Living Inside Out

We had another round of layoffs at work on Wednesday and yesterday I had such a massive headache that I really couldn’t write- please forgive me.  I went to bed early and today I awoke restored and happy because today is a BIG day.  After being away for over a month my parents return home tonight! Hip-Hip Hooray!  I miss their laughter – they are so silly that when at home the house is filled with cheer.  I miss arriving home to their happy hellos, the house is too quiet even Dollar’s welcome is a depressive sigh of relief.  Yet, we survived.  I managed to keep myself and our pets’ alive (smile) which was the big joke that upon their return we would look like starving children from an underdeveloped country.  We still have our curves though inwardly we are starved for their company.  Today, God willing, we reunite the house will once again be full and cheerful. 

Wednesday was a tough day, it was so full of activity because two months ago when a friend invited me to see “A Gentleman’s Guide to Love and Murder” I didn’t realize that it would be on Ash Wednesday.  Thus, my day was so compacted with activity that I didn’t have a moment alone to process things.  Yet, while I watched the most grisly musical a song was sung that really inspired me.  The song, “Inside Out,” has such a beautiful message.  The title pretty much states its subject, if we all lived inside out: “The world would be in awfully good condition.”  In a world where we have learned to put on mask after mask – to think of living honestly - unafraid to reveal ourselves without a need to hide is such a positive message.  When I was first diagnosed with bipolar and started one-on-one sessions with a therapist I never wore make-up to see her because I wanted those sessions to be as honest as possible.  I remembered she asked me once about it and I told her that I was tired of wearing masks and living a double life between who I am and who I thought people needed me to be.  That double life made me feel like the biggest phony.  That at least in that therapy room, for that hour I wanted to be completely me.  “Inside Out” reminded me of how much I love realness and how difficult it can be to find it this world.  It also validated my desire to live without walls and showed me how “if we all could live outside in, there would be fewer who could hurt you.”  Walls might keep people out, but they also keep people from coming in.

When I started following Jesus I was afraid that I would lose myself becoming a stereotypical clone, but He showed me to a greater degree that we all need to live inside out.  He constantly exhorts us to live honestly and pay more attention to our inner being.  His advice to be more like children brings this message of humility, vulnerability and a forgetful mind (that easily forgives) home.  I think that’s why I can’t wait for my parents to return home because they constantly show me inside out living.  With them around it’s easier for me to have a happier more optimistic disposition because they are the most infectious (in a good way) people I know.  God just comes to life through them.