patience

The ride to church this morning was highly aggravating. i didn't want to wake up, but did, and got dressed, and ate a quick breakfast, and came out to get into an overstuffed van. i was in a pleasant enough mood, just tired, as i haven't been getting enough sleep this week due to the return of insomnia. The three kids who were sitting behind me proceeded to whine and bicker the entire way into town. If i told them to be quiet, or nice, they would ignore me. My seatbelt kept locking up and choking me. Sammy asked me why i was in a bad mood, why i had been in a bad mood when i came down, which of course doesn't help my mood. And then everyone in the front seat started singing annoying kids' songs about having joy in your heart and all that jazz... because it's so nice to be in a sandwich of rudeness and judgment.

And i know that it's wrong of me to be annoyed, but i need quiet, i have only just gotten out of bed and i can't take the cacophony that i am surrounded by. i'm not a morning person, i need time to wake up so i can process things and not be overloaded. Peace and quiet not being forthcoming, i stuck my fingers in my ears and tried to imagine myself in my happy place, which varies from time to time. Today i was thinking of standing on the Monument embracing the wind a la Pride and Prejudice (the Knightley version). It helped me deal as the cacophony continued unabated.

i arrive in class first of course. No one comes in until 9:01, and the teacher doesn't arrive for several minutes after that. It gave me time to listen to some of the music on my phone, further bolstering my mood. The class was fine once it got started, i suppose, i'm still not sure where i should be. i feel at home in my parents' class, surrounded with acceptance and love. Waiting around for people to show up that i don't really know doesn't quite lend the same feeling. i know that no one means to make me feel excluded or hated, it just doesn't feel quite like home (to be more precise, i feel out of place). The old Sunday school class was what i missed the most about Colorado, they are who i wanted to invite to my wedding, the only friends i really have. i feel like i should be making an effort to form new friendships, etc., but i'm not sure i can handle it. Things are so uncertain for me right now, raw and damaged as i am.

A verse stuck out to me today, not one that the lesson or sermon was on, but one that was nearby, across the page, underlined in fact.

A life of moral excellence leads to knowing God better. Knowing God leads to self-control. Self-control leads to patient endurance, and patient endurance leads to godliness. Godliness leads to love for other Christians, and finally you will grow to have genuine love for everyone. The more you grow like this, the more you will become productive and useful in your knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. (2 Peter 1:5b-9)

Self-control... it's not exactly a trait that i have been displaying lately. Upon reading the passage, a part of me is confused. It's not that i'm trying to quibble about semantics, i'm not, i'm just very literal and sometimes things i read seem to contradict itself and leaves me wondering what in the world the author was trying to say.

How can someone have self-control without patience? i guess my perception is wrong, but it seems to me that if you're not patient then you're not going to control yourself. Even if you do control your speech, that doesn't guarantee that you're controlling your thoughts and attitude. i want to have more self-control, i want to be more meditative and contemplative and wait five minutes before i respond, but... i don't know how to. i can't chew my food twenty times before swallowing (every chew i swallow a bit more, i can't help it), if i wait to make a comment i might forget is and lose what i was trying to say (i'm turning into my mother and becoming forgetful), not to mention that when i wait i never get to speak because no one will give me the chance. i don't want to interrupt, or blurt out, but sometimes i just can't help it, it won't stay in, it has to come forth.

i've been trying to figure out how to develop my patience for a long time. It's a lot easier when you're only living with one person, or a couple (not that it's easy), but it's very difficult when your presence makes nine. How am i supposed to develop patience? It looks like i have to develop self-control first. How on earth am i supposed to develop self-control??? It goes back to the moral excellence and knowing God, i suppose. i've had moral excellence in my life, i was such a goodie-two-shoes growing up that the memory makes me sick. (lol people were "frightened by my excellence," just like Sue Ellen on Arthur).

But how am i supposed to know God? Nearly ten years of silence have done anything but develop my patience. i'm not as legalistic anymore, am i then not morally excellent? My conscience feels no twinges of guilt, in fact it feels nothing at all. Most of all, how am i supposed to know the One who will not directly communicate with me? i feel so lost. Many times i feel like i don't even know who He is anymore. i guess my only option is to read my Bible more, pray more, etc., as if that has gotten me very far in the past decade. i am so discouraged. i hate being single and i don't know what to do.