I’ve spent most of my life not caring.
I’m not really sure when it started, but I remember the parent-teacher discussions before I was even 10: “He’s a pleasure to have in class, but he doesn’t apply himself. Brilliant but lazy.” Each year it was the same thing. I got put in the enrichment program, but quit because I wanted to goof off with my friends in class. I skated from kindergarten to college on 50% effort. I cared a little more about sports, putting in about 75% at practice. I knew I could make good enough grades without studying too hard, and I knew I would get to play because of athleticism and just enough effort at practice. Some of my friends even used to joke and call me zero because I lived with “zero cares given”. This wasn’t quite the case all the time, though. I worked a little harder in the things I enjoyed. I saved my 100% for art class and game day.
I love the arts, and I love sports.
But even in those endeavors, apathy left its fingerprints everywhere. I had a passion and talent for creating from chalk, charcoal, and paint… I was too lazy to arrange a portfolio and send it to art programs. I had a passion and talent for playing football and defending receivers… I didn’t want to deal with practice and workouts anymore. I wanted to just keep skating by as a regular, mediocre student who didn’t apply himself.
Unfortunately at college, you have the option of not going to class and not doing homework, and then skating by quickly becomes face planting on the pavement. So I got back up, figured out a new formula for a new level of minimum effort to yield slightly better results, and eventually made it to the avenue I was willing put that 100% effort into. That avenue was creative writing.
From the moment I wrote my first story in first grade “Junior Authors”, I had a love for story-telling. It was the one gift that I always put 100% into, and the only passion I really cared about enough to keep pursuing. At college, it shaped my identity and not always in a good way. I was a writer, and I wrote a reflection of my reality. As I made poor choices, and continued not to care about much, I found myself writing with a very cynical voice. My works seemed to say, “Existence is pain. It’s beautiful, but painful none the less. Oh and it doesn’t really matter.”
For some reason, that type of statement seems to be well regarded in the artistic world. My professors and peers were loving my writing and giving it praise. One professor even said that my writing reminds him of Ernest Hemingway, and he thinks I could be one of the great writers of our generation. At the time, this was the greatest compliment I could’ve ever imagined. Hemingway was my favorite author, and I craved that type of fame and praise. I was so proud of myself. I finally cared about something, and now I was having success at it.
Not long after that, I discovered the root of all my apathy. In that compliment came the challenge I had been running from my whole life. I had to live up to an expectation. I had set the bar too high, and I had to reach it again.
WRITER’S BLOCK.
What if the next thing I write sucks? What if this professor is wrong and ALL my writing sucks? Everything I write has to be perfect. Wait, Hemingway was a lonely alcoholic who killed himself. Do I even want to be a writer? Am I going to end up like that? I’m already on the path to end up like that.
Fear overcame me. I was afraid of falling short of people’s expectations. I was afraid of being rejected. I was afraid of pouring my heart and effort into something I thought was good, only to have it torn apart. I was afraid of not being able to do better than I had already done. I was afraid. I had no idea what to do.
As the rest of my life had already been falling apart (poor choices, not caring about things) I found myself broken. I had placed all of my remaining hope and identity in being a writer. I let fear destroy that. I was lost without hope, so I talked to God for the first time in years. He told me to drop out of college (refer to my first blog: The Holy Spirit Was There, Always).
I look back at my time in college, and I remember the talks that I had with my dad about writing. I was so cynical and so far from God. I told my dad that I couldn’t write for God’s glory. I wanted to write for my own glory. I wanted to write about depressing, disgusting things, and I wanted to be famous for it. In my writing, I spent so many words judging the world and its people and spreading my cynical diagnosis to anyone who would read it. I was using my gift to attack hope and glorify myself. My gift of writing was glorifying lies and evil, so God blocked that gift from me.
Then, I sat down to write my first blog for the World Race. I had been sitting in writer’s block for over a year; I couldn’t put pen to paper or open up a word document. I sat there in fear of the blank page, unable to type out a single word. I asked Holy Spirit to give me the words to glorify God. I decided that I would only use my gift to do that.
Now I sit in Bulgaria, writing. Each time I write, I ask God for the words, and I ask Him to lead me and teach me as I write them. I pray that each time I write something, its purpose is to glorify God and help others. I ask God to make me write fearlessly. I pray this gift will bring healing to people. I pray this gift will change the minds of people who don’t follow Christ. I pray this gift will change the way people think, speak, and act. I pray this gift will change the way people love and treat each other. I pray this gift will change the lives of my generation, and inspire them to change the world.
I know, now, that nothing I write will be perfect. It may not even be very “good”. But everything I write will be from the Lord, and for His glory. And I’m going to be doing it a lot more often because God entrusted me with this gift. I’m going to push apathy out of the way, rip off the wrapping paper, and let the Lord shine. I’m tired of leaving my gifts in the trash. God is doing amazing things in my life right now, and I look forward to the ways He is going to use me to glorify Him more frequently.
I pray that your hearts and inboxes are ready.
