Laura’s Muses

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So it’s that time of year again…the beginning! I’ve decided to blog about my resolutions so that I will be more encouraged to stick to them. At least, that is the hope.

At the top of the list, along with 98% of the population in general, I’m sure, is to get in shape. Chris and I have decided to undertake this together, and have established a plan that works around our very different schedules. I have no excuse, as I rarely have to be at work before noon, not to mention the fact that I only work four days a week. While that time off is not exactly “free time,” I definitely have ample opportunities to take a long walk or hit the gym.

Next is to get my finances in order. I am terrible, horrible, awful at managing money and I need to stop expecting God to fix it just because ‘I tithed more that 10% this week’, or ‘gave $50 to such and such charity’. I need to be the one to undertake this and I am sure He has things He wants to show me and teach me in the process… Luckily Chris has signed on, yet again, to help me out with this.

Once those two are underway, I can concentrate my attention on getting my business off the ground. Chris is working on the website right now, but it will be a little while before it’s finished, so I have no excuse not to be working on resolutions 1 & 2 in the meantime.

Re-connecting with friends and staying connected is fourth on my list. I’m just really bad at returning phone calls and making time to hang out with friends. Laziness and not wanting to be outside of my comfort zone are the main reasons why I let things like that slip…but I need to be more diligent about reaching out and keeping up my end of the friendship.

I also need to work on lots of spiritual stuff, but I won’t go into that here only because I haven’t quite ironed out the specifics yet.

That’s pretty much the list… Friends, wish me luck with mine, and know that I’ll be praying for you and yours!

I attended a bible study this morning that I’ve been to a few times before. It’s about fifteen or so women that get together on Wednesday mornings and talk about the gospel and Jesus and how it all applies to our lives. It’s kind of an inconvenience for me, since I have to get up early instead of sleeping in like I usually do on Wednesdays, but by the time I leave there I feel happy and refreshed and really just… connected. Today, though, I was hesitant to go because some of my past mistakes have been coming back to bite me and remind me of who I used to be, and I just didn’t feel like getting out of bed and looking in the mirror at myself. I was afraid these women would see right through me and know that even though I’ve been wanting, and trying to, live the right way, I’m still messily stumbling along. If nothing else, though, I knew I needed to hear what Jesus had to say to me today so I got up and went.

I took a really, really good look at these women- my sisters in Christ, to be more in context with today’s study. These women vary in age from early twenties to probably mid-fifties. Some grew up Christian or in a religious home and some didn’t. Some of them might be married, might even be divorced, might never have been either. Each of them has a unique story, an orginial tale of how they became who they are today. As we sat around a cluster of tables pushed together and discussed today’s study, I looked around at them all and I realized that I respect and value these women more than any women I’ve ever met. They are beautiful and honest people who let the love of God shine from them, and that light spills over to bring me out of the shadows. In this group, I become a real woman, too. I see what it really means to be a woman, and what God wants us to be as women. I cried today because I realized that I have wasted so many of my years looking in all of the wrong places and doing all of the wrong things, only to find the answers to what it takes to be a REAL woman here in this room. I cried because I didn’t feel worthy today of being with these amazing, kind, beautiful women because I have been struggling to be the same way and have mostly just failed miserably. Mostly, though, I cried because they still accepted me, still considered me a part of them, and still told me that it’s OK, God LOVES me, God forgives me, and He will always consider me a real woman as long as I’m living for Him.

My heart has been in the right place lately, I know that now. With Jesus holding my hand, leading me through, I can be everything He wants me to be. With these women to lean on and support me, I WILL be that woman.

You probably thought this was going to be a Halloween post, didn’t you? Well, unfortunately, it’s not. Read on anyway.

Here and there over the past year or so, and more frequently in the last few months, I’ve been having nightmares. Not to the point of waking and screaming, or ghosts and goblins or anything like that. It’s more of a…. spiritual attack. Usually there is some kind of “presence” in the dream that I try to stay away from. The “presence” is truly terrifying, although I can’t ever pinpoint exactly why I know that. When I am near it, my mind changes. I think awful thoughts, and I want to do awful things. I know, even in the depths of the dream, that it’s not ME who is thinking these things, but it’s completely out of my control. Usually, I spend the dream running from the police because I’ve murdered someone, and I sob uncontrollably when I realize that I’ve done it. I know I’m not capable of doing it; I have only done it because I was possessed by this presence.

Sometimes in the dream, I haven’t committed a crime. For example, last night’s dream about a painting. There was nothing “wrong” with the painting, but I knew this presence was in it. I tried and tried not to look at it, but eventually I did. These images started flowing through my brain, like ocean waves, building in intensity until I couldn’t take it. I would break visual contact somehow, pulling at something deep down inside me to do so. In another recent (and recurring) dream, the presence was at the bottom of a set of stairs. I couldn’t see anything, but I could feel it, like a very heavy blanket of anxiety and deceit. When I would get close to it, my head would fill with thoughts about God, how it is wrong to follow Him and how I really didn’t believe anyway. This internal struggle would begin, where I would try to shout out the truth, that I DO believe in God, and I would NEVER turn away from Him like that! I would become so terrified that God would hear these thoughts and turn away from me forever. Usually, thankfully, I wake up immediately.

Spiritual warfare is REAL. Am I experiencing it? Hmmm, that’s tough to say. On one hand, I think some of my true anxiety and guilt over my sins work their way in to my subconscious and overflow into these kinds of dreams. On the other, one could argue, Satan himself might be using my guilt to work against me. I have always had vivid dreams, so it’s not unusual for me to be tormented for days over a feeling I had in a dream. Again, on the other hand, this may be a convenient way for Satan to reach me with the least resistance.

I need to learn that I once I’ve repented of sin, it’s time to let it go! This unnecessary guilt is just leaving the door open. Then, I can spend my time in a positive and uplifting way, by reconnecting with God through prayer, studying His Word, and worship.

Photo Credit: Evil Soul by Al-Fassam. Some rights reserved.

As most modified (i.e. tattooed, pierced, branded, what-have-you) person will inevitably tell you, body modifications are addicting. I really hate being part of that stereotype because I’d like to think that it’s possible to get only one, possibly long sought-after, tattoo or piercing and be content forevermore. In my personal experience, however, this is not the case.

Previously have I been the proud owner of at least seven different piercings, including ear cartilage, my right nostril, tongue, navel and some others which weren’t quite as…visible. Following the lineage of my self-inflicted holes, you can almost see my courage grow and my tolerance of pain increase although some hurt terribly and some hardly pinched–the which-were-which may surprise you, or maybe not. I digress.

I have since retired almost all of the piercings for varying reasons, but I loved each of them and still terribly miss some of them. Each empowered me in it’s own unique way, and I proved to myself over and over that I could face the fear of pain and overcome it. Once a piercing was in place, it was always a long internal debate over removing it once the time came. In example, the tongue piercing was a complete pain in the ass, but I was so proud of myself for doing it (I was literally terrified of the thought of a needle passing through my tongue!) that it took weeks for me to finally accept that it just wasn’t right for me. Plus, it was becoming so grossly “main stream” among young females that my personal reasoning for the piercing was getting lost somewhere in the public stigma of it, and the assumption that I did it because it was the “cool” thing to do. Conversely, the nostril piercing felt so natural that when it fell out one night during my sleep, I cried when I realized the hole had grown over by the next morning.

My parents were none too happy about my foray into the world of the more temporary modifications, although for some odd reason my first (but hopefully not only) tattoo, or permanent modification, was happily accepted. I sometimes wonder if my open-mindedness towards “mods” in general didn’t open the door for my father, mother and sister to permanently alter their own skin under the tattoo needle with little, if any, hesitation, as currently they each boast at least one tattoo of their own.

Getting back to the title of this post… it’s been almost four years since my tattoo, and in that time I’ve retired piercings but have added no new mods. For awhile I felt I may have been satiated, or even that maybe I had “grown out of the phase.” After all, most jobs won’t allow them to be visible, and even today-as main-stream as it’s becoming society honestly doesn’t treat you quite the same if you have visible modifications as if you don’t. However, my itch is itching again. I’m starting to feel…boring. Plain. Something on the inside wants to be showcased on the outside. The way make-up makes a girl feel pretty, or even more substantially, the way painting a picture can make you feel like you created something beautiful; a piercing or tattoo released those emotions in me. A piercing can bring that extra element, that missing piece that helps me express my individuality. A months-long search for the art that tugs at something inside me, inked permanently upon my skin can bring that release that has built inside, waiting to be shown to the world. To me, it shows my true personality, more than clothes can, or make-up, or a hairstyle. When I look at it, it reminds me that I am confident of who I am on the inside and that I overcame the pain, and the fear associated with it, and that makes me proud.

I have some current ideas, although I will patiently pray about it before commiting to anything. I’m truthful and honest when I say that I have no idea what the Christian standpoint is on the matter of body modification but I will definitely do much research before making a final decision.

I was flipping through a tattoo magazine this morning, and stumbled across a photo of a young-ish girl (early 30’s?) with a nice, large, black tattoo that read “Jesus died for somebody’s sins, but not mine.” It was stretched across her chest, under the collarbone area, in two bold lines. Now, I’m all for artistic expression and I respect everyone’s own personal view of Jesus even if I don’t agree with it. It just seems that this particular tattoo seemed to express two things to me as the viewer: 1) she WANTS to debate about Jesus, and is even inviting such a conversation. This leads me to the conclusion that 2) In my opinion, she may not even know what she really feels about Jesus deep down. More often than not, I’ve found that the people that tend to talk about Him or want to argue about His existence usually end up finding Him later in life and becoming a Christian.

Anyway, I just found that interesting…

Sometimes I wonder if I’m the only person concerned with the moral downfall of society in general, and more specifically the celebrity population. Flipping through the pages of a People magazine the other day, I noticed article after article and picture after picture of these Hollywood icons flaunting to our youth what’s “popular” these days: pregnancy before marriage, racking up DUI’s, divorces, custody battles, public sex acts, and list goes on and on.

Most frustrating to me recently was realizing how Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt have become this epitomy of the “perfect family.” Um, hello! He supposedly cheated on his ex-wife with Angelina, then left his marriage to shack up with her, the two of them had a baby together AND adopted another child, and they’re STILL not married.

Other examples: The Nick and Vanessa incident in Mexico recently. Remember those X rated pictures? I was surprised it wasn’t followed by another celebrity sex tape. Let’s not forget Nicole Richie and Joel Madden…dating for, what, four mintues before she’s pregnant? Speaking of pregnancies, who the heck is the father of Salma Hayek’s baby? What else… oh, I read somewhere the Kate Moss and her druggie boyfriend are talking about having kids… and no, I’m not even going to go into the whole Britney situation. That’s a post in and of itself.

My point is, these are the people that are most influental in our society and they are completely shying away from any decent and moral behavior. They expect us to accept their lifestyles as “normal” and do not seem to care how young America will be affected by their choices. Stars that seem to have a shred of decency and interest in how they are portrayed (Mandy Moore, the reformed Christina Agulera, Amanda Bynes) are cast off as being too boring to talk about, which says a lot about the standards of the media and those of us who thrive on the celebrity gossip.