New Year's Resolutions

I don't do New Years resolutions. Let's be honest... how often do people actually succeed at them? I guilt myself enough, so setting some unrealistic resolution would only be another recipe for failure in my life.

And yet... a new year brings about a certain thoughtfulness of what we're leaving behind and what we're hoping to head for. I suppose that's why people do it... because we have no other way of expressing the past and future we are faced with. It is like, for one day, the two aspects of time collide and leave us in wonder, with the hope of change.

I have felt stuck, lately, in my own skin and my own little world. I grow restless sometimes and want to just leave everything behind, go somewhere else and try a new life for awhile. Who doesn't, though? I just... fear, and hope, that corporate America isn't the end of the road for me. But what will change that? What could be the difference between me and the people that have been at my job for 10 or more years, still doing the same thing I've done this past year? Not knowing the answer to that question makes me give in to the haunting fears that float through my consciousness. Perhaps I am no different at all. I can't remember, even, what made me think that I was...

I've said that I'm going through a quarter life crisis. Call it what you will, but this year I looked around at my life and said: "This isn't what I really wanted... why is this it??" I thought I was supposed to be a published writer. I thought I was supposed to be married, with kids, or at least well on my way. I thought I was supposed to be making a positive difference in people's lives, being the voice for those who have none. And the desire is certainly still there... the willingness, even... so why am I going to a dead-end job every day, barely making ends meet, where one day bleeds into another, then another... and nothing is ever really accomplished or changed? If I am not who I was, but not yet who I hope to be, then who am I?

Only one year at this job, and it has already taken its toll. I have stopped reading, stopped showing up to places, stopped cleaning my apartment, and stopped looking for miracles. To some degree, I have even stopped hoping for things to change. I know I am falling back into one of my depressions; the curse of the artistic spirit. It happened exactly this time last year as well. It is, perhaps, merely a seasonal thing. I'm sure I could take some pills to numb the questions, or simply wait it out until the sun's warmth and light remind me of truth.

But right now, I am faced with the frightening reality of the question: what's the point? Why should I keep believing things are going to change, or get better, or that somehow I will motivate myself to do something different in the near future? It feels like nothing has changed in a long time. And I'll not try to hide the fact that part of me has simply given up. Not the viewpoint a Christian is supposed to have, I am sure. But I can't even live up to my own standards, so what's to make me think I will ever live up to God's?

I do not feel so sad as I may sound. In reality, I feel only numb and cynical, and like I am disappointing everyone. Perhaps I only ebb and flow with the tide of seasons, and my heart will thaw out as the sun creates longer days and warmer realities. It never fails that, at some point, something touches me from the inside out and I am inspired to a brighter outlook. I think I am about due for one...

The good news for me is that God is a God of details. If he notices the sparrow's fall, then he has noticed my heart sinking, my dreams losing their color, my motivation to stay positive waning. He notices that I am drowning in my own mind's oceans, and that a badly-lit cubicle is no place for the wild creativity of my heart to flourish. He is, no doubt, leading me to higher ground, as he has so many times before. I just have to do my best to see it.

"I lift my eyes to the hills. From whence does my help come? My help comes from the Lord, the Maker of heaven and earth." Psalm 121

Welcome, 2009, and whatever it is that you bring...