Inconcievable

Yesterday, I tried a little experiment. 

Usually, when I listen to my iPod, if a song isn’t one of the chosen few of the moment, I skip right past in to one of my favorites. I don’t even give it the time of day. 

But last night, I decided that as long as I didn’t absolutely hate the song, I was going to listen to it and give it a shot. It was quite enjoyable. 

I’ve also been doing the same with thoughts. Instead of just pushing away everything that didn’t fit into my pre-concieved, narrowly defined paradigm, I entertained thoughts that often leave me uncomfortable. 

A lot of these thoughts have to do with God and divinity in general. I’ve been questioning my conception of God, and where I fit in the scheme of things in a much different way lately. 

In the past, God was just GOD and I was just this completely insignificant, unworthy creation who would simply never be worthy–Atonement or no Atonement. 

And I’ve come to some conclusions that many in my life, culture, and religion would find completely disturbing. But this is my journey and my struggle. My path to enlightenment is simply going to be different than yours, but that’s okay. 

Now that I’ve accepted that, my next post on the nature of God and the inconcievibilty of sin will be much easier to write.

Hope for the Hopeless?

It’s difficult to capture poignant moments in words and tell stories about them, when there aren’t really stories to tell, just moments and insights that one doesn’t really know how to share.

A single moment of an ordinary day can change a life, so long as the potential changee doesn’t lose the lesson in the hustle of building a life.

It breaks my heart that we live in a world overrun by destructive moments; that callousness seems to be the order of the day, and that I often help callousness on its way.

 It reminds me of when Elder Holland gave a talk in General Conference about Speaking with the Tongues of Angels. I remember how convicted I felt, because I am nothing if not biting and sarcastic.

How do I reconcile my cynicism with my quest for Christianity? It causes such cognitive dissonance that I often despair.

How can I decry the cruelty of the world, when everyday, in some way, I contribute to it?

It almost makes life feel vain. What is the point of lofty goals and pretty creeds, if not accompanied by integrity and character?

No wonder we need the Atonment; if only I could cast off pride, let go of doubt and surrender.

Constant Comparisons

You know, I read the blogs of others quite frequently, and this is why I don’t write un my own as frequently.

I am not them. I do not have their lives. I do not have their concerns. I do not have their talents.

And I certainly do not have their spirituality.

I have the longing; the wishing; the hoping, but I also have the knowledge that I will never be what they are.

You want to know the status of my prayer life? It sucks. I hate it. I feel like I am talking to some invisible man, who quite possibly does not exist.

I say this not because I don’t believe in God. Oh, I am sure he exists up there on His big ol’ mountain. But he is up there and I am down here and I just can’t bring myself to actually believe that he gives a damn about me.

That’s right. I said it. Blasphemy.

I don’t believe in a Personal Savior. Just don’t.

I believe that Jesus died to save us all, and he loves us all, in that crazy way that only God can. But he doesn’t love me, Crystal, crazy girl who prays to an invisible god.

He loves me. Child of God, someday Mother in Zion. Maybe even someone’s wife someday.

I guess I believe that God loves me in concept.

It’s the only way that I can accept it.

I can go to Church. I can pay my tithing. I can serve my neighbor and love him as I love myself.

But don’t ask me to pray.

I don’t believe in a God who answers prayers.

Crawling Toward Zion

It must come as quite a shock to see new words on this screen. It will come as a shock to me if there is anyone left reading this blog.

The hour is late and my lids are droopy, but my mind is wide awake.

So much has changed and so much is so much the same.

I have a move planned that begins in two weeks. I am moving southward, back very close to my hometown.

I feel an ever-increasing need to gather closer to the people whom I love. So, I am. I will be leaving a few people behind here, but I will still work with the most important of the bunch. The commute to work will be more than worth the time and effort.

I’m renting a few rooms from the Livingstons, a family to whom I have been close for many years. The children are truly a delight, Bret makes me laugh even when calling me to repentance (which he does for good reason!), and Kora always helps put things in perspective for me.

For the first time, I will live in a household that has the Priesthood present, and it brings me an odd sense of comfort. I’ve been praying and studying and changing, and there is nothing more I need right now than the influence that only the Gospel can give.

School can wait.

I have more important things to learn right now.

Reproving Betimes with Sharpness

I have a tendency to fly off the handle when it comes to debating certain topics. I know, I know, hard to believe.

But I know it’s really bad when Glenn Beck has to tell me to let it go.

I really got into it with some people over at the GB Insider Forums during a Daily Show Thread.

 Of course I’m going to get frustrated when I answer the same question three times in the same thread and then get a smart ass comment about what I just said for the third time. I’m only human! (and apparently, a very bad example. Imagine that!)

I’m going to really take Glenn’s advice to heart. I just shouldn’t engage. I gotta keep my mouth shut.

 Like Stu said, no one was ever saved on a forum.

Lonely.

It’s at times like this. 2 AM, home from work and fighting sleep, that the loneliness is concrete.

The funny thing is that I am not alone. A whole 20 ft away is the roommate, formerly the fiance, but that relationship is as strained as you might imagine.

When classes are in session, I barely have time to think, never mind dwell,  but the 40 hour summer work weeks leave me with too much time on my hands.

And it’s not a romantic relationship longing, though a little intimacy, to put it politely, would be welcomed.

What I really want is a once a week boyfriend. Someone who will settle for one date a week and plenty of phone time. But I doubt he exists. And I don’t even need that.

I would even be happier if I got to spend more outside of work time with Johanna, or if Jen lived closer, or of it wasn’t an hour and a half to my grandparents’ house. Or if people I missed would return my phone calls. Just a little acknowledgment is all I’m asking.

Or maybe I just need some sleep.

…

I’m supposed to be cleaning, so instead, I’m reflecting.

I made the mistake of unpacking my high school yearbook. Ah, the life imagined and never achieved. Everyone, myself included, thought I’d be writer. Now all the writing I do is blogging–and let’s face it; blogging isn’t real writing. It’s just high tech journaling.

I really shouldn’t give into the melancholy, but how can I not? What is this life I lead? This empty, meaningless life.

But the alternative is worst, so I continue.

Continue being a nobody behind a computer screen. Just trying to live a proletariat life, trying to pretend there is nobility in amounting to absolutely nothing.

The Work and the Worry

I’ve always been fascinated with Jewish culture, especially Orthodox Judaism, most probably because adherents demonstrate a discipline and devotion that I never will.

The Gift of Asher Lev has been on my mind for a few days now. I read it fairly quickly–perhaps too quickly. It wasn’t until two days after reading it, while trying to fall asleep, that I finally understood what his gift truly was. There’s something mystical about books that good. I want to be the writer of books that good.

My relationship with my own faith community is mentally exhausting and frustrating. I feel continually judged, and at the same time condemned, because I just don’t fit, but still I can’t let go.

While I find many other faiths beautiful and fascinating, I find my own convincing and necessary. The God I worship is decidedly Mormon, but the life I lead is not.

I wonder what to do with myself. The more I ponder it, the more I know that I believe the Gospel to be true, but I don’t believe in the perfection of the Church. This is why it irks me when I hear testimonies that begin with “I know the Church is True.” I don’t know that and perhaps I am merely jealous.

I seem to draw much from multimedia these days. Monday nights are Big Love nights. Every week I tune in, and not just for the polygamy. The Henricksons, Bill especially, are a family who live out their faith in the best way they know how. They don’t rely on a structure to hold them together. They have a specific belief and they live it, despite all of the problems that entails.

I’m not sure what I expect of myself. I don’t want to go back to pretending a belief in something, just because believing it would make my faith easier and less complicated.

I worry that I am simply rationalizing my behavior. That I want the belief without the work.

But then, this feels like work to me.

Doors Closing and Doors Opening

Finally, tomorrow, I am a free woman.

Tomorrow I begin running my own shifts. I’ve already begun being paid as a manager, so that isn’t the perk I am most looking forward to. It’s the extra day off. Shift Supervisors work four ten hour shifts, and I already have so much planned for those three remaining days.

Today, after the annual trip to the Strawberry Festival, which takes place in the town in which I was raised, I drove home, falling asleep by the time I hit Millville. It was a 45 minute struggle, but I made it home in one piece.

As soon as I passed the threshold, the sleepiness evaporated, so I began to tidy the apartment. Week One of Three Days Off will involve Project Clean House. And my little OCD heart is so happy for it.

____

This morning, I managed to make it to church, and the ceiling didn’t even cave on my head.

Karlo and Lori are headed off to California, which was enough to completely dissolve me. Why is it that all the good families move away?

At least Bret and Kora came back.

And then I moved away.

____

It is a strange thing to have a full and bright testimony of the Gospel, but still not feel moved to action.

I know Joseph was a prophet and the Book of Mormon is surely scripture, but I have no desire to attend Church meetings.

And who will believe my insistance that I do not have a testimony problem, or any hidden sin? That I am not a project in need of fixing?

Such is the paradox of a powerful testimony with no faith to back it up.

Now, how do I slam this revolving door?

The Sweet Life

I’m easing into my summer life. Between overtime, dating, cleaning, baking, and television, the proverbial plate is full.

It’s not yet June, so I don’t feel like I am wasting my summertime stuck in the house, so I am taking advantage of it while I can.

My favorite part of the brownies is the crispy part, so I figured out that if I make cookies of the mix, the whole thing is crispy. I’m really experimenting so that I can make baked goods for others, but the mistakes are still delicious enough to fatten me up.

I’m rediscovering the joy that is the novel; I had been reading books that were interesting, but not especially enjoyable. Non-fiction just doesn’t have that same sparkle for me. I love reading stories that capture cultures other than my own, which is why I loved Interperter of Maladies. After what I predict to be a short stay with 1984, a book I never read in school, I am finally reading The Gift of Asher Lev. I absolutely loved The Chosen and The Promise, so this should be quite the mental treat.

And then, of course, there is the matter of boys.

I don’t seek them out. As previously demonstrated, my life is both full and satisfying, but dating opportunities don’t need seeking out, something I wish had been true earlier in life. Imagine my surprise that in the ordinary course of events, some boys will just ask, simply because they are interested.

And there is fun to be had; dinners in which conversation, passionate conversation, is participated in by both parties. Movies that are mutually enjoyable, and that tense, but sweet moment at the end, when you wonder if he wants to, and he wonders if you want him to.

And of course the funny moments, when pressed for physical intimacy that goes beyond current familiarity.

“C’mon. Really kiss me.”

“This is the first date. What kind of ho do you think I am?”