On the medical front things are going so well I sometimes forget what I've been through or how far I've come. I saw the dermatologist a couple of weeks ago and she was amazed by the progress of the healing post GVHD. I found a photo that I'd taken to send to the doctor when it first developed and I myself was shocked. It truly is amazing what the human body is capable of when it's given the right tools necessary for growth and healing, when the temple is worshipped... It took me a long time to realize that, and I've been looking into the foods I eat to nourish my temple. Some of the stuff on the shelves at the stores really does scare me. It's no surprise, therefore, that the number of diseases we continue to encounter are becoming more and more numerous. All of this research has also led me to some other theories and a new way of interacting in the world around me, more on that to come...
Physically I feel great. I've been out walking and riding my bike more and more and I look forward to getting out and hiking and maybe (FINALLY) doing a little fishing. Mentally and emotionally I think it's safe to say I've never felt as good as I do presently. When I got home from church last Sunday, for the first time I sat down and really dug into the sermon, and it led me to some really great stuff. What I found odd, and what I spent a good deal of time pondering, was that most of the things I was looking into had come into my life before. I finally realized that in those moments, when these resources had come before, I simply wasn't ready to deal with them. I've also come to realize that very often when we are going through some difficult time we look for solutions, for shortcuts to make our journey through Suckville shorter, to get us back to where we feel happy. The thing is, we all too often have to take the hard road to get there, we need, as part of the process, to embrace the suck. It has come into our lives for a reason and we need to find out why. Sometimes we manage to find what we think is a shortcut to get us around the suck but eventually it comes back, sometimes deeper and messier than before.
People often ask "Why did God let this happen?" or "Why does God let bad things happen to good people?" God is always available to us, He is there all the time and is waiting on you. People don't suffer because of God, people suffer because of people, because we don't allow the spirit of God to flow through us. We all too often get in our own way and separate ourselves from God. I think when those things happen God is right alongside us, He never leaves us, His love never fails. All of us are longing for that connection, whether we admit it or not, but we let our egos get in the way. We want things for ourselves, money, nice cars, new clothes, giant TVs... Where does God come into play when we are pursuing those things? We're also inherently lazy, as a species, and we are programmed to take the path of least resistance. We KNOW junk food is bad for us, that fast food is bad for us, but we still eat it... So if we don't keep God foremost when things are good and we are embracing all the things we want for us, how then can we be angry or upset when we think He's not there in the bad times? Maybe those bad things come to us because we have strayed too far from His path and we need a reminder. Maybe we never were on the path and some really Big Stuff™ will stop us dead in our tracks and set us on the path, like a child picking up a toy train and setting it on another track. I can tell you with certainty that's how it worked for me. I've learned more in the last few years than in all the schooling and years of experiences prior and I wouldn't trade any of the suck for anything in the world. I love who I am now, and who I am becoming.
So when things aren't going your way, learn to take a time out and ask yourself why, ask if this is really the direction you were meant to be going and if so, then ask why it's so upsetting to you. Find the root cause, it's there but you have to look. Be forewarned, you may not like what you find. When life pulls the rug out from under you and you land in the suck ask yourself how you came to be on that rug. There's likely something you are meant to learn and if you try to circumvent the road out of the suck know that you may very well find yourself back in it all too soon and again and again and so on until you finally embrace the suck and slog your way through it, thus learning the lesson presented you.
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