..limits

Today I was supposed to write a paper about Jack in the Box but I didn't.  Instead I thought about a  lot of other things:

I thought about the curse of limitlessness.  Sometime in your childhood you were likely told that you could be whatever you wanted to be when you grew up.  Astronaut, veterinarian, lawyer, dentist?  Just believe in  yourself and you could do it.  Well, I think that's bad thinking and very false.  I could never & will never be a long list of things due to the limits of my interests and natural abilities.  Instead of being a force of suppression, I think that there is freedom within those boundaries.  A sense of infinite possibility is paralyzing and fear inducing - if I can do everything will I ever be good at anything?  And it creates a world where my ultimate purpose is to pursue my inherent potential for everything, for the fulfillment of every desire.  People, money, time all become tools that are put to work, helping to fulfill my potential.  But just like the economy, environment, and tolerance for US foreign policy have limits (even if they are still looming), so do humans.  To recognize my limits is to embrace my humanity; it obliterates the possibility of me becoming God, and that is relieving.  I will not be successful at everything I attempt, I was not created for that.  I think that that is one of the parts of life that I am learning about right now.  I was designed to kick serious ass at certain things and it is my responsibility to be faithful to discovering and pursuing those things.  Most other things can be done by other people who are better at them.  

I don't know, I have little to show for my day but I feel like I have learned, so whatever that's worth...

..bathrooms

They are my phobia.  My anxiety raises whenever I go in them.  I feel like they are places where potential disaster is brooding- lots of strangers, intimate quarters, faulty equipment, wet countertops, etc.  My anxiety increases when the toilet is directly behind the door.  The possible embarrassment of  a wide door and a shocked audience is too high.  And then there is the danger of going into the wrong bathroom.  Most of my nightmares involve me walking out of a stall, washing my hands, and then seeing a urinal behind me in the mirror.  Even if no one was there to witness it I would want to die.  LOCKS!  The little hook lock that goes into the sketchy little loop does not offer very much security and causes me to only go half-time because I just want to get out while I still can. Or the punk rock lock that is made out of a bent paper clip. Really, really? Or what about the sketchy doorknob locks where you twist the dial in the middle so that the line is vertical.  Do they all have to be vertical?  Recently an evil person locked the open door to a bathroom before they left it, so I went in, placed the dial in the opposite direct, started my business and then the door opens.  The poor woman on the other side probably wet herself out of fear.  And the worst part is you can't escape- there is only one door out of the bathroom and there is a good likelihood that the victim/perpetrator is waiting on the other side.  I don't feel awkward about it but the whole situation is awkward and intrusive and falsely intimate.  I also recently had an experience where there was no lock on the bathroom door.  It was in an old house but that still not justified, people in 1920's probably needed  privacy too.  There is nothing quite as vulnerable as using the bathroom without it locked, especially in the house of a person who may one day write you a reference.  And what about bathroom stalls that have doors with bad hinges/bad locks.  You just have to slam them closed and hope with all your might that another person doesn't enter with their shoulder and that you don't have to crawl out from under the stubborn door.  I have 18 more things that terrify me about bathrooms (holding up skirts, asking strangers for toilet paper, stall-to-stall conversations, being introduced to new people in bathrooms, seeing professional/respected people you know, and others that are more private).  

The bathroom I loathe the most:  Weter. It's awful and if anything ever went wrong all of campus would be there to see.  The risk is too great.

I hate bathrooms.  If I could have one wish I would wish that I would never have to use them again.

..margin

I could spend time listing out the sources and reasons for my current stress, but it's boring to recant and usually causes me further stress.  So I'm not.

But my life has been stressful as of late.  Is the stress legitimate?  I don't know, but it exists and I have a wide range of responses to it, some constructive and many that aren't. Despite the stress I have been learning things...

I have been learning  about margin.  Often I think of margin as the wiggle room in my life.  The 10 minute buffer I give myself between an activity and the next one.  For me it's usually about time management, occasionally about money.  Recently I have had to reconsider my understanding of margin and now it strongly includes people.  I am terribly afraid of inconveniencing people.  I like following directions and being independent because it doesn't place additional burdens on people in my life.  But with that desire to not be a burden, giving myself grace when I need help is often difficult.  I find myself feeling guilty when I receive help or thinking about ways that I can repay the favor later.

Part of this thinking is rooted in a misperception of who I am - I need to learn that its okay if I'm not 100% put together and on top of my shit.  Another part of it is that I have misperceptions about the people I am in relationship with.  Somewhere I assume that people will feel obligated and guilted to help if I ask, or they are reluctant to help if I don't.  This is simply not true and believing it cheapens the love that other people have for me.  I can never fully enjoy it because I am always busy managing it.  I want to learn how to be a gracious receiver, and I want to make some improvement in my life management skills so that I am being responsible about the burdens that fall on others.

On Sunday, I went to Grace and the pastor stated that grumbling was the cause of spiritual decay. He described it as an unwillingness to give God the credit for things that are provided in our lives, a situation that quickly causes us to question God's goodness and faithfulness.  So instead of grumbling about stress,  I want to choose to see the way that God seeps out of the people in my life.

This is what I'm thankful for... bus slips, dinners prepared by my housemates, help on my math homework, sly glances that turn into laughter, people repairing my back tire (4 times...), quick conversations at the corner of the dinner table, borrowed cars, grant money, a ride to Olympia at midnight, baked goods for lunch, facebook messages, tests that get turned in for me, hugs, a friend who listens to my endless confusion about life, a day in a hotel room by myself, Al's, housemates who rock at grocery shopping, switching chores, monies from my Grandma, an awesome advisor, and a few other things...