Identify the longing

Good morning -

So, I'm longing to share my journey with you, but I truly don't know where to start. Every morning I think, "I have so much to write," but every morning I don't know which thing to write. I suspect the last couple months may come out in bits and pieces. For today, I'm prompted to share one of the simple lessons I learned recently.

First of all, for any new readers, I've been on a quest to find True Rest since January. This quest has led me through some painful memories, an acute awareness of my weaknesses, depression, a growing deep knowledge of God's love for me, and most recently - a season of "pruning" that I'm calling my "fast." My fast was to willingly give up any and all distractions, my well-practiced escape routes in life, in order to be still before God. These escape routes included several technological distractions, as well as novels, chewing gum, and unhealthy food. I felt the freedom to break the fast on Sunday, May 16th, and I'm slowly adjusting to life with new habits yet no self-imposed tight restraints.

During this month of fasting, I have had several "a-ha" moments about rest. I'm calling them my keys to rest, and I've been compiling a list. Over the next several weeks I hope to share many of those keys with you. (as well as telling you the promised "dirty laundry" story - which I need to dig out of an old e-mail)

Several times in my former life (I call it my former life because I'm no longer a slave to live that way) I found myself on the computer, late at night surfing different news stories. I would follow link after link, reading stories about what's going on in the world. Mostly bad news, or just plain gossip. As I was sitting there, I would repeatedly think "I should go to bed, it's getting late, this is a waste of time." Yet when I would move the mouse to close the screen, I would divert and keep reading. Sometimes hours at a time. 11pm would come and go, 12am would come and go, but still I would sit and surf pointless stories with absolutely no connection to my life. There was something in my soul pulling me to read the next story, and the next - almost as if I were looking for something I couldn't quite find.

At those times, I would have this feeling well up inside me. A feeling of desire and need for fulfillment. As I went from one story to the next I would think, "What is it that I'm looking for? What longing am I expecting to be filled by these stories? What story could I possibly read that would leave me with fulfilled contentment?" And it NEVER did. Every time I would finally shut off the computer, look at the clock as if awaking from a trance, and think "Why in the world did I just do that?!" I would feel slimed, guilty, yucked - as if I had taken a dip in a forbidden mud bath, and not only was I dirty, but I was guilty. The news stories never edified me - they pulled me down. The entertainment stories never renewed me - they just left me with a deeper knowledge of the depravity of humankind and the misery of broken relationships. I would go to bed feeling guilty, ashamed of my lack of self control, and very, very tired. When I woke the next morning, my shame was there to greet me and I had to struggle through the morning to overcome my self-condemnation for how tired and spent I was.

Fast forward to April, 2010. I'm in the second week of my fast, and I head to the laundry room to get something. In order to get to the laundry room, I have to pass the computer. As I walk past the door to the office, I feel that familiar pull of my soul to the screen. Almost a physical feeling. I stop for a minute and reaffirm that I won't be turning the computer on to check e-mail, or see if anyone posted a comment on my blog post, or check in with facebook. The sheer power of self-control thrills me as I realize that I'm holding fast. And then I have a new thought - "What is it that I'm longing for? What is the desire that draws me to the computer?"

Like the day dawning in a clouded sky, a soft light began to shine on my heart and I said to myself, "I think. . . . I'm lonely. Yes, I think that's the emotion I'm feeling." It astounded me. I would never have identified myself as a lonely person, but as I stood there with my soul being pulled to a lifeless computer screen, I realized that I use the computer for social connection throughout the day. I was having psuedo-relationship through fragmented conversation via a screen, when the deep longing of my soul was to know and be known. Deep down I was hoping that internet interaction could fill my need for human connection and make me feel that I was accepted and appreciated. On an even deeper level, I was hoping that my interactions on the World Wide Web would reverse some beliefs I had about myself all my life, about being unattractive and unwanted - feelings of rejection.

As a matter of fact, I'm aware that even now, as I type this moment, I'm hopeful that you will read it and feel connected to me. And I'm hopeful that you will comment so that I know you feel connected to me and approve of me. And while that's not necessarily a bad desire, it's a bad master.

See, I've had to admit that there were slave drivers in my soul. Think back to the Israelites in Egypt. They had slave drivers telling them what to do all the time. Making bricks isn't really bad all by itself, but to have a relentless slave driver demanding you make bricks is crazy bad. And that's the difference between a healthy use of the internet - as a tool - and having the need for approval as my slave driver, relentlessly driving me to the computer, as if this machine in front of me could fill my desperate desire for acceptance and approval.

So on the day I stood in the door between the laundry room and the office, stunned by the realization that the longing I felt was loneliness, I decided to fill that longing by connecting with a real, live person - on the phone. (I know, the phone is still technology, but somehow it seems very different!) I asked God if there was someone in particular He would like me to connect with, and a name popped into my head. Later in the day I called her and we had a great conversation. It was an answer to my loneliness that was both healthy and mutually edifying. My emotions, rightly recognized, led me to a positive outcome.

And that day between the laundry room and the office was the day I learned this key to rest: Identify the longing. When I'm drawn to something, I need to take a moment to be still and ask myself, "What is my true desire?" If I will identify the longing for what it is, I may find that there is a more positive, healthy, life giving, shame resistant, God blessed way of fulfilling that longing.