Faith

Been dog-sitting the past week again. Here's the little dude.

He's a little cuddle-ho, but oh-so-lovable!
I've been kinda down lately for some reason. Feeling pretty discouraged about life, school, yoga, myself in general. Doesn't help that I've just been fatigued lately, no matter how many hours of sleep I'm getting. I guess there's just some things I've been struggling with, and I feel like I'm running and running with no end in sight.

I had the joy of catching up with one of my dearest friends in Austin this past week. Over happy hour, we shared with each other all that's happened in our lives since we last got together. She's been through a rollercoaster since I last talked to her. She had planned to pack up her life and move to Guatemala for missions when God closed all those doors and completely turned her life upside down by resurrecting and restoring a relationship that had left her broken over the last two years. Now she's completely confused as to what she's supposed to do, and trying to step out in faith even while being haunted by insecurities. At one point, she looked at me with this look of exasperation and said "Tracy, this faith is so hard. Packing up and moving to Guatemala, that's easy for me. Giving my life over to missions, that's easy for me. But staying in Austin and trying to follow God in this relationship - trying to trust Him and follow His lead - that is hard. That faith is difficult!"

I think I feel a lot of unrest in my life because I lack faith. I yearn for this ideal life I have fabricated in my mind, because in that life, it's easy to have faith and follow the Lord. To me, it's easy to have faith when I'm sleeping in the bushes of Africa or South America because faith is all I have. I feel called to the life I have now, but truth be told I'm a little confused as to where I'm going. And to muddle through my life, feeling lonely, not sure when and how God's promises to me will be fulfilled - that just feels like a constant struggle. But perhaps I've been expecting faith to be easy. I've been expecting to coast through my life, knowing exactly where I'm going. But perhaps I'm called to my life now because God's refining my faith in Him. He's teaching me that I have to turn to Him on a daily basis for direction, because there is no way I can find my way on my own.

I've always felt that my grad school years are a time of training for me to prepare me for something greater later on. But now that I'm in the middle of this time, I've lost track of what I'm supposed to be doing. It took a dear friend to remind me and set me back on track, and for that I'm so grateful.