"You're 'in it' right now, aren't you?"

 

I watched Garden State for the first time in a while the other night with a beautiful little friend of mine. It isn't that the film is such a deep learning or move-you-to-think type of watch, or even a bring-a-new-not-yet-thought-of-concept-to-the-table kind of movie. But it does have an identifiable aspect of the characters' struggles that is easily recognized, an awkward realness that is both entertaining and raw, funny and depressing.  Plus, I just really think the filming techniques are kind of brilliant.  But that's besides the point. 

I guess it's semi-weird to admit that I was affected even after the movie was over.  It genuinely made me feel down a little. I think it was strange for me to recognize how similar my life had looked compared to his (the main character).  Because we all feel that sometimes, right?  Like life seems to be the prominent antagonist in our own story.  But that isn't where the similarities ended.  Not only is life his antagonist, but he runs from it too.  The whole movie is about this guy who chooses to live in life, instead of living it, because it's easier that way.

I think I thought about it so much because my pretty friend and I had a good long conversation about it afterward- what simply "living in life" has looked like for us. One of the biggest challenges for me since I hit the mighty idea that I was going to learn to love (because that's the only real way to live) is letting go of my past, and yet not forgetting the way's He's grown me through it.  I always find myself pulling too far to one extreme or the other, never quite hitting the nail on the head.  If I wasn't dwelling on the things I could not change, I was shoving the things I could far from sight, out of fear.  And while He has been revealing Himself to me in ways I had not anticipated by any stretch of the imagination, all that stuff is still there.  All the ways I cowered, all the things  I chose not to say, all the instances I walked away, all the secrets my heart still holds, all the lies I told myself could change things.  They're all still there.  And funny story: the lies didn't change things.

I know He is still healing, and I know, for that, we're on His time.  Patience is something I'm learning to embrace openly as He takes every little stain my heart has held and trades it for Himself, with such executed and precise detail. 

I praise Him the time He's taking as I learn more and more about obedience and submission to the Holder of that [MY] heart, the Love of my life.  And I think He's having a good time showing me how to live, in true love and true faith-- faith that moves by, and stands up through, the God of the universe.