Built on Sand

There's a parable in the Christian Scriptures. In this parable, a man builds a house on sand. Floods come, and the house, being on a weak foundation, is annihilated. Another man builds a house on solid ground, and when the floods come, his home remains intact.

The point that I, personally, get out of the parable is this: if your faith (whatever "faith" means to you, and whatever/whomever you have faith in) is weak, then it will waiver and stagnate at every obstacle or whim of your emotions. But if it is strong, then you will be secure in your faith, and be able to use that faith to strengthen you in the difficult times.

Sometimes I feel like my "house" - my "faith" - is built on nothing but sand. Not even normal sand, but quicksand, that sucks everything in its path into a bottomless pit. My faith in Deity, my faith in my Druidic practice, and most of all, my faith in myself, seems to wax and wane on every whim of good or bad fortune, every mood swing I may have in a day.

Take recent events for example. Stuck in a dead end job. Inability to obtain a 2nd internship, in spite of interviews, prayers, and aggressive spellwork. Total lack of confidence in myself and cynicism towards my life in general. Faith, mostly in myself, is broken.

 On Tuesday, I went on a two-day long mini-vacation to another beach about two hours away, with a good friend of mine. Most of the day, we spent at a nearby garden and art sculpture attraction, which housed some of the most beautiful gardens and art sculptures I've seen in recent times. It had a small zoo, a butterfly garden, a boat tour (where we saw three alligators and a couple of turtles), and a nice little labyrinth for meditation. It was a beautiful day. The day had its standard little oddities that tend to happen to me - a bird in an aviary crapping on my new shirt I was wearing, somehow getting an earthworm stuck in my sandal and getting the poor thing's guts all over my sandal (of course, my "good" sandals), I think I actually walked into a tree at one point. I began a small meditative walk in the labyrinth. I focused my thoughts, did a bit of a mental chant to banish negative energies, and I started to feel more optimistic and better about things. Faith slowly being restored.

Then, in the middle of my labyrinth walk, I get a phone call from my University's field placement office, to basically tell me to hurry up and get an internship placement because they're running out of agencies with openings. I remind them of the fact that I had recently had two interviews, neither of which had contacted me when they said they would with a final decision of whether or not they were going to invite me to join them as an intern. After I get off the phone with the school, any positive effects from the labyrinth walk now rendered useless, I call the agency I most recently interviewed with, and most wanted to intern with, a program run by the psychiatric unit of a local very high-profile hospital. I left a message inquiring as to a decision, but without much hope. The rest of the day goes well overall, but frustration and anxiety keep me from fully enjoying myself. Faith is once again shattered.

On Wednesday, we had a low-activity day. Slept in, then spent the afternoon on the beach. That evening, we went to a local dinner theater.

In the afternoon, while out on the beach, I checked the time on the phone, and noticed I had two voicemails awaiting me. The first was from a local parasailing company, to reschedule our parasailing appointment for the next day. The second was from the hospital I was attempting to intern with, apologizing for the delay in getting back with me and offering me the internship position. Obviously, I immediately returned the phone call and, after a few minutes of "phone tag", accepted the internship. I felt all (or at least, most) of the stress leave me, a weight lifted off my shoulders. I remembered the spell I performed to try to obtain the internship, and the fact that part of the frustration was the fact that I included as part of the spell a stipulation that the internship come to me by the end of April (to provide enough time to to notify the school and get all the preliminary agency requirements and paperwork done before time to actually start the internship). Upon recognition that I actually made the initial phone call that led to the interview on April 28th, after being given the contact info by a classmate who had also recently gotten an internship at the same hospital, I begin to think that perhaps, spellwork really does always work, even if not in the way or timeframe we expect. After all, I was thinking to already secure the internship by the end of April, but one could say the spell still worked in a way, in that even though the internship itself wasn't secured in that timeframe, the process to obtain it began within the specified timeframe. Faith once again restored.

Thursday, the final day of the mini-vacation, was great. I went parasailing for the first time, and more than likely will not be the last time. This guy took us on a raft, connected to a jet ski, to the actual boat, where we did the parasailing. There were six of us, and it was quite amusing that, while I was the smallest guy on the raft, I was also the only one who did not fall off at some point. In addition, I checked my grades online while checking my summer classes to ensure I ordered the right textbooks. My GPA is now a 3.2, up from a 2.9 at this time last year, effectively ending my academic probation (if I was indeed still on it).

Finally, recently I've been talking to a local girl, an RN who is currently volunteering in Africa, and I believe there may be the possibility of at least a meet-up. Now, since the last ex and I split up in 2007, I have had a bit of a string of "one hit wonders" so to speak.... I average about 1 date every 3-6 months, and none of them have yet led to a second date..... so I'm not quite counting the eggs before they hatch. I'm just on a bit of a feel-good "high" that I haven't felt in a long time, because it's been so long since I've really had a significant level of good happen in my life...... and I really do feel good for once. But I also am a bit saddened, wishing I could just enjoy it all without the nagging feeling of "Okay, so when will the other shoe drop?" and wishing that my faith in myself had been stronger during all the uncertainties.

Successes and Regressions

Well, Lent and the Easter season are over. I consider my Lenten commitments a partial success.

My first goal was to eat vegetarian on Thursdays, as a part of my church's Lenten tradition of fasting in some form on every Thursday from the start of Lent through Maundy Thursday. This was my most successful practice, since I have been eating healthier, only ate meat on one Thursday, and plan to continue the practice of eating fully vegetarian one day a week(typically Mondays) as a spiritual/health practice from here on out (although I haven't tried out anything from my vegetarian cookbook yet).

My  next goal was to drink primarily water. This, I was somewhat successful in. However, due to frequent long drives as part of my internship responsibilities, as well as the long drive home for Easter, I did drink sodas with caffeine, even if in less frequency and quantity as previously.

My final goal was to do more spiritual readings and continue in my spiritual growth. I consider this my least successful component. In fact, it feels like in the last couple of months, I've regressed into some of my old cynicism of my late college years, prior to finding Unitarian-Universalism and Wicca (and subsequently Druidry). I haven't been consistent in meditating or my daily spiritual practices and readings. And I must say I don't like that feeling. Those days were probably some of the days I felt most lost, without purpose. Some people seem to do okay without the belief in a higher power, or the belief that everything has a purpose and works out as it should in the end. I'm not one of those people. I'm stuck in my dead-end, shady job - on a side note, they did finally catch the kid, he somehow made it back to his home state, and the facility is continuing to do its shady damage control. In addition, I have yet to definitively secure an internship for the next school year, in spite of several interviews with organizations, which I thought went well. As a "generic" theist in my conservative Christian days, I struggled with the question of what it meant when "prayers go unanswered", which I believe was a contributing factor in my shift in religious belief. Now, as a panentheist, my perception of deity is different, and when I pray, it isn't with the perception that He/She/It has that kind of control over anything - although I certainly continue to believe in lighting candles and saying prayers as well wishes, if that makes sense. I believe that the Divine exists both within and without all of existence, but as such, I don't believe that the Divine intervenes in the traditionally believed sense. In a similar vein, those on the nature-based spiritual paths must struggle with what to do or think when spells "don't work". Some interpret it as "it's not meant to be". Others, "I wasn't focused enough" or "wrong timing". Or perhaps a combination of both. As I struggle with the amount of unaccomplished goals I have, in spite of the level of hard work, spellwork, prayers, everything, I struggle with the meanings behind it all as well. I find myself anxious and frustrated, above anything. If I can't find a decent internship, I don't know how that will affect my next school year. And I'm running out of ideas of places to interview. I'm just not sure where to go from here.