a million miles

Some days you just hit a wall.

That's what happened to me today.  It wasn't as bad as it could've been.  Maybe wall isn't the best choice of word... a speed bump perhaps, is a better analogy.  Or maybe an iceberg.  Something that doesn't seem big but betrays a bigger issue.

So I came home from encountering said speed bump, ate, and convinced myself that I was worth a trip to B&N to buy Don Miller's new book, A Million Miles in a Thousand Years.  And then I convinced myself that I was worth wandering next door to Old Navy.  And then I convinced myself that I was worth a half-zip performance fleece on sale for $8.  So I spent roughly $20 on myself tonight, which I haven't done in a while... since last month I suppose, when I really wanted to go to the Stravinsky extravaganza for opening weekend at the St. Louis Symphony.

I think it's ok to spend $20 on yourself every now and then.  Sometimes I really have to tell myself that's ok.  Sometimes I have to really tell myself it's ok to spend $5 on myself...  I can be really ridiculous about it... come to think of it, I can be really ridiculous about a lot of things...

... but it's a process of self-discovery.  That is, discovering that I'm worth something to myself.

Maybe someday I'll convince myself that I'm worth another $20k to go to grad school.

But I think I'm gonna have to wait until I really, really want it.  Like tonight when I really wanted this book.  Because I knew this book would be so good for me to read... because I knew it would be exactly what I needed.  I already know this and I've only read the author's note.

Because when you know, you know.  And if you wait until you really, really want something or really, really need it, receiving it is the sweetest thing.

This is what being a [starving] artist has taught me more than anything recently...

... that, and that there's a Christ out there that I thought I knew, but I didn't... not in the way I'm seeing him now. 

Because let me just be honest with you:  being a starving artist has taught me that I need Jesus.  And not the Jesus that was in my head, or the Jesus I had made him out to be (the one I had grown up with and wrestled with all through college thinking I had him [mostly] figured out but for the life of me could not get him to do what I wanted), but the Jesus who came for me and reveals himself to those who have nothing to give in return.  That's the one I need.  The one who heals us when we can't and saves us from ourselves...

... because when you really, really need something, receiving it is the sweetest thing.