Trust The Spark

“You, Lord, keep my lamp burning;
my God turns my darkness into light.” Psalm 18:28

I’m a woman of words. I obsess over them, mull over them, am transformed by them.

I've been relinquishing burnout this last week. Unclinging myself from an identity of defeat.

I know what I’m moving away from. I have a vocabulary for burnout that I've painstakingly compiled over the last year. But what am I moving toward?

In my life, I've shifted from cynicism to gratitude, from despair to hope. But what lies on the other side of the burnout pendulum?

Productivity? Usefulness? Even the joy that I have been promised doesn't quite seem to be the opposite of burnout.

So I've been hoping for a word. A hint of where to go. How to navigate this process of rebuilding. In a foreign country. Away from (most) friends and family.

But I've been scared to ask. Scared that I won’t get a response.

Yet yesterday, while the pastor spoke about the vision of the church and I easily tuned out his Spanish, I dared to close my eyes and ask.

“Please give me a word.”

I thought maybe “baby steps,” “open,” “willing.”

But those words were mine, not His.

And then out of the silence, out of nothing, out of I don’t know where. The phrase resonated, vibrated, crystallized within me.

Trust the Spark. 

Trust the spark? What does that mean?

And then I heard, remember the spark, Aly? The spark within you that loves and cares and wants more? The part of you that can’t help but fiddle with words and tinker with ideas and come up with goals? The part that feels and flies and aches to do something meaningful?

The part of you that is loving and creative and patient and beautiful?
The part that never gives up?
Remember that, Aly?

That spark is still there.

You have a spark that burnout did not snuff. A small flame that will never go out. That still burns within you.

That spark is Me within you.

Trust the spark.
Grow the spark.
I am in you.
I am here.
I have never left you.

I will turn your darkness into light. I will keep your lamp burning.

Relinquishing Burnout; also, Living Abroad Is Hard

The honeymoon is over. I missed the bus to my new volunteer job this morning. My computer screen is filled with squiggly, wiggly lines and I have to readjust the screen every five seconds just to see what I’ve typed. The internet is down at my house. 

Oh, and did I mention I’m lonely?

I have an overwhelming sense that all of my friends in San Diego have adjusted to life without me. I can picture them all having family dinners and frequenting hipster bars with microbrews and having beach days and laughing so hard they snort and cry while generally enjoying the richness of life together.

All while I stutter through superficial conversations in painstaking Spanish and get my hopes dashed yet again when I find out my new friend will only be in Antigua for two weeks for Spanish school and I will forced to start the befriending all over again.

Pity party of one, please. 

Yes, I’m still enamored with the salsa dancing and rolling r’s and Spanish archways and volcanoes. I still love walking through the park and living within walking distance of the world’s cutest restaurants. I still believe I'm here for a reason. 

But I’m lonely. I’m struggling here.

The last week I’ve been reluctant to blog. Yes, because of the frustration of a faulty computer screen, but also because I haven’t wanted to admit that things aren’t going as I planned.

I’m lonely. I feel purposeless. I feel distant from friends and family, from myself, from God. You would think I would use this free time I have to write, to pray, to be engaged in life, to do all the things I wanted to do but didn’t have time for in San Diego. But now I don’t want to do them anymore.

I’ve been avoiding my sadness. Numbing with salsa dancing and flirting and brushing up on Guatemalan slang and watching a lot of shows on Netflix.

I pictured Guatemala as a springboard for new life, renewed vision and purpose and energy after burnout. But I’m just as tired. Just as resistant to work. Just as lost as to what I should be doing with my life.

And I picture everyone else back in the States with their jobs, their friends, their passions, and their lives, and I start to feel sorry for myself. I know I shouldn’t compare. I know it doesn’t do any good. I know it just breeds more discontent. I know I should practice gratitude instead.  But loneliness and discontent creeps in and I just get caught in the cycle.

I recently committed to volunteering with an organization called Camino Seguro or Safe Passage (which I blogged about here). Camino Seguro is a beacon of hope in the middle of a super rough neighborhood in Guatemala City. For the next couple of months, I’ll be teaching mothers how to read and write and do basic math, so that they can get better jobs, help their kids with their homework, be less vulnerable to being cheated in the market, on the streets, by their neighbors.

In theory, I’m excited about this. Working in women’s literacy in a Spanish speaking country has been my dream for years. And yet, I don’t actually FEEL excited. In the same way that working at Plant With Purpose was meaningful in a way I couldn’t explain, I now feel a sense of meaninglessness that I can’t explain.

I’m still going. I’m still committed. I’m still going to show up (on days that I don't miss the bus).  But I deeply desire a sense of meaning and purpose. I ache for joy. I ache to know I’m doing something redemptive with my time. And yet it still feels empty.

Am I supposed to wait till those feelings stir or just dive in anyway? What if I never feel passionate again? 

These last couple days, I’ve been stuck feeling sorry for myself. But today, I chose to lean in. To look in. To ask myself what’s missing. Where am I clinging too tightly? Where DO I see God moving?

And today, this morning, after missing the bus and having a cry fest at the central park, I heard from God. I haven’t been hearing from him very much lately, mostly on account of not listening very well lately.

But today I heard:

 Aly, RELINQUISH BURNOUT

RELINQUISH EMPTINESS           

Allow ME to FILL you.

Do I even believe he can do this anymore?

Do I even think he’ll show up?

How quickly I forget. He’s asked me to relinquish things before. To let go of my false identity. And he showed up.

A few years back, God asked me to relinquish my anger, to shed my identification with the bitterness boiling inside of me. And he MOVED.  He filled me with a gratitude and joy beyond anything my angry heart could have hoped for.

Another time he told me to relinquish cynicism and he MOVED again. He brought peace and hope and understanding to a situation I had given up on.

How easily I forget.

I’ve come to see burnout as the progression from “I can/I get to” to “I have to” to, eventually after long hours and unrealistic expectations, to a surrender of “I can’t.” And on the heels of “I can’t,” rides “God can’t.” This hopelessness. This despair, has taken root in me, infected my hopes and dreams. My prayer life.

You would think getting me to Guatemala would be enough to renew my faith and hope. But I have a thick, obstinate skull and how quickly I forget. Repetition of “I can’t” drives the darkness down deep. It takes a conscious effort to give Him space, to allow myself to hope, to believe that he can fill me, renew me, heal me. Turn my identity of burnout, of “I can’t” to a testimony of what he CAN do.

I don’t quite know how, but today I will try to take the first baby steps of relinquishing burnout. I will give him space to move. I will say, even if I don’t yet believe it,

Aly, you are not your failure. You are not your loneliness. You are loved. You have gifts and talents that can serve the world. You are creative. You are compassionate. You are learning and growing and living.

And I am comforted because I know God is in those words. His spirit is recreating my heart, renewing purpose, rebuilding faith. He is moving in the very syllables and letters of the love notes I type. He is the Word and the words of love I whisper beneath my breath, write over and over in my journal, carry close to my heart.

Today I may not feel full or passionate, but I can choose to shape my thoughts with love, with grace, with compassion. And maybe that is the first step to relinquishing burnout and making life in another country a little less hard. 

Finding My Way

I've lost that loving feeling. That spark. That passion. 

I've lost my joy and giddiness at work. My creativity.

I live on writing, on creating, on explaining. For years I would literally jump and twirl for joy (just ask my coworkers) when writing a new blog post or putting the finishing touches on a grant proposal at work.

I loved explaining the intricacies of transformational development and desertification. I loved thinking up new ways to share my favorite story ever--the story of rural farmers overcoming poverty and transforming their lives. I loved writing the first couple of grant proposals. I loved improving on the next batch of proposals. I loved crafting reports on the funding we received. I loved following up on those reports the next year.

I loved it all the first four or five times around. I burned out some time between thinking up the 5th and 6th best way to explain what we do to the same funder.

I love the work that Plant With Purpose does, but I no longer love the work that I do.

God has other for plans for me, I know. Exciting plans. Only-God plans for only-God dreams.

But for now, I've lost that loving feeling and I still have 25 more days with Plant With Purpose.

I'm desperate for a spark of hope. I know God WILL restore my joy. I know He's up to something crazy stupid good. But I want to see Him now. I hunger, ache, for a sliver of joy to hold me over. To assure me that I won't always feel this burnout. That my brain won't always feel like mush and that God won't just move at some unforeseen point in the future when He clears a way, but that He can and He will move NOW. That He is present NOW. That His joy is for the taking NOW.

On Tuesday I shared a quote from T.S. Eliot's play, The Rock, that really struck a chord with me. I've been mulling over this phrase in particular:

"Knowledge of words, and ignorance of the Word."

At work, I've lost my words. I can still complete assignments, meet deadlines, operate on auto-pilot. But I've lost the words that flowed so freely, out of love and joy. I wonder, Is this a chance to experience more of The Word?

Can He move? Will He move NOW?

I'm losing hope. Burnout has taught me to identify myself by my own inadequacies. Burnout has forced me to admit that I can't accomplish what I want. Burnout has cornered me into believing that I will never accomplish what I want. That I will never care. Never grow. Never be passionate again. Burnout has pumped poisonous lies into my bloodstream and I'm scared I will never wash clean.

Daniel Taylor wrote, "Freedom is useless if we don't exercise it as characters making choices... We are free to change the stories by which we live. Because we are genuine characters, and not mere puppets, we can choose our defining stories. We can do so because we actively participate in the creation of our stories. We are co-authors as well as characters. Few things are as encouraging as the realization that things can be different and that we can have a role in making them so."

Burnout wants to claim my life, my thoughts, my time, my last 25 days at work. But I believe in change, in growth. I believe I can change; things can look different.

The best analogy I can come up with for my current state is that of a depressed person who has decided to move forward with treatment (medicine and counseling), but who hasn't yet started the treatment yet. I know a break is what I need. A new country, a new job, a new challenge give me hope of healing, but I'm not there yet.

But even now, before the metaphorical drugs kick in, I can take baby steps. I can choose health. I can choose to fight the lies. I can have a role in making things look different. And I can give myself grace when change is slow going.

I am taking an important step. Desperate times call for desperate measures: I'm starting a twelve week program to sober up from my toxic thoughts. More like a twelve-week challenge to foster creative freedom. To bring back that loving feeling.

One of my wonderful coworkers bought me The Artist's Way at Work. I've gone through The Artist's Way before and have been transformed by the weeks of intentional focus on creativity. In creating, I experience God. 

Like the writers of The Artist's Way, I am strong believer that "The Great Creator has gifted us with creativity. Our gift back is our use of it."

Even in this time of burnout, I will fight for my creativity. I will choose to start this program now. I will choose to believe that things can look different. That I can experience His joy now.

If you're a creative, or a blocked creative, or a wannabe creative, I highly recommend The Artist's Way-- either for work or the original. There are a ton of really cool exercises to combat our inner critics, to nurture our dreams, and to enjoy the great gifts our Creator has given us and to learn to use them to bring healing and hope to our world.

Exercise by exercise, page by page, and week by week, I will use my words to glorify The Word. I'm excited to share how God moves, and I will pass along useful tips and assignments to help you in your own creative journey.