Health

it is a funny thing to feel your age for once in your life. i am not talking about suddenly feeling old because your back went out or forgetting when your apointment is. I am talking about that feeling that comes over you when you Finlay feel like you are the same age, physically and mentally. Perhaps it is better to say it like this. Often in life, we get stalled in our development, we get put on hold in one or more area of our life. something happens to make us jump off the track and we can not get on again or get going until we heal/resolve/deal with the penny on the tracks that made us stop. so we go through life with parts of our selves restrained or put on hold well the rest of us goes trucking along. this can cause some problems, but it more often just makes us really believe that we are younger then we are. if you ask some one, how old do you feel you are, you will probably get a different answer then what their divers license says. But some times, through events mostly out side of our selves, some time those derailed trains get back on the track and start to catch up. they work double time until they are up to speed with the rest of us. I guess what i am talking about is health, in every sense of the word. feeling healthy. it is a strange feeling, trust me.

well, today it begins. I am starting my new carrier at the springs rescue mission. I am excited to get going. I did not know when i had to come in to work, so i got up and ready to go at 6:25 this morning. then i got the last minute email that said i did not have to be in until 9:00. oh well, maybe i can make this a habit, get some things done in the morning. I am going to be working in what is called the new life program. it is a year long residential program for guys coming off the streets who want to get thier llives back togeather. I will be doing some counseling, teaching, social work and other such things. it is really what i havebeen looking for. I never saw my self as a privet practice counselor, i like to do to meany other things. I enjoy teaching, i like to work with the system and use resources to help people. so i am really looking foward to this work. I will try to keep up this blog to let you all know how the change is going and what i am learning. I am sure it will be a lot.

crazy couple of days

well, it has been a crazy few days, there has been allot happening back at the ranch in colo. spr. we have had friends come home to stay, friends reach mile stones on the way to educational fulfillment, we have found a new church and started new bible studies/movie nights. and it may not be done yet. it seams that when god moves, he dose it all at once and then lets us ceatch up to him. i wonder if the older we get, the better we run and the faster we ceatch up to what god is doing. i guess fall is the new spring.

China and free will

So, I learned a little something about God giving us free will while watching the Olympics last night. The finals of the 30m platform diving was on, and the TV spin machine was pitting the 15 year old Chinese diver against the much older American diver. Now of course, there has been some press about the Chinese gymnasts and their age, but what stretch my mind every time is when the sport expert, the commentator hired by the network, discusses the training of many of the Chinese athletes, no matter what age. They talk with glee, almost jealously, about how Chinese children, once they are determined to be of correct body type and ability, are taken from their families at ages of 3 and 4, placed in government run sports prisions, and trained relentlessly for years until they reach optional performance capability. Hence the pressure to have under aged girls compete in the gymnastics. They were at there scientific peak, and in four more years would be no good to the country, there for they must compete now. a little photo shop and and we have "official Chinese passports." Any way, these commentators are so caught up in competition and their own little sport, they fail miserably to see the larger picture. Flash to the American diver, making her last competition dives of her career. she was grinning ear to ear before every jump. and when her last belly flop was done, tears ran down her face with the emotion of having ended her career. Now, the Chinese diver did take first and the American not so much, but look at the larger picture. This little girl, taken from her family, drilled and trained not to let her country down or she would be a failure for life, performed a robotic and technically perfect series of dives, and won. The American was trying just as hard, but basking in the joy of doing what you love and eating up the moment for all it was worth. The gold medalist had to scrape the smile off of her face, because that would not be acceptable for her country, while the American let her emotions flow. It really made me realise how much free will means to us as humans when it comes to God. Yes, he could have indoctrinated us with unfailing love, and we would all perform robotic and technically perfect series of praise and worship services on earth and then die with a gold medal. Or he can let us come as we can, and perform not quite as well, but perform out of our hearts, and it is beautiful. I would not trade all the gold medals in the world that were won out of robotic obedience for just one that come from the love of the sport.

Skipping II (crashing a family reunion and staying for the pie)

So our saga of Church shopping continues. after a few weeks of trying the other popular mega Churches in town, we began to tire of roast preacher for lunch. I have a good friend who i talked with about our church frustrations and he recommended his home church, he said it would be a good fit. so we finally gave it a try. This church happens to be part of the IAC, or international Anglican church family. From what i understand, the Anglican church of Rwanda saw that the American church was really suffering and needed help. so they sent missionaries to the u.s. to plant Churches. yes, African missionaries coming to the states. pretty cool in my book. Any way, we find the church, which meets in a monastery (not really the brother cadfile type of monastery, more the 1970's post office kind of monastery) and found our way to the auditorium. It was apparent right away that this was a different kind of Church. I had been to an Anglican service twice before, once in Shang Hi and once in Jerusalem, but in those settings, different was expected and not as much of a shock. The whole thing really had a familial feel about it. People wandered in during praise time, people dressed from very formal to short pants. the preacher/priest/brother had the black shirt and white collier, with levies and sandals. different. the service was divided into two equal halves, the sermon and the communion. during the sermon, kids were in the nursery, during communion, every one was involved. different. and even we got amber back and she started making her little baby noises, not a head turned, it was normal. different. the service had a lot of readings, and symbolic stuff, but it seamed like people understands that ceremonies stood for something, and were not the point in them selves. different. so all this different kind of took me back, but as i thought more about it, that was just the kind of thing that i was looking for. we both really liked it, there were a good number of people from our tribe there (thirty somethings with chacos and Subaru's) and a good number of the Christan mental health community from the springs. so we will see. it seams that there are still some people doing Church for some of the right reasons in this town. we will not be attending this Sunday, as we have to drive up to Denver, in the middle of the Democratic convention, to attend a birthday party for two children who will never know we were there.

Skipping

So, we skipped Church yesterday, and it was awesome. we have been struggling with our church lately, and we finally decided to do some looking around. I have been going to this church for 8 years, so this decision dose not come lightly. and we may end up back, at the same place, but it is just time to look at other options. It has been so hard to connect lately in the Church. Ever scence our small group disbanded, it has not been the same at all. But more importantly, skipping church was such a relief, especially after reading through Blue and really beginning to realise living by grace and outside of the law. I really agree with one comment i heard from a pastor, he said "all my life, growing up, we were told that we did not have to live by the law, but by grace, and then the church would proceeded to teach us how to follow all the rules." It seamed kind of like flossing your teeth, every one agrees that it is the best thing to do, but who actually dose it?

Blue

So i finally finished blue like jazz. I know i am kind of a late comer to this but i have been reading nothing but psychology for the past three years. It was actually my fist non required reading that i have done sense graduating. and if nothing else, it showed me that i have a heart that will be captured by just about any ones vision or passion. I experienced this in my schooling as well. every time i finished a class i was sure that was the area of counseling i was going to specialize in. after the ptsd class, i wanted to work with that, after the grief and loss, i wanted to work in a hospice, after psychopharmachology, i wanted to kill my self. any way, i feel the same things after reading such a good book like blue. on one side, i really like that i have a open heart and can join others in there passion, but on the other side, i would really like to have a passion that i can call my own, one that is totally mine and is chosen for me. I am getting a strange feeling like i have written this some where before. oh well, i guess this would be a good time to post my life long goals.

1. To have MY compound raided by the ATF
2. To see it rain beer
3. To eat my weight in something
4. To have an invention featured on an infomercial
5. To make the Letterman top 10 list
6. To eat a bald eagle.