ugh.

So I've started at least 3 posts, just to not have enough time to finish them, and then by the time I get around to it, it's just old news and too much work to totally revise it.

For everyone curious about my new job, it's pretty great. I think I killed an entire forest by misprinting 50 or more letters at once, which I had done about 2 or 3 times (the first time it wasn't my fault, but everything after that was all mine). Other than that, I think I'm getting it so far, some stuff definitely takes a little bit longer. What do I love most? The fact that I can have Caribou coffee every single morning for free? Or that outside of my trainer checking my work no one looks over my shoulder. There have been a few times when I'd get nervous thinking that I should be telling someone when I'm going to lunch or taking a quick break, but then I'd realize that no one really cares. I could get used to this!

So that's good. The rest of me is working back into routines. For whatever reason I had decided to become the world's laziest in everything. I hadn't really been working out, reading my Bible, doing much in general that was productive outside of throwing together dinner and doing the laundry when I couldn't put it off any longer. As a result I'd spend hours daily playing the Gameboy (this is why I CANNOT own a Wii, no matter how much I would love to) and just wasting time in general. But I've finally gotten to the point (I think) where I'm able to pick up and start making good habits again.

As a result of these last few weeks, I have begun contemplating life and sin...I had to realize that these things weren't just me getting "into a funk", but that in general, my life is full of disobedience and pride...I had been purposefully not reading my Bible, not spending time with God, not working out, ignoring just about every inclination (prompting by the Holy Spirit) to do any of it. I've generally not being disciplined to do what I know I should, when I have the opportunity. Which, of course, leads me to feel like crap.

At the same time I'm the one who put myself here, so can I really feel that bad for me? And I'm having a hard time thinking that God is anything but disappointed in me lately...So yeah. I was thinking about people that I've stopped actively trying to help out because even though I love them and they're quite open about their shortcomings, they really don't do much to overcome them. It has come to my attention that lately, I've been one of those people...

I don't really have any answers for this - how to keep motivated, how to get back to where I have been, why those areas of my life have not been entirely submitted to God after following him my entire life...I think I never really realized that that's the deal, this is why I keep going up and down with it all. Definitely no good.

Before I started slacking, I was trying to memorize Phillipians 2:13 - "For God is working in you, giving you the desire and the power to do what pleases him". I think I'll start there again. My constant struggle is this: how much of this is supposed to be my own effort, and how much is God's grace and power working thru me? I know I can't do this on my own, but I can't just expect the Holy Spirit to take me over and be good...

Anyway, this started at lunch, is done at approximately 4:45 with my brain feeling especially heavy and mushy from a particularly difficult Monday of learning a dastardly long and difficult new process. Sorry if it doesn't make much sense toward the end...