Nothing at all

3/13/10
Have you ever had those times when you feel like you have so much inside of you waiting to come out....and yet you can't figure out any sort of medium to express it?
Have you ever had something on the tip of your tongue, but your memory isn't quick enough to recall it....but you can FEEL that it's RIGHT THERE?
Have you ever searched for something and you KNOW that you know that you know that it's around here SOMEwhere...but it eludes your discovery?

I feel as if I've been in a perpetual state of this...this whatever it is.
I'm full to the brim but I can't express it adequately...in any medium. I'm not a good enough painter, sketcher, photographer, violist, writer, speaker, sculptor to get it out of my mind. There is no sort of paper, or string, or clay, or camera, or canvas that could capture it. Even if I could, I don't even know what I would do. Which brings me to my next point...

What is even IN my mind? I have no idea. I just know it's there; rattling around in half forms and vague whispers. Nothing is fully realized, therefore when I do pick up a paint brush, I have nothing to paint. When I pick up a pencil, no words are available. It's like being in a dark room where I can feel that something is there, by me, but I can't see it. I couldn't tell you what it was; I couldn't tell you if it truly existed. All I know is that it's there, wanting to be known. Perhaps it's not ready? Perhaps I'm not patient enough? Perhaps I'm not diligent enough?

This last issue is with God and other things I'm searching for. Perhaps the postmoderns are right, maybe truth really can't be known. But it's frustrating!! I feel as if the answer is so close but always beyond my reach. Sometimes, in the minutes before I fall asleep or the dreaming moments before I wake, I think I have the answer. I'm so SURE that I have the answer...and yet when I'm awake, I have nothing. My understanding comes and goes; sometimes I have more pieces, and at other times I have less. But they never go together. That satisfying "click" when all the puzzle pieces fall into place and the whole picture is revealed, evades me. Even with simple ideas (like social justice...did I say simple? I mean terribly complex), I can't seem to grasp them. Sometimes I think I have them so I try to hold onto them. But the tighter and tighter I close my hand, the more and more slips through my fingers until I only have a fraction of what I had before.

And unless the other person has felt, seen, touched the same things I'm trying to get at, forget about trying to explain it to others. If they haven't experienced it, they will just look at you like you should be admitted.

I wish I could be like those that are good at something. The writer, the actor, the painter, the player, the photographer. To just be able to have an outlet-but I feel as if I have none, and it frustrates me so! I want to be creative so badly, but I have no original ideas. I want to create, but I have nothing to make! I want to write but I have nothing profound to say! When I was young, I would look up quotes of people. They had such insight it seems. I wonder if they felt as I do now. Like they have nothing to say, or to contribute, or to make. I wonder if they just lived, and it just happened, without intention; flowing from the core of their being.

I wonder if its just in a person, or if its something they work at-to matter. I wonder if they tried. Somedays, I don't have the patience or the discipline to try to matter. So I chuck it all and say, "Ok God. I matter not. Therefore I'll just be and you sort out all the pieces. K? K bye!" And that seems to work fine. Then other days come, the days when I remember I have nothing and am nobody, and I wonder if thats ok? And then I think it's not ok. Maybe I am actually supposed to try, and because I'm not trying (because I can't get it OUT even if I HAD something), I'm living up to less than my potential.

What is potential anyway? My Mac dictionary says its this:

potential |pəˈten ch əl|
adjective [ attrib. ]
having or showing the capacity to become or develop into something in the future : a two-pronged campaign to woo
potential customers. See note at latent .

noun
1 latent qualities or abilities that may be developed and lead to future success or usefulness : a young broadcaster with
great potential | the potentials of the technology were never wholly controllable.
• (often potential for/to do something) the possibility of something happening or of someone doing something in the
future : the crane operator's clear view reduces the potential for accidents | pesticides with the potential to cause cancer.

2 Physics the quantity determining the energy of mass in a gravitational field or of charge in an electric field.

Frankly, I'm partial to the last definition. But sadly, it seems that all the other definitions have to do with some sort of work. Hmmm, that's rather discouraging. So does that mean that if we don't work at it, then we won't see the full potential? I guess that's true with a skill....I think that's true with most things.....doesn't really work for me, I'm lazy. I enjoy being lazy. Laziness is one of my favorite past times. Of course, I think the bible has much to say on the subject, most of it saying it's not ok.

I think I just get overwhelmed. There's just too much and not enough time. How can you be good at everything? How can you know all that there is to know? Can we REALLY meet our full potential. Thank God He's gracious.