Redemptive Curiosity

I {still} need some alone time with the Lord.

I’ve been learning a lot in my intro to counseling class that meets on Monday nights.  There are a lot of things that make so much sense and stories keep coming to mind of the people in my life and patterns I’ve seen in their lives.  It’s starting to all come together in my head, all of those years of observing and filling things in without even knowing what in the world I was doing.  I had good teachers then, ones that let me be part of their lives and learn along side them.  I’m so glad for the things I learned in high school about what people really look like because otherwise the charts and graphs that I’m learning in school wouldn’t mean squat.

One thing that has intrigued me in this class has been the idea of having a redemptive curiosity about other people’s stories.  Somehow, I need to find a way to step into the lives of those around me so that I can begin to understand what shapes the way they live.  What questions do I ask?  How do I look past the obvious and touch the deep things that they don’t even know are there?  What do I risk to get past the surface?  I don’t know if I will ever figure it out, but I’m willing to give it a try.  

Of course, learning to be curious about other’s stories has forced me to take a look at my own.  Old wounds are resurfacing and I’m once again facing my inadequacies.  That’s all I feel lately.  I’m not big enough, strong enough, smart enough, pretty enough, good enough.  I have great fears and they affect how I relate to the people I love every single day.  I struggle with the fact that I’m not free of baggage.  Shouldn’t I have it figured out already?  Sometimes I just don’t know how to do life.

But, of course, God is still good.  

Of nothing else am I certain.