13||Tis the Season As They Say

Create a collage or inspiration/mood board for this season in your life.

mine/via/mine

I am living overseas, but life cannot stop until life goes "back to normal." 

I am not a teacher at an elite college prep high school, but I find my identity in so much more than my profession. 

I start graduate classes again in two days, but I am more than a graduate student.

I am a single, almost 30 Christian gal, but I refuse to be defined by my relationship status or my age.

In so many ways, my life has completely changed since moving to Thailand, but in so many ways, it is entirely the same. I don't have to work too hard to maintain an American lifestyle here in Asia and I find myself guilty of such all too often. I still feel like I am trying to figure out what it means to be a grown up, I still act like a kid much of the time, I still have my faith, I still have a job, and I don't anticipate any major events for awhile, so what, then, is my season of life?

I really don't mean to be difficult... I just find myself truly questioning what my current season is. I am in Thailand until something else comes along and, until then, I suppose I am in the most stable season of life I have been in for awhile. So, regardless of what this season may or may not be, I share three of my biggest focuses in life right now.

First, growing relationship with Christ. I am in a completely different place in life and faith and understanding than I ever anticipated for myself, even more so in the last ten months. I am a Christian in a predominantly non-Christian nation and I am literally equipping the next generation of world changers. I feel such a burden for my students, their families, this nation, our broken world. How do I continue to live out my faith in a way that glorifies God and makes Him known outside of the direction faith instruction so many of my students shirk?

Second, learning to live life. I am a perpetual planner. I enjoy lists and calendars and plans but I am learning to embrace change and spontaneity (ahem, moving to Thailand?!). Sometimes embracing life means just the little things at a moment in time but sometimes it means the big things. A student wants to meet for lunch on my busiest day of the week? Yes, because this may be the moment she really needs somebody to give her the time. Take a night bus to see a new Thai site? Let's do it! Stay in Thailand a possible five years to set myself up for financial success post-30? Five years may seem like a lot now, but as soon as my debt is eliminated, I know I will be grateful. Sometimes it's the big things and sometimes it's the little. But if not now, then when?

Finally, blooming where planted. I had a blog before this one and I called it "Bloom Where Planted." I have always struggled with living life where I am for the moment. I was ready to move to college at 16, ready to be done with college at 20, and ready to retire at 24. Well, not really retire, but the first four years of teaching where so tough. Additionally, the older I get, the more I come to understand just how broken, ugly, and painful the world is. I am ready for my heavenly home. But until that day comes, I will do my best to bloom where God has planted me much like that poppy made its home at the base of my parents' driveway in the sea of concrete.

All that to say, I don't really know what season of life I am in, but I'm going with what I have and making the most of what has been placed before me.

Soli deo Gloria.

The 2015 Blog-Tember Challenge. Day 1. Day 2. Day 3. Day 4. Day 5. Day 6. Day 7. Day 8. Day 9. Day 10. Day 11. Day 12. Day 13.

10|| 10 Things About Yours Truly

Still working to complete "The Blog-tember Challenge" even though I have missed the deadline by a long shot. Don't judge... It will be fun to finally finish! 

List 10 things that you love about yourself! Let's kick that negative self-talk outta here!

I really cannot list 10 things I love about myself without giving credit where it is due-- to my Heavenly father. I have only in the last couple of years decided to wage a war against my insecurity. Some days are certainly better than others and it's been a rough patch as of late, for sure. But I have been created in His image to do great things that He prepared me specifically to fulfill. The same is absolutely true of you. Just let that sink into your mind for a spell. God did not create either you or me and then random assign purpose to our lives. He created the world, saw a need to be filled, and then created each individual to fill each specific purpose.

I feel like my life carries an entirely different weight when I maintain that mindset, no?

I feel convicted on a whole new level to get rid of my self hate and to really learn to value myself for the excellent creation God made me to be. I would not be pleased to see a creation of my own being so dissatisfied with my handiwork, so why do I think it is okay to do the same thing to God?

Without further ado, here are 10 things I love (or am learning to love) about myself-- the woman God created me to be!

One. I am created specifically in the image of God and for the purpose of bringing glory to God! My life has so much purpose just knowing that I am living for something greater than myself. I could not imagining doing life on earth any other way.

Two. I have been given the privilege of being a teacher. I have long desired to know that I am doing exactly what God has called me to do and to change the world. I know I am definitely in the former and I may be doing just a little bit of the latter.

Three. I have been given the opportunity to live overseas and experience another culture and another way of life. I have much sitting in the archives about living in the Land of Smiles. I just need to buck it up and make it happen.

Four. I am finally learning how to be a good friend, daughter, sister, etc. It has taken me a long time to understand how to authentically relate to people. All too often, I have let myself be completely taken over by somebody needy, selfish, and unable to support me as a friend. That being said, I have also been a selfish, unfair friend. I am grateful for the people God has placed in my life to help me develop into a gracious and authentic woman of God. #Longjourney #Stillfiguringitout

Five. I intentionally value people and experiences over things. I have come to develop a great disdain for a lot of stuff and would much rather spend my resources on people and experiences. My family, friends, faith, students, and traveling are all high priorities in my life and daily decision making.

And because we can't be all serious around here all of the time...

Six. I will try anything once. I was not an adventurous child or teenager, but once I got to college, something shifted and I'm ready to go. Moving to Thailand has given me many more opportunities than I ever would have found for myself in the States and I am trying to make the most of it. Recent shenanigans include eating crickets, learning to ride a motorbike, and learning to speak Thai. #SpeakingThaiisalwaysanadventure

Seven. I can change a tire all by myself. I feel like I have had to change more than my share (six!) of tires in the last five years. I can also check my oil and replace a tail light. And I know that blinkers to not run on fluid. Granted, I still can't hard boil an egg, but that's neither here nor there.

Eight. I can say the English alphabet forwards and backwards. It would be my one party trick if I ever ended up at a party. As an INTJ, though, I would probably just hang out in the back corner of the room and check out the host's book collection.

Nine. Along with one terrible party trick, I have a random assortment of useless trivia. For example, know the capitals of Cambodia, Malaysia, Indonesia, Canada, and Finland. The majority of this information is much less impressive now that I live in southeast Asia, but nevertheless. I can also tell you the all fifty states and capitals while locating them on a map, provide the history of the term "bowdlerize," and explain why the North Dakota capitol does not have a dome.

Ten. I can make a mean pie. Apple, rhubarb-peach, and lemon meringue are my go-to pieces of choice! I made an ice cream pie yesterday for a friend's birthday, but that doesn't count. This fall, I made a pumpkin pie entirely from scratch and it was so good. If I ever get married, I will have pie at my reception, not cake. And that's a nonnegotiable... The groom can deal or go. #JK #Sorta

Second Chance Book Club, February: The Glass Menagerie-- Tennessee Williams

I was going to try to get this post written early. And then I tried to just meet February 28 deadline, BKK time. And then on February 28 by CST. And now I'm just late. But I'm much less late than the last time, so that has to count for something, right? Please?

I bring to you February's read, The Glass Menagerie by Tennessee Williams.

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Which character did you connect most with? I read the play with this question in mind (ahem, part of the reason I am late in posting) and I found myself waffling between connecting with each character in a different way and feeling complete alienated from all of the characters in general. Then Jim came into the picture and I was pulling hard for him. Until the end. The meanie pants. However, overall, I still find myself connecting the most with Jim, mainly for two reasons. First, he speaks truth and encouragement into Laura's life which is something I take seriously in my own life. I loved Jim's words in the seventh scene when he is speaking to Laura:

          "And everybody has problems, not just you, but practically everybody                has got some problems.You think of yourself as having the only                        problems, as being the only one who is disappointed. But just look                    around you and you will see lots of people as disappointed as you are."

If that's not the real deal, no? We are all broken people with broken lives and we are all doing this thing called life together. I must remember to give grace to myself and extend grace to those around me. On a lesser note, I also enjoyed what Jim said in the next sentence. "For instance, I hoped when I was going to high school that I would be further along at this time, six years later, than I am now." My life is nothing what I imagined for myself in high school, but I am quickly learning that I wouldn't change it for all the tea in China. Or Thailand. Thailand would be much more practical. The second reason I connect with Jim is much like the first, but not exactly the same. Later in the same scene he challenges Laura:

          "Just look about you a little. What do you see? A world full of common                people! All of 'em born and all of 'em going to die! Which of them has                one-tenth of your good points! Or mine! Or anyone else's, as far as 

           that goes-- gosh! Everybody excels in some one thing... All you've got                to do is discover in what!"

Again, maybe it's the teacher in me, maybe it's the insecure woman, but these are words I find myself telling my students but failing to remember myself. I wholeheartedly believe God equips each of us with a talent specific to His creation for each of us and we need to embrace that talent and go. I firmly believe that talent is not always academic and I could not be more grateful for that. I have had more students not go to college than go, but I know they were each created for a specific purpose that I, as their teacher, worked to bring out in them. Likewise, I may not have been created to be a wife and/or mother and/or anything else I have imagined for myself, but I believe God has equipped me in other ways and I must seek to serve Him with those talents until I am led by His spirit to do otherwise.

What were your expectations for the play? Did the play meet or exceed your expectations? I went into this play with exactly zero expectations. I may be the only English major to earn an undergraduate degree without having ever taken a poetry, drama, or British literature class so I am not at all educated in the way of the dramatic arts. That being said, I think plays are very fun to read and I choose to believe I have read more scripts than the average, non-English major person. I enjoy reading the stage directions in a script and generating the images in my mind. As a storyline, I felt the play moved slowly and then brought the proverbial hammer down hard and fast on the reader, but that is just my opinion. I would enjoy an opportunity to see this play performed live so that I can see another interpretation of the story and compare it to what I made in my own mind.

Overall, what were your opinions of the play? How do you feel about plays in general? Overall, I do not regret reading the play, but I definitely was hoping for something more. I am a huge fan of A Streetcar Named Desire and I think I was expecting something more from this play seeing as it too was written by Tennessee Williams.

How many stars would you give The Glass Menagerie (1-5)? I would give The Glass Menagerie 2.5 or 3 stars out of 5. 2 stars seems low, I still feel bad about 2.5, but 3 stars seems a little high. Perhaps 2.75 stars would be the best score, but that just seems a little ridiculous. 2.5-3/5 stars it is. Clearly it's a good thing I did not go into math. Oi vey.

13|| It's a Gift... Let It Be a Blessing!

Your current relationship status. If dating/married, give us a glimpse of your story! If single, share about this special season.

Being the good Midwest girl that I am, I assumed I would go to college, meet a guy, get a ring by the proverbial spring, and marry in the months following graduation.

That didn't happen during my undergraduate years and since I have done the majority of my graduate school online, the likelihood of meeting somebody in these years is pretty slim too.

I would be lying if I said I haven't struggled in coming to terms with my singleness, but I can truthfully say that by the grace of God I have arrived at a place of comfort and acceptance.

The church can be a very harsh place for singles and I wish so desperately it wasn't that way. I know I am not the first person to make this comment, nor am I the first person to feel this way, but it is the truth-- maybe even moreso for women than for men. In too many eyes, a Christian is not truly an adult until he or she is married with the intention of children on the way. As single adults, we are quickly lumped with the college students because they theoretically haven't started their lives either because they are not yet married and not yet with jobs. I can attest, though, that I am in a much different place at 26 than I was at 21. Even if I don't act like it all of the time.

I have spent far too much of my twenties hurt and confused as to what my position is in the church and the faith as a single woman with no prospects on the horizon. It has only been in the last couple of months, and even this last week in entirely complete disclosure, that God has really helped me reconcile some of my thoughts and feelings.

Will I get married some day? I don't know. Is it the desire of my heart to get married? Yes. Am I in a unique place in life as a single woman? Most definitely.

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As such, I am working to make the most of my time as a single woman. Although I am discouraged at times, I am also grateful for this time God has given me to do life outside of marriage. And even if marriage never happens, that's okay too because we are all going to be single on the other side of eternity any way!

I take comfort in the knowledge that singleness is a gift from God (1 Cor. 7:7) and God does not give bad gifts. Likewise, both singleness and marriage portray the gospel. One is not better than the other, although we all too often feel inferior as singles. After all, singleness portrays the Christian's identity in Christ (Isaiah 54, John 3, Revelation 19) as well as the Christian's eternal identification with the church (Genesis 2:18). My gift of singleness may last for a season or it may last for my earthly life. Either is just fine with me because marriage itself is only temporary-- once we pass from this life into the next, we will be united to Christ (Matt. 22:30).

Take heart, my dear sisters. The single journey can be a tough one, but, like marriage, it is a worthwhile one that garners its own unique heavenly reward.

May your day be blessed.

Soli deo gloria.