Some Things I've Learned

So, This list of "learnings" are by no means the absolute truth or something I expect everyone to agree with, but I have found in my own life that these various findings are true for me and I hope they can offer you something as well. :)
These treasures are composed from a compilation of the crazy, tumultuous and exquisite life I've been blessed enough to live thus far. . .
They are derived from amazing books I've read, intriguing random people I've encountered, great friends who inspire me, ex-boyfriends who loved me enough to be honest with me and finally-- long, deep, thoughtful days and nights spent in my own mind or basking in the beauty of God's quiet grace. . .

I compiled a list of these learnings quite a few months ago and then I put them away. And when I say put them away. . .that means deeply buried in Shanon's denegration of sacred junk stored in her closet. . . Which if placed haphazardly at the time (likely), might be incredibly difficult to locate when needed. . .
But thankfully one of my new years "resolutions" was to organize these sacred treasures. (Come to find some things were not so sacred. . .) Sooo, some things were thrown out, and others carefully placed into their designated plastic tubs. I didn't get a chance to read everything in detail as I was organizing them, but for some reason, when I came across this list. . .I stopped to read every word.

I AM SO GLAD I DID. It made me realize how rich and beautiful my life has really been. So, I decided to share them with you lovely folks. 

Some things I've learned:

1) The right person at the wrong time is the wrong thing.

2) Being an extremist isn't always a bad thing. You can be an extremist for love, for example. However, it just seems that all the zealous people are extreme about the wrong things. . .

3) It seems that all the truly selfless, good people are too meek to actually exhibit the bravery needed to change the world, and all the evil people are too arrogant to realize how evil they really are. . .

4) Nothing you have not given, will ever truly be yours. (C.S. Lewis)

5) Go out of your way to help someone else. Don't merely offer assistance when it is convenient for you, otherwise it isn't truly a goodness and it only serves to accommodate your own ego or status. (B. Alexander)

6) A lot of people rationalize their own wrongs. They choose to be blinded, so what makes you think that they won't lie to you too?

7) I've found that people who are hurting do the exact opposite of what they need. For example, they may isolate themselves when they really need help or community.

8) Loneliness is a reminder of how far acceptance is from understanding. (Jewel).

9) Every situation is a chance for God to show you his goodness. . .if we let him. Every situation.

10) When you are feeling down or sad, I've learned to do these three things: Be thankful/ meditate on that, do something nice for someone else and envelop your whole being in an activity or hobby that you are passionate about. Before you know it, you won't be sad anymore. . .I think it's because we are created to love... to give to something outside ourselves and by that, we become whole.

11) Truly pure, sacrificial love is disarming: Meaning, it can cause good people to become better. . .or it will make evil people more evil.

12) There is a difference between joy and bliss.

13) If we are not living in peace it is because we have forgotten that we belong to each other.

14) I believe that Christianity is in its deepest, truest form--(the way Jesus intended it to be, before our society made it about money or religion or guilt or any of that bullcrap). . . is about radical humanism. The cause of God coincides with the cause of man and if you want to be close to Christ. . .go where there are people who are suffering and help the people who most people don't associate with.

15) The Kingdom that Jesus talked about was complex, but not complicated. (There is a difference.) And I believe that all the best things are this way.

16) If you want to stop doing a "bad" thing (a habit), don't focus on "stopping" it with constantly berating yourself and start adding good stuff in your life contrary to that habit. Work on those things and meditate on them continually and soon you will find that the bad cannot dwell in the same place as the good. Think of it as a big jug of Kool Aid which represents the "bad". The more you add water-- the "good", the more the Kool aid is diluted and soon it is completely dissipated by the water.

16) There is a difference between listening and just waiting to talk.

17) Don't ever go to bed angry.

18) You can't control what others say/do to you, but you CAN choose how you react to it. Afterall, we are all responsible for our own actions no matter what someone else did to us.

19) Sickness is a means by which an organism frees itself of foreign matter. It is sometimes necessary to rid us of something that doesn't belong. This applies physically and spiritually.

20) It is important to learn to ask for help. When we can't ask for help, we are making ourselves unnecessary martyrs. It isn't noble to sit at home and pretend to be strong while we waste away alone. . . it is a false humility. We are built to need others and in maturity, that is something we realize more and more.

21) It doesn't matter how good something is TO you, if it isn't good FOR you, you have to let it go.

22) If you want something you've never had, you've gotta do something you've never done.

23) Sometimes we must do the difficult thing, even when we think we can't. We must do it. . .afraid. We must help when we feel unable to. We must love when we don't feel like it and we must pray even when prayer sees dry as dust. Finally, we must fight when we don't believe in our own strengths. That is when breakthroughs happen.

24) Perhaps everything terrible is in its deepest being something helpless that needs help from us. Perhaps all the dragons of our lives are really just princesses waiting to see us once brave.

25) Sometimes the only wrong thing to do--is to do nothing.

26) Love lasts even when relationships don't.

27) Sometimes we must endure melancholy moments or that "good pain" because they are for a greater cause. Pains, which if we follow through long enough will bring us new truths, resolutions . . . healing which we didn't even know we needed.

28) I think it is a common misconception that we go through trials and suffering so that God can see our heart or that he's testing us or something, but I think it's less that and more so that we may be able to see what's in our own hearts. I mean, because God already knows our heart. Perhaps sometimes we need to see the pride or brokenness of our own hearts to realize how far we are from God's or to see how much we need Him. . .

29) We should not pretend that everything is ok when it isn't, but we should however never stop believing that beauty is to found in spite of it.

30) I believe imagination is a virtue. True genius realizes how to inject depth and wisdom into the heart of a man with the needle of genuine meek simplicity.

31) Poets and dreamers preach a gospel without actually preaching. Their steadfast passion/art becomes a fierce gentle sermon in itself. I think parables are like this. Situational stories for the common person to relate to, while simultaneously enveloping a powerful truth fit to knock you to your knees.

32) Love begins free, but in its highest form is actually UNFREE. What I mean is that love is a process which is meant to be perfected in us. It starts as something we choose to do, but eventually its purpose is to make it impossible for us to "not love". It becomes not just some action but it is who we are. We do it so much that it becomes such a part of us that we breathe, walk and talk it. Isn't that beautiful? There is an Eastern idea similar to that called "anaphora". Students would be required to practice this "anaphora" with everything they learned. It means to repeat something over and over and over again. The purpose was to make the thing they were learning so ingrained in their mind that they no longer would need to "recall" it for tests, but it became who they were. :)

33) Our experiences are our greatest strengths and our greatest weakness. We learn a lot from what we go through so that we hopefully don't make the same mistakes again, yet the hurt and reality of it all often leaves us insecure and tattered. . .

34) Boredom is self-inflicted. One of my favorite writers, Rilke says that if you find your situation or surroundings too boring to write about or create something from, then it's your own fault. It is because you are not artist enough to call forth its richness. For, there is so much wealth to be found. Find it.

35) It is always easier to blame the "evil" devil for overtaking us, or the "omnipotent-all powerful" God for not intervening, but when are we going to start taking responsibility for our own actions?!

36) I wonder when we started having so many complexes. . .so many reservations, issues and things that hold us back from good things. When did that start? I think instead of growing up, we need to start growing down and maybe instead of praying for more wisdom, we need to pray for humility. A humility that giggles when all hell is breaking loose.

37) You have to willing to let things and people go in your life, to really enjoy them being in our life. Therein lies the lesson.

38) it only takes one moment to react out of love.

39) It is possible to actually "be" free but still behave in a slave mentality. Don't let the illusions of your own chains bind you anymore.

40) Never lose your childish enthusiasm. It is the most important thing.