety for yourself.