The Journey of Life

These are some drawings I did for the cafe at my church in Dundee.  The theme was to be "a journey" so I figured I'd go ahead and be ambiguous. =)

(The 3rd scanned better than the other two... but I no longer own them, so can't fix this. Sorry!)

I guess the theme is pretty self explanatory.  I may venture to scribe my thoughts down about them at some point when I have more time and don't have to feel guilty about being unfaithful to studying.
Enjoy =) 

 And now that I have more time than I know what to do with, some musings:


Childhood:
Pure innocence and curiosity; an endearingly simple outlook on life, time and love; a sweet naivety to danger; A longing to explore all that the world holds, and to discover how the most fun can be made of it.

Worms on fingers. Ladybirds on arms. Captured moths in triumphantly clasped hands. Dandelions blown. Daisy-chains made. Ocean waves jumped. Shorelines escaped. Sand running through fingers and toes. Forests explored. Fields ran. Hills tumbled. Trees climbed. Bubbles burst. Lips taste of soap. Bright painted hands and feet. Muddy legs. Holes in clothes. A scratched knee. A black eye. A bumped head. Cake mixture licked from "empty" bowls. Ice-cream left on the tip of your nose. Adventures found in everything. Make-believe, anyone or anything was who you could be. Dens in bushes, or hide-outs under blankets and books. Indiscriminate trust. A million hands to hold. Bedtime stories. A goodnight kiss. The warmth of an embrace, given so easily.

I miss those days, when everything was beautiful. A simple belief in all things good. Still, though, I take comfort in the knowledge that I will always be God's child.
  
Everything in between:
Time is passing...
                  Live
                         Laugh
                                    Love
                                            Learn
                         Pray
                                   Discover
                                            Wonder
                                                      Yearn
                                   Be
                                            Do
                                                      Go
                                                                See
                                           Hope
                                        Trust
                                               Obey
                                                   Believe

This is the time that is shaping me. My decisions and choices, even the ones I don't fully understand, are what will lead me to where I will eventually be. My choice, my biggest decision and desire, is to let God lead me there. Let Him be the centre of my life and adventures. Let Him be the purpose of my wonder and yearning. I pray that I will take every good chance given to me, stepping out faithfully in to the unknown.

Senescence:
Time is a funny thing; we rarely deem it to be right.
Days move too quickly
They don't move at all
The nights are too long
The daytime is fleeting
"It seems like forever..."
"It seems like just yesterday..."
"It seems like I've known you my whole life."
"I wish we'd had more time."

I remember in primary school, my teacher once asked our class to draw timelines of our lives. Mine seemed so empty then, so insignificant. I seem to remember that the most exciting point of my life that I could recall in that moment was 'that one time I got a bead stuck up my nose'... Tragic. I was upset with my timeline, dissatisfied with my lack of 'exciting' experiences. If only I had realised then all of the wonderful things I'd done; all of the love that had been given to me; all of the incredible people in my life who were changing me, and I them; all of the childhood memories that I then took for granted; all of the smiles exchanged; all of the laughter shared; all of the tears cried; all of the things that I never dreamed I would have remembered, seemingly transient words and moments that are now locked in my memory.

Though even through the nostalgia, it seems if I were to draw my timeline now, i would again be dissatisfied, though not for lack of excitement, but for its inability to express quite how unique my life has been. 

There are so many details that will never escape the deep reaches of my mind. Vague secrets that I may never think to share. Thoughts and memories that could never be expressed in words or even art. A suitcase full of forgotten photographs; sepia secrets. History hidden in cobwebs and darkness. One day, I'll forget them too. They'll become nothing more than dust.

The thing is,  the end will only be the beginning of something far more beautiful. A gateway to grand adventures. I'll be new, reborn in the full array of glorious colour I was first intended to be painted in, unblemished and unbroken. Free to fly.

Sunrise

A view from my window very early one morning last year. 
When days are for dreaming,
And the nights are alive.
We can fall asleep at sunrise to the lullaby of the birds.

The Art of Losing Myself

Do you ever have that feeling where you just want to scream? Not at anything, or anyone, or about anything, but just to escape normality? Sometimes I want to run. Not away, or to any specific destination, but just to feel free. Sometimes I want to jump, to freefall and have nothing but trust that someone will catch me. I have a deep desire for freedom, for adventure, but there always seems to be something stopping me. Prior commitments, expected priorities... or even sometimes myself, my own insecurities and fears.

Past hurt leads to a paranoid present and a fear of the future.
I suffer quietly. Suppress feelings, just as the world tells me to. I fight dreams, forget desires, and keep emotions to myself. When something repeatedly goes wrong, it is so easy to give up, to disregard what you know you want and need to do, so as not to be hurt again. When problems arise, it is so easy to play naive, to make-believe, to choose to ignore something in the simple hope that it will conveniently disappear.

But this is not how I have been called to live my life. I am challenged to face my problems head on in the strength of God. Challenged to fight my fears, and pray that my thoughts will be pure, my desires, God-given. Living a passive existence does not glorify God in the entirety that he deserves. I have given my life entirely to God, and strive to live as he intended me to, with Jesus as my example. A love giver, a joy bringer, a peace deliverer.


And the art of it all is losing myself. Surrendering everything. Becoming vulnerable and helpless. Relying entirely on Him.


The beautiful simplicity of Christ's Love has set me free.

First Post

I seem to find it so much easier to arrange my thoughts as I write them down. Seeing them living in the familiar shapes of letters on a page, rather than the fleeting flashes of lost thoughts and past conversations that dance through my mind. Hidden glimpses of forgotten dreams. They escape every time I try to grasp them, like trying to catch tiny moths in a meadow... like catching butterflies.

Yet butterflies live to be free, to tumble through the summer air, peaceful yet so alive. This is how I wish my thoughts to be. To be free. To be alive.

And so I write them on this page, rearranging a muddled mind. Catching butterflies and setting them free.