Working on Myself

On Sunday night, when my friends started posting on Facebook that Google Reader was disappearing, I shared in their panic and instantly joined the first blog reader that was suggested as remotely decent. This caused me to then realize that I am terrible at keeping up on reading blogs. Especially my friend’s blogs. And I have a lot of friends that blog. Hopefully, they won’t scorn me for this when they read these words. But, it’s true. I love you all — but I’m flawed.

So, of course, this meant that on Monday night I stayed up way too late reading my friend’s blogs. Among those posts I read this post by my friend Teri. It flashed into my thoughts again today as I was running through my neighborhood. When I go on evening runs like this, I often find myself working. My thoughts bounce around with ideas about what I’ll say in worship and sometimes I’ll even have a flash of brilliance about a new ministry opportunity I’d like to try. The latter did not happen tonight. Just the former until I pushed those work-related thoughts away to review my day. My spiritual director advised me on this practice kinda like the Ignatian Examen where you review the events of the day and ask God what you’re supposed to learn from them. That’s when I flashed back to Teri’s blog with the sudden realization: I’m not working on myself. Those were the words God gave me.

I mean, come on. Cut me some slack. But, here’s the thing: last year was tough. I was doing a lot of personal work that you can catch a glimpse of here. I was trying really hard to figure out how in the hell I was going to live past the birthday that I never thought I’d see. And once I got there. Once I became the girl who lived, I stopped doing the work. (Good for you in getting the Harry Potter reference.) I just kinda froze. So, it kinda makes sense that God is pushing me to think about this stuff again through my angel messenger via blog post.

That thing that Teri did — that thing called the Credo program that created her plan — is something I really want to do. I am jealous of all my Presbyterian and Episcopalian colleagues who get this opportunity. I really want a plan because I have no plan and I’m not really sure how to do it myself. I mean, that’s the God’s honest truth. I have no plan. I bought a house last week and I have no plan. I’m making huge commitments that require mortgage payments but I have no plan.

I’m really hoping that I get one. I’m holding it out as a question because I don’t how else to do it. I really believe that God has no secret plan. I don’t think God is hiding something from me but it’s something I need to discover with God. So, I’m waiting — and the really good news is that there might be some structure to discovering that answered prayer. Last week, four friends and I received a grant to do participate in the College of Pastoral Leaders at Austin Presbyterian Seminary. These are friends that have already nourished my soul in so many ways through the bonds we forged in The Young Clergy Women Project but this project will allow us to do some different work on women’s leadership. I’m sure I’ll have more to say about it down the road but right now — I’m just hoping it’s an answered prayer. Or at least part of one.