So, I have a week off from teaching for Winter Break (thank you, Paulding), and on my list of to-dos (one aim a day - which I still need to complete one for today), I have realized some problems with the chore of cleaning:
1) I am messy; I own it, and I am trying to become not-messy, not-spotless, just tidy.
2) I need to clean WAY more often given my messy-ness.
3) I reacquaint myself with things that I HATE about me.
Okay, the first two are practical, "hey, try better" realities. The third is the clencher though - a chief reason why cleaning and organizing can be painful for me.
Amidst papers strewn all over two rooms that I occupy in mom's house (I pay rent, therefore I'm "allowed" to be a mess), the clothes on the floor, the books on every clear space (or really on every space, in every space, around every space), are unaccomplished goals. Admist the papers, documents, bills, letters, there lies my procrastination. There lies my failure to do things in a timely fashion. There lies another idea that I had that I didn't follow through on. There lies me, undisciplined, unmotivated, overwhelmed, and just trying to catch my breath because I have been just treading water. And that water is above my lips, under my nose. I should say that truly, I have already drowned. I really am dead already - some of these ideas, hopes, goals, dreams - they are in the past, so they are dead weight. It's not my death that's the problem, it's the haunting that I feel. The biggest word that comes to mind is "shame." Shame that I failed again, shame that I couldn't do it, or didn't because "I was too busy." But, I am never too busy - I get on facebook, I watch TV, I play games to pass the time away. I am NOT EVER too busy. But I am too undisciplined. And I get to confront this when I get around to cleaning.
It's no wonder why I love and hate "getting organized." On the one hand, getting my things in order and neat is therapeutic. On the other, it is a painful reminder of my inconsistency, my lack of motivation, and my just plain sadness over the failure that I have so long felt I have been and lived. I realize that part of loving Jesus is abiding by His standards. Too often, I hold my own standard for myself higher than Jesus's, and let me just say, I am not a forgiving person when it comes to my own shortcomings. And being that I don't want to confront the unforgiving part of me, because, well, that person is mean, it's just easier to remain disappointed and stay away from her.
But it doesn't work. I'm worshipping my own standard, not the forgiveness and acceptance of my weakness that Jesus preaches in the Bible. That's idolatry. That's thinking that I know better than Jesus, the SON of GOD. And I need to repent of my unforgiveness. Of my worship of my own, faulty, unreachable, unattainable standard. And when I confront that side of myself with Bible verses, with Scripture, acknowledging that I don't make it and I can't make it by myself by my own standard by my own efforts, I actually feel impowered to do better. I might cry over my feeling of "wasted time" - it's extremely painful, but that is one precious step in the way to getting better. Part of the process of learning to DO better, rather than trying to force it out of guilt by means of self-loathing. Once I accept that I just fail and it makes me sad, I feel like there is hope because God came to heal the sick, not pass time with the healthy. And grace meets me again, low on the totem pole, broken again over failure and lack of discipline, and helps me make small, homely progress - but progress nonetheless. And I feel thankful that God has taken my mind under captivity, so that my own person cannot berate my own efforts.
When all I wanted to do was clean up my room, God cleaned up my mind at the same time.
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