This song continues with the theme from Monday’s post, urging us to do more than just go through the motions…

Artist: Matthew West

Song Title: The Motions

(You can listen to the song and read more about it at the title link above.)

Lyrics:

This might hurt, it’s not safe,
But I know that I’ve gotta make a change.
I don’t care if I break,
At least I’ll be feeling something.
‘Cause just okay is not enough,
Help me fight through the nothingness of life.

I don’t wanna go through the motions.
I don’t wanna go one more day
without Your all consuming passion inside of me.
I don’t wanna spend my whole life asking,
“What if I had given everything,
instead of going through the motions?”

No regrets, not this time,
I’m gonna let my heart defeat my mind.
Let Your love make me whole,
I think I’m finally feeling something.
‘Cause just okay is not enough,
Help me fight through the nothingness of this life.

‘Cause I don’t wanna go through the motions.
I don’t wanna go one more day
without Your all consuming passion inside of me.
I don’t wanna spend my whole life asking,
“What if I had given everything,
instead of going through the motions?”

Wow - so much on my mind! Lots of significant, meaningful things going on right now…

* This past weekend marked the beginning of my last semester of MBA school.

* This past Friday, I met up with friends to participate in Relay for Life in memory of Julie.

* This upcoming Friday, I will be graduating!! I can’t wait to see my family!

(Yeah, I know it’s confusing… we technically still have a summer semester to complete, but they wanted our class to be able to participate in the big UT graduation festivities in Austin, so we are “walking” before we are officially finished.)

* Plus, we have another important family event this Saturday… More about that soon!

I know it sounds cliche, but I really am trying to live in the moment and soak up the goodness of all these moments. In the course of reading things online last week, I stumbled upon something very inspirational to me. It seemed to speak to where I am right now — wanting to do more than just go through the motions of life.

I will do more than belong. I will participate.

A continuation on the theme of waiting from last week’s Worship Wednesday post…

One weekend last fall at church, Shauna Niequist and her husband were guests at our church. They helped lead the service. At one point, Shauna read from her book titled Cold Tangerines. I was so touched by the way her reading urged us all to celebrate the ordinary moments of life. It was really beautiful! So, afterwards, I proceeded to purchase and read her book. Later, I even purchased it for some of my girlfriends for Christmas. It’s a really simple read. I highly encourage you all to check it out.

To whet your appetite, here is an excerpt that I am particularly fond of… It’s lengthy, but worth the read. This happens to be the passage she read during our church service. (Note - I’m assuming it’s okay for me to post here, as this excerpt is published in its entirety here on her website.)

“On Waiting”
by Shauna Niequist

I have always, essentially, been waiting. Waiting to become something else, waiting to be that person I always thought I was on the verge of becoming, waiting for that life I thought I would have. In my head, I was always one step away. In high school, I was biding my time until I could become the college version of myself, the one my mind could see so clearly. In college, the post-college “adult” person was always looming in front of me, smarter, stronger, more organized. Then the married person, then the person I’d become when we have kids. For twenty years, literally, I have waited to become the thin version of myself, because that’s when life will really begin.

And through all that waiting, here I am. My life is passing, day by day, and I am waiting for it to start. I am waiting for that time, that person, that event when my life will finally begin.

I love movies about “The Big Moment” — the game or the performance or the wedding day or the record deal, the stories that split time with that key event, and everything is reframed, before it and after it, because it has changed everything. I have always wanted this movie-worthy event, something that will change everything and grab me out of this waiting game into the whirlwind in front of me. I cry and cry at these movies, because I am still waiting for my own big moment. I had visions of life as an adventure, a thing to be celebrated and experienced, but all I was doing was going to work and coming home, and that wasn’t what it looked like in the movies.

John Lennon once said, “Life is what happens when you’re busy making other plans.” For me, life is what was happening while I was busy waiting for my big moment. I was ready for it and believed that the rest of my life would fade into the background, and that my big moment would carry me through life like a lifeboat. The Big Moment, unfortunately, is an urban myth. Some people have them, in a sense, when they win the Heisman or become the next American Idol. But even that football player or that singer is living a life made up of more than that one moment. Life is a collection of a million, billion moments, tiny little moments and choices, like a handful of luminous, glowing pearls. And strung together, built upon one another, lined up through the days and the years, they make a life, a person. It takes so much time, and so much work, and those beads and moments are so small, and so much less fabulous and dramatic than the movies.

But this is what I’m finding, in glimpses and flashes: this is it. This is it, in the best possible way. That thing I’m waiting for, that adventure, that movie-score-worthy experience unfolding gracefully. This is it. Normal, daily life ticking by on our streets and sidewalks, in our houses and apartments, in our beds and at our dinner tables, in our dreams and prayers and fights and secrets. This pedestrian life is the most precious thing any of us will ever experience.

I believe that this way of living, this focus on the present, the daily, the tangible, this intense concentration not on the news headlines but on the flowers growing in your own garden, the children growing in your own home, this way of living has the potential to open up the heavens, to yield a glittering handful of diamonds where a second ago there was coal. This way of living and noticing and building and crafting can crack through the movie sets and soundtracks that keep us waiting for our own life stories to begin, and set us free to observe the lives we have been creating all along without even realizing it.

I don’t want to wait anymore. I choose to believe that there is nothing more sacred or profound than this day. I choose to believe that there may be a thousand big moments embedded in this day, waiting to be discovered like tiny shards of gold. The big moments are the daily, tiny moments of courage and forgiveness and hope that we grab on to and extend to one another. That’s the drama of life, swirling all around us, and generally I don’t even see it, because I’m too busy waiting to become whatever it is I think I am about to become. The big moments are in every hour, every conversation, every meal, every meeting.

The Heisman Trophy winner knows this. He knows that his big moment was not when they gave him the trophy. It was the thousand times he went to practice instead of going back to bed. It was the miles run on rainy days, the healthy meals when a burger sounded like heaven. That big moment represented and rested on a foundation of moments that had come before it.

I believe that if we cultivate a true attention, a deep ability to see what has been there all along, we will find worlds within us and between us, dreams and stories and memories spilling over. The nuances and shades and secrets and intimations of love and friendship and marriage and parenting are action-packed and multicolored, if you know where to look.

Today is your big moment. Moments, really. The life you’ve been waiting for is happening all around you. The scene unfolding right outside your window is worth more than the most beautiful painting, and the crackers and peanut butter that you’re having for lunch on the coffee table are as profound, in their own way, as the Last Supper. This is it. This is life in all its glory, swirling and unfolding around us, disguised as pedantic, pedestrian non-events. But pull off the mask and you will find your life, waiting to be made, chosen, woven, crafted.

Your life, right now, today, is exploding with energy and power and detail and dimension, better than the best movie you have ever seen. You and your family and your friends and your house and your dinner table and your garage have all the makings of a life of epic proportions, a story for the ages. Because they all are. Every life is.

You have stories worth telling, memories worth remembering, dreams worth working toward, a body worth feeding, a soul worth tending, and beyond that, the God of the universe dwells within you, the true culmination of super and natural.

You are more than dust and bones.

You are spirit and power and image of God.

And you have been given Today.

Really loving this one lately — very moving and inspiring…

Artist: John Waller

Song Title: “While I’m Waiting”

From the soundtrack to the movie Fireproof. You can watch / listen to a video of the song here on his website.

Lyrics: (bold emphasis is mine)

I’m waiting,
I’m waiting on You, Lord.
And I am hopeful.
I’m waiting on You, Lord
Though it is painful
But patiently, I will wait.

I will move ahead, bold and confident,
Taking every step in obedience.
While I’m waiting
I will serve You.
While I’m waiting
I will worship.
While I’m waiting
I will not faint.
I’ll be running the race
Even while I wait.

I’m waiting,
I’m waiting on You, Lord.
And I am peaceful.
I’m waiting on You, Lord
Though it’s not easy.
But faithfully, I will wait.
Yes, I will wait…

I will serve You while I’m waiting,
I will worship while I’m waiting,
I will serve You while I’m waiting,
I will worship while I’m waiting,
I will serve you while I’m waiting,
I will worship while I’m waiting on You, Lord.

(on my 32nd birthday last week)

I came across this ultra simple and succinct quote last week from Vietnamese philosopher Thich Nhat Hanh. (I remember learning a little about him when I was in Vietnam last year!) For several reasons, it spoke to me - right where I am right now. I hope you enjoy. Happy Monday!

“Smile, breathe, and go slowly.”