One of the most exhausting things I've experienced in life is to be pulled in two very different directions. I think, too, as Christians, this is an almost never-ending battle...never-ending, until the End. (An End to which I look forward with most anticipation.) My flesh, versus my spirit--a battle God promises us, but even with the guarantee is made no less difficult.

I already battle a never-resting mind. Even in my sleep I dream long, detailed, decision-rampant dreams; I get no breaks from my over-active mind. I don't say this as a complaint, necessarily. More just a statement of fact to paint a picture of the way I'm pulled every which way, every day.

I love shoes. I love clothes. I love fashion and looking good and dressing up. So I spend time maybe once or twice a month looking at my favorite websites at inexpensive clothes; I stick all the things I 'can't live without' in my shopping cart, and when I'm finished looking through every page at all the things I love (tops, shoes, bags, and necklaces), I go back through my shopping cart and pick a few things to actually buy. So I guess that's not a horrible practice. I don't spend hundreds of dollars a month on cute clothes...but I would like to. I would like to have a room-sized closet, wall-to-wall filled with beautiful things (very well organized). I would love to have a shoe wall-- a wall with ceiling-high shelves and row after row of glamorous heels.

But while I'm sitting here dreaming of said closet, I can't help but frown upon myself and these silly moments of flesh-relapse. While I sift through pages and pages of aesthetically pleasing attire, I feel a gnawing somewhere deep in my heart that tells me, "But this isn't what you were made for." (Can you believe my conscience ends sentences in prepositions?) My spirit is committed to something else. I don't want to say "greater," because that's not fair, and awfully judgmental, to people who don't have the future desires I have. So it's not "something greater," it's just something very different, on a personal level, that my spirit and I know, and have known, I've been committed to for a very long time.

This commitment has something to do with life being ever-short-- a brief and tiny flash of time spent here, and what I do with that little time. I'm still not sure what I believe as for purpose. Does God birth us for something specific, or do we assign our own? Either way, I'm to the same conclusion that my life is not about fancy clothes and shoes and shiny necklaces, but is far more about helping to give meaning to the lives of others. Not that a person can't do both, but I don't believe I can, because the shoes and the people are two very great loves for me-- loves that/who are at a constant battle for my affection. And because of this battle, because I can't seem to make room for both, I must prioritize. And people always, always come before things.

People are beautiful, and tender, and broken, and often unloved, and so they need my love, my care, concern, and attention. I could wear cute shoes and attend to hurting people. I could. But I can't. I want to love people who ache for love, and they don't need me to look any certain way. They just need me. My kindness or generosity won't be extended by a pretty blouse, but it could, in some circumstances, be limited. And if I'm truly going to devote my life to practically loving unloved people, how can I carry on in life with even the tiniest limitation on that love?

Anyway, as usual toward the end of my ramblings I'm getting muddled. But I write these things for me, anyway, and I think I've said to myself what I need to say.

:)