I have been running lately. And I didn’t know it until yesterday. Running from things I don’t want to deal with. Running from (potential) shame. Running from actually admitting things in my life that hurt me or people that have hurt me. I spent time with Chelsea yesterday catching up on life and sitting with her in hard things and before we sat in hard things I told her that my life was good and I was content and that it was calm and easy to breathe right now which is not a lie. As we waded through things in her life and she let me listen and love her I realized there were things that I didn’t want to deal with that could affect my content state of being. I still don’t want to face those things. I still don’t want to acknowledge them. But they are looming closer now. It’ll happen when it’s supposed to happen and I may get kicked in the ass later in life for not dealing with them now but that’ll be alright too.

also, I realize I’ve been living in a false reality. Which goes along with the above. I read a blog by Ellie Holcomb a week or so ago and she talked about how she’s been so good at lying to herself for the past few years and it wasn’t until she started going to counseling recently that she realized it. My first thought was to be shocked that Ellie Holcomb just admitted and really would lie to herself and about herself and live in a false reality. Her life seems so perfect. And then so quickly I realized that I was living in a false reality even about people like her who I don’t know—I so often think other people have it all together and must never have messy lives like I do. Dumb. So Chelsea and I waded through the waters of realities and perceptions and expectations. Heavy things. I lie to myself about things that happened (things that I maybe wish would happen but haven’t or things that could happen even though they probably never will) or how I see myself or how others see me, and I lie to myself about what other people’s lives are like.

Brandon and I talked the other day about how people perceive us. He talked about how he wished people would perceive him as the person he wants to be (his potential) not who he is now. I’ve been thinking about that a lot lately because I thought at the time it was a dumb thought. I thought you should take people as they are and not just wish they’d be this person you think they could be. I think both sides are right though. You have to be expectant that God is changing that person just like he is changing you but also be okay to sit in the heavy things for a while until they figure life out. If God is choosing to work in my heart and weed out the bad things then chances are He’s choosing to work in other people’s hearts too. I forget that a lot. Again, I live in this false reality that people are either perfect or too messy to have the Spirit weed out the junk in them.

I want to live in reality. I want to live with the messy things that have happened but I want to have a kingdom mindset and live in the glory that is in me that happens to be the same glory that was in Jesus. I want to live in the grace gifts I’ve been given here and not live in the shame or even in the potential shame that I know I could face someday again in life if I gave into it. Not because I don’t want to face reality but because the reality of my life is that I’m forgiven and loved and treasured and that is the only reality I want to choose to live in.