Knowing God

“What matters supremely, therefore, is not, in the last analysis, the fact that I know God, but the larger fact which underlies it—the fact that HE KNOWS ME. I am graven on the palms of His hands. I am never out of His mind. All my knowledge of Him depends on His sustained initiative in knowing me. I know Him, because He first knew me, and continues to know me. He knows me as a friend, one who loves me; and there is no moment when His eye is off me, or His attention distracted from me, and no moment therefore, when His care falters.

“This is momentous knowledge. There is unspeakable comfort—the sort of comfort that energizes…God is constantly taking knowledge of me in love, and watching over me for my good. There is tremendous relief in knowing that His love to me is utterly realistic, based at every point on prior knowledge of the worst about me, so that no discovery now can disillusion him about me, in the way I am so often disillusioned about myself, and quench His determination to bless me. There is, certainly, great cause for humility in the thought that He sees all the twisted things about me that my fellow-men do not see, and that He sees more corruption in me than that which I see in myself. There is however, equally great incentive to worship and love God in the thought that, for some unfathomable reason, he wants me as his friend, and desires to be my friend, and has given His Son to die for me in order to realize this purpose.”

 -- J. I.  Packer, from his book Knowing God.

Steps To Creativity

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The majority of my time over the past few weeks has been swallowed up by a class I'm in, Life-Span Development. Though the content is extremely interesting to me, I've been getting frustrated with the lack of time to be creative (or really, to do anything). Today I'm in an especially creative mood and it has been taking all of my energy to focus on the work at hand.  

But, in my reading today, I came across a list of ways to be more creative and I thought it might interest some of you. People have their own avenues they like to explore in creativity, but some people don't realize how creative they really are! So, I hope you read this list and find some way to add creativity to this beautiful day (seriously, can the weather get any better?!).

The first step toward a more creative life is cultivating your curiosity and interest. How, do you say?

• Try to be surprised by something every day. Maybe it is something you see, hear, or read about. Become absorbed in a lecture or a book. Be open to what the world is telling you. Life is a stream of experiences. Swim widely and deeply in it, and your life will be richer.
• Try to surprise at least one person every day. In a lot of things you do, you have to be predictable and patterned. Do something different for a change. Ask a question you normally would not ask. Invite someone to go to a show or a museum you never have visited.
• Write down each day what surprised you and how you surprised others. Most creative people keep a diary, notes, or lab records to ensure that their experience is not fleeting or forgotten. Start with a specific task. Each evening record the most surprising event that occurred that day and your most surprising actions. After a few days, reread your notes and reflect on your past experiences. After a few weeks, you might see a pattern of interest emerging in your notes, one that might suggest an area you can explore in greater depth.
• When something sparks your interest, follow it. Usually when something captures your attention, it is short-lived--an idea, a song, a flower. Too often we are too busy to explore the idea, song, or flower further. Or we think these areas are none of our business because we are not experts about them. Yet the world is our business. We can't know which part of it is best suited to our interests until we make a serious effort to learn as much about as many aspects of it as possible.
• Wake up in the morning with a specific goal to look forward to. Creative people wake up eager to start the day. Why? Not necessarily because they are cheerful, enthusiastic types but because they know that there is something meaningful to accomplish each day, and they can't wait to get started.
• Spend time in settings that stimulate your creativity. In Csikszentmihalyi's research, he gave people an electronic pager and beeped them randomly at different times of the day. When he asked them how they felt, they reported the highest levels of creativity when walking, driving, or swimming.These activities are semiautomatic in that they take a certain amount of attention while leaving some time free to make connections among ideas. Another setting in which highly creative people report coming up with novel ideas is the sort of half-asleep, half-awake state we are in when we are deeply relaxed or barely awake.

[This was taken from the book, Essentials of Life-Span Development.]

p.s. Do you know what also fosters creativity?Pinterest! I was on it for way too long today, but you know what? When something sparks your interest, follow it! (I think this bullet point is the one I need to work on the most)

The Pursuit

I just wanted to share a quick excerpt from The Pursuit of God which I think is just beautiful. This book has been such a blessing to me and I really encourage you to pick up a copy for yourself! There's not much more I could add to his words, so I'll let A. W. Tozer take it away:

"Let us say it again: The universal Presence is a fact. God is here. The whole universe is alive with His life. And He is no strange or foreign God, but the familiar Father of our Lord Jesus Christ whose love has for these thousands of years enfolded the sinful race of men. And always He is trying to get our attention, to reveal Himself to us, to communicate with us. We have within us the ability to know Him if we will but respond to His overtures. (And this we call pursuing God!) We will know Him in increasing degree as our receptivity becomes more perfect by faith and love and practice."

See what I mean?! He has a way with words!

On another note, it feels good to spend an evening with my brother and I'm so looking forward to the time when he moves here! My mom always points out the moments where I act just like him, and I have to say, it's nice seeing where I get some of my tendencies. All in all, I am so lucky to be a part of this family! I'm getting to see that more and more these days.

The Pursuit of God

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A week or so ago I won a giveaway from this insightful lady. It was the first thing I've ever won (besides a sodoku book at my high school gradfest--talk about exciting huh). But this was so much more than a sodoku book... It's a book from A. W. Tozer called "The Pursuit of God."

I started reading about fifteen minutes ago and have only gotten through the Preface before I had to share! This book is good! I already feel a deep connection with its contents, topics which Meg and I have had several conversations about. Isn't that the greatest feeling? When you feel strongly about an idea that it seems people are missing and then you encounter a book, written well before your time, speaking of the same idea in such a way that it's like they were in your brain but were able to put it out into the world in a more eloquent and thought provoking way than you ever could.


Books find me at just the right time, when those relating thoughts are at their strongest and I know that it's God, because if I were to find those books by chance, I don't think it would always happen in such perfect timing.

So far, this book is about how many people in Christianity have become so based in the fundamentals that they don't search for God with their whole hearts or connect with his Presence in their daily lives and this book will help people to see that the greatest thing we can do in our lives is pursue God. In one of our talks, we were saying how people in the western culture don't seem to realize how much power is in their lives because of Jesus and how faith is not just some set of beliefs, but a real way of living where you see God working and moving. Faith has been dumbed down to a list of moral codes upon which we tend to judge ourselves and others, but really it's an active state of living that should change every aspect of our lives. Although I do have a strong passion for people seeing the true life that God brings, I know I haven't grasped this concept fully either.

I'm so excited to work my way through this book and to share with you along the way. On another post sometime I might share a few excerpts from it that have already gotten my blood pumping! If this sort of thing interests you, I definitely recommend this read.

A Change Is Gonna Come

Sam Cooke couldn't have said it better. "It's been a long, a long time coming, But I know a change gonna come, Oh yes it will" (you really must listen to the song because it doesn't sound nearly as wonderful when you read the words)

Let me just preface this by saying that I don't plan on many posts being like this, but I feel I need to write this for three reasons:
     1. It will explain why it's been quite some time since I last posted.
     2. It's the only thing I've been able to muster up the energy to write about.
     3. The name of my blog is "This Liminal Life" and this is certainly a state of liminality that I'm in. A change is gonna come and in many ways, has already begun. This is a pretty huge step for me in going from who I was to who I'm going to be so I feel I owe it to myself to document it.

On to the main event... (and I'll try to keep it short, which everyone around me knows is hard for me to do, so I won't keep any promises but feel free to stop reading at any point).

Lately, I've been pretty darn depressed. Most days I can't get out of bed, I have absolutely no motivation to do even the things I love (including writing on this here blog), and my mind is in a constant downward spiral. I've seen the commercials for anti-depressants and when they list the symptoms associated with depression, I see that on paper the way I've been lines up right along them, but I don't think the commercials do a great job at demonstrating how painful and paralyzing each symptom feels. They kind of just float through the list without showing the weight of each word.

But this depression isn't new to me, it's a constant in my life. (And I know that I'm not the only one going through hard times or depression, that this is the real world and depression is common to many people). However, it was yesterday as I was putting on my makeup, that I realized it's been eight years of dealing with depression on a regular basis. I've been depressed more often than not and that was a hard pill to swallow. I've let it go on for too long without getting outside help. I've tried to fix it myself when really, I have no idea how.

I was kind of taught early on in my depression that it was wrong to seek the help of medication or therapists so I tried to deal with it myself, which led to some pretty awful coping methods. I know that may not be an excuse for some, but hearing that when I was fourteen left a big impression on me that was hard to shake. My family meant well, and their advice may work for them, but I'm finally starting to see that it hasn't worked for me.

Now this is where things start to take a turn.

I think the biggest moment that started to push me forward was the realization that this isn't the way my life has to go. There's help I can get that will keep me from being paralyzed by doubt, guilt, fear, and insurmountable sorrow. These feelings don't have to defeat me.

I started reading a book my mom got me for Christmas that I've wanted since it's release: "A Million Miles In A Thousand Years" by Donald Miller.

In it he talks about how he had the chance to edit his story when offered a movie deal about his life. He makes the connection that our lives are like stories and all the great stories go to those who don't give into fear. The point of the story isn't about the ending, it's about the character being changed and overcoming circumstances to get what he wants. He helps you to see how important it is to live a story worth living and to do that, every character needs an inciting incident: a doorway through which the protagonist cannot return.

I needed an inciting incident. Heck, I needed 20! I reached out to my friends and got references to counselors and psychiatrists and started the process, which I am so thrilled about. But the biggest I-have-to-do-something-that-I-can't-go-back-on inciting incident was signing up with my husband to compete in Warrior Dash! It's a 3.24 mile race filled with 13 warrior-like obstacles: jumping over fire, climbing hay bales, going through swampy water, climbing up a cargo net, and crawling underneath barbed wire to name a few.

Doesn't that look like fun?! Jakub and I have been wanting to get in shape for quite a while but haven't been able to follow through because we haven't had something that gives enough motivation, and I think this is just the thing to get our butts into gear! It's not a typical race; there's adventure and thrill to it.

Today was the first day of "training" for me and I have to say, I feel so overwhelmingly empowered. Without realizing it, I did a combination of running and walking for an hour (started out walking 5 minutes, then ran every other minute, and finished with 5 minutes of walking) and I actually went SIX MILES! I didn't even think I could do one! This helped me to see that in every aspect of my life I should be telling myself that I can succeed, I can do what others thought I couldn't, I can do what I thought I couldn't.

This post certainly wasn't for the faint of heart, but if you read all of this, I greatly appreciate it! I'd love to hear if anyone else going through an inciting incident of their own!