I went totally brain dead for a few weeks prior to the end of my last job. wasn't proud about the decline in spiritual life either -- to the point that even reading Mockingbird articles has became difficult. :SSSSS rather than blaming it on external factors I think I really need to have a good think about how to look after myself better in a toxic world. Such things unfortunately are often more easily said than done, and I am probably clueless how to even make a start.
http://www.mbird.com/2016/02/forgive-yourself-or-die-trying/
Sentiments from this terribly sad story i could identify with in many ways. :S It interestingly reminded me of another old friend. Whenever Agur from proverbs 30 opens his mouth I can usually hear myself talking:
Proverbs 30:7-9
do not refuse me before I die:
Keep falsehood and lies far from me;
give me neither poverty nor riches,
but give me only my daily bread.
Otherwise, I may have too much and disown you
and say, ‘Who is the Lord?’
Or I may become poor and steal,
and so dishonor the name of my God.
there is a well known Proverbs 31 Ministry with a somewhat feminist undertone that pops up now an then in my newsfeed. not only I find Proverbs 31 rather grandiose...lately the more I looked at it in its entirety... the more i think it is reflective of all kinds of unresolved Oedipus complex issues... XD (well... interested parties are long dead and likely won't be offended by me saying that I hope...)
alternatively i can be more politically correct and say that people's callings are just very different...XD and if ever God permits... i hope to be able to start a Proverbs 30 ministry one day and help like minded neurotics to survive and thrive in this toxic grandiose world...
Therefore after this many years... I am still envious of very non-grandiose Agur... whoever he was... who opened his prayer grumbling about how worn out he was, and admitted so frankly of his generalised acopia, who wanted things to be neither good or bad but falling into a very narrow range of his neurotic thresholds...
and approached God with no guilt and shame in his fulminant neuroticism.
as God was likely abdundant and unrestrained in His blessings of both riches and poverty, poor Agur probably never managed to stay low-key middle class as he so wished.
But that's okay, he and his neurotic ranting made it to Proverbs, and that to me, speaks of much grace, especially in difficult times.
