I have only 10 days left... "Hearing"

Well, things really aren't getting any less busy, BUT, I have found time to sit down and write a little and and then find time again to blog about the experience...
I usually find myself on days when I don't have work or school going to a prayer that's a little north of me. It's a quiet place and I find that time has it's own flow there.
An hour can feel like ten minutes and ten minutes can feel like an hour... but it's the place that I go to get quiet, to sit, to listen and to write, draw and pray (not particularly in that order). I call it my 'mountain top'.

But today's writing is going to be a little longer, the challenge posed was this, "What sound set your life spinning?"
This question all comes out of the past few challenges of being still, allowing memories and thoughts to be anchored by a physical focus; ie, breathing, the position of your hands, even what you hear... and what you have heard affects you.

So, Natalie Goldberg asks a simple question, when in your life did a sound, that you perceived, rock your whole world at that moment.

This story is one that I consider a changing moment for me and I felt that it is something that I needed to write down, so that it can be shared to you and others and be allowed the opportunity to encourage.

Be blessed!

"Hearing"

This is another story about Kansas City; I had been out of the Onething Internship for about 3-4 months; life at that point was a series of late nights and work.

A typical day would be; wake up at noon, go to work, come back around 6 or 7 at night, hang out with good friends, eat food and play music till about 2 am (activities of the night were determined by how many people were over, which ranged from 2 to 30), then to bed.
This was a fantastic time for me, becuase I got to hang out with all these cool people and got to develop relationships; friendships, sisters and brothers, with these people that I may not have otherwise...

But my relationship with the Father was suffering.

One night, I was chatting online with a friend of mine that really challenged me with, "was I living this christian walk becuase it was what I believed or becuase it was the only thing I knew to be right?"

That really grabbed my heart and I remember laying in my bed just journallying this struggle within me, "God, why do I follow you?"

After about an hour or two I was on my face on the floor and I heard God ask, "Eric, do you want a thunderstorm to prove my love for you?"

I told God no, thinking that it wasn't "righteous" to take God up on his offer, so I answered, "God, your presence is enough."

But God knew what I needed; he saw the wounded heart of his son and knew that he needed more than just an etheral expression of "his presence" to know the love that He (God) had for him, he needed something, real.

No more than the words, "...is enough." had left me lips then I heard a monsterous clap of thunder roll across my room...

I grew up in the plains of Missouri, so I'm pretty used to thunderstorms, but this was something else...

It was deep, piercing through wall, window and mind, it captured your attention and as it rolled by you, you heard it's physical presence make itslef known by the car alarms that were going off outside.

You felt it's vibraitons in your chest, and as my mind, ear and heart heard it, I knew it to be an expression of the heart of the Father towards his, son.

And I wept...

With each casading rythme and beat, a new wave of tears swelled within my eyes as I saw this expression of sound turn into the layers of God's love that he had for me. 

I couldn't move, I could barely breathe, as I allowed the tears to flow and my heart to break open as love flowed to take the place of fear, rejection and the wounds that we carry in our hearts.

Finally, I was able to stand, a few of my friends were sitting in the living room; one of them being a girl that I felt was an older sister to me.

I laugh and smile a little at the thought, becuase she asked me if I had ever felt or had God make something that we could see, hear, taste, smell or feel.  

And I told her what had just happened in that bedroom and that this storm that we all were experiencing was God showing his love for me.

She marveled at that thought for a minute, but as the night went on and the storm contunued to flash and roll with it's thunder, she would radomly, and frequently, hit me in the arm, pretty hard too. And give me a look as to say, "I know that God made this for you and I'm jealous that he did."

But all I could do was smile; becuase I was with and around these that cared for me and I for them, a place that was warm, friendly, light with laughter and a joy in the eyes...

And outside, was a manifestation of love, from a God that cared for me enough to show his heart through something that I loved, a thunderstorm.

Thanks for reading everyone! Here are some pics on a piece that I'm working on in sculpture; the final piece is going to be carved out of stone! :D
The clay model is only about 4 inches high... I'm hoping to find a good piece of stone and carve it out so that it's 6 or 8 inches... we will see!

Have a great night my friends,

-Eric Alan

Great Students

Today I am in Missouri seeing some of my family over spring break. Traveling for 10 hours yesterday and hanging out with my brothers made it so that I wasn't able to blog... but its good to be back and getting back to the writing!

Today is only one writing, it's a bit longer than the others I have shared so far (the limit I gave myself was 20 minutes instead of 10). The chapter is called "Great Students", in it, Natalie Goldberg remarks on how we all remember the great (and bad) teachers in our lives; those that helped shape us, guide us and, well, teach us. But she asks the question, "What about great students that we knew?"
She goes on to say that this writing is looking into negative space, focusing on what you have not noticed, like drawing attention to everything around a tree, except the tree itself.
As she says, "You're focusing not on the teacher but the key element that creates a teacher. No teacher exists without students."

So, here's to all the students that I have encountered in my life and to all the teachers that helped us get there... cheers!

"Great Students"

Great students in my life? That's a bit of a hard one; my mind is racing through a myriad of times spent in a classroom; grade school at a private christian school in Missouri, community college at Moberly and the study partners that I had, especially in history classes.
For me, history was always easy, but for many other people it's a tedious study up there like math is for me.
I remember my first art history class, there was this cute, little, out-going blond girl that mostly didn't have a clue about what was going on in class (nothing against blonds, I am still one if I had my hair ;), but she was fearless enough to ask people around her if they wanted to study together, and I said yes.
Most of the time it was just me and her going over my notes that I had taken in class (I took some seriously detailed notes, including small drawings of the pieces/art that we were studying), she would sit down at her kitchen table, pull out her notebook and we would slowly go over everything that we had covered in class; boiling everything down to a quick outline that can be looked over to help get over those pre-test jitters.
There were several people like that, we would get together at homes or local eateries, like Country Kitchen, and spend hours pouring over pages of notes of names, dates, babies (just kidding), places and pieces.

I remember my biology class and how all my classmates there worked hard to make sure that they got passing grades.
This was most exemplified by these green pieces of paper that we got before we took out biology tests.
Our teacher, handed out these blank "study sheets" that were on green paper, and the deal was, that we could write down as many notes, facts, definitions, etc. we could on those pieces of paper and we could use it for the test as a reference.
You should have seen how small people can write when they are allowed too.
I remember several sheets (my own included) where there wasn't a square inch of that paper that was not taken with some definition, concept, or scientific fact that I felt was need on that test.
I can only imagine the hours that we all spent writing and re-writing our notes so that we could get as much information as possible... fun times!

Other people that I can think of would have to be in art classes.
So many people would come in clueless about what they were to draw, paint, or make with clay.
They would struggle with taking a ball of clay and "centering" it on the wheel (that's when you would take the clay and throw it on a wheel and then apply steady pressure to the clay with your hands to make it so that it wouldn't be wobbling all over the place as you spun the wheel around).
They would start...

Times Up!

Looking forward to see what the topic is for tomorrow! Hope everyone is well and if your on spring break, I especially hope for you that you get some of the much earned rest that you deserve!
Take care everyone

-Eric Alan

PS. Brittany, you can borrow the book when I am done :)