How I Grew This Summer

All the high school and college kids in my city went back to school today and even though I'm not joining them (for the first time ever!), it does feel like today marked the end of the summer. Honestly, this was one of the strangest summers for me, and definitely one of the hardest. But even though these past three months were very difficult, I also learned a lot throughout them. I can look back and see all the things this summer has taught me, and the ways I've grown since it started. These are some of them.

Learning to Live in Bittersweet

One of the strangest things I felt after my grandpa passed away in June was the strong impression that life was now going to be colored with a twinge of sadness, no matter how much time passed. I suppose that's the nature of tragedies, and of people we love moving on. And it was strange for me to realize that, to get used to the idea that life can still be beautiful and full of joy even if there's always something that can make us sad if we think for long about it. The word for this is bittersweet, which I've always thought of as such an unusual, but redemptive thing that occurs in life.

As I was thinking about it, I realized that God too, is familiar with bittersweet. He knows what it's like to feel great joy in the midst of great sorrow. Like when He rescued His people from sin while having to watch His Son die on a cross. Or maybe God feels bittersweet more than we know- maybe that's what it's like to be able to see everything at the same time, to see some of your children suffering great pain while others are living great joy. We'll probably never understand the depth of bittersweet things until we get to Heaven, but it comforts me to know that God is familiar with that feeling, and that His redemption is so powerfully at work in the middle of it. This quote by Shauna Niequist says it so well:

"I believe that God is making all things new. I believe that Christ overcame death and that pattern is apparent all through life and history: life from death, water from a stone, redemption from failure, connection from alienation. I believe that suffering is part of the narrative, and that nothing really good gets built when everything's easy."

Embracing a Routine

I've always said I'm not a fan of the idea of busyness- of living your life swamped with meetings and appointments and task after task. And while that's true- I'm pretty much wired to need time off to reflect and mediate about life- I've also learned that neither extreme is better than the other. If there's one thing that the long, lazy days of summer have taught me, it's that as much as I hate to admit it, I need routine in my life too. I need to establish a set time to wake up, read my Bible, and exercise. I need to create more daily habits, even if it means that my schedule isn't going to be as free and flexible as I'd always like. Two things I've been trying to stick to lately are the daily regimes of journaling and writing (aka writing 1000 words for my novel everyday).

While I love the idea of living a life motivated by inspiration and spontaneity, I've learned that I can't just live there, or I'll never get any long-term project accomplished. So I'm trying to find ways to bring myself into a stricter (than the one I have now) routine, and hopefully I'll see better results from that.

Being Gracious to Myself

I've always been a bit of a perfectionist, especially when it comes to my work. I think it might have to do with being the oldest of my siblings. I naturally feel like I have to take responsibility, so I can sometimes be hard on myself if I mess up. But I'm learning to ease up on this. Mistakes that would have bothered me so much before have been easier to let go of this summer. Just recently, I didn't accomplish a task for an event the way I was supposed to and while at first it really bothered me because I worried I had let people down, I decided to look at the bigger picture instead. Just because I hadn't done this one thing perfectly didn't mean that the event we were putting on was ruined. It was really only a tiny hiccup that wouldn't matter in the long run. This event was so much bigger than one little task, and I tried to keep in mind that what mattered was that I had learned something from it.

Letting things go like this isn't always easy, because I really do want to do every job I'm assigned perfectly. But I have to come to terms with the fact that I'm human and so no matter how hard I try not to, I will sometimes make mistakes. Obviously that doesn't mean I'm going to stop trying to do things with excellence, but in my case, learning to be okay with messing up is something I need to get better at.

When this recent thing happened, I kept this in mind: i wanted the people who were running this event to have grace for my mistake, didn't I? I wanted them to realize that I was human and that my small mistake wasn't that much of a deal in the big picture. So then, shouldn't I have that same kind of grace and understanding toward myself? Think about that next time you want to beat yourself up over a mistake. Have the same kind of grace toward yourself that you would want others to offer you. After all, we can't expect people to treat us better than we choose to treat ourselves.

This summer was definitely challenging, but looking back at these things helps me see how much I've grown in the midst of it. I remember posting at its start that what mattered to me most about this summer was how I grew throughout it- much more than the crazy adventures or roadtrips or trips to the beach. So it makes me really happy to see that this summer was about growth. And I'm so looking forward to continue that as we step into fall.

#2015 #christian