A long time since the last post. First year teaching: fear, anxiety, spiritual weightlifting.

the last post was...August? I think? Which shows you about when I became incredibly busy. First year as a teacher. It's exhausting. It's also scary. Mainly, every weekend, Sunday afternoon, and today, the last day of winter break, there is fear and my stomach feels nauseous. I'm not ready. Have you ever had those dreams where you're giving a presentation and then you realize you're in your underwear? I haven't, but I suspect it's a similar feeling. Feeling naked, feeling unprepared. I wish I had boundless energy and focus and courage and faith, so I could properly handle this job. All I have is patience and love and compassion and caring.

It's a profoundly powerful spiritual experience, if you let it be, just as a romantic relationship can be: these situations force you into uncomfortable places, they force you to look at parts of yourself that are not fully formed, that are wounded, that you try to look away from if you can. But you are forced to look and more than look, to act. It is good, but it is not comfortable. It will get better, I've been assured.

The new year. Endings and beginnings. I feel cold and alone. May I have the strength to do what needs to be done regardless, may I have the faith to trust that God is with me even when I feel this way, that though the path is sometimes painful it is leading me on to my ultimate goal.

May I have the trust and lion-hearted-ness to find joy and laughter no matter the situation.

All life's a game, a play, and we but actors on the stage. Play your part, play it well, but don't get so caught up in it that you are made truly miserable by the drama. An actor enjoys the play, even if their part is a sad one, because they know deep down that it is not who and what they truly are.

This is the meaning of "be in the world, but don't let the world be in you" or "be in the world but not of it." Like a boat used to cross the river, the boat is in the river, but you don't want the river getting into the boat. This is the true meaning of spiritual detachment, and why it is said to lead to great and unshakable peace.