skull2skull

This week's been a trip. I've felt the circle of cycle of life swirling around me: Julie's sudden death, my own struggles with loneliness again, going to a wedding, and living here with this family. There's deep sadness in my heart for my friend, and it's challenged and reawakened my heart in a weird way. Here is a letter I wrote to some folks in my community about how things have been going for me.

hey cell,

hope things are well. i wanted to share some of my thoughts lately if that's ok.

i've felt pretty disconnected for a while. traveling has been great. seeing friends on my trip has been food for my soul. still, i feel that i had such an urgency to get away from any scent of disappointment/loneliness/depression/sadness that i shut down part of my heart. so my travels were good, but i struggled to really process anything. i wanted to think about this past year, this trip to chi/atl/san, but it never worked. i'd sit. and the paper and pen would sit there with me.

i had a bit of a meltdown on monday. i felt some of the same sadness creeping up on me late that night. and i was afraid. it's the same fear that makes me hold onto moving away to some where far from here. i'm afraid that i'll be fine through summer, but fall and winter will be times of darkness again for me. i prayed that night, that prayer of overwhelming need. the same way i'd pray myself to sleep during those lonely nights. it scared me to discover that my longings still remain here. yet, i'd finally come back into god's presence. god seems to use my struggles to bring me to him.

(some of yall know already...) i found out on tuesday that a friend of mine had died. she was my age (26), and we sent to ucsd together. she was really a beautiful gal who loved god dearly, and her friends as family. she was always on my side, reminding me to dream big because our god is really big. she had just begun life as a missionary in the philippines, something she longed and waited to be for years.

i can't tell you how much i miss her. i've told some folks already that i've been learning a lot through this. i haven't tasted death before, and this seems to make salvation more real, more pressing, and more beautiful.

i'm doing alright. i'm not a wreck (thank god), but i feel like my heart has awakened again. i still am fearful of being lonely (or those feelings), i still don't feel supergreat about any 'decision' of staying or leaving. it feels less relevant. in the greater picture, god can't fail me.

i'm sharing all this, because i've been thinking more about carlos' teaching on sunday. that statement that: we belong to each other. i've been asking myself what that means for me in relation to you, and for you to me. i feel that thinking this way extends beyond our church/cell family... i'm not sure exactly how, but it helps me to see folks better: heart to heart, skull to skull.

thanks for listening. emmanuel!

-ben