Year-end Review.

I must say, I am not terribly disappointed to see 2012 go. 

This year has been eventful, to say the least. In the last 365 days, I:

 interviewed and was accepted to my first choice of grad schools,

 spent one last semester in Fort Collins,

felt the joy of watching my friends greet exciting futures,

created new friendships & cherished old ones,

said goodbye,

had my heart broken,

nearly lost everything to a fire,

saw countless prayers answered,

moved across the country,

laughed a lot,

cried a lot,

closed out coffee shops while studying,

explored a handful of new cities, 

& grew. More than I ever have before.

If I had to choose the biggest lesson I learned [& continue to learn] in 2012, 

I'd have to say it's patience. I never realized I was impatient until I had

to wait. & that's what I've done all this past year it seems. As hard as this year

has been, I wouldn't trade the outcome of it for an easier journey. I'm hopeful 

for a new tomorrow.

Here's to 2013!

This is home.

It's easy to love where I'm from. I might be biased, 

but I truly believe I grew up on some of the prettiest land on this earth. 

Call me Jacob.

It's Christmas Eve. It has just started to snow, & as it blankets

the earth, creating a white Christmas here in Colorado, I feel peace settling over

my heart on this night. It hasn't felt this way for the majority of this year, 

& I am thankful that as this month comes to a close, I am able to watch

things change around me & within me. I've been thinking recently about

writing a year-end review, & I still intend to, but I came across an article

that I found extremely relevant at this time in my life. It's well-written, & 

a beautiful, honest account of what it looks like to be real with God. 

It's one of those things that I wish I could have articulated myself, but

was unable to find the words for: 

[Call me Jacob]

What I've Learned [Parts 5 & 6]

I've been avoiding finishing this mini series for a while now. 

I'm just kind of sick of the process of reflecting. 

I've gotten to a place that I'm fairly familiar with- a place where I am just

tired of thinking about things. Oh, how I'd love to just not think for a while. 

& that's what I've attempted to do. But I've realized that there's a reason why

I started this, & it's about time I finished. I'm coming to a compromise & 

combining the last 2 topics into one post: 

Nothing is wasted. 

It is easy to keep yourself from healing. 

[If you've missed anything, catch up:]

overview, part 1, part 2, part 3, part 4

The first of these two things is rather straight forward. As I've experienced

a semester or growth, pain, opportunity, & change, I've come to realize

that, piece-by-piece, my story is fitting together. I'm thankful that I have 

an interest in documenting my life through journaling & this blog, because its

been so easy in the monotony of each day to think that the details are insignificant. 

But they're not, & of this I am convinced. I'm stoked to be able to look back on this

all one day & have the fog lifted entirely from my understanding of why things happen

the way they do, but until then, this is a promise I'll gladly hold on to. 

It's the last topic that I avoided the most. [that's why I put it last.]

For months I didn't want to believe that I might be hindering my own healing

process, & for months, I avoided confronting the realization that unless I gave

up control to allow God to heal my heart, I never would truly heal. 

I knew in my heart the process of healing would be a painful one, but I 

desperately wanted the control of how quickly I would allow it to happen. & if I'm 

really honest, I think part of me didn't actually want my heart to be healed. 

Accepting brokenness & healing meant admitting that I might have been wrong

in the way I had directed my life thus far, & I wasn't ready to admit that.

It's kind of amazing the destruction we can inflict on ourselves. 

But it's even more amazing how quickly peace can overwhelm the most

broken of circumstances once you let it. 

It changes me.

In light of the elementary school shooting that happened in CT last week, 

I have been thinking a lot. As I watched the news in the ATL airport, 

I couldn't help but remember the Columbine High School shooting, and how it felt

to live so near to something so tragic. My 10-year-old mind couldn't understand 

it, & if I'm honest, my 23-year-old mind still doesn't. 

As a person who believes that there is a higher power- that there is a purpose

bigger than myself, I struggle with the idea of prayer. 

Whether they formally did it or not, I'd bet that every child's parent

at that school formulated the thought, "please, don't let it be my child."

Yet, for 20 families, it was their child. So does prayer work, or does it not? 

My heart knows it does, but situations like these make me question

my own grasp on it all. I can certainly see how easily one can lose hope

when something so devastating happens. 

I just started reading a book yesterday, & came across this. It seemed pretty 

opportune for the thoughts inside my head: 

"It is not so true that 'prayer changes things' as that prayer changes us, 

& then we change things. Jesus Chris is not a social reformer. He came to alter us

first, & if there is any social reform to be done on earth, we must do it. 

God has so constituted things that prayer on the basis of redemption alters the 

way we look at things. Prayer is not altering things externally, but working wonders

within our disposition. When we pray, things remain the same but we begin to be different.

We are never what we are in spite of our circumstances, but because of them."

-Oswald Chambers

Here.

I made it back to the 719, & it feels good. 

The past week started off in Atlanta, where I visited the World of Coke, 

walked across covered bridges & perused little shops all decorated for Christmas.

 I made my way to Fort Collins, where I wandered through flea markets, 

thrift shops, & a welded-creation wonderland. I stayed up entirely too late

every single night, & I had more fun than should be allowed in one week. 

I think I left my heart in Fort Collins back in May. But now I'm here:

& it feels good. 

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas

[if Christmas was rainy and overcast.]

Tennessee has made an effort to get as close as it can to a white

Christmas with lots of cold rain this morning. I don't mind; weather

like this is always appropriate for finals week. 

I cannot believe I am one final away from finishing my first semester

of graduate school. 

Next stop: Atlanta & then home for Christmas. 

Tennessee, you're starting to grow on me, but it just wouldn't 

feel right to spend Christmas anywhere but here: 

29 days.

This year has one month left in it. 

Never in my life have I wanted time to pass quickly & stand still 

so badly at the same time.  Part of me wants to just put 2012 out of its misery & welcome

2013 with arms wide open. But another part wants time to stop-

I just don't want to start a new year just yet. Give me one more month &

maybe then I'll be ready. But sure enough, each morning I wake up & another

day has passed. I don't even want to talk about the fact that it was

August just yesterday, wasn't it? Then I think about all I've done since

then and all of a sudden the past 4 months feel like an eternity, crawling

by at a snail's pace. Time is so strange like that. 

So here I am on December 2, and I am already thinking about 

this year's end & if I'm honest, I'm a little bit scared. What if this new year doesn't bring

what I hope it will? What if I miss something in these next 29 days because

all I can think about are the following 365? What if the messiness of this

past year doesn't become compartmentalized in 2012 on December 31, 

never to be seen again in 2013? 

The truth is, I know it won't. Life doesn't work that way. 

While I'll never again live through December 2, 2012, I probably

will carry with me some of the hurt, confusion, & uncertainty of this year into

the next. & maybe I won't. Either way, time is moving forward, & like

everyone has always told me, time has a strange way of settling things. 

I can feel it happening. I'm looking forward to these next 29 days.