The big picture...

I'm attempting to write down a lesson I learned yesterday because I never want to forget it.  For those of you who are totally unselfish, who have life figured out, please read no further.  This post is not for you, lest you see my worst side and waste your time reading about lessons you've already mastered.  To the rest of you, read at your own risk, it may be lengthy...

I had one of those nights of extreme guilt because I WASTED a solid hour on the computer.  Blogs and Facebook.  That was the problem.  I got in bed feeling like I'd blown a whole evening where I could've read or relaxed, but no, I chose the other.  The other problem was looking at too many people's lives in one sitting.  Too many great things, great pieces of news, great accomplishments, milestones, achievements, successes, etc., etc.  I can appreciate people's triumphs.  I love to glory with others in their successes, but it was overload.  There are so many very accomplished people in this world.

I felt very small.  Very insignificant with this meager life of mine.  I started my journal with the words of a song, "O Great God, be small enough for me..."  My feelings were pleadings with God to help me see my purpose in life, my role, and to be satisfied with it--to be able to say "That's enough for me," and really mean it.

I put my thoughts away, hoping for sleep and a better tommorow.  It didn't come.  Obviously, the Lord wasn't done teaching me.  I started writing again, knowing that when I write, things seem to lay themselves out more clearly for my brain to work through. 

Being small isn't a bad thing.  I read a book once where a mother taught her young son to "always stay small, not in an insecure sort of way, but in a humble way."  Gandhi would say, "reduce yourself to zero."  Realizing that I am ONE person in a world of billions is enough to make me feel small.  This smallness inclines me to reach out; life is not all about me.  Duh.  Not by a long shot.  It's easy to get caught up in my bubble, my reality, thinking that it's everything, it's the big picture, when really life is so much bigger.  I'm a small part of a tremendous whole.  There is no room for finding fulfillment in life by gratifying myself.  Real happiness, real purpose comes from reaching outside of myself to others.  If I can reach out to others, help someone, love someone, give my time to those in my sphere of influence (thank you, Mr. Covey), than God will bless me with a satisfied life.  And not just satisfaction, but joy.  This is what Jesus taught his entire life, I know, or I thought I did.

Think of all the wasted time spent yearning for others lives, others worldy accomplishments, others recognitions.  It's so destructive.  Forgetting myself for the Lord, so I can in turn find myself is the key.  When you lose yourself in the service of others, all that crap, that pride, just goes away.  It doesn't matter.  Only then, will God reveal your purpose to you.  How can you see your purpose when you're so caught up in someone else's?  It's funny to me that I've been taught this stuff all my life.  I've known it to be true in my brain, and I've even had glimpses where it reached my heart.  But it really hit me hard last night, coursing through every atrium and ventricle...whole-heartedly:).

I'm small.  That's okay.  I want to "stay small."  I never want to forget it.  And I started today with my family.  I was small with my family, and I realized how big I thought I was before.  Line upon line, little by little.