Something i’ve recently been realizing is that as much as I might not want to be in a certain place because things are challenging, I will probably wanna be right back where I am a year from now. The past two months have been hard. I’d like to say that it has just been a couple of bad days every now and then but i’ve honestly just had a bad 2 months. Christmas away from home, no matter how sweet, is hard. I never really thought I would be homesick at all but somehow I am constantly consumed by thoughts of home and everything I miss about it. The first month here was slow. We did a lot of teachings and evangelism but mainly has a lot of off time. We went to the jungle for a week but that wasn’t nearly as much time as we would have liked. Having so much downtime was great but honestly I felt very useless and was wondering what i’m doing here if we aren’t going to ministry every day. When we finally got back into ministry, things got better but our days are still extremely short with only about 2 hours of ministry a day, much shorter than other teams. I have recently been trying to learn to make the best out of the limited time we have with these kids but that doesn’t help the fact that I still feel kind of useless. As bad as this might sound, I find myself wondering if I could be doing more at home. We had some people go home on our squad the begginingg of last month and that was HARD! You get so used to being around people that they become family and loosing a part of your family hurts, simple as that. Seeing people leave made me question if i was supposed to be here or not.
I think the past few months, things that have been challenging shouldn’t be and the things that should be hard aren’t. I know that sounds super confusing but let me explain myself a little bit. Most things that have been challenging have to do with being too comfortable. We have a Walmart and Starbucks right down the street and we live in a low key mansion. We have comfy beds and a chef. I mean come on that’s more than I have at home (really miss your cooking tho Chuck, just saying). We get back from ministry at 1ish every day and have the whole rest of the day to do whatever. It just feels a little too much like home to me. So close yet so far. It’s a rest weird place to be in and I honestly hate it a lot. We had things pretty easy in Asia too, but the culture was different enough that we definitely weren’t this comfortable. Getting up early to do anything isn’t the best but the 3 months in Asia, I can honestly say I didn’t dread getting up to go to ministry. It is a lot different story here. (Also just to add, this is just how i’m feeling and i’m not speaking on behalf of everyone.) Getting myself out of bed to get ready to go to ministry is the absolute hardest thing for me. I never look forward to it and nothing has really happened to change my mind on it. Every day is slow, uneventful, and extremely frustrating for me. I do not like kids and that’s the majority of the ministry that we’ve had in this country. Our ministry host is great but a very very intense human that speaks her mind always. I do not feel
like I ever do anything right and she usually ends up just doing it herself anyways. I feel more like a burden than a help.
Ive been asking the Lord why He called me to be here if He knew I would be having such a hard time. I don’t really like ministry at all, I miss home, Im anxious and exhausted all the time, and it has been harder than ever for me to find joy in things.
However, as I had conversations with my leader and got truth spoken over situations, I realized that we only grow in the uncomfortable and I don’t always have to love where Im at to trust that the Lord knows whats best. It’s super easy to be confident that God has you where He wants you when things are going good. You are comfortable and thanking God for the many blessings He is giving you in that season. It is a lot harder to trust Him, when you hate where you’re at. I’v learned this lesson big time over the last couple months. I’v learned how to find good in the things I normally expect to be so bad. I have learned to humble myself, go before the Lord, and tell Him I have absolutely nothing left to give. I am empty, drained, out of motivation. He hears me and time and time again puts sweet things in my life every day. He gently points out the better side of them. He’s teaching me what having a glass half full attitude looks like when I have absolutly nothing left. He can write my story a lot better than I ever could. Thats just facts.
The past few nights I’ve been having dreams about what it’s going to be life to go home and how wrecked I’m going to be when I have to say bye to the ones I do life with daily and I realized how much I’m going to miss it. I constantly find myself wanting to be somewhere Im not. Im in Costa Rica but I wish I was in college. Next year i’ll be in college desperatly wanting to be right back where I am now. Since I can never seem to win with this mindset, I’ve decided to just be present where I’m at…to find the sweet in the hard and the joy in the sadness. That just makes things easier.
I’ve been working out a lot lately because i’ve realized that it just makes me a happier person when I feel like i’m not being a lazy bum. When you work out and your muscles get stronger, they first have to get torn apart first and built back up. I stared running every day last month and didn’t think anything of it but got super bad shin splints and realized I probably did too much too fast and didn’t give myself time to adjust. I think right now the Lord is pulling me apart and pressing me to make new wine. We don’t grow when we are comfortable and complacent with where we are. We grow when we are stretched. I’m getting stretched so I can realize how to really rely on the Lord fully when I have nothing else. If things were perfect then I wouldn’t really have to rely on Him that much.
With all that being said, I am turning over a new leaf. The Lord has continually reassured me that He does in-fact have me right where He wants me. Things are already starting to look a lot better and I could not be more exited or Ecuador! Attitude is everything so I have really been trying to have a more positive one. I’ve been doing the opposite for a while not so it’s definitely going to be a process but I’m learning to rely on the Lord for that. To give me joy every day and realize that His mercies are new every morning and He loves me even when I suck at being happy.
SOOO that was super honest but I just wanted to be really transparent about my past 2 months and where I’m currently at. Here’s to a better next 3ish months and a more positive attitude. WOOOHOOO
God is so good:))
