Pick Me Up, Love

This will likely be the last entry for a while because as of tomorrow, I will be on the road with the Summer Ministry Team. After these first week and a half, I am excited to work with these young ladies and see what the summer has in store. There will be challenges as I try to adjust to the team and try to lead as best I can. However, we are leaving here in a little over six hours. So, this will (or should) be short.

Tonight at youth, we were talking about the topic of my last blog post which was 'letting go and moving on'. Generally, if I am asked to teach in some capacity and I am given free reign to choose the topic, I will go with one that I am thinking about. I also thought it suited this time in youth's lives as some are graduation and are preparing for their next step.

In my last post, I said that this was the biggest challenge for humankind and that the journey of life is essentially all about moving on. I still believe that. For me personally, it has been sinking into my perspective more and more and how I navigate life. I have more peace and have become more comfortable with the life in which we find ourselves. However, I have also come to see the potential downfalls of this perspective.

The most obvious is passion. More specifically, the lack of it. If one becomes more and more focused on looking to the horizon and willing to let things go and move on, it may get to the point where we won't hold anything for any period of time. We may drift through life, not really participating in any of it. That if the opportunity for something wonderful comes along, we may not try to reach for it at all or do it with a half-hearted attempt.

I don't think this extreme is good either, because this kind of hands-off approach can leave us to miss participating in the wonder of life. Although I don't want to be weighed down by clinging to things for too long and too desperately, I still want to live life. I think of the times when I would ride in the back of a truck going through tall grass and I would reach out and try to grab the tall weeds as I went by in one of those impromptu games that only you play and only you know that you're playing a game. I am simply seeing if I can grab it as I go. Then the weed pulls up out of the ground or snaps and then I try to grab another. I didn't want to simply brush my hands through the grass, I wanted to grab.

In the same way, I don't want to breeze through life with no passion. Perhaps I just need to see those moments or phases in life or special people and relationships that I can grab, experience, and let go when the time is up. I think, if we know that time we have is precious, then we will live with passion. With a love for life and what it has for us and what it can teach us. Then when it comes time for us to let it go, we know that we experienced it well and did not take our time or relationships for granted and we can move on to the next wonderful experience in life.

"Pick me up, love, from the bottom
Up onto the top, love, everyday
Pay no mind to taunts or advances
I'm gonna take my chances on everyday
Left to right
Up and up and inside out right
Good love fight for everyday
Jump in the mud, mud
Get your hands filthy, love
Give it up, love
Everyday"
- Title track of the Dave Matthews Band album "Everyday"
(for the first time, I will share a link to the music video, because it is that fantastic and you should spend the few minutes watching it. Especially, if you are a fan of 30 Rock: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RXe8PFKsOIc )